A/N-I'm SO GLAD that people want to read this, thank you so much for the warm reception. My mind is completely looping on this story, it's very persistent, so I'm really enjoying sharing it with you all. Update for "Preservation" will be up soon. Thanks to all who alerted/favorited the story, and to all who reviewed: IHeartHouseCuddy, Reader, Bounce, Jane Q. Doe, Alex, Abby, HuddyGirl, lenasti16, Boo's House, jaybe61, TheHouseWitch, OldSFfan, JLCH, LapizSilkwood, LoveMyHouse, newdayz, BJAllen815, gemdevisine, ClareBear14, Suzieqlondon, dmarchl21, housebound, givemekevinbacon, Little Greg and Mon Fogel.

Thank you so much to all who wished us well during the storm. The house didn't blow away!

All Disclaimers apply.

-The NICU-

House watched from the other side of the glass as Cuddy spoke to the head nurse in the NICU. The conversation was curt but professional, from what he could tell, since he couldn't actually hear. Nurse Roberts didn't seem to appreciate whatever Cuddy was questioning while the nurse tended to the baby in her charge. The child was small, weak looking, but likely only a week or two premature, certainly not in any immediate distress. House guessed the child was there for observation after a C-section, or perhaps just there under the heat lamp after an early birth. The type of case where a NICU nurse didn't have to worry too much about her patient's needs.

The head nurse diapered the child quickly, with the swift efficiency of a woman who had diapered hundreds, if not thousands, of babies in the past, so unlike the cautious, gentle care the child would soon receive from his parents. The more serious cases were in the room behind them, which was filled with monitors, wires and babies who were very premature or quite ill. The nurse looked as if she was about to mount an argument to whatever it was that Cuddy was saying, while the dean gestured for two interns who stood nearby to join in the conversation. Just when the group was all standing together, there was an emergency behind them. The nurse hurriedly put the baby down on the table under the warming lamp and herded the students to the emergency so they could learn through experience.

Cuddy stood there, waiting, looking down at her clipboard and trying to ignore the increasing whining of the child only two feet away from her. She looked as if she was growing impatient, looking between her papers and the area where the staff were all working. House saw her sigh, tilt her head to one side, and look at the crying infant. She let the clipboard hang loosely at her side between her bent fingers and her hip, and thought. She tucked the clipboard under her arm, washed her hands, and returned to the child. Reaching one hand up, slowly, hesitantly, she placed her hand over the baby's torso comfortingly, but the child continued to cry. Little fists twisted and legs kicked with displeasure at his lonely spot on the table. It was amazing that a child so young could mount such an angry and ardent argument.

She looked around again, likely because she hoped that someone, anyone, would come in and scoop the child up to offer him comfort. Resigned that no one was coming to her aid, she placed the clipboard down on the supply table next to the table where the baby was waiting, and took a blanket. She lifted the child up onto her shoulder while she spread the blanket open on the table, and he stopped crying. Cuddy's chest filled with air that she blew out slowly, pleased that the crying had ceased. She put the baby in the middle of the blanket on the table, and he immediately began to cry again. Wrapping him up in the blanket, she brought him cautiously closer until he was settled tightly next to her body, supported by one arm.

Cuddy looked down at the child in her arms and her brow furrowed, House could feel the tension from her. She did not want to hold that baby. Picking up her clipboard to shift her attention away from the boy, she put a stoic, professional look on her face, and looked over her work, remaining coolly disengaged, although unable to repress the almost instinctive sway back and forth that her body adopted to ease the child's discomfort. She had succeeded; she was completely ignoring the drive to nurture that she often felt in such situations.

House was impressed as he watched, seeing her ability to disconnect, to disassociate from the unpleasant feelings and continue on with her work, all while he could see the underlying ache. She was winning her battle, will defeating nature, resolve besting instinct, outright determination crushing want. He watched Cuddy systematically extinguish her maternal stirrings. Her jaw set confidently and her resolve seemed impenetrable.

Then with one, tiny, innate reaction from a six pound, hours-old infant, her strength broke.

When the child brushed against her warm body, he turned, rooting hungrily toward her breast, mouth wide open, fists and legs jerking with need. The determination melted slowly from Cuddy's face, the pain of her own broken dreams evident in her expression. The clipboard clattered to the ground, the few papers that weren't fastened, fluttering more casually to the ground. She wrapped her free arm around the baby, both wanting to coddle and comfort the child, and move him away from her as her entire body yearned for a connection to a child of her own. Her mind flashed to needful fantasies, allowing her imagination to tinker with the idea of what it would be like to hold her own child in her arms. Her ache echoed resoundingly through her entire body when the intern rushed back in the room.

"Dr. Cuddy," the intern practically shouted, "I'm so sorry you got stuck in here doing this."

The awkward young man practically pulled the baby from her, and House could see the battle, the moment where part of her wanted to hold the baby and refuse to let go, and part of her wanted to get as far away from the child as she could. The sensible part, of course, won out, and she surrendered control of the squirming infant to the intern, and almost ran from the room. Her sadness melded with frustration when she almost ran directly into the chest of House, who looked at her with a calmly perplexed expression. "Get out of my way," she said angrily, "There's an emergency."

"In a hospital? No way," he joked.

She scowled up at him, her eyes just barely red, but her lip quivering slightly, "I have a job that I actually do. Get out of my way…so that I can do it."

"What emergency? You didn't get a page or a call. No one came to get you."

She shook her head with irritation as she moved persistently past him. "I just wanted to know why?" he asked as he followed her down the hall.

She flung her arms at her side. "Can we do this later, House?" she asked, but the question was largely rhetorical, since she was already disappearing down the hall.

She was in her office after gaining her composure, pleased that she didn't allow her tough administrative façade to crack while walking through the halls of her hospital. Her computer was on, she was going for email, knowing there must be something in there that could make her angry, a lawsuit, HR complaint, something else to focus her energy on so her mind was not left to wander. Almost expectedly, she heard her assistant yelling at someone, and then her door was open. There he was, as always. She raised her hand to stop his progress toward her, "I'm asking you, if you have…any professional courtesy, the most minute modicum of respect for me…do not push this right now."

He squinted, half of his mouth twisting with thought, and he turned back to her, extending his hand to produce the clipboard that she left on the floor of the NICU.

Her defenses dropped as she pushed her chair back from her desk, got up, and walked swiftly over, taking the clipboard from his hand, and offering an apologetically sheepish, "thanks," before returning to her desk.

He walked closer, studying her, and deciding to ask his question before she became too angry. "I was wondering why you were giving me next week off."

She almost sighed at the nature of the question, "Are you really going to complain about time off work?"

"No. I'm not complaining. I want to know why."

She tapped her desk testily with one finger. "There's no point in dragging you to a conference in the days before you leave, your schedule was already cleared because of the conference and I…" her face changed. "I want you to have some time to enjoy things in case the procedure goes wrong. Because if it does…I'll really have something to feel guilty about."

He stared, clearly stunned by what she said, and the forthrightness with which she said it. "I'm going willingly. Most…really worthy endeavors…come with huge payouts…and huge risks."

She rubbed her forehead, clearly worried.

"Look, if you don't want me to go…" he began.

"I want you to go…if it's what you want."

"Cuddy…at this point…death is probably better than constant pain."

Her eyes softened with sadness. "I hope it doesn't come to that."

"I did a lot of research this week. Similar trials have yet to lose a patient, unless the person was pretty much dead already."

"It's amazing how you can talk about it like it doesn't impact you personally," she laughed sadly.

She was looking at him, engaged in the conversation. Then he said, gently, "A high compliment…from a woman so adept at disassociation and…a master of making personal things…not personal."

Her eyes tightened for a minute and she made a popping sound with her lips, waving her fingers in a 'stop' motion and symbolically breaking the personal moment between them. She turned to her computer, adopting her board room voice, "I don't care. Take the week off…work every waking hour and sleep in your chair. It's up to you."

"OK," he said, accepting the cooling of the atmosphere, and turning to leave. "Making things less personal…may be good or bad…but it sure helps to get you through. I'm not judging you for it…I just get it."

Cuddy stomped through the parking lot to her car. It was almost eight that night, and she knew that, on that particular day, she did every last piece of work that she could before heading home. She heard the blip of her car as the locks were released. Opening the door, she tossed her attaché case across into the passenger seat and jerked when she heard a responding, "Ow," and realized that the case didn't go as far into the vehicle as it should have.

She didn't even look over, she knew. "What if I was a mugger? Or a sex fiend?"

"You are a sex fiend," she countered, feeling his grinning answer. "It's a shame that I'm not really all that surprised. I'd just love to know how you got in here."

"I've done way more amazing things than breaking into your car."

She shrugged in agreement.

"Need a ride," he stated nonchalantly.

"Isn't that your motorcycle?" she said, pointing.

"Don't like riding in the rain."

She looked out her windshield and up toward the sky. "You love riding in the rain. And it's not raining."

"It will."

She laughed. "What do you want?"

"A ride"

She started up her car, "Fine. A ride."

He made her stop for food, he had already called in an order. She sat in her car, thumping her steering wheel and realizing that sitting in the dark, being irritated with House, was better than sitting in her own home, and realizing when she looked at her watch that likely, within a half an hour, she would be sitting in her living room. Alone.

He got back in the car and she drove in silence to his apartment. "OK," she said when she pulled up, "I'll see ya."

"When do you leave for that conference?" he asked, making no move to leave her car.

"Two days"

He nodded. "Come on," he said with expectation.

"What?"

"Aren't you coming? You don't, seriously think I can eat this all on my own?"

"I'm going home. I'm tired."

"No you are not," he accused directly.

"I am."

"So…if something goes wrong with this whole experimental deal…and I die…you'll be sitting at my funeral saying to yourself, 'why didn't I at least have one damn dinner with the guy, that I didn't even have to pay for?'"

"You didn't steal money from my wallet?"

"Of course not. That's not how we treat our friends," he said, as if talking to a child.

Cuddy scoffed, "You took the money from Wilson, didn't you?"

"I need to come up with some new tricks if I'm that predictable."

Cuddy actually laughed aloud before she remembered that most of her didn't feel much like laughing.

"Come on, Cuddy," he stated, not loudly, but demandingly.

"I really should be…" Cuddy began, looking around out the window, her eyes settling on the window of his apartment. "You really…want to eat dinner with me? You and Wilson fighting or something?"

"It's selfish. I'm concerned your ass is losing fatness."

She thought for a moment, seeming to acknowledge in one part that it was a mistake, but opening her door anyway.

She stood nervously behind him while he unlocked the door. He opened it, gesturing her inside with a flourish and noticing the look. "Is it that painful? The thought of eating with me?"

"Look," she said, leaning over the sofa and dropping the food on the seat while he stared blatantly at her butt. "I don't want to talk about my feeling guilty, or trials, or-"

That was the last word she successfully formed. The remaining words were muffled mumbles, because when she turned, House was directly behind her, capturing her face in his hands and her lips with his. His body pressed her backward against the sofa until her lower half ran into the furniture. Initially, her hands were out to the side in surprise and perhaps surrender. Her nearly numb body woke in a frenzy, but there was no denying the eager response of her mouth. She was willingly, urgently, accepting his kiss, and devouring him in return. Her hands, which had been off to the side, moved to his waist, gripping at his shirt to pull him closer.

She could feel, she could actually sense, his response to her every movement: the twitches in his body when she hoisted up so she was almost sitting on the back of the sofa, her one leg slipping seductively behind his, the slight press of his pelvis in response to her movement in kind, the quiver in his body when she groaned her assent.

But much to her disappointment, he pulled away, the hungry attention of his mouth shifting to smaller pecks of his lips, and ending as he ran his thumb across her full, red, lower lip. "I was…thinking about the other day. In your kitchen. I thought maybe I'd just address that now and get it out of the way."

"You thought that would…fix the problem?"

"Yea," he said as they panted against each others lips.

Their hands were both still moving, dragging luxuriously across backs, sides and hips, and he didn't hide his slight grin when his hands slid down to her full ass. "You hungry?" he asked.

And then he stepped away, grabbing the handles of the paper bags that contained their food and walking to the kitchen. She slid down from the sofa, confused, and stunned, knowing that, if he had wanted to, she would have willingly fucked him before they were four feet into his apartment. She adjusted her hair, her mind trying to decide if he just wanted to kiss her, or if he wanted to prove to them both that she wanted him. She became suspicious, her mind expecting the worst, that maybe he was just toying with her, he just wanted to prove how much she wanted him under her calm, repressed exterior. And she did want him.

He came out of the kitchen, first with plates, and then with glasses full of wine that she didn't even know that he would have. And dinner was pleasant, far more pleasant than she had expected. He told her about the Petrified Forest in China, and how the pyramids of Egypt mirrored muted and morphed reflections of the sun's colors when it set that were imperfect reflections that became more beautiful because of their differences from the original.

He was strangely without guard, talking about things that were impersonal in deeply personal ways. So she shared with him moments of childhood, ones that he'd never suspect, of her and Julia playing a prank on their mother that was beyond brilliantly mischievous. He smiled his admiration for her cleverness as a girl, and her careful conscription of Julia as an ally in her dastardly plan. He actually laughed so that she could hear it, a true laugh, and a sound that she immediately committed to memory because she hadn't heard it before, and doubted she'd ever hear again.

The dinner was satisfying, disarmingly so, and while she enjoyed the glass of wine, she was surprised when he brought her a bottle of water when he brought the bottle of wine to refill their glasses. It didn't seem he was trying to encourage intoxication. There was nothing manipulative or sneaky about him during that dinner, and she found herself, not suspecting that she was seeing a different side of him, but rather that she was seeing him more fully. She wanted to capture that moment, to bottle it to save, to remind him of when they were fighting, or to remind her of when she thought that life had few pleasant moments beyond the taste of professional victory.

After they ate, she scooped up their plates, laughing at the last thing he had said while she walked to his kitchen. When she turned, he was standing in the doorway. "It wasn't his fault," House said sincerely.

"Whose?"

"The baby. In the NICU."

She was immediately flustered. "What…wasn't his fault?"

"It's just instinct," he said, his finger tracing lines in the trim around the archway separating the two rooms. "A baby, found something warm and soft…that held the possibility of providing him both with what he wanted, and with what he needed…right there against him, brushing his cheek. To him, it was a promise of a full belly…and perhaps a comforting touch. A safe place to find something that feels good…and satisfies needs and wants and instincts alike."

"I don't know what you're talking about," she said, suddenly flustered while she tried to finish putting the dishes and utensils somewhere acceptable so she could flee the discussion.

"Yes, you do," he said, in a persistent but easy way. "You know exactly what I mean. I'm just saying that…I don't fault him for it. After all, those instincts are supposed to fade after a few months…but if you put them next to my face…"

She folded her arms, giving up her search for a trashcan to toss the dirty napkins in that were crumpled on top of the plates, and just standing still, hoping the moment that felt so perfect a minute ago could somehow return. House walked closer, rounding the tall, block table to the wall she was standing next to. He was near her, far too near again, because now he was in her mind, in her thoughts, and remained achingly absent from her body.

If she would have looked at him, she could have seen that he didn't like the shift in her attitude, he didn't actually want to hurt her, but he did want the truth, for himself as much as her. "I shouldn't have stayed," she said, trying to look unaffected while he approached her.

She brushed her sleeve nervously, uncomfortable being in his apartment, with her guard down, and her feelings so exposed. When he got near, she lashed out, hoping to keep him a distance from her, both emotionally and physically, "This is why I'm here? So you can dissect me? So you can…hurt me?"

He shook his head, accepting the anger that followed.

"Are you gonna shut me up? Kiss me again? Try to see if you can …make me want you so that you can push me away?"

He shook his head, walking closer anyway, his legs feeling heavier simply from the thick tension in the air. "I don't want to dissect you. I want to understand you. I don't want you to shut up. I want you to tell me what you're thinking. And I definitely don't want to hurt you."

He was standing over her, watching her trying to suppress the urge to crawl out of her own skin and get away from the horribly uncomfortable grip that her momentary reality had on her. "It hurt. Didn't it?" he asked barely above a whisper as his hand reached out to her rib, his thumb resting along the side of her breast.

"What are you talking about?" she asked angrily, her voice wavering.

"You know what I'm talking about," he nodded once.

"What do you want? You want me to cry…to look…weak…frail?"

"Pain doesn't make you weak."

"It will to you. You have no idea about how I feel."

"Maybe not. You held that baby and it reminded of you of something you're missing. Like someone cut a big fucking chunk right out of you. And you want to fill that…space…that hollow, empty ache…with anything so that you don't feel it anymore."

She was breathing heavily, tension becoming an entity within the room, pounding through the space between them, her eyes threatening to scowl, but not quite succeeding. She tried to say something, had several false starts, and then she nodded. He almost couldn't see it, it was so slight. But she looked up at him, slightly less concerned with his motivations.

"So…in a paraphrase of your words…you think I'm just some…heartless bastard…someone who can see you in such pain and not feel an ounce of empathy or compassion?"

"It's not the same thing," she said bravely.

"It is. How is it different?"

"The nerve endings in your leg, the destruction of muscle…" she began in clinical, practiced words.

"No," he shook his head. "Don't do that. We just established a common ground. The empty space, the missing…the desire to make that…feeling…go away. For us, these feelings are constant fact. Our needs are…chronically unrequited."

"Why are you doing this?" she asked nervously.

"I told you. I want to understand."

"We have been…the way are…for a long time now. Why now?"

"Because you tried to help. You tried to stop the pain. Not from guilt, or obligation…but because you saw it…it made you feel something. I don't get it. I'm not…a friend, if anything, you see me as an enemy, and you ignored that. I don't understand why, and furthermore, I don't understand why…I like it. I shouldn't like it…I should hate it," he stated.

"There's nothing to understand. I told you. I don't want you to hurt."

"I…actually believe you. When I saw you in the NICU…I saw someone else…feeling what I feel…every day."

It was then that she noticed that his hand was still along her side, his thumb stroking gently, his fingers pressed firmly against her side in a way that showed her that he was there. "So now I want to fix it."

"I don't want payment. You don't owe me anything, and I'm not…holding this over your head," she answered stiffly.

"I know. If you set me up with that study to gain leverage…to manipulate me, I wouldn't go. And you know I'm just that stubborn. It just makes me…think. I don't want you to feel that way either."

She looked away and then looked back at him. Her eyes met him, the longing and sadness that she felt was there, unhidden and unashamed. She slowly raised herself onto her tiptoes, her hands on his shoulders, she asked for permission. She wanted the following step to be understood, consensual, mutual. The agreement was in his eyes, in the way that his idle hand moved to her side, finding the back of her hip, and in the gentle stoop he took in his posture to meet her. She kissed him, the kiss almost immediately deep, but sensual and slow. There was no need to rush, she hoped. This was supposed to be purposeful, thoughtful, in no way an accident or a reaction.

There was a slight groan in his throat, something involuntary that surprised her due to the sheer honesty, the barriers he lowered to be there in the way that he was. Her hands drifted down from his shoulders, flattened against his chest, feeling the length of his torso, his chest and sides, her hands moving to his back to pull him closer. The way that she was touching him, trying to feel all of him, along with the fact that she may actually want him specifically, was confusing and arousing and entirely thrilling.

Her lips were tugging and sliding against his, she nipped at his lip, and in the next move, smashed her chest into his, no longer attempting to feign disinterest in any way. She pulled him backward toward the living room, her hands still moving everywhere, her mouth still meeting his in ways that seemed to read his mind. They made it a few steps and she pushed him back against the wall, her hands unbuttoning the buttons on his shirt until they were all open and she could push the shirt down off of his shoulders. Her hands were back along his chest, smoothing and skimming down to the hem of his tee shirt. His hands were back on her sides when her fingers and palms slid up under his shirt, and found his warm skin, realizing that she had someone in front of her that she actually wanted, and then she hesitated, "What are we doing?"

"I dunno," he answered, breathless.

One of them always stopped this. They would allow their push and pull, flirtation and rejection, but one of them always knew when to stop their gravitation toward each other, but in that moment neither was willing to fill that role.

She had started everything this time, she was the one hurdling them forward, removing clothes, forcing their bodies more closely together. She was the one encouraging friction. So he pulled her close, wanting her to know the seduction was still, after all of those years, completely mutual. He turned them around, pushing her back against the wall while her shoulders shimmied against it, almost climbing up closer to him. His hands moved to the back of her thighs, pulling her pelvis against him. He was so aroused, his ache one of complete desire, wanting her to know how much whatever it was that they were doing was effecting him.

"Do you want me?" she moaned.

He slowed a bit, slightly confused that she would need to ask that question, then when he felt her tense, her meaning became clear. "You're who I'm thinking about," he kissed her collarbone, "who I want to touch," he nipped at her ear, "who I want to taste," he found her mouth again and found her somehow needier, a feat that he didn't believe was possible.

Her eyes met his with a spark of passion. "I want you," she said as she practically lunged toward him, that time, actually removing his tee shirt and reaching down to his jeans.

Her hands clumsily groped for his belt and button, although when he tried to help her, she shooed his hands away. He sighed with relief both because his jeans had become constrictive, and because her hand slipped beneath the elastic of his boxers, her fingers curling around the base of his erection and stroking steadily upward. He couldn't help but look down to watch what she was doing, seeing the delicate curve of her wrist, a body part that he could see every day that he saw her, in this drastically different context made the experience so much more intense.

It was almost surreal, that the object of his desire was standing in front of him, touching him, wanting him. She noticed that he was standing there, watching her, with a look of amazement on his face, which was foreign and endearing. When the reality of what, of who, was in front of him bubbled into his mind, he grabbed her hand and led her back to his room.

Clicking on the bedside light because he wanted to see everything about her, he sat on the edge of the bed, pulling her in front of him. He helped her remove her shirt, kissing the inside of her wrist, her shoulder, and along her stomach, he reached behind her to unclasp her bra. His fingers slowly dragged the silky straps down her arms, her breasts finally freed, ample yet firm, and presented beautifully in front of his face. He wrapped one arm around her waist, holding her close to him, and the other slid from the hem of the skirt across her tight, smooth belly, to the rippling of her ribs, up to her breast. Cupping it with one hand, he lapped at the nipple, teasing although she needed no encouragement. Nipping just hard enough to send sparks of sensation through her body, he watched her reaction proudly. When he moved to her other breast, her eyes were watching him when he searched for them, and when he found her urgent desire, he wanted nothing more than to do that to her at every waking moment for the rest of his life. He could feel the urge to both shield her from the pain she was feeling, and to make the emptiness within her whole.

The sound of the zipper opening at the side of her skirt sent shivers down his spine, and he could hear every fiber of fabric as it whooshed and whispered to the floor. "You look…amazing, better than you did before."

He was sitting back, his hands resting on his knees. There were plenty of responses that she could have given, confident, funny or shy, but she said nothing. She bent slightly, enough to kiss him again while she lifted his hands from their places and brought them to her hips. Her impatient assertiveness sent jolts to his already straining arousal and he hooked his thumbs into her panties to drag them down her legs. He grabbed her waist and pulled her down onto him, his opened jeans still in place on his hips, angling her to the side, and flipping her so that she lay sideways on the bed. It was easy to forget exactly how strong he was physically, to be deceived by his limp and his use of a cane, but the way he picked her up so easily, and directed her significantly smaller body, was the perfect reminder that his body wasn't weak at all.

He followed her when she flipped, landing between her legs and shifting downward. His hands opened her thighs, firm and muscular, and like the rest of her, covered in the softest, most inviting skin that he'd ever found. He pressed down to open her legs fully, watching them drop completely down to the mattress. His thumbs pressed and massaged her body, reaching her center. Her hips were twisting, pressing upward already, her hands reaching for him, whispering pleas for contact. The whispered words that finally decimated his resolve were simple, "House, please," the second word dragged out far beyond the syllables or letters that comprised it.

The back of his index finger pulled slowly upward, opening her center to him, and he couldn't believe the degree of arousal she could possibly have for him. His lips and tongue and fingers found each wet fold and crevice, exploring each of the things that made her gasp with desire. He followed the waves of her body, her hips rhythmically pressing up to him and rocking away before rising again to meet him. Her one leg was wrapped around him, her heel pressing down into his back, just above the top of his jeans. The rough dig of her heel into his back, pulling his skin, would have hurt, except at that moment, his body registered no pain. Her other leg was still wide open, the area from her knee to the side of her foot rubbing against the sheet as she wriggled with approval. He reached for her hands, lacing his fingers with hers, pulling them down onto the bed next to her hips so that she couldn't push him away.

He followed the cues from her, really part of the joy of finally finding himself between her legs, experiencing each moan, gasp or exhalation, every dig of her heel, or tightening of her grip. He was trying to keep things going as long as possible, but her body and mind were so tight with sexual tension that it was a more delicate slipping of the tip of his tongue that actually sent her over.

She sat up as far as she could, her fingers still laced with his, her one heel driving down into him and she gasped inward, inhaling until her lungs were fuller than what seemed possible, and then she held her breath. Her body was perfectly tense, every muscle seemed stretched so tautly that he could feel it. Then her head dropped back, and she let out a rough, very female growl as her legs kicked out, her fingers and toes suddenly splaying while she gasped for enough control to manage to breathe air fully back into her lungs.

She collapsed onto the bed as the pleasure pulsed slowly downward while House rested the heel of his palm against her core, not moving, just applying a steady, reassuring pressure. As she sighed she laughed, at ease, "Holy fuck I was right."

House laughed, as he rested his head on her stomach, "What? You need help, Cuddy."

She chuckled, one of her hands resting on her ribs and the other tickling his head, "I was right that…you are absolutely amazing."

"I'm a huge fan of sexual flattery."

"Then you should be an even huger fan of sexual truth," she replied.

When her toe came in contact with the waist of his jeans, she ordered, "Would you take your fucking pants off?"

He chuckled as he complied, slipping his body over hers, feeling her skin's contrast to his. He was still being patient, to the degree that she began to wonder how interested he was in the encounter. She reached between them to grab him, to encourage him to continue, to take her the way she had hoped that he would. The satisfied groan that slipped from him when he entered her perfectly displayed his interest. He hung his head, exchanging tiny kisses as their bodies began to rock even while he willed his to remain still. Their movements were shallow at first while her body still seemed to be twitching from her earlier orgasm, or perhaps from the excitement that seemed to overcome her again. Their desires felt temporarily met, their only existence was in that moment.

His upper body was resting on his elbows and she weaved her hand through his arms so that she could find his hand again. Her other hand found his face, while she kissed the parts of him that she found her lips near, stubbly chin, soft lips, rough cheeks, neck and shoulders, she wanted to touch all of him. Her arms and legs wound tightly around him when she found her body tensing again, and his control began to shrivel, he couldn't wait any longer. She started to whimper, to moan, to find his name on her lips, and he felt indestructible. He rose higher on his arms, feeling her pelvis tip so she could make sure to capture every bit of him that she could, and he began pounding into her. Their bodies moved roughly but still together, with surges and responses that only fed the excitement.

In that moment, there was no pain. There was no loss or emptiness. There was bliss.

His orgasm welled and he didn't even register the way his body moved anymore, all he noticed was the tight wrap she had around him, tiny sensations of her body finding his, and just as he started, she climaxed again, screaming roughly in a way that made their sex seem more feral and visceral, both real and unavoidable. The way she shamelessly enjoyed sex fried his senses.

They couldn't seem to stop touching each other for the remainder of the night. They napped between gropes and orgasms and all-out raw, desperate sex.

By nine the next day, she was still there, and he thought she had lost her mind. "I don't really want you to leave…but did you forget that you care about your job?"

"I'm off today," she yawned. "I needed a day to get ready to go to the conference.

"Right," he nodded while he touched her bare shoulder with his index finger. "So you leave tomorrow…and when you get back, I'll be gone."

"Yea," she nodded. "I'm presenting…"

"I know," he acknowledged.

"I can try to cancel, try to get someone to take my place…"

"Don't, I'd…rather hang out by myself. Maybe I'll fly to Germany a few days early, check out some stuff over there."

The rest of their day together was awkward, filled with words that weren't said and misunderstanding in the air. She kissed him softly before she left, "Call me, and I'll pick you up at the airport when you come back."

"Thanks," he smiled sadly.

"House…" she began.

"We'll figure it out when I get back," he stated. "OK?"

Suddenly the hurt was flowing back over both of them, both scared to say things that would crush their fragile interaction.

She went through her preparations, convinced that he'd creep into her home, but he didn't. She was convinced he'd pick her up to take her to the airport, and again, he didn't. She boarded a plane, checking for any last minute messages, and there were none. The whole plane ride was filled with concern and confusion, wondering how several hours earlier she was in a warm bed, feeling amazing things with someone who mattered, and suddenly she was as alone as she ever was, although she felt it more than usual.

She checked into her hotel and decided that she couldn't possibly sit in a hotel and feel sad when there was a new city in a foreign land just waiting for her to explore, and she had almost a full day to herself before the activities began. She shopped, sampled local cuisine, and decided she was done accepting less. Just as she became completely certain that she would do something to really make a change, she saw something that made her look more closely. Strangely, both to her surprise, and meeting her expectation, in an alley some distance away from the hotel, she saw a figure with a very distinctive walk.