Disclaimer- the flower never lies; the front page holds the answers you are looking for here.

A/N- Sorry I took so long to post! Exam time, and Internet problems, talk about frustrating! I know the flower is like a mood ring, but it plays its part. Wait and see. There is also another part to the bet, once again you'll have to wait and see. Hope you have as much fun reading it as I did writing it!

"Time has changed so much that I don't know if I can call and tell you I care." Beautiful -Pete Murry

Reports In

It was fast approaching 0900 and Doctor Beverly Crusher was still keeping herself busy unlocking secrets to the mysterious flower they had brought back with them from Reckit II. It appeared that whenever someone touched the naturally white flower, it changed colour according to the person's feelings or emotions. For example, when she touched it, it turned orange, because of her curiosity about it, but when Worf had first touched it he was nervous about their situation and it had turned a deep royal blue. So far she hadn't discovered what made the plant do this, but she had discovered that if someone's blood made contact with the flower it could tell you their feelings/ emotions whether or not they were present, or in contact with the flower.

Still running test as the morning shift turned up for duty, Dr Crusher was roused from her work by Nurse Alyssa Ogawa.

"Doctor?" asked the alarmed young officer.

"Oh, hello Alyssa."

"Doctor have you been in here all night?"

"I guess so. What time is it?"

"0855."

"What?" Muttering some curses under her breath, Beverly quickly gathered all her notes together and made a very rough report for the Captain.

"What is it Doctor?" Asked her concerned friend.

"This report," she said briefly holding up the padd she was quickly adding more information to, "is suppose to be handed into Jean-Luc in less than 5 minuets. Time got away from me last night, I didn't stop my research to even start this."

"Some how I think the Captain will be willing to let you hand it in a little late." She answered, a knowing smile spreading across her face.

"Me too, but it's Will I'm more afraid of. He'll say I'm using my personal relationship with him to get my own way."

"He only doses that to stir both of you." Then after a small pause she continued. "Actually, I'd say Will was one of most pleased about you two, and your timing."

"What?" Beverly asked not taking her eyes off the report.

"Nothing." Alyssa responded.

Beverly gave a small smile of recognition before returning to her padd. After a few moments, she was on her feet again and heading for the door.

"Good luck, Beverly," Alyssa called out to her as she rushed out the door.

"Thanks."

/\

"Nice to see you can be punctual Doctor." Commander William Riker sarcastically called to her as she entered the bridge.

"Well if I had been informed sooner of the report I would have to hand up I might have started my preparations sooner." She bit back.

"Now whose fault is that?" he innocently asked.

"Gee, I thought it would be the commanding officer of the away team I was on. That would make it…" she pretend to be thinking hard. " That would make it you, Commander."

"I gave you plenty of time to get the report done."

"Yeah, if wasn't doing any research in my report or getting any sleep."

Will gave her big grin before he spoke again, and he spoke with the excitement a child has when they prove their teacher or parent wrong. "All I have to say now is, thank you Doctor." Seeing the confused look on her face he continued. "Thank you for participating in this little argument, because now that report in your hot little hand is later than it was 5 minuets ago."

With a small cry of frustration, Beverly made her way to the Captain's Ready Room door. "Mark my words, William Riker, I'll get you back for this." Beverly promised.

"I'll be waiting," he called out just as she disappeared into the room.

/\

The Captain was quietly sitting at his desk when the one thing he was thinking of walked through the door.

"Sorry Captain, time got away from me and I know it's a bad excuse, but it's the truth. Sorry for handing this in late." Beverly quickly rabbled as she made her way to his desk.

"That's okay Doctor. I have only briefly looked over the reports so far." Then he gave her one of his smiles that he reserves for her, and her alone. "My mind has been else where."

After placing the padd on the desk, she looked at him and had a curious smile on her face. "And where might your mind be?"

"Funny that you should say that, it came back to this room the moment you walked in, but it had nothing to do with this work." He then gestured to the padds on his desk.

"Honestly Jean-Luc, you'd think the way we started was embarrassing enough."

He was now close enough to wrap his arms around her waist. She showed no sign of objection. "Which part is that, what we got caught doing or how quickly the entire fleet found out?"

"The combination of the two."

He gave out a small chuckle at the memory. "We were asking for it when we took the step forward on that ship, and one that had a Captain that was a buddy of Will's at the Academy."

"We didn't exactly plan on going that far when we chose the ship." She paused. "Actually we didn't even think that anything would be happening then."

"That's right. It just…. happened." They both thought of the faithful events of the USS Amon, only weeks earlier.

They were on their way to rondeau with the Enterprise after they had dealt with all the issues they needed to on Star Base 16. They we're hitching ride on the USS Amon.

They were quietly sharing dinner in Jean-Luc's assigned quarters. The meal was noting special. They had their usual quiet dinner conversation. Nothing out of the ordinary happen throughout dinner.

After dinner they moved their conversation to the coach. They continued to chat until it got late.

Beverly stood up and started to move to leave. Jean-Luc got up to see her to out. They met a few feet before the door.

"Well, thank you for another lovely dinner, Jean-Luc."

"Anytime Beverly, anytime."

They shared a soft kiss on the cheek, then they faced each other and both waited for the other to back away first. Neither of them made any sign of moving.

They stood like that for a long time. Until finally, they both leant in closer and shared another kiss, this time on the lips.

With their next kiss, Jean-Luc put his arms slowly around Beverly's waist, pulling her in closer to him. As their kisses deepened, Beverly's arms wrapped around Jean-Luc's neck, pulling them closer still.

Slowly their hands began the exploration of their bodies. Without either of them realising they had made their way into the bedroom.

Their kisses turned more passionate as they collapsed on the bed, becoming totally immersed in each other. They lost all concept of time and completely forgot where they were.

They didn't notice anything going on around them. It wasn't until there was a violent fit of coughing coming from the doorway, that they even broke their connection. There they were met with the sight a very shocked Captain Joshua Bucket, and two others. The man on his left was having a small coughing fit, and the woman on his right was looking just as surprised as her Captain.

Despite his reddening face, Jean-Luc cleared his throat and asked, "Joshua, is there anything I can help you with?"

Snapping out of his daze Joshua replied, "Actually Jean-Luc, we came," he indicated to the people with him, "to see if we could help you."

"Why would we need help?"

"Well, we've had a miner incident and neither of you were responding to our attempts to contact you. But as we can um … see … you were both err … busy. And you seem to have everything … um …in hand here."

Jean-Luc and Beverly didn't know what to say to this, but both continued to redden.

"Well, now we can see that you're okay, we can leave you to um … continue." He let a smile work it's way to his face at the end of this comment.

"Thank you for your concern," Jean-Luc said as they all turned to leave.

Once the three visitors left, Beverly turned to Jean-Luc and said, "How long do think it will be before Will hears about this?"

"I wouldn't be surprised if Joshua is rushing to a station to contact him now."

"Seems like we're going to be the butt of the gossip on two ships."

"I think that's a safe bet."

But little did they realise how much they under-estimated their infamous 'relationship'. Within 12 hours the entire crew of both ships knew. It took another 12 hours for more than half of fleet to be informed of this new revelation.

This brought an end to one the longest running bets in the history of Starfleet. The fleet wide bet on if or when those two would finally get together, had ended. Although no one had the exact date you could find a very happy, and rich, Will Riker at the end of it, with several thousand chips under his belt for being the closest to the date.

He pulled her in even closer. "At this rate I'm never going to get any work done. I'm just distracted too easily."

"Only when I'm around." She gave a radiant smile.

"Smiles like that is what got this all started."

"Are you complaining?"

"No."

"Then why are we still talking?"

Before he could give a response she pulled him into another deep and passionate kiss. His hands begin a familiar journey across her body.

As their bodies started to react to each other. They were startled by how far they were willing to go in his Ready Room.

But they were interrupted, again, by the comm. system.

"Riker to Picard."

"Go ahead Number One."

"Sorry if I'm interrupting anything, sir." Even though they couldn't see his face, both Beverly and Jean-Luc knew that there was a big cheesy grin there. "But an unknown ship has just appeared from around the planet."

"What type is it?"

"That's just it, we had absolutely no idea what race might even be aboard."

"Seems like we truly are going into an unknown here."

"Yes, sir."

"Alright, I'm on my way. Picard out."

"Seems we are getting all the luck with timing."

"Maybe we could continue this topic over some dinner tonight." Jean-Luc suggested.

"Over dinner? This seems like the type of thing that is discussed after dinner."

"Who ever said that is very un-imaginative," he whispered before turning to enter the bridge, followed by giggling Beverly.

Getting interesting yet? Let me know what you think. Sorry it's a bit short.

A/N2- Thanks again to Kaytee33, and new reviewers Velvet Strom and lasemeuse. Your're reviews were greatly appreciated, THANKS.

And Kaytee did it make you laugh?