Author's Note: I know this update is overdue. I was sick the last few days.


"What are you doing at two?" he asked through the door while she was showering nearly two weeks after they had started having sex.

Her silence lasted a breath or two too long, "I have a meeting."

"I find that difficult to believe. See, you put information about all of your meetings in your calendar. Usually stuff like meeting location, contact names, little notes of things to remember. And yet, today at two, there is just an hour long block of time. You know I check your schedule, I'm sure you know that, so I have this feeling that you're hiding something."

The shower turned off and she came out of the bathroom. She walked past him, the thick white robe tied around her. Going to the door, she checked the lock and the single chair they used as a barricade before she could continue getting ready. Even if the door was out of her sight for a few minutes, she would have to check the locks. He no longer commented about things like that. After she returned to the bathroom, he watched her brush her hair and rub the steam off the mirror.

"I'm not experiencing any short-term memory loss. You still didn't answer my question. What are you doing at two?"

"A friend is coming to meet me."

"A male friend?"

She stopped brushing, "You're the only person I'm seeing, so it's nothing to worry about."

"I'm not worried. Do whatever you want."

"I'm seeing a therapist, it's not social. She's someone who was recommended to me."

His lack of answer was an answer while he continued to watch from the bathroom door.

"Why do you look so mortified?" she asked.

"I just don't know why you're doing that."

"You can't be serious. Maybe because I'm still having nightmares. I'm still checking locks. I'm still not ready to go home. You think I don't know how fucked up I am?"

"So it's taking time. You're doing fine."

"I am not doing fine."


She noticed that House wasn't around during much of the day. He seemed to be hurt, worried or irritated, she wasn't sure exactly what he was feeling, but her appointment definitely affected him.

Her session came and went. The therapist was frustratingly calm, something that Cuddy thought she should have found soothing, but instead found infuriating. After the session, she found House in a clinic exam room, playing his handheld. "Cured yet?" he asked without looking at her.

"Do you want me to be like this forever?"

"I'd like to keep some parts of you the way they are now."

"The sleeplessness, the anxiety or the paranoia?"

"Forget it."

"Just tell me what you're thinking."

"I'm not thinking anything. I'm waiting for test results. I swabbed the requisite number of crotches for the day. So I don't think you have a reason to nag. What do you need?"

"I need you."

"For what?" he asked, groaning at something that was happening in his game.

"Detective Porter called. She wants me to meet her at my place. There was another attack. They aren't sure if they're related or not, but they're looking for new leads."

"They need me there?"

"They didn't ask for you. I need you."

He finally stopped and looked up, "Can't you take your shrink?"

"You can't possibly be threatened by that."

"No. I'm just not sure what you want from me."

"Why do I need to choose between you and seeking help? The therapist thinks I may have PTSD."

"Wow," he sarcastically drawled, "she must be a leader in her field. Of course you have PTSD."

"And you don't want me to seek help for that?"

"We can deal with it."

"This isn't a threat to what we have."

"What exactly is it that we have? Do you really think Dr. Obvious is going to recommend that you continue fucking your worst employee as a way to deal with this?"

"Is that what this is? Is this 'fucking'?"

He patiently waited for the question to evaporate, but eventually he shook his head.

Her nervousness was eased by his gesture. She continued, "You know what, just forget it. I'll go myself."

"What time?" he asked, standing before she could leave.

"I said forget it."

He pushed the door shut again, his arm over her shoulder, "I'll go. Don't act stupid."

"I'm stupid?" she snapped back. "Why is that? Is that because I'm looking for help or because I'm doing what I can to catch these guys?"

Leaning in, his hand connected with her hip and his mouth sought out hers. She didn't stop him or try to avoid the touch. If anything, she moved into it, letting her body conform to the line of his.

They'd refused to name what was happening between them, but the comfort that they found in each other's arms was powerful. Tenderness was allowed to exist in that moment. During sex, they could find ways to momentarily forget everything that was wrong around them. And they were having a lot of sex. Cuddy usually instigated it, she was often the aggressor and the more dominant during the session. Part of it seemed to be what she needed. House didn't mind. He liked the translation of portions of their work dynamic into the bedroom. Sometimes she was dominant, sometimes they were equals, but since the attack, he was never dominant when they had sex.

While he enjoyed the dynamic, in truth, he knew he didn't want to hurt her any more than she had been. He wanted her to regain a sense of control over her body, over her sexuality. He wanted her to know that what they were doing was exactly what she wanted. He knew that if she wanted to stop, it would tear through him like piles of shrapnel hurdling toward him at impossibly high speeds. His mind, his body, his very self, needed those moments of shelter as much or more than she did.

His mind was lost in thoughts of need and desire when she interrupted, "This, the therapist, doesn't mean I need you less."

"When you feel better, this whole thing will seem like a huge lapse in sanity."

"No it won't. You were right, things will never be the way they were before all of this happened. When you're skulking around, pissed at me, I don't like how it makes me feel. I never know if one of these times is going to be the time when you've had enough."

"It won't be."

"I'm not trying to replace you, House."

"I wasn't worried about that," he said, his eyes betraying him.

She pushed her lips against his neck, hiding an affectionate look, "Come with me."


She wasn't sure where he stood on things, conversations about emotions were always stunted and weird, and they still hadn't bothered to try to define what was going on between them. She knew she needed it. She needed him. Her mind suspected that he needed it just as much as she did, and his unhappy reaction to the thought of her seeing a therapist seemed to validate her theories.

Their fucked up, almost solely physically expressed relationship, was holding them together.

She drove to her home in the early evening. The detective had asked her, but Cuddy took charge and willingly went to the location as House sat in the passenger's seat. They never stopped there, usually they didn't even drive by. She took breaths to try to clear her mind, attempting to steady her fluttering nerves because she was not going to let her own home defeat her.

They parked in the street, looking at the building she had once considered a place of refuge that was now a house of horrors, complete with psychological funhouse mirrors and trap doors. She turned to House, expecting to see him waiting impatiently, but he was pale and worried himself. Her fingers met his forearm, and she stated, calmly, "You don't have to do this. You can wait here."

Looking at her fingers before looking back at her place, he said, "Let's go."

They moved slowly up her walkway, side-by-side but not touching. The detective was on Cuddy's doorstep, along with one of the police officers they recognized from the night of the attack. There were words of introduction and reintroduction before they went to the side of the home where the attack had occurred.

The detective asked Cuddy why she had been out that night, and Cuddy started to remember that she had seen House. She remembered their fight, she remembered the friction that seemed to stem from the night they'd kissed in her foyer after she suffered a very painful loss. She had suffered many losses in that home. She had been alone after her miscarriage, she had been alone when she heard her father had died, but after Joy was practically ripped from her arms, House showed up.

He was there the night of the attack, too. He was the reason she had gone outside. He also fought with her when they escaped their captors. Her mind started to wander to how the attackers would have gained entrance, and then she started to wonder what would have happened to her that night in her home with the two strangers had she not chased House into the street.

The detective was still asking questions, Cuddy was answering automatically, and occasionally House offered a piece of information or an observation. Before they walked through the gate, he put his arm against Cuddy's back. He didn't push her through, but he let her feel he was there. After a moment, they walked through the gate.

She continued to answer questions, right there in the place where her orderly world began to fall apart. While she explained, she realized that she was leaning back against House's side. It felt strangely good to have him at her back, literally and figuratively. It was so different from the night when the man at her back threatened to take so much away from her. As they finished, she realized how much she needed the man she had grown to not only trust, but she had developed much deeper feelings for.

Since there had been reports of an attack again, he expected that she would be more nervous and uncertain, but instead, she seemed almost invigorated on the ride back to the hotel. He wasn't sure if it was adrenaline, or the satisfaction of facing something that she had been so afraid of for so long. Walking into the hotel, she was talking, almost nonstop, about what had happened, about catching the men who did it, and in that, there were glimmers of her full self.

She was standing next to the door of their room, her fingers reaching for the locks while House lumbered to the chair that he would hand over to her to use the physically block the door. He heard the locks click in their now very familiar pattern, but the expected pattern came to a sudden halt. When he turned, he saw that she was sitting on the floor with her back against the door.

He casually held a hand out to help her up, which she eventually took. He pulled her up, observing the look in her eyes that was both empowered and stunned. The effect of facing that one fear was visible in her eyes. It was a knowing look, almost wise, the look of a person who had found knowledge through a series of experiences. "Do you still want to stay?" she asked.

"You already know the answer."

Cuddy started walking to the center of the room, apparently forgetting that she had not completed her locking ritual. House stepped up behind her, tossing his cane near the bed. His arm wrapped around her waist and pulled her against him. Her body tensed in automatic reaction, but only a second later, she relaxed again as he whispered, "I won't hurt you."

"I know that."

He covered her eyes with his other hand, his mouth moving to all of the sensitive spots along her neck, face and shoulders that he had catalogued. Her body seemed to fluctuate between guarded moments and relaxed ones, and he finally said, "All you have to do is say 'stop' and I will."

"What are you going to do?"

"What I want to do. But if you want me to stop, I will."

His one hand still covered her eyes, the other hand slipping under her top to the massage her lace covered breasts. The touch was demanding, but not rough while he pushed his fingers under her bra.

"Stop," she said clearly. He did, loosening his grip until she added, "I don't want you to ruin another bra."

He knew she was testing him, dipping her toe in the water to make sure she knew the temperature. "Fine," he answered, "so do you want me to keep going or actually stop?"

"Fuck me on the table. Hard."

"No."

"What do you mean no?" she asked, trying to spin but unable when his arms tightened around her.

"This isn't about what you want. It's about what I want. If you say stop, I'll stop, otherwise we're going to do what I want."

She nodded, releasing back against him and feeling his hands along her thighs. He stepped away, sealing the hints of brightness around the windows and turning out the lights before he returned to her.

"Should I stop?" he asked one more time.

"No," she answered, immediately feeling him tug at the peaked point of one nipple.

She relaxed her back against his chest and he allowed his hands to roam her body. There was little demonstration of obvious urgency, even though he felt it. He wanted her to enjoy the moments in almost entire darkness as she surrendered all of her reservations to him. Nothing he did would have prevented her from leaving, had she wanted to, but he was clearly the one directing. When she would become tenser, he'd say something, telling her how beautiful she was, even in the dark, or how incredibly sexy she was, or detailing just how much he wanted her.

His voice was both reassuring and arousing, so she would know that the man she was trusting her body with was the same man she had come to trust. Her body was responding, although much more slowly than normal because she was a little on edge. And suddenly, she seemed empowered, like her hesitation was a thing of the past.

Her hand moved between them, pressing against the sizable bulge in his jeans. "I thought this was about what you wanted?"

"It is," he replied, reaching out with a hand until he could feel the bed. He lifted her when they were next to it and placed her down on the thickly cushioned top.

Her body sunk in, and she momentarily reached out toward him when she couldn't find him. After a moment, she saw movement in the dim blue glow of the clock, hearing his voice through the dark so she would know it was him. He lay next to her, she could feel that he had removed his clothing before he started to remove the rest of hers. After separating from her, he moved between her legs, lying on his stomach between them. His hands moved up her thighs, the heel of his hand pressing against her pubic bone while he listened to her sigh.

He wanted her surrender to a moment in the dark. Part of him wanted the demonstration of her trust, but mostly he wanted to show her how much he could be trusted. He wanted her to know that these types of sensations could be found when she wasn't in control, at least when she was in his hands.

His tongue parted her folds, gently opening her to him. His mouth sought out what he couldn't see, feeling even more turned on when he felt how wet she was becoming at his touch. Concentrating first on her clit, he experimented with varying levels of intensity, building her from softer contact to increasingly intense touches. She answered with moans of approval, her body moving under his as it felt like the reservations she'd had were long since forgotten.

Her hands moved down her tummy to her thighs, it was the type of thing she did that normally drove him crazy, but he took her hands in his and pushed them down on the mattress. She tensed for only a second while her mind assessed the situation and decided, again, that she was perfectly safe. He pushed her hands under the small of her back, counting on her to leave them there, because he wanted both of his hands free to touch her.

While his mouth lavished attention on her pussy, his hands pressed her thighs completely open before he moved to her sex. Two long fingers pushed into her quivering core, slowly testing the access she was giving him. He twisted them in her, allowing his knuckles to press against her g-spot while he massaged her depths.

His impatience was calling him as the urge to hear her cry out became more demanding. Her moans intensified while he could feel the rhythmic tightening of her muscles around his fingers. He kept lapping up her juices, tasting the increased wetness that accompanied her high level of arousal as she screamed out. She came so loudly, her voice clear, completely uninhibited as her orgasm possessed her body and took over.

She sat up, trapping his bent fingers inside her and making it impossible for him to continue licking her. He kept pressing his fingers against the walls of her tight center until her muscles no longer responded. She collapsed back on the bed, her energy momentarily spent.

Kissing and licking from her hips to her breasts, he felt her fingers move to the back of his head, holding him against her. He ached for release, needing her touch more than he was ready to accept. His hips were between her still opened thighs. They could feel the promising heat of each other so close. His dick rested in her folds as he started to subtly pump his hips so she could feel him stimulating her clit again.

He pulled her legs around his waist, high above his hips, angling her toward him. Moving closer, the blunt tip of his cock moved along the crease of her folds until he found the opening of her body. He pushed into her, needing only a moment of guidance from his hand because he was completely hard and she was dripping wet, so their bodies were made to be together in that way. His first thrust was patient. Her body was always tight and he was larger than average, so he was always careful not hurt her. On top of that, they had been having so much sex that he suspected she must have been sore, although she gave no indication of that. His biggest concern though was ensuring that he was never unwelcomed.

She was gasping softly, moaning sounds and words of approval that let him know that she was fully willing. He hit the end of her and held there, kissing her as tongues, lips and breath met. She lifted her hips up to him to encourage movement. His groan practically yelled, "Thank God," although there were no actual words spoken. He slipped out of her body completely so he could feel his tip enter her body and move fully into her again. After two more pumps of his hips as he tested her, he pulled back to establish the faster pace that he desperately needed to end the ache that he felt.

His pleasure rang for a few seconds throughout his whole body like the reverberations of a bell that had been well-struck until she said, firmly, "Wait."

He wasn't sure if she understood the resolve that stopping required. Or perhaps she did. He stopped moving, trying to silence the groan of displeasure. Stopping at that point required gigantic resolve. After a second, he started to pull away but she tightened her whole body around him. "Wait doesn't mean stop," she explained, but he thought perhaps she was testing him again.

Her whole body tightened around him but she moved her hands under his. He had never felt so chosen in his life. After all that she had been through, she knew she wouldn't hurt her. He wrapped his fingers around her wrists, his mouth seeking hers. The emotional need was as powerful as the sexual one. The tie between them had somehow depended.

When she broke from the kiss, she moaned, "Don't stop."

"You sure?" he asked, hoping he knew the answer because he was physically in need, but also because they seemed incapable of expressing their emotional connection in ways that didn't involve sex. So much was pent up inside him, and he needed her more than he could deal with.

"God yes. Completely sure."

He thrust into her, capturing the pleasure she offered him. The sex they had been having was usually in the context of their sadness. All of the trust that had been built seemed to culminate in a moment where they truly let go, and, after confronting the place of the attack, there was almost a sense of victory in the air. Their bodies were mostly healed, so they had greater range of motion, there seemed to be no barriers between them.

Taking cues from each other, they could each sense the approaching climax. No one said a thing. They were wild in their fervor for each other, feeling the arousal of their bodies moving higher and higher until they both crossed the edge. They exploded into orgasmic bliss, knowing that their partner was reaching full satisfaction just as they were. Letting go fully was freeing.

His mind completely left the realms of conscious reality and he disappeared into the total surrender of the moment. He started to feel other things again as the fog cleared, mostly her fingers along his face and neck as she whispered her satisfaction. "I still need you," she confessed into his ear.

He rolled, pulling her along. His eyes were growing heavy and he wanted to let the words on the tip of his tongue disappear into sleep, but they emerged anyway, "You'll always have me. Even when you don't want to anymore."

She woke about an hour later. Her eyes went to the door as she realized that the chair she usually used to prop against it was still sitting next to the door and, although the main lock had been engaged, one of the other locks was still unlatched. It was the first time such a thing had happened since the attack. She got out of bed, going to the door and engaging the lock that was unlatched. Her hand moved to begin the ritual, the same ritual in the same way that she would always use to check the locks. Then she paused, balling her hand into a fist. She looked at each lock, checking them visually instead of compulsively testing them. It took enormous courage, but she allowed the visual inspection to suffice before she braced the handle with the chair.

She went back to bed, sliding next to House under the covers, finally feeling certain that the attack was not going to define her future.