A/N: The timeline runs concurrent with Lady's Man. Some text is pulled directly from the show - no copyright infringement intended.

The entire story is Alex POV

In the morning, I felt better. Exhausted, but better.

And after my eyes had been open for only a few seconds, I remembered Bobby telling me that he loved me.

Showing me that he loved me.

I couldn't stop the smile.

And then, of course, I had to think about Mulrooney. We still had to finish up this case. Although, Bobby was going to have to work without me for awhile, because I had been called to testify in a case that I'd worked on while he was on suspension so I was going to be in court all morning.

Leaving him alone to pursue our leads had me a little nervous. I mean, I felt on firmer ground as far as our personal relationship went, but how was he going to look at me at work? He'd seen me weak and vulnerable, and yet he was supposed to then trust me to watch his back? To see me as an equal partner?

My stomach began to churn again at all of my unanswered questions.

"You're awake," Bobby said as he came into the room. He was already dressed. "I was just getting ready to wake you up. I think you would've liked how I was going to do it," he teased.

I knew he was feeling me out, trying to see which side of sanity I was on today.

"Maybe I should go back to sleep then," I replied with a smile, but I sat up as I said the words and accepted the cup of coffee that he offered me.

He sat down beside me on the bed.

"Are you okay?"

"I'm getting there. Thank you…for…last night. I know I haven't been easy lately," I admitted.

"Well, it is your turn," he said casually.

"My turn?"

"To be difficult. I had the past nine years. You can have the next nine," he told me, gently nudging my shoulder with his own.

"You weren't that bad," I replied.

"You weren't either," he insisted. "So, you've got court this morning?"

"Yeah. I don't know how long it'll take me."

"I've got a few ideas I'm going to chase down. We'll catch up when you're done, okay?"

"Okay," I agreed, although again I was fraught with nerves.

"Relax," he told me, instantly reading my unease. "We'll finish this thing up today. Then maybe we can get a couple of days off. What do you think?"

He seemed a little unsure of himself, and I realized how tremendous of a step it had been for him to put himself on the line for me. He'd shown me his heart without any expectations.

"Bobby," I began, with every intention of telling him how I felt.

"Tonight," he interrupted.

"What's tonight?"

"Tonight we'll go out. We'll celebrate closing this case," he said confidently. "And then you can tell me whatever is on your mind."

That last part was said hesitantly, as though maybe he was afraid for me to speak my mind.

Did he honestly think I didn't love him in return? Or did he think I just wasn't sure yet?

I wasn't sure, but I did know that he wanted me to wait until I was myself again, and for that I loved him even more.

Bobby waited patiently while I got myself ready for work and then I dropped him off at 1PP before heading over to the courthouse.

I could tell on the drive over that his mind was already on the case, but that didn't keep him from holding my hand.

I hadn't even had to tell him how much I liked it. Or maybe he did it because he liked it.

Whichever the case, it worked out fine. It was a connection we could make without feeling like we were really breaking any rules.

And okay, so we were breaking departmental rules by mere virtue of being together, but we were mostly keeping it out of work.

That was what was important.

It wasn't the NYPD's business what I did on my own time as long as it didn't interfere with my ability to do my job.

Although, is that what it had done this time?

Would I have been as shaken, as ineffective on this case if I weren't in a relationship with my partner?

Probably.

Even if we hadn't crossed the line, I still would've wanted to. We still would've had feelings that ran deeper than just partners even if we hadn't acted on them.

"You sure you're okay?" he asked me for the tenth time as he got out of the truck.

"I'm fine," I insisted. "I'll catch up with you as soon as I'm done."

He looked at me for another moment, and then gave me a wink and closed the door. I watched him go into the building and then I headed for the courthouse.

Six hours later, I finally finished.

Six long, miserable hours of sitting there, waiting to offer my so-called expert testimony.

I was supposed to have been called to the stand around nine. Then ten. Then eleven-thirty. If they had just told me first thing that it would be more like one-thirty, I could've left and come back.

But instead I'd had to wait. And stew about what Bobby was doing.

So as I walked into the squad room at two o'clock in the afternoon, I was nervous.

This was the true test.

How would he see me at work after all we'd gone through last night?

He was sitting at his desk and he looked tired.

Of course he was. I'd kept him up most of the night with my whining.

"Mulrooney's meeting me in evidence lock-up in about two hours," he said.

Meeting me, he'd said. Not us.

"I hope you're not saying I can't go," I replied without thinking.

And then I mentally berated myself.

Since when did I need his permission? We were partners. And here I was acting weak again, at a time when I needed to be strong.

How was he ever going to respect me in the office?

"No," he said, looking away from me.

I really wished that I knew what he was thinking. Had he hoped that I would tear into him for even suggesting that I wasn't invited? Was he trying to bait me into returning to my old self?

But then he turned sympathetic eyes onto me.

"I'm…things are going to be said…things revealed…

"Things that won't be pleasant for me."

"Right."

"But it's about getting him, right?"

He slowly nodded at me.

"So what's the problem?" I asked with fake bravado.

Hell, if I didn't have it for real, then the least I could do was pretend. I'd let Bobby do the lion's share of the work on this case while I'd been ducking and running for cover.

If I wanted him to continue to respect me at work, then I needed to earn it. And the first step was going to be to face this thing head on. It's what I should've done from the beginning.

"How did the court thing go?" he asked me quietly when I went back to my chair.

"It was fine," I replied without looking at him.

"Eames…"

I raised my eyes and met his. He glanced around quickly to make sure that no one was within earshot and then returned his eyes to mine.

"I'm just trying to protect you," he told me.

"I know," I said, because I did know that. But I also couldn't let him. Not like that anyway. "But we're partners. We do this stuff together, even when it's hard."

My phone rang, interrupting whatever his response may have been. It was the ADA.

"I need you to come back, Detective Eames. I have to recall you to the stand."

"Are you kidding me? I just spent the better part of my day over there."

"If you can get here in the next half hour, I'll have you out of here by three."

I agreed, and hung up the phone.

"You've got to go back?" Bobby asked.

"Yeah," I said as I rose from my chair. "He said I'll be done by three. But you know what that means."

He smiled at me carefully as though he was still unsure of my mood.

"That means probably more like four or five," he replied.

"Don't start without me," I told him. And maybe now I was taking it to the other extreme because ordinarily if something like this had happened, we would each trust the other to handle the case.

But I really needed to be there. He hadn't even filled me in on his theory yet.

"I wouldn't dream of it. I'll keep him there all night if I have to."

As it turned out, he didn't have to wait for me at all. I met him in the hall outside of evidence lock-up five minutes ahead of schedule.

"I'm guessing you've got something good," I said when I saw him. I could tell by the way he was bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet. He was anxious to bring down the hammer.

"I think I can trip him up. But Eames," he said, leaning in close so that no one else could hear. "He's going to pull every punch he can."

"I've faced down tougher men than him," I reminded him.

"Yes you have," he confirmed with a grin. "On a regular basis."

"Then let's do this."

We went into the room together.

I looked at Mulrooney as he sat on the far side of the table and I wondered what I had ever seen in him.

Was it simply need that had drawn me to him? Certainly it wasn't a physical attraction.

He'd listened when I needed to talk. It was nothing more than that.

Bobby got the discussion got underway, but Kevin wasted no time getting his digs in.

"Yeah, well, I don't go to court until things are fully formed. I learned that lesson," he said derisively.

Bobby was quick to call him out on it.

"Well, we clearly don't want a repeat of that. It's too bad that Detective Eames wouldn't fudge her testimony."

"That's not what I'm suggesting."

"Oh, come on," I fired back. "If I hadn't found that letter you'd be on the yellow brick road to Bureau Chief, not taking orders from your former paralegal."

"I'm not really sure you should be here."

"I think she needs to be here," Bobby retorted. "I think she's carried around this guilt of that acquittal for ten years…"

My first reaction to Bobby jumping to my defense was that I needed to fight my own battles. He was taking over for me, covering for me again.

But then I listened to what he was saying, and I realized what my mistake had been all along.

I was so concerned about my personal involvement in this case, and how it would make me look, and how it would make Bobby feel, that I hadn't really looked at the case.

I hadn't been analyzing the evidence or considering what was ultimately going on.

But Bobby had. And he was helping me find my way back, too. He turned around and showed me evidence from the original Burnham case, and I quickly forgot about everything else except for his show and tell exhibition.

I sat down next to him as he continued explaining the difference in the papers on which the letters had been written and the specificity of the search warrants.

And then I noticed that Mulrooney was getting fidgety.

I knew that Bobby had suspected that Mulrooney was somehow involved, but I didn't realize that he was actually our killer. I was again ashamed for my lack of vision, my blind spot with this apparent suspect, but I had to move past that.

I listened as Bobby talked about the strength that men receive from women. It was a theory of Jung and I'd heard it before, but hearing him say it now made me think that he was using that analogy just for me.

He got some of his strength from me.

With my confidence building, my mind raced to keep up with where the evidence was pointing, and then suddenly I had it.

I couldn't hardly believe it. But still…I had it.

Mulrooney had set this whole thing up as payback.

"You wanted me to know it was you and think that there wasn't a damn thing that I could do to prove it," I stated.

And I knew that without Bobby, it probably would've worked.

But he pushed and poked and prodded until Kevin broke down and admitted it.

"Alright," he said at last. "Alright. Alright. You'll find things. This bitch can gloat. But I've seen her broken, a crushed flower, sobbing for poor dead Joe. And wanting me…"

I'd known he would say things. I was as prepared as I could be, but it still hurt. It hurt to know that one of the most painful and vulnerable times of my life was being used to mock and humiliate me.

I was glad that I'd talked with Bobby last night so that he knew what to expect, but I was still afraid to look at him. Instead I couldn't take my eyes off of Kevin, wondering how in the world I could've been such a horrible judge of character.

"I'm ready to see a lawyer," Mulrooney said after his taunts. Bobby turned to look at me, but I was rooted to the floor, so he pulled out his cuffs and jerked Kevin away from the wall.

"Hold still, sweetie," Bobby told him mockingly as he pulled Kevin's hands behind his back.

And then he looked at me, not with pity or disgust or shame, but with encouragement. Determination. Respect.

The next thing I knew, he walked past Mulrooney, nearly knocking him to the ground with a glancing blow of his shoulder.

Then he held out the cuffs to me.

That was his way of giving me back my power. My sense of self. It was his way of showing me that we were still equal, and nothing that had been said changed the fact that we were partners.

I cuffed Mulrooney and read him his rights before handing him off to an officer waiting in the hall. I watched as the officer led him away.

"You okay?" Bobby asked. He was directly behind me, so close that I could feel his body heat.

"Thank you," I replied without turning around.

"For what?"

"For getting me back on track. I owe you…"

"You don't owe me anything," he insisted. "Partners pick up each other's slack from time to time."

"You did more than that."

"Can we argue about this at home? Or do we need to finish the paperwork first?"

Once again, he was giving me back my control. He was encouraging me to make a work decision. How many of those had I made in the past few days? Not nearly enough.

I'd really let Mulrooney mess with my head.

"The paperwork can wait," I said as I led the way down the hall. We went into the stairwell and climbed up one flight, but I paused before I opened the door that led to the main floor.

I turned around quickly, and caught Bobby by surprise. In fact, I'd caught him looking at my butt.

"I was…um…I'm sorry," he stuttered, color flooding his cheeks.

"It's not like I didn't know you looked," I teased him, letting him off the hook. "Why do you think I always walk in front of you?"

He tilted his head and looked at me quizzically, my suddenly cheerful mood clearly catching him off guard.

"It's such a relief. To be done with this," I clarified. "And to know that it really wasn't my fault."

"You had to know that it wasn't," he said in confusion. "And you had to know that I would never think that you'd done something unethical."

"I wasn't sure," I admitted. "I was afraid of losing your respect. I was afraid of having my life examined and that maybe you might not like what you saw. And then because of all that, I quit doing my job. I'm sure I've been a lot of fun to be around lately."

His eyes softened and he ran his fingertip along my arm up to my shoulder. It was a bold move, considering where we were, but hopefully we would hear footsteps approaching before anyone came within view.

"You earned my respect a long time ago. Nothing is going to change that," he said sincerely. "And as for the personal stuff, we're still learning each other. But trivial details are just that - trivial. Even though I don't know everything, I know enough to know that I love you."

I let myself get lost in his eyes for a moment as the words registered in my head. If only I'd been willing to talk to him sooner, maybe these past few days would've been easier.

But then again, maybe they had to be just as they were for us to move forward.

"So we're okay?" I asked him.

"We are so much more than okay," he assured me.

I turned to push open the door, but then I made a split-second decision and I couldn't wait. I turned back around.

"I love you," I told him. I watched him as a smile spread across his face.

"I should've said it last night," I added. "Or any night in the past two weeks."

And then because I wasn't going to play games with him, I admitted, "Hell, if I'm really going to be honest, I could've said it a whole lot longer ago than that."

"You said it now. That's all that matters."

We went by the squad room before we left 1PP, knowing that Ross expected a full report even though we were going to procrastinate on the official paperwork.

"So it was Mulrooney?" he asked, surprised by the turn of events. Normally I kept him up to speed on things, but I assured him that things had evolved too quickly for our usual briefings.

Then Bobby and I alternated nearly every other sentence, filling the captain in on the investigation and subsequent arrest, and showing a united front to the boss.

"Nice work, Detectives," he told us as his means of dismissal.

"Another case solved by Goren and Eames," I said playfully to Bobby as we left his office.

"Uh uh," he replied. "Eames and Goren."

"Doesn't have the same ring to it," I countered, grabbing my coat from the rack.

"It doesn't need to ring," he said on the way to the elevator. "It just needs to work."

And it did.

We went to the parking garage and got into the SUV, each of us seemingly lost in our own thoughts.

"I used to hate Scotch," Bobby said suddenly as I drove us to his place.

"Really?" I asked in surprise. "When?"

I waited expectantly, thrilled that he was going to offer me an insight.

"When I was a kid."

"Well I should hope so," I laughed. He chuckled with me, and I realized that I felt better than I had in days, since before this damn case.

No, actually I felt better than ever.

"My old man drank it," he elaborated. "He taught me how to fix it for him when I was about six. Glass tumbler, three ice cubes, Scotch filled to an inch below the top."

I glanced at him and saw that he was lost in his memory. But I loved the look on his face. Despite his words to the contrary, it was a pleasant memory for him.

"I did it perfectly every time," he continued. "And he drank quite a bit. It got so that I equated the smell with my dad. By the time I was eleven, I swore that I would never drink anything alcoholic, ever. I blamed everything bad he ever did on that Scotch."

"So what changed your mind?"

"When I was eighteen, he called me up and invited me over to his place. When I got there, he took me into the kitchen and sat me down at the table. He had two glasses of Scotch. He wanted to have a drink with me, since I had become a man."

"That's pretty…symbolic for a man who…"

"Didn't spend much time with me? I know. It went a long way towards bridging the gap. I sat there with him and sipped on the drink. It was the first drink I'd ever had. We talked about what I was going to do, go to college or join the army, and what I wanted out of life."

"He treated you as an equal instead of as a child."

"Right," he agreed. He turned toward me then and settled his hand on my leg. "And suddenly the smell didn't just make me think about being a kid and hearing the arguments or watching him stumble out the door and wonder if he was going to gamble away our rent money. Now it makes me think of possibilities. It always reminds me of where I've been, but at the same time, it makes me think about what's still to come."

I nodded in understanding and we drove the rest of the way in silence. I found a parking spot outside his building, and then we went inside.

On the kitchen table was a bottle of Kentucky bourbon.

"When did you…"

"When you got called back to court," he explained.

He had left work and picked up the bottle and brought it home for me.

His actions told me two things.

One, he'd planned to tell me his Scotch story all along.

Two, he'd had confidence in me to know that I would rise to the occasion today. If he'd thought for a second that I would crumble in front of Mulrooney, he never would've had such a blatant reminder sitting out in plain sight.

"You knew that I'd…" I began as I picked up the bottle and read the label. "You trusted me to hold it together."

"You did more than hold it together," he countered as he came up behind me. He wrapped his arms around my waist as I stood staring at the bottle. "You stood tough against someone who played dirty. He violated your confidence and tried to expose your weakness."

"He did a pretty good job," I said quietly.

"He misjudged you though. Because he never really knew you. He only saw a brief glimpse of you at a time when you needed a friend," he said.

I closed my eyes and leaned back against his chest, loving the feel of his strong arms around me.

"I wish I'd known you then," he whispered. "I would've been your friend."

How much of a difference would that have made, I wondered. If I'd met Bobby and opened up to him instead of Kevin?

Would we still be here today? Or would that experience have changed our dynamic forever?

"You're my best friend," I told him. "But I'm glad things happened the way that they did. Otherwise we might not be here."

"So you believe in destiny?" he asked and I could hear the tease in his voice.

"I believe," I began as I reached for the bottle. "That we're going to open up this bourbon and put a new spin on things."

He moved from behind me and got two glasses out of the cabinet. He put three cubes in each and then held them out for me to fill them with the amber liquid.

"So what do we drink to?" I asked once we each had our drink.

"We don't have to drink to anything. It's about feeling. Just think about how you feel right now," he said softly.

I thought about it.

How did I feel?

I was once again confident in my ability to do my job.

And I was secure in my relationship with Bobby.

I actually felt pretty damn good.

THE END