The Good Wife: The Itch

Chapter 4

A/N: Forgive me in advance for my lack of knowledge on United States geography. I'm basically just making most of this up with some minor help from Wikipedia.

A small smile crossed Alicia's lips as she looked up at the clock on her office wall to see that it was nearly 5pm on Friday and soon she'd be off for the entire weekend; a luxury that didn't often afford itself to her. This weekend however she knew she would be out of town and had made arrangements ahead of time with Will and Dianne that she would be unavailable to be on-call but that Cary would be if needed. She couldn't remember the last time she had a weekend free of work-related stress but with every minute the clock struck closer to 5 she realized whenever it was it was entirely too long ago.

She was in the home stretch now, had finished up the last few case file documents she had been working on and was in the midst of packing up her briefcase, a smile playing on her lips as she daydreamed about the possibility of what this weekend had in store for her when suddenly her desk phone rang and startled her out of her reverie.

Alicia glared at the phone, as if doing so would cause it to cease its ringing but unfortunately for her it did no such thing. Cary looked over to her from his adjacent desk and smirked at her obvious annoyance to the offending device.

"Go on, get out of here. I'll get it and say you've left for the weekend" Cary offered with a slight shrug of his shoulder.

She smiled sweetly at him. She'd be lying if she said it wasn't nice to have him back.

"It's okay Cary" Alicia insisted, reaching for the phone.

"Hello?" She answered, knowing by the line that was lit up on the phone that it was just her assistant that was ringing her.

"Hi Mrs. Florrick, sorry to bother you but Mr. Gold says he needs to see you in his office"

Alicia let out an audible groan and looked up and across the hallway sure enough to see Eli leaning against his desk, facing her and signalling her over with a wave of his hand.

"Thank you" she spoke into the phone with a hint of mild annoyance in her tone. Not towards her assistant of course, but to the man who is possibly about to ruin what could've been a great weekend.

"What's up?" Cary asked; noting Alicia's change of mood as she placed the phone back on the receiver with a light huff.

"Hopefully nothing, but it's Eli so I'm sure to him the sky is falling somewhere" she grumbled before taking her leave from their shared office and heading across the hall.

"Alicia, hi" Eli greeted, cordially as always. And as always, Alicia had no idea what his demeanour was saying to her. His poker face could be bested by no one.

"Hi…" She offered cautiously as she noticed the newspaper clutched in his hand. "Is something wrong?"

"Had a busy day, just got back to the office to talk to you about this now" he said, nodding his head towards the newspaper in his hand. "It seems you and Peter have made the papers again" he said evenly.

Alicia felt her throat drop to the pit of her stomach. What in God's name had happened now? Today had gone so well, of course Eli would have to rain on her parade.

Her mind went to a thousand places all at once. What could possibly be newsworthy about them now? Another scandal? Involving her? Involving him? Alicia quickly shook her head at the notion. Peter wouldn't do that to her. Not again anyway. Not after everything they've gone through. He had made promises to her and their family, and she believed him.

Suddenly all the thoughts running through her mind came to a stand-still as she realized what she had just admitted to herself. She was beginning to trust in him again. Maybe not completely, or undoubtedly so, but there was certainly progress made. For the first time in years she had his back and wasn't immediately fearing the worst in him. Peter has changed, that much she has accepted. Whether or not it's enough, well, that was something she would have to work through on her own.

Suddenly a small smile crossed her lips and she looked up at Eli, ready to hear whatever ridiculous thing he had to say.

"What is it Eli?" she asked calmly and watched as a sly grin spread across Eli's lips. It was unnerving to say the least. She was used to angry Eli, and over-dramatic Eli sure; but this Eli? No, this look was definitely new.

"It's gold Alicia" he answered simply.

"Oh…" Alicia stared at him for a brief moment rather puzzled. "Sorry, what is it Mr. Gold" she corrected. He was her boss after all, and they had had this 'boundary' discussion already but she thought that they had moved past that and that they were finally beginning to work well together again.

"What? Oh, no, that's not what I meant" Eli quickly shook his head and Alicia felt a small wave a relief wash over her, glad she hadn't made the same mistake twice.

"I mean the article, it's pure gold" he continued a moment later, grinning as he passed her the paper. Alicia unfolded it to see a large picture in the centre of the page of her and Peter from their ice skating endeavour the previous evening. The picture had been snapped right after Alicia's near wipe-out on the ice; showing Peter with his arms wrapped around her, their faces only inches apart and both laughing and smiling with a headline above it that read 'Christmas With The Florricks?'. Her eyes only skimmed over the article, but the words 'canoodling' and 'romantic' had popped in once or twice and it read more like a Page Six item rather than front page news but Alicia chalked it up to it likely being a slow day for news or maybe a reporter that Eli had in his pocket. The latter was certainly more likely, she mused inwardly. To an untrained eye they appeared the picture-perfect couple and though it was easily far from the truth, Alicia couldn't help as the corners of her lips curved up into a smile.

"One of our trackers got it" Eli began again after a moment of gauging her reaction. "Yes, sometimes our trackers follow you guys as well, just to keep an eye out for our competitor's trackers. One of Grace's friends had seen her at the park and tagged her as being there on their facebook. Kids these days" Eli said with a sigh. "They make it next to no challenge at all to stalk them"

"Well that's comforting Eli" Alicia deadpanned and Eli simply shrugged his shoulders.

"In this case it worked in our favour so it's hard for me to pretend to be upset about it" He stated matter-of-factly. "Do you have any idea how great this is for us? Kresteva is going to be pissed when he sees Peter's approval rating sky rocket after this. Actually, that's why I wanted to speak with you"

Alicia sighed. Of course Eli already had his wheels spinning on how this could potentially be turned into a nightmare for all of them.

"Okay, let's hear it"

"Well, you'll see when you read the article, but it's basically painting the picture of what is your now perfect marriage. Their words, not mine" Eli quickly defended when he saw the look of disbelief on Alicia's face. "Anyway, Kresteva is going to want to pounce all over that and try and prove that your marriage is anything but perfect. So, we need to… prepare for that" Eli said cautiously.

"Just get on with it and tell me what you need Eli" Alicia sighed. She hated these political games but she was still bitter towards Mike Kresteva and his defamation towards her so she vowed to make herself part of the mission to ensure he doesn't get elected Governor of Illinois.

"Well, Peter informed me that you're coming on the trip this weekend to Belleville"

"Yes" Alicia nodded.

"Well, we can expect Kresteva's trackers to be tailing us so I can't stress enough the importance of image on this trip. They'll pick up on anything they can to spin that image into a negative one"

"Eli, just say whatever it is you're trying to say" Alicia sighed. She could tell he was dancing around trying to tell her something she may potentially not want to hear and she just wasn't in the mood right now.

"I can't have you guys standing united together at the podium and then book you separate hotel rooms" he admitted quickly in one long breath. "It looks bad, Alicia" he finished calmly.

"Oh…" Was all Alicia could manage at the moment. Peter had been very clear with Eli from the beginning on Alicia's wishes for her involvement in the campaign. She would stand beside him when the cameras were flashing, and hold his hand, but their private life was just that, private. They weren't to speak of their living arrangements, and wouldn't admit either way if they were living under the same roof or not. On the campaign trail Alicia held the right to refuse to attend any event she wanted and if an overnight stay was required she would be given her own room. Eli would have agreed to nearly anything that was stipulated; knowing that having Alicia in their corner was the backbone of their entire campaign. Peter needed her, and therefore Eli needed her.

"I'm sorry, I know I said I wouldn't put this kind of pressure on you, so if you want you can have my room. I'll be in the room next to Peter's. I can leave the passage door unlocked so you can get through without being seen by anyone who might be watching the floor. I'll… sleep on the bus or something" he said with a slight shrug of indifference.

"Eli, it's okay" Alicia said after a moment to think about it. "But I appreciate the gesture" she offered genuinely. For all the grief he caused her, she knew deep down he cared for and respected her.

"Are you sure?" Eli asked in mild disbelief.

"Yes" she eased his mind with an easy smile. "It's fine. Peter and I are adults, we can come to an arrangement"

"I'll make sure you have a suite with a sofa" Eli nodded.

It was terribly humiliating to be having this type of conversation with him, but ever the professional Eli managed to ease much of that discomfort in the way he spoke to her; light and well-mannered and withholding of all judgement; as if he's had the same conversation hundreds of times and it was simply his job to say and think of these things.

"Thank you Eli" she gave him a small but genuine smile and he nodded.

"Anytime. I'll see you on the bus in the morning"

"See you then" she agreed before taking her leave from his office and heading back to her own to finish gathering her things.

Saturday morning came all too quickly for Alicia who was still collecting all her last minute toiletries up when she heard a knock at the front door.

"Coming!" she called out from her bathroom as she threw the last few remaining items into her suitcase and pulled the zipper shut.

"Hey" Peter greeted her with a warm smile as she opened the front door to see him standing on the other side. "You all set?"

"Yeah I think I have everything"

"Kids up yet?" He asked, peering over her shoulder to look inside.

"Still asleep" she shrugged. "I didn't want to wake them"

"Oh, it's fine, just thought I'd say hi if they were up. Can I take your bag?"

"Sure, thank you" Alicia smiled, stepping aside so Peter could grab her overnight bag for her.

Alicia stopped to take one final look around; doing a mental check that she didn't in fact forget anything before finally turning back to Peter and giving him a quick nod to let him know she was ready and he headed towards the elevator with Alicia following closely behind him.

Alicia could hardly believe that six hours had passed them by when they finally made it to their destination of Belleville, Illinois. It turned out that Peter was great company on a road trip. They had spent the first hour or so going over Peter's speech; at the insistence of Eli; but from then on it was just casual conversation flowing between the two of them seamlessly. They talked briefly about work, both Peter's and Alicia's, but mostly about the kids and other things that were going on in their lives such as Peter's most recent renovations to their old family home and what else he had planned for it. Alicia talked about how nice it was for her to have Owen around more often and what a great help he'd been with the kids over their break from school.

"Eli told me about the hotel situation by the way" Peter mentioned quietly as they approached the event location. "I'm sorry I know that wasn't-"

"Peter it's okay" Alicia offered with a small smile. "We talked about it, I understand. I told you from the beginning that I am supporting you on the campaign, I wouldn't want to hinder it in any way"

"Thank you" he said with a genuine smile. "And your support means a lot to me. I couldn't do this without you. I wouldn't have done this without you"

Alicia simply smiled in return before letting her hand fall on top of his and giving it a reassuring squeeze.

"Peter, you ready?"

Eli's voice quickly caught their attention as he stood at the front of the bus and they realized they had in fact arrived. Peter gave a quick glance over to Alicia who merely nodded once and smiled.

"We're ready" Peter confirmed as he stood and held his hand out to Alicia. Standing up Alicia took Peter's hand, lacing their fingers together and leaned up to give him a quick kiss to his cheek.

"Good luck" she whispered against his skin and she could feel his smile grow wide before he led them off of the bus and into the sea of flashing cameras and persistent reporters.

It was well after dark before Alicia and Peter finally got to their hotel room. After the various speeches and meet-and-greets were held Eli insisted on the whole lot of them going to dinner in the restaurant hotel to debrief and of course, discuss more strategy. Alicia was glad to see when she entered the room that someone had taken the liberty of bringing the luggage to their room because the last thing she wanted to do was go back downstairs.

"Long day huh?" Peter mentioned as he closed the door behind them and tossed his suit jacket over a nearby chair.

"I don't know where you and Eli get the energy to do this all the time" she commented as she dropped herself onto the sofa and began to take off her shoes; instantly heaving a sigh of relief as the first heel slid off her foot and she ran her hands over it to soothe the dull throbbing.

"How about some wine?" Peter asked, walking toward the mini bar.

"Sounds perfect" Alicia agreed, the second shoe already removed and tossed carelessly on the carpet to join the other.

"Hmmm, no wine glasses, just these" Peter mentioned, holding up two crystal tumblers he found sitting next to the ice bucket.

"It's fine" Alicia offered an easy smile. She'd drink it out of a boot at this point. It turned out that fifteen hours straight with campaign-mode-Eli was more than any one person should ever have to endure.

Peter poured two glasses and walked over to join Alicia on the sofa; handing her one of the glasses as he took a seat next to her and leaned back into the plush leather.

"So…" he began cautiously, studying her body language for a moment. Alicia was seated on the edge of the sofa, glass firmly gripped between both her hands as her right index finger drew random patterns on the side of the glass. She was nervous, maybe even uncomfortable. Peter could sense that immediately and decided he would leave it up to her to address the elephant in the room and in the meantime he could find other things to talk about with her until she felt more settled.

"What did you think about today? You weren't too bored I hope"

Alicia turned to him and offered a small smile. "No, it was great actually. I enjoyed myself"

"Good, good" Peter nodded. "It's nice having you here. Eli actually gives me a break every once and a while. You should come along more often" he said with a smirk and Alicia chuckled.

"We'll see" she shrugged, a smile still playing on her lips.

"Are you tired?"

"Exhausted" she sighed with a roll of her eyes. "Like I said, I don't know how you do this all the time"

Peter merely shrugged. "You get used to it I guess. Did you want to go to sleep, or…?" Peter asked tentatively but Alicia gently shook her head.

"No, I'm okay for a while. Think I'm too wound from the day to actually fall asleep just yet" she shrugged.

"Okay, well I thought I'd call the kids and check in if that's alright?"

She smiled warmly at him. "Of course it's alright"

"Great. I'll put it on speaker" he smiled back at her before reaching to the coffee table for his cell phone and quickly dialing Alicia's home number.

"Hellooooo?" Owen answered; drawing out his greeting and Peter gently nudged Alicia, signalling her to talk to Owen instead and she rolled her eyes though her lips twitched into the smallest of smirks. After all these years Peter and Owen couldn't even manage to be civil to each other over the phone, apparently some things never changed.

"Hi Owen" Alicia greeted her brother. "How's it going there?"

"Why what have you heard? They're lying" came Owen's immediate response and Alicia shook her head at his silliness. "No, everything is fine here. You don't need to worry so much you know" he assured her.

"Peter and I just called to say hi to the kids. Are they still up?"

"Uh, yeah… sure, just a second" Owen seemed to hesitate for a moment; seemingly off guard that Alicia and Peter were still together at this time at night. "Kids!" she could hear him yell in the background. "Your Mom's on the phone"

They heard footsteps, followed by some muffled sounds of the phone being passed until finally Grace's sleepy voice filled their hotel room.

"Hi Mom" she yawned into the phone. "How's your trip?"

"Great sweetie. Dad's here too, he wants to say hi"

"Oh, hi Dad" Grace said, her voice lighting up notably as it always did when she spoke to her father. She would forever be Daddy's Little Girl Alicia thought to herself.

"Hi Grace" Peter smiled brightly. "You sound like you're half asleep, did we wake you up?"

"No, Zach and I were watching a movie with Uncle Owen and I guess I'm just more tired than I thought"

"Oh yeah? What movie?"

"Land of the-"

"Land Before Time!" Zach quickly interrupted, grabbing the phone from his sister.

"Zach…" Peter groaned into the phone. "You guys haven't watched those movies since Grace was in diapers. Was Uncle Owen showing you zombie movies again?"

"Ummm…" Zach hesitated on the other end and Peter just looked to Alicia and gave her a sarcastic eye roll.

"Okay well I think it's time your sister went to bed. You can finish the movie with Owen afterwards, alright?"

"Okay Dad" Zach quickly agreed.

"Alright well we just wanted to check in and say hi and, well, goodnight now I guess. Please make sure your sister gets to bed, it's late"

"Yeah I will, goodnight Dad" Zach offered.

"Goodnight Zach, Goodnight Grace!" Alicia called out softly.

"Night Mom" Zach answered before passing the phone off to his sister.

"Goodnight Mom, night Dad" Grace smiled into the phone.

"Night sweetie. And tell Uncle Owen no more scary movies before bed alright?" Alicia warned gently.

"Okay Mom…" Grace agreed guiltily.

"Bye sweetie" Peter offered.

"Bye" they heard before Grace hung up and Peter returned the phone to the coffee table.

"Zombies huh?" Peter asked of Alicia, raising his eyebrows at her.

"No worse than the time you took Zach to see that Texas Chainsaw whatever movie" Alicia said with a shake of her head at the memory. "Zach had nightmares for two days afterwards!"

"Well he was going to sneak in to see it with his friends regardless so I figured if he's going to see that crap then it should be with me. It worked didn't it? He went four years before he ever watched another horror movie, and by that time he was actually old enough"

Alicia simply shrugged. He was right, it had worked. Zach had sworn off horror movies until recently.

"Even still, let's not have Owen attempt to apply the same methods with Grace"

"That we can agree on" Peter quickly assured her. "More wine?"

"Hmmm" Alicia hesitated for a moment, tilting her head to the side. "What time do we have to get up in the morning?"

"Seven, maybe seven thirty if Eli decides to be nice"

"Ugh" Alicia groaned, falling back into the cushions. "It's already nearly midnight. Maybe we should get some sleep"

"Sure, if that's what you want to do" Peter gave her a small smile as he leaned forward on the sofa and placed his glass down on the table, then did the same for Alicia. "I'm going to grab a quick shower, unless you wanted to?" Peter asked, standing from the sofa.

"No, you go ahead, I'm fine. I'll just brush my teeth first if that's alright?"

"Of course"

As per her nightly ritual Alicia washed the make-up off her face and spread some moisturizer on before finally brushing her teeth and then her hair. Satisfied that aside from being in her pyjamas she was ready for bed, she took her leave from the bathroom and let Peter go in.

Walking over to the bed Alicia pulled out her suitcase and opened it up. She stared at the garments inside for what seemed like an eternity. She was only staying for one night but for some reason deemed it completely necessary to pack four different types of pyjamas. She didn't want to give out the wrong impression so the silk nightgown was quickly out of the equation but she still had far too many choices. Finally deciding on a pair of cotton shorts and a black camisole Alicia closed her suitcase and pulled back the blankets, crawling into the cool white sheets of the king sized bed.

She lay there staring at the ceiling, half willing herself to fall asleep so that she wouldn't have to endure the inevitably awkward moment when Peter walked out of the bathroom and having to decide where to go to sleep, and the other half not being able to shut her mind off about all the things they planned on talking about during this trip. It was now or never, she thought to herself. Once they went to sleep Eli would be by to rouse them first thing in the morning and they'd be back on the campaign bus headed for home. She felt she'd somehow be cheating him if she didn't allow this conversation happen that they agreed upon to, though at the moment she had no idea how that conversation would go. The simple thought of it was the fighting force that kept her awake.

Peter had emerged from the bathroom not long afterwards. Hair still damp from the shower but otherwise perfectly in place, and he wore a simple pair of grey pyjama bottoms and a white t-shirt.

"You're still awake" he noted as he stepped further into the room. The soft glow of the moonlight peering through the curtains bathed the room in a subtle darkness but he could still see her eyes on him as he moved.

"Yeah, I…" Alicia hesitated for a moment. Now or never, she reminded herself. "I thought I'd wait for you, I know we said we'd talk this weekend, so I just thought…"

"Okay" Peter nodded before slowly making his way over towards the bed. The sofa faced away from the bed so logically speaking, Alicia realized there was no other way for them to have this conversation without him joining her and although the initial thought worried her slightly, all that seemed to float away the moment he eased himself in next to her and gave her an easy smile. How he still had this calming effect on her with a single look after all this time was beyond her. She returned his smile with one of her own and propped herself up on her elbow so she was facing him.

"So where do we start?" Alicia asked; not knowing the answer herself but hoping that Peter might.

A/N: Sorry to cut you off here folks but this chapter was starting to get a little long and I decided it was time for a chapter break. I know there's not too much happening here, but the next chapter will hopefully hold a lot more for you. Thanks for reading, and of course reviews are always greatly appreciated! Oh, and for those who haven't seen it yet, I've posted a new A/P video on youtube. This site doesn't allow me to post links, but if you type "Peter/Alicia Only Shadows" in the YT search bar, it'll be the first video that comes up ;) Look forward to hearing your thoughts on this update :)