Just because I love you, reader, here's the fluff you wanted. This is an alternate to chapter three, they are not in succession.

Also, there's a bit of dialogue in here stolen from another TV show that I love, and if you catch it, you get a cookie.

Yes

Gillian opened her mouth to answer, and decided that she didn't need words. Instead she wrapped a hand around the back of his neck and pulled him to her, meeting his lips in their first real, honest kiss.

It was electric. Her tongue snaked out to lick his lip, then pushed into his mouth. He responded with a moan, pushing his body up against hers until she was nearly crushed between him and the wall. Her fingers ran through his hair, and she gasped as his lips moved away from hers, down to her jaw and throat. His hands moved to cradle her face as he went back to kissing her, and they just couldn't get close enough.

Suddenly she found herself frustrated by the fact that he was still mostly dressed, and she reached down to the hem of his shirt, pulling it up over his head.

"You know," he said as he nipped and sucked on her neck, "if I were any kind of gentleman, I'd take you home. Do this properly—some wine, a bed—"

"Unless you can get me there in the next thirty seconds, I think it'll have to wait."

He looked into her eyes and grinned. "Eager?"

She smiled back a mischievous smirk as she put a hand on his chest and pushed him backwards, gently, until he collapsed onto the couch. "You have no idea," she murmured, straddling his lap and leaning down again to capture his lips.

He slid his hands up her back until he found the clasp of her bra. When he had gotten the thing off of her, he sat back, looking her up and down. She tried to lean forward to kiss him again, but his hands on her ribcage kept her firmly where she was.

"Cal…" she moaned, impatient for things to move forward.

"Hold on a moment, love," he drawled, his eyes raking up and down her body with a mixture of adoration and lust. "This here's a spectacle that might warrant a moment's consideration. Gillian Foster, in nothing but her knickers. It's a sight for sore eyes if ever I saw one. I could stare at it all day."

"I was hoping you'd do a bit more than stare."

"Yeah, good point, that," he replied, and he shifted her sideways so she was lying on the couch and he was on top of her. He divested both of them of the rest of their clothes quickly, and his hand found the crook of her knee, pulling it up so he could settle between her thighs.

He looked her in the eyes again, and his expression took her breath away. Speaking of things you could stare at forever, she thought. She'd never get tired of the love in his eyes, no longer muted or masked or laughed off as nothing. And she knew her face mirrored his perfectly.

"I love you," she said.

"I know," he replied with a cheeky grin. She giggled, and smacked him on the arm. "Oh, right! Sorry. Of course, what I meant was, I love you too."

"I know," she whispered, and they kissed again as he slipped inside of her for the first time. He moaned into her mouth as he rocked in and out of her.

"Christ, Gill," he muttered. He couldn't keep his hands still, wanting to feel every inch of her, amazed by how soft and delicious her skin was.

Gillian wrapped her legs around his back, desperate to be as close as possible, rocking her hips in time with him. She scraped her nails lightly over his shoulders, and smiled when she felt a shudder race through him. Then a similar shudder raced through her when his fingers suddenly found her breast, making circles around a nipple in time to their thrusts.

Cal's mouth found her neck again, which she noticed was beginning to be quite a thing with him. Not that she minded, of course. She heard him mumble something against her skin, but she couldn't quite make it out.

"What?"

"I said, you're mine," he answered, pulling his head up to meet her eyes again. Her breath quickened in one gallop at his possessiveness. She had no idea she would have found it so arousing.

"Yes," she breathed. Because it was true. With this last concession, she truly belonged to him. His eyes darkened.

"Say it." The words were a demand, but his tone was uncertain.

"I'm yours." The speed of his thrusts picked up, and she arched into him. "Body and soul, Cal. I'm yours."

He cried out, his calm dissolving into frenzy. "Darling," he panted, "I can't—I'm almost…" She squeezed him tight with her legs and dug her nails into his back as he thrust into her erratically, driving her to the edge.

"Me too," she said, gasping, so close it was driving her mad. Determined to make her come before he lost it, he reached between them and found her clit, touched her exactly how he had learned she liked it. It was all she needed, moaning and arching her back underneath him. Her internal muscles clenched him as her climax flowed through her, and the sensation was enough to send him over as well, coming inside her with a few quick thrusts.

They lay there together on the couch for a long time, Cal with his head on her chest, listening as her heart rate returned to normal. Her fingers were running slowly up and down his spine, leaving goosebumps as they went.

"That was…" Gillian started, but couldn't find words with enough magnitude to complete the sentence.

"Bloody brilliant," he finished, and both of them chuckled.

"For starters, yeah." There was another long pause between them, savoring the moment.

"So what comes next?" he asked.

"What do you want to come next?" she responded, genuinely curious.

"Well," he started, shifting off of her to lie on his side, still holding her in his arms, "I want… just, the whole bloody package, love. Holding you in my arms whenever I want, lazy Sunday mornings, breakfast in bed, domestic sodding bliss. The rest of my life with you." He saw the hesitation in her face. "But if that's too much, too fast…"

"It sounds wonderful," she said. "And I'm ready to give it a shot, but…" she trailed off.

"Look, I'll have you know, this is it for me. This is all I want, and I don't fancy the idea of mucking it up. So you tell me what I need to do, and I'll do it." She smiled, and snuggled into him, glad that it was such a big couch that they could lie on it side by side. Just as she closed her eyes, he said, "No, that wasn't rhetorical. I'm serious. Tell me what I have to do to make this work."

Gillian had rarely heard him so earnest, and she opened her eyes to see the look on his face. He was waiting, practically with baited breath, to hear what she would say. This was new, she thought to herself. Since when did Cal Lightman care more about people's words than what he could read on their faces?

"Well, you have to know that being with you isn't like being with other men."

"You saying I'm special?" he asked with a goofy grin.

"Cal, you're practically a mind-reader sometimes. Which might sound good on paper, but…"

"But you saw what happened to my marriage."

She hadn't really meant to bring it up, but that was exactly what Gillian had been thinking. Which, of course, only reinforced the point. She nodded.

"So, do you want to keep the line there? I ignore the things I see, unless you bring them up?"

"No, you don't have to do that anymore." She felt Cal release a breath. "My feelings are your business now, where they weren't necessarily before."

"I like the sound of that," he said with a smile. "So, what do you want, then?"

"I want… I want it to be fair."

"You want me to let you know what I'm feeling."

"Not constantly," she said hastily. She knew that would be asking too much of him, to ask him to become an open, sharing person. "But when I ask, you can't brush me off anymore, okay?"

"Okay. I think I can manage that. Do you want to know how I'm feeling now?"

"Of course. Anything you want to share with me, you're always free to do that. Now moreso than ever."

"Ever the shrink, eh, love? Well, aside from being completely, ecstatically happy to have you in my arms, I'm terrified." She looked at him with surprise, not expecting such open honesty out of him so quickly. Maybe they could do this, after all.

"Go on."

"Well, all the women in my life leave me. My mother, my wife, even Emily's going off to school 3000 miles away. And I'm scared you're going to do the same. I'm worried I'll mess it up, and you'll leave me. And I think that might just kill me, Gill."

Gillian's heart swelled with emotion. She was struck with the desperate need to reassure him, to take away his fears, now that she knew he was feeling them. She snuggled close to him, reaching up to the back of the couch to pull down the blanket folded there. As he helped her spread it over them, she said, "Cal, think of all the crazy stunts you've pulled over the last ten years. If none of that was enough to scare me away, what more do you think you can do?"

He chuckled. "You've got a point there, love." Then he sobered. He held her close, and as both of them began to drift off, she heard him speak again, barely audible.

"And just for the record, I'm yours too."

There. Lovely, mushing ending. You're welcome.