A/N: Bit of local difficulty here, my lap-top decided to start eating things so had to wait for my hero to do a recovery job on the directories, sound like I know what I'm talking about, don't I? Can assure you I don't. Please review for me, I need your feedback because I found myself saying Oh shi*t, can't start again! Luckily didn't have to, not this time, but as we have no clue why it did it he can't guarantee it won't happen again.

-OG-

"Nice chat?"

Oh fuuuck, where did that come from? She could hear the tone of her voice and it wasn't great, she sounded like some whining jealous girlfriend, which she was bloody well wasn't, not the girlfriend bit anyhow. Okay, she'd admit she might be a bit jealous, well, quite a lot jealous, but just because he'd kissed her a few times, well, okay they'd had a few snogs, it didn't mean he wasn't allowed to talk to his ex, or to anyone else if he wanted, without telling her what they was talking about or that she was allowed to get all shitty with him. But she felt shitty, he'd been talking to Rebecca for ages, and she couldn't help it, because hard as she tried not to, she couldn't stop thinking that there was something not right here.

"Not particularly"

He raised his eyebrows in a sort of unspoken question, obviously puzzled at the tone of her voice, but she had absolutely no intention of answering, if he wanted to know what was wrong with her he'd have to ask properly. She glared at his back as he moved to get some wine and she was very tempted to wait until he'd poured it before throwing some sort of petulant strop and saying that he should have asked her first if she wanted any because she didn't want wine, except that that would be cutting off her nose to spite her face, as Nan would say, because her jealousy was feeding her self-pity to the extent that the thought of alcohol, and bucket loads of it, was very appealing.

"What's wrong?"

She couldn't bring herself to say anything, even though he'd asked, which was what she'd wanted him to do, she'd wanted him to notice that she was upsetbut it really was none of her business "We were talking about Sam, okay? About his school, she wants to move him, says that the school is not that great, but I'm not so sure, still, what the fuck do I know?"

"Oh" Now they were in territory that she knew absolutely sod-all about, personally she thought Sam would do okay in any school and it wasn't like the local primary would be a shit-hole or a drug den or nothing, was it, not in that area? Still, that was another thing what was none of her business.

"I've told you before, I am not in-fucking-volved with my ex-wife, so why don't you believe me?"

"Sorry" Oh shit, he'd never said that he was clairvoyant, that he could read minds "It wasn't that" She shrugged, hoping that he wouldn't see that she was lying through her teeth, she'd always been a crap liar so that even the little ones saw straight through her "I'm just not looking forward to … you know, tomorrow" Why couldn't she just tell him, what was so hard about it? "I were just sort of wondering whether you'd said some'ing to her, you know, about me, about this." Nearly the truth, well a little bit nearer anyhow… .

"No, I'm not looking forward to tomorrow either" He chewed at his bottom lip as she did her best to avoid his eyes, feeling as the tell-tale tide of colour crept up her neck. That was the other bugger, her neck always went this horrible mottled red when she told lies, although, thank fuck, he didn't know her well enough to know that. He frowned and shook his head as he spoke, a bucket load of irritation showing in his voice "You really thought I was telling her about you? About this as you call it?"

"Nah, well, yeah, I s'pose I did really, I mean, I dunno, do I? Anyhow, it's none of my business what you and her was talking about, is it?"

"I didn't say anything about you ….about this ….. of course I bloody didn't, what do you take me for?"

"Sorry"

"And stop saying sorry, God, I've told you that before as well"

Lovely, their first row, and the stern face and irritation in his voice were back with a vengeance so that Molly wanted to stop and rewind to that bit where he'd put his arms round her and made some stupid joke about them snogging in the kitchen, this was not exactly what she'd had in mind for this evening.

"I know I should have explained, you were bound to wonder ….." He paused and grimaced "When I got injured it was touch and go and well to give Rebecca her due, she was great, she spent a lot of time in the hospital with me, bought Scamp in to see me a lot, but when things got a bit better she decided it would be best for all of us if we got back together" He snorted a laugh down his nose "But I couldn't, the problems we'd had, well they were still there, so I said no" He was staring into space as he moved to perch on the edge of the table, then pulled her to stand in between his legs "Have you ever tried saying 'NO' to someone who always gets their own way? Well of course you have, you're a nanny" He snorted another laugh as Molly thought that no, in actual fact she hadn't, the kids she'd come across couldn't possibly be called spoilt brats, they mostly had nothing, except for Velvet and Silk and they didn't have that much either, except for a whole lot of stuff "Rebecca finds it very difficult to let go of something if someone tells her she can't have it anymore, she's not used to it"

"It's none of my business"

"Stop saying that its none of your business when it clearly is"

"Sorry" Oh shit, she'd said it again and it was bound to irritate him, but what the fuck was she allowed to say? Shittin' hell, this could hardly be going any worse.

"Don't be fooled by the boyfriend" You could almost see the inverted commas round the word "He's about the same age as her dad and she used to say he was repulsive, well, until she needed someone to make me jealous" He looked at Molly's horrified expression "That sounds arrogant, and I don't mean to, but it's not because she loves me or anything like that, so you can put that idea out of your head, it's because I won't do what she wants me to and she can't bear it, so she's doing her best to show that she's in charge, especially when it comes to Sam. The latest is that she's thinking of taking him to live in the States, that there's nothing much for her here anymore and employing a nanny was supposed to show that I can't be trusted to look after him on my own, so there'd be no point in going for custody, not that I'd put him through that"

"Shit I'm sorry, oh sorry didn't mean to say sorry again"

"Her little attempt at manipulating things backfired on her pretty badly though, didn't it? She sent you" He was biting and chewing at his bottom lip then put his head back and laughed out loud "I'm fucking sure that this wasn't what she had in mind" He paused again "She'll be here about midday and I know you've got to go back with her, but I thought that if you ring me when you get away from her, I can come and get you, well if you want me to, you don't have to, obviously …..what do you think?"

"Okay"

"We can come back here or go somewhere else for the weekend, it's up to you" He grinned as she nodded her head "I could pick you up from home if you like, if you're going home to see your family"

"Oh yeah that's a bleeding good idea" She raised her eyebrows and gave a wry giggle at the thought "I don't think so, mate, me Mum would be okay, but me Nan likes good-looking sexy blokes like you so she'd eat you alive, and me Dad, well, he wouldn't care if you was an axe murderer as long as you've got a bob or two in the bank and he can tap you for a loan"

"Are you trying to freak me out here, Miss Dawes?"

"Yeah, did it work?"

"Nope, you'll have to put more effort in than that"

"What sort of effort did you have in mind?"

"I'm sure I'll think of something"

-OG-

Lovely, she'd gone from jealous as fuck that they might be going to get back together or that they weren't even properly apart, to being shit-scared that he was doing this to get back at the ex, to teach her a bloody lesson because of the underlying thing that was going on with them. She knew all the theory stuff about separated couples and their kids 'n that, how they were still sort of together, even if they weren't actually together as such, and that because of Sam, Charles would never be free of Rebecca, not for years and years anyway. It wasn't like she couldn't cope with that or nothing, she could, or she thought she could, mind you as mum would say, it might be better to leave off worrying about it until she was asked, anything else was a bit previous even for her.

They were back to their opposite ends of the sofa and there was this terrible, horrible silence as they both tried to think of some neutral topic of conversation, until Charles sat forward and looked down at his feet, then looked sideways up at her, a small smile playing around his lips "Told you I was good at fucking things up, didn't I?"

"You haven't, it were me, I got a bit jealous, sorry, I know, I know, but sorry I can't stop saying it, think it's a bit of a habit"

"No, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you feel that you couldn't say what you wanted to, I just want to make you happy, that's all"

"You do" She giggled "well, you could do"

"What are you suggesting, here Miss Dawes?"

He was laughing as he said it so she shifted along to sit herself next to him, to curl up by him, and then reached up to kiss him on the cheek. She wanted to kiss him, wanted desperately for him to kiss her, for the mood between them to change and for them to get away from all the deep and meaningful crap, because time was running out and although he'd said about the weekend, there was no guarantee, and in her experience life had this way of stuffing things up. That was when she kissed him. She simply looked up into those brown eyes of his and kissed him, on the lips, not a lingering open mouthed kiss, not a passionate kiss and definitely not one with tongues, but a gentle little kiss that was full of the affection for him that was bubbling away inside her.

They drew apart and just looked at each other and this time there was no talk about it being too soon or about not knowing each other well enough or long enough, because suddenly they were kissing one another as if there was no tomorrow. He flipped her over and tucked her under him so that his solid weight was pressing her down into the sofa cushions and there was absolutely no suggestion of some chaste little chat or kissing, just increasingly steamy passion which meant that their breathing was very rapid and very ragged. This time he made no attempt to angle himself away from her, the absolute opposite was true and she could feel every bit of how much he wanted her, which was probably matched by the way she wanted him. The only possible way that she could have got any closer was if he could unzip his skin for her to crawl inside, or do what she wanted to do more than anything else in the world, which was to go to bed with him.

"Come on" He struggled to his feet and pulled her up to hers, then looked down into green eyes that were absolutely huge and slightly unfocussed, full of desire as they looked back at him "Let's go to bed, this sofa isn't bloody long enough for this"

As soon as she nodded he swept her off her feet and laughed out loud, sounding unbelievably happy, as he said that he was just making sure she didn't seduce him on the stairs.

"I'm not gonna seduce you on the stairs, you should be so bleeding lucky" She threw her head back and also began laughing with sheer happiness "Anyhow, would of thought you was too old for messing on the stairs"

"I am not too old, I'll show you if you like"

"You can't, Sammie might come out to see what his dad's up to"

"Okaaaay, not the stairs then, bedroom it is"

"Put me down, I can walk, and anyhow you might drop me on the stairs, if you break me bloody neck, how will you explain that to Rebecca?"

"I can't, but then I wouldn't have to, I'd leave you to tell her"

"Thought you was s'posed to be a gentleman?"

"Who told you that?"

"You did"

"Oh well, in that case it must be true, and I'm not going to drop you, you only weigh about half as much as a feather"

"You are such a liar Captain Army Bossy Person" She giggled "But such a nice one"

-OG-

He leaned against the door watching her as she stood and looked around his room and he was aware, probably for the first time in a very long time, well the first time he'd acknowledged it anyway, just how little of his character was in it. It was immaculately tidy, army ship-shape so that it would have passed a kit inspection, but apart from one single photograph of his parents and a couple of Sam there was nothing of him on display at all. As he looked at it through her eyes he realised that it was soulless, that nothing in there had any kind of emotional significance attached to it at all, it was the story of his life over the past few years.

He'd had relationships since he and Rebecca split, quite a few actually, both before and after he'd been injured, and always with the same kind of girl, tall, blonde girls with long legs, physically similar to Rebecca, girls from the same kind of background as his own, but there had been no real emotional attachments, not on either side. They had been physically satisfying relationships, and they'd always liked one another, but he hadn't loved any of them and they hadn't loved him, not that he knew of anyway, so that when it was over they'd been able to walk away with only some fleeting regrets, but with no real pain on either side.

He'd be the first to admit that the girl standing in front of him was probably far too young for him. She was also totally different in just about every possible way to anyone he'd ever been involved with before, she was tiny with green eyes and dark hair, a girl who came from a completely different background from his so that she was very skilful at mangling the English Language. But she was the girl who made him laugh more than any girl he could ever remember, the girl whose company made him happy just by her being there with him, by her smiling at him the way she did, so that this girl and what she called 'this' were now incredibly bloody important to him.