Derek found Marti in the kitchen the next morning. Dressed in yellow and red tartan pyjamas, she was eating cereal and sipping at a giant-sized cup of coffee. He frowned wondering if he had ever seen Marti drink coffee before. It was just so grown up! He looked back over his shoulder at the empty couch he had just passed.

"Where's Itchy McSnores-a-lot?" He asked. Marti glanced up, an eyebrow arched.

"Casey snores?" She enquired.

"Not really." Derek shrugged. "Only when she has a cold. Where is she?"

"Do you have any idea how unnerving it is that you even know that?" His sister asked turning her attention back to her cereal bowl. Derek rolled his eyes but Marti continued. "Tell me, when you guys sleep together, do you both wear pjs or is clothing optional?"

He dead-panned. "Neither. Casey thinks that fabric between us ruins our skin-to-skin bonding so we're both naked."

Marti spat her cereal out in shock causing Derek to chuckle. "Relax Smarts, I'm kidding. We wear pjs. Now are you going to tell me where she is, or do I have to beat it out of you?"

"She's taken the car to the gas station to fill up and check tyre pressures and stuff." Marti said, wiping her dripping chin with the back of her hand. "And just in case you thought you were off the hook, you're not. She's still pissed as hell at you. You'll be lucky if she gives you a ride back to Ottawa. You might have to walk."

"She needs to stay here, Marti. It's safer."

"I'd say the choice was Casey's not yours." Marti said laying her spoon in her empty bowl. "She wants to be in Ottawa. For some ridiculous reason she cares enough about you to want to be with you."

"She's insane. Someone is trying to kill me and she wants in on it."

His sister grinned and he realised what he had said.

"I mean she wants to share the danger."

"Actually, the idea of Casey trying to kill you sounds far more realistic, D." Marti pointed out.

"We aren't like that anymore." Derek said, offended.

Marti shrugged. "You didn't see Casey this morning." she warned.

"Fuck." He sighed and sat down. "I don't want her hurt, Marti."

"Then stop hurting her."

"I'm not."

Marti gave him a "give-me-a-break" look. "You spend all these months living together and now that there is a problem you say you don't want her anymore."

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to Derek. Your actions say it for you."

Derek looked away. "It shouldn't be any other way, anyway." He tried to justify himself. "Why would Casey expect me to "want" her?"

"Gah! The pair of you! Derek listen to yourself, please! You live together. You touch each other constantly. The UST in that living room last night was so bad I nearly vomited. I may have only been a kid when we all lived together but Casey's always been the one who pressed your buttons and it's obvious that she's still at the controls right now."
"She's not...I'm not...that's stupid, Marti."

"Is it? Look me in the eye and tell me that you don't think about Casey that way."
Derek stared his sister down. "I don't think about Casey that way."

"Bullshit Derek. The only reason you can do that is because you had so much practice lying to Lassiter and Dad." She took a deep breath. "Look, hun. I'm only going to say this once and then I'll drop it, okay?"
Derek was cautious. "Okay."

Marti leaned back on her chair and folded her arms. "Break Casey's heart and I'll kill you."

Derek was slightly peeved. "A bit biased? What happened to loving your brother?"
His sister stood up and put her bowl in the sink. "That was me loving my sister." She explained, moving towards the door. "The "loving my brother" bit came first thing this morning when I said the same thing to Casey about you."

"Is that everything?" Derek asked Casey as he put the last box in her car.

No response.

"Casey?"

No response.

Gazing briefly heaven-wards, Marti stepped forward. "Casey, have you got everything?"

"I think so." Casey replied, not looking at Derek. Marti rolled her eyes and hid a smile.

"Are you sure you two can make this journey without killing each other?"

It was Casey who replied. "Don't be ridiculous, Marti. I'm driving. No one is going to die."
Derek snorted. "Because the roads aren't safe when I'm behind the wheel?" He muttered.

Casey opened her mouth to give a retort, realised that would involve talking to Derek and closed her mouth again. She turned to Marti.

"I'm just going for a..."

"...last and final pee...yeah, we know. You always do." Derek interrupted with a grump.

Casey glared at him and stomped off into the apartment building.

Marti looked at Derek. "Aw! You sound just like an old married couple. Probably best to try not to make her more angry than she already is, Derek. Her only crime is caring about you."

"Why am I the bad guy here? I just want her to be safe."

"And that's all she wants for you. She sees you going into danger and she knows that she's a doctor. She wants to be close in case she can save you."
He frowned. "I thought you said she wanted to go back to Ottawa because she "loves" me."

Marti smiled. "That as well. Seriously, you two are funny. Having a serious conversation with you about Casey is like déjà vu. I feel like I've had the conversation before...which I normally have, only with Casey." She put a hand on his arm. "Look after each other. Make Casey happy, Smerek."

"What makes you think she'll let me?"
Marti grinned in an annoying way.

They continued to stand for a few moments beside the car, not saying anything. Neither of them wanted this goodbye, but both of them were grateful there had been a "hello".

"I'm not leaving you for good Smarti, you know that don't you?" Derek said casually throwing an arm around his little sister's shoulders.

Marti nodded. "I won't let you, D. I'm not going to stop you doing your job, but I wouldn't stay out of this argument if I thought you were going to completely sever ties again."
"It wasn't my choice last time."

"I know I understand." Marti smiled. "Of course, part of the reason I'm so accepting is that I know Casey will keep you on the straight and narrow."

"She doesn't have that much control over me you know." Derek objected.

"Ha ha. That's hilarious."

"Marti..." He warned.

"You should just tell her you love her." Marti said a while later.

"Tell her I what?" Derek looked at Marti in disbelief. "I don't..."
"...yes, you do. Tell her."

Casey emerged from the apartment building as Marti spoke, and walked towards them. As she drew level with Marti the one sister turned to the other.

"And you," Marti announced to Casey. "You remember what I said to you this morning." Casey blushed making Derek wonder about the conversation but before he could ask, Marti was hugging him tightly.

"I'll miss you." She said softly.

"I'll miss you too." Derek said. He watched as Marti turned to hug Casey, and then he followed Casey to the car where they both got in.

Before they pulled away and determined to leave with the upper hand, Derek rolled down his window.

"Oh, Smarti?"

"Yes Smerek?"
"Just for the record, I may have been distracted this visit but I am aware of certain "events" in your love life. Tell Simon I have a gun and I'm trained and licensed to use it. Next time I come to London I fully intend to meet my little sister's first boyfriend. He might want to start running now." He smiled menacingly.

Marti's face paled as Casey, trying to hide a tiny grin, pulled out into the line of traffic.

"Just so I know," Derek began about ten minutes into the journey. "Are you planning on ignoring me all the way home?"

Casey said nothing.

"I thought so." Derek muttered, put in his ipod ear buds and cranked up the volume.

Casey didn't just ignore Derek on the way home, she ignored him when they got home too. But, what was worse was the way she pulled an air mattress from the hall cupboard, blew it up and promptly made up a bed for herself in the spare room. That had never happened before.

She still wasn't talking to him when they left for work the following morning. Casey merely emerged from the bathroom fully dressed, grabbed her medical bag and left. Derek watched her go from the apartment window. He groaned. Clearly, this cold shoulder approach was going to last a long time.

"What's the matter with you?" Jazz asked about twenty minutes into Derek's shift as they drove to check out a snitch.

"Nothing." Derek muttered.

"Seriously? You're so tense I could trampoline on your ass."

"It's nothing." Derek hissed back.

Jazz's expression lost its jovial nature. "Derek, it's something. Either you're still pissed about the whole Rich/Spike thing or something happened during that relaxing trip to London you weren't authorised to take. Either way you're going to talk about it because I'm not a big fan of secrets anymore and neither is my fucking leg. "

"I don't need to get authorisation to take a trip on my vacation."
"Spike thinks you do."

"Well Spike can take a running jump. As can you."

"Jesus what crawled up your hole?" Jazz was surprised. It took a lot to rile Derek, mainly because you have to care about something to get worked up about it and until Casey had come back on the scene there had been little to care about.

"Mind your own!"

"Let me guess. It's got something to do with Casey?"

Derek glared at him and turned away but Jazz slapped him on the upper arm with the back of his hand..

"What did she do? Steal all the bed clothes?" He grinned.
"Jazz..." Derek warned.

"Come on dude. Who else are you going to talk to? Spike?"

Derek sighed. In the past the only person he had to talk to had been Spike so he had largely kept his feelings to himself; it wasn't a good idea to let your boss know about personal crises. Having Jazz aware made things...interesting, particularly as in Derek's absence he appeared to have not only accepted Derek's back story but also begun to use Derek's real name when addressing him.

Derek scratched at the side of his nose and relented.

"Casey's pissed at me. That's nothing new but she's taken it to a new level."

"Oh?"
"I want her to stay in London with our family. Spike's put the whole family under surveillance and a guard. Casey would be safer with them there than here."

"And Casey didn't want to stay in London." Jazz guessed. "She's worried about her career?"

Derek shook his head. "She says..." Deep breath. "She says she doesn't want to be away from me. She says I need her and she's stopped talking to me."

There was silence for a moment.

"Wow!" Jazz said. He smiled. "And how does that make you feel?"

His partner frowned at him. "You a shrink now?"
Jazz chuckled. "I meant how does her confession make you feel?"

"Confession?"
"It's a big deal, Derek. Your pseudo-girlfriend told you she cares about you."
"My "pseudo-girlfriend" is my sister. Of course she fucking cares about me."

Jazz sighed. "Cut that shit out, it's old. She's not your sister. At least not legally. If I were you, I'd be turning cartwheels and then moving right on to tapping that ass."

There were no words to explain the degree of restraint Derek needed right at that moment.

"Jazz, right now, everyone close to me is in danger. My family and my friends. I need to put in place measures to keep them safe and one of the best ways to do that is to distance myself from them. My lame step-sister won't take the fucking hint and stay away from me. She's putting herself in danger from the same people who shot me in the head. She may care about me, but I care about her too and strangely seeing her with the back of her head missing is not something I'm in a hurry to witness. So she can start whistling the fucking wedding march for all I care and it isn't going to change the fact that being around me is going to get her killed."

Jazz looked taken aback.

"But that's why you're angry with her." He stated. "And she's back in Ottawa so she got her way. Why is she angry with you?"
Derek shrugged. "She thinks I'm pushing her away. And she right. If she won't stay in London, I won't stay in Ottawa. Marti says Casey's angry because I'm rejecting her because I don't want to be with her."

"And do you?"

"Do I what?"
"Want to be with her?"

"I don't want her to die."
"But if that wasn't hanging over you?"

Derek pulled a face but it was a contemplative one.

"I don't know."

As the day wore on, Derek had a meeting with Spike while his boss confirmed the security arrangements that were being made for the rest of the family. He raised a curious eyebrow when Derek acknowledged Casey's non-cooperation with the whole "stay away from Derek" idea.

"Did you expect her to?" Spike asked.

"Well I hoped her survival instinct would kick in." Derek stated.

Spike chuckled. "I've been married a long time and I can tell you that you should never tell a woman what to do, Derek. It always backfires on you. I doubt very much that you would ever get Casey to do something for you, willingly, by flat out stating she should do it."

"So what do we do?"
"How co-operative do you think she'll be?"
"Not at all, at least if it comes from me."

"So it coming from someone else might make a difference? I can try and have a word with her if you like."

Derek thought about it. "I doubt it would work, but she probably needs some reassurance about the rest of the family's safety and I can't give it to her because she's not talking to me."

"Hmm. Okay. I'll go see her. Now that you've calmed the fuck down, how do you think we should play this whole Sal business?"

"I think I should lay low, maybe go into hiding."

"You could, although that makes looking after everyone rather resource intensive. The fewer places I need to cover the better. Plus, you know Casey. She'll camp out in my office until one of us cracks as to where you are."

"I wouldn't tell you where I was. I'd just call in now and again. And Casey would get the message eventually."

"You really believe that? She would never forgive you. You know, sometimes you achieve more if you work together on stuff."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning, if you let Casey stay and stay yourself, maybe we will all end up wasting less time trying to keep her safe."

Derek took a deep breath. "I don't want her hurt, Spike."

"Then make sure you aren't the one doing the hurting."

Derek groaned, not missing the fact that was the second time in two days that someone had said that to him.

Casey was hurting. She was hurting a lot. The trouble was she was having a hard time justifying why. When she tried to look at things from Derek's point of view she really didn't see why he should treat her any differently than he had. They weren't dating. Casey should have no expectations of any sort of commitment from him – not even a commitment to stay with her as a roommate.

But her heart said otherwise. Her heart put too much weight on the time they had spent together. It saw something in the way they behaved together; saw love where there was probably only affection, joy where there was probably only a degree of happiness and contentment where there was only convenience. She had over-committed herself, left her heart open to hurt. Most of the anger she felt was directed towards herself.

The anger towards Derek was more about the danger he was putting himself in.

Returning to work took her mind off things, but only in so far as her hands were busy. The cases before her didn't help the distraction. She dealt with four gunshots wounds on her first day back, the result of gang warfare. Sometimes it wasn't easy to be in Trauma. She knew that the status quo with Derek couldn't continue, but she didn't know how to turn it around. Because to watch him walk away was more painful every time it happened.

"I'm looking for Dr McDonald." The voice carried from the nurses' station as Casey dealt with a 70 year old man with angina in a curtained cubicle. He was stable and one of the house doctors was playing second chair, so Casey excused herself and went to find her visitor.

"Mr Thompson." Casey said in surprise as she recognised Spike. He was smiling so she knew not to panic. "To what do I owe the honour?"
"Can't an old man visit a pretty girl?"

Casey snorted. "Nice try." She said. "But you're not an old man, you're a fairly young, happily married one who just so happens to be my brother's boss. I think we can all see the weak spots in that cover story."

Spike grinned. "Got time to talk?"

"Did Derek send you?"

"Not directly."

"Then fine. Coffee?" she asked and led him to the staff coffee lounge. Once there, Spike sat down. Casey chuckled.

"Don't get comfortable. I only came in here to get my purse. The coffee has been responsible for at least ten hospital admissions to my knowledge. We'll go across the street to the diner."

"So what do I owe the pleasure?" Casey asked again as the waitress brought their coffees.

Spike looked thoughtful and then sat back.

"Derek thought you might want to know what safety measures we've put in place for your family."

Casey nodded. "Okay…"

Spike straightened. "I've spoken to your step-father and explained to him that the threat level has increased. We discussed the family's day-to-day schedule and came up with some minor improvements to make them safer, so that they can continue their normal routines. With an armed presence of course. We've increased security at each of their dwellings, and we're currently vetting all of the contacts they make during the course of their normal week. So far we haven't had any problems, except for one of your sister's boyfriends."

Casey felt a shiver, she couldn't bear it if Marti lost Simon, she was just so…in love.

"Who?" Casey asked.

Spike reached into his pocket and withdrew a notebook. "Some contact of your sister Elizabeth's. He's an eco-activist but he has a rap-sheet a mile long. Fortunately, Elizabeth doesn't seem too distressed at severing the connection. She's moved out of the squat she was in and is currently staying at Edwin's apartment. Apparently he has a spare room. The situation is a big win for the local police because it cuts down on the number of premises under surveillance."

Casey nodded.

"Your mum works from home, and your youngest brother has quite a rigid schedule so looking after them is quite straight forward. Your step-father isn't too happy because we've advised again him taking part in these drop-in clinics he's been running. An appointment system gives us a chance to check out his clients before they step foot across the threshold."

"Sounds good."

"It is."

"I'm sorry you had to make a special trip out to see me. Derek could have told me himself."

Spike tilted his head with a wry smile. "Could he? I gather things are a little frosty between you right now."

Casey shrugged. "Only so long as he's being unreasonable."

"He doesn't think he is."

"He's treating me like a child." She protested.

"He cares about you."
Casey sat forward her voice a little raised. "And I care about him. I don't ask him to give up his job and stay at home all day."

"Is that what he asked you to do?"

"In a way. But it isn't about my job. It's about what I'm prepared to face. I can face the danger, I've done it before. What I can't face is the uncertainty, the silence, and the not knowing because he's hiding from me." She sipped at her coffee. "Maybe I'll only see him for a few minutes at night. Maybe he'll be grouchy as hell and a nightmare to live with. But with him it will be living. What I had in London…that wasn't living."

Spike nodded. "For what it's worth, I understand. And deep down, I think Derek does too. He's just worried about you."
Casey said nothing for a moment.

"He doesn't want me here." She said eventually.

"Did he say that?"

"Not exactly. But Sal has known about Derek for months, yet Derek still thinks I need to leave – or he'll leave me. Why at the first sign of trouble does he want us apart?"
Spike looked up at her with a complete look of sincerity on his face.

"We protect the things we love, even when that means we lose them. It's called love, Casey."