He'd left her with the parting word of "Always," after the case that involved her friend Matthew ended. He'd been hard on her, bordering on asshole, those couple of days, trying to protect her and frustrated that he knew something much deeper was going on that she wasn't sharing with him that might help him understand her behavior.
The snow was just starting to fall that night when he pulled up in front of his apartment. He let himself inside and immediately went and grabbed a beer before sitting on his couch. He leaned his head back and closed his eyes, thinking about everything he'd shared with her a couple years before, and everything she'd shared with him since then. He finally came to the conclusion that she did trust him, so whatever it was she was holding back from him must have been pretty damn bad.
He picked up his phone to call her, but then set it down. He'd sat in his car thirty minutes before and watched her walk off alone and she obviously wanted space. He turned on his TV and tried to not think. About an hour later, she showed up at his door, freezing cold, with tears in her eyes.
"I told Rossi because he pressed me, and I couldn't tell you because I didn't want you to think less of me. Because it wasn't something done to me, it was something I did to myself."
He pulled her inside and helped her get out of her coat before wrapping her in a hug and rubbing his hands up and down her back to try and warm her up. "You can tell me anything," he said to her when she stopped shivering in his arms.
He made her a hot cup of tea, and she sat on his couch with a blanket wrapped around her. She told him the whole story about getting pregnant, and Matthew, and having an abortion. He reached for her hand and squeezed it. "I wish I'd known from the beginning of this case, and I'm so sorry you went through all of that back then and felt so scared and alone. But, Emily, it doesn't define you."
She gave him a small smile at those words and stood up, going to her coat and retrieving a picture, which she handed to him. "My fifteenth birthday, in Rome. My mom and dad were out of town for several days, and the house attendant who was supposed to be keeping an eye on me with strict boundaries turned a blind eye when I told her I was going to spend the whole day with friends for my birthday. John and Matthew and I spent the day exploring Rome, doing what we wanted." She smiled at the memory. "It was a great day."
Derek looked at the picture and gently ran his finger over the face of a much younger Emily. "They were good friends," he stated.
"They were."
"I'm sorry about Matthew, Emily."
She whispered, "Thank you," and sat against the corner of his couch, her knees drawn up and her eyes staring intently at him. "Do you ever have a full day where you just feel completely relaxed?"
He set the picture on his coffee table and turned to face her. "Not really. Not in a very, very long time."
She nodded again, understanding. "Me, too. The last time was the day that picture was taken. A couple months after that, I found out I was pregnant and I never really can remember a full day of relaxation after that, because my mind would drift to that time a lot, and when that finally stopped, I was in college and life was stressful, and then there was my career. So that was the last time I had a whole day where not a single bad memory or something stressful or sad entered my mind, on my fifteenth birthday. What about you?"
He looked at her and cleared his throat. "My dad took me to a Chicago Cubs game. We left the house in the morning and went out to breakfast, and then went to the afternoon game. He brought me to the field early and some of the players signed my baseball glove. During the game, he held me by my legs so I could reach over the wall and get a foul ball that rolled down the third base line. We went out to dinner and a movie that night, made a whole day out of it. Four days after that, he was murdered," he said softly.
She blinked back the tears in her eyes and searched his face. It wasn't the first time the thought crossed his mind to throw all caution to the wind, to forget their jobs and the consequences and just let themselves get lost in each other and forget the sadness, but it was the most powerful the feeling had ever overcome him. He thought about how much he valued and relied on her friendship, and he banished that thought as quickly as it came.
She reached out and touched his arm. "We are both a hot mess, Derek Morgan," she said with a sad laugh.
He laughed sadly, too. "Maybe we should try it one time. A whole day, no talking about work or anything heavy. Nothing but fun."
She gave him a small grin. "OK. But I'm fairly certain that's a lofty goal. I'm not sure I even know how to really relax anymore for any extended period of time. I'm willing to give it a shot, though."
It became almost a joke after that between the two of them. It was either laugh or cry about it, how they couldn't get far enough away from a case to carve out a time they both felt up to giving one day of pure relaxation a go, and the few times they tried, they inevitably got called into work.
That summer was a beautiful, unbelievable assault on his emotions, as his heart went places he didn't even know it could go. He didn't know so many days of consecutive, absolute happiness were even possible. It started his first day there, and continued on his second day, when they went to get him a wetsuit and she got one, too. It was nearly his undoing in the small surf shop, seeing her in that wetsuit and wanting nothing but to get her out of it, right there in the dressing room.
It spiraled from there into a series of ecstatic images that he had to remind himself were real at the end of every day: How they took the boogie boards out and laughed as they rode waves together; how they kayaked to the tide pools and flipped the kayak over when Em leaned forward and tried to put a starfish on his face; how when they'd get out of the ocean, she'd partially unzip her wetsuit so there was just a hit of cleavage showing, and how the sand on her chest would dry and sparkle in the sun. How they both smiled and laughed almost all the time, and her shoulders never went rigid, and she was always affectionate.
He met Gretchen and instantly fell in love with that woman and her chickens, and loved watching how Em adored her. They walked to the farmer's market a couple times a week, and they woke up early in the mornings together and got breakfast ready for the people at the inn. They spent countless nights talking to the guests around the outdoor fire pit, hearing interesting stories. And Em's hand rarely left his.
His knee got stronger and they swam longer distances in that cold ocean water. No matter how much sunscreen Em put on, she got some natural color in her cheeks and a few freckles appeared on her nose, and he could spend an eternity running his lips over her sun-kissed skin and never get tired of it.
They slept a sound, solid eight hours a night, naked in each other's arms. And he woke up each morning marveling at the fact that this was his life and it was so fucking good that it defied all possibility. The bit of pessimist in him who had a series of both longer and shorter failed relationships thought about things crashing down around him, but this wasn't like those other relationships. He and Emily had loved each other for a very long time without acknowledging it, and there was nothing they didn't know about each other. All the joy, relaxation and calm they'd held in reserve because of life circumstances exploded over both of them that July. Together, and finally having the freedom, they discovered they knew how to live crazy happy, and they lived it every day.
The flip side of the coin was that he was still Derek Morgan, and he had to play his role. He kept his promise to Penelope, driving some distance once a week, turning on his personal cell phone and giving her a call. The first time, he drove to San Francisco. "My car just kept going west like it couldn't get here fast enough," he told her. Not a lie.
The second time, he drove to Pacifica. He parked his car facing the ocean and dialed her number. When she picked up, she said, "It's your lucky day. We're in the briefing room." And he listened and gave vague answers as all of those people he cared about asked him how he was doing. He leaned his head against the seat and closed his eyes as their voices washed over him. He had no regrets, but he missed them.
He drove home that evening and found Em in their kitchen making dinner. He stood behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist and leaning his forehead on her shoulder. "When you left for London, how long did it take before you stopped missing all of us?"
She turned in his arms and hugged him. "I never did. I still haven't. I just learned to live with missing them. But over time, I stopped thinking about them so much, except you. I still thought about you every day. I'm sorry, Derek."
"Don't be. I wouldn't trade this life for anything. Really. I was just wondering."
He stepped outside to call his mom, the woman he could be a little more candid with. He asked her if she wanted to come out to California for Thanksgiving and she jumped at the opportunity. He explained that no one knew about Melanie yet, but it wasn't complicated anymore and he was very happy.
"I can tell by your voice that you're happy, Derek, and I'm happy for you, my son. She's hiding from someone?"
He figured his mom might eventually guess something like this, that Melanie was hiding from an abusive ex or something along those lines. And the truth was she was hiding from someone, many someones. "Something like that," he told his mom.
"I don't need to know the story, but I'm glad she found someone like you."
Derek smiled into the phone. "Me, too."
Two weeks later, he made the call to Penelope from Santa Cruz and started planting the next seed. "I really love it here. I'm thinking about getting a house to renovate."
At the beginning of August, he bought a small hot tub for the back patio and put in a fence so they had privacy. The night it was all ready, and once it got dark, he put on his swimsuit and said, "Come on, Em."
She raised her eyebrow at him. "A swimsuit? Really?" And she stripped off her clothes right there in the kitchen and walked out to the patio, smiling at him over her shoulder. It was a warm night, the area experiencing a heat wave, but the ocean breeze was comfortable.
What he remembered first about the night was the hot water and her resting her back against his chest and both of them staring out at the stars. He remembered his hands feeling so comfortable on her skin; he loved the wonder and new discoveries, but this level of comfort was just as good.
She turned around after a few minutes to face him in the water and kissed him. Her hands ran over his body, and his did the same over hers. After a few minutes, he pushed forward and moved her to the seat on the opposite side of the hot tub, entering her in one swift movement that caused her to throw her head back and gasp. His lips immediately found her neck and they started moving, but after a couple of minutes she gasped, "I'm going to pass out. It's too hot in here."
He was feeling the same way and helped lift her to the edge of the hot tub, but once she was there, he couldn't maneuver his knee in the right position to get any sort of leverage. She smiled at him and touched his face. "Come on, gimpy," she said.
She helped him out of the hot tub and they didn't make it far. She threw both their towels down on the patio, one on top of the other, and used her hands to guide him to lay down. And then all he could remember was her on top of him, her skin with small drops of water on it shining in the moonlight, and the millions of stars beyond her body as she moved over him.
After, she laid her body on top of his and whispered, "We became."
"Hmmm?" he asked.
"We hung in there long enough to become this, Derek. Never in my wildest dreams did I think life could be like this."
And then he remembered clutching her to him and smiling with her in his arms.
The third Friday in August, he was sitting in a chair outside and Em was mowing the lawn. The pressure of pushing the mower over the inclined lawn was still hard on his knee, so he'd let her sleep in while he took care of breakfast at the inn and now was enjoying the view of her in her shorts, pushing the mower over the yard.
He felt a presence behind him before a familiar voice he'd missed so much sarcastically whispered, "This is what I shot you for, so you could ogle her while she does all the work?"
He sprang up from his chair and wrapped JJ in his arms, both of them laughing together. The lawn mower cut off and Melanie was beside them. JJ glanced at her, her eyes going wide at first, before her hand reached out and touched Melanie's nose gently. "Emily?" she asked.
Melanie nodded and tears came to her eyes before she put her arms around JJ. Derek stood back with a smile on his face while the two of them hugged.
When Emily released her, JJ looked at the both of them. "We had a case. In Fresno. Will has Henry in Louisiana this weekend, and I couldn't stand the idea of being so close and not coming here. When the case ended, I laid it on thick about how it had been a hard one for me, and I was going to take a couple of days to enjoy the west coast, and fly home Monday. I got in a rental car and drove straight here. I tried calling, but neither of you answered."
"The phones are in the cottage," said Derek.
JJ was free and easy with them. "Ahh, the life of not having to have a cell phone attached to your hip."
They laughed and Melanie said, "Let me show you around."
Derek collected many happy memories that weekend: How Em lent JJ some beach-appropriate clothes and they all sat around talking, how JJ couldn't stop smiling at the two of them, how at one point when Melanie went off to the the main house to clean up breakfast, JJ whispered to him, "I can see how it would be worth it, me shooting you. Your happiness is contagious."
But his favorite memory was on Saturday evening, when he went to deal with a couple of guests checking in and returned to the cottage to find it empty. He went outside and his eyes searched the beach and he spotted the two of them sitting in the sand facing the water, and Em's arm was around JJ's shoulder. It was only after JJ left that Derek learned she'd told Emily everything that had been going on with her over the past few years, but he knew instantly, seeing the two of them together on the beach, that he'd made the right decision to get their friendship back together. Emily could understand every feeling JJ experienced better than any of them.
On Sunday night, before they all went to bed, and when JJ had to get up very early in order to make her flight out of San Jose the next morning, Em looked at JJ while she was settling into the sleeper sofa in the cottage. "You shouldn't lie to Will because of me. And he won't tell anyone; we both could have exploded into a million pieces a few years back. He owes me one. I want you to visit again, free and clear. Your whole family is welcome here. Henry would love it. So you do what you think is right, but I don't want you to have secrets from your husband because of me."
JJ nodded gratefully at her. "We'd all love it here."
Em smiled, "You have a free room for eternity."
The last Sunday in August, he woke up slightly when Em got out of bed way earlier than usual. "Sleep," she whispered to him. "It's a surprise."
He grinned sleepily and dozed for a bit after that, but came awake fully at seven that morning, used to the routine of getting breakfast ready for the guests. He stayed in bed and waited. He heard the door to the cottage open just before eight and heard her voice call out, "Close your eyes."
He smiled and closed his eyes. He heard her walk into the room and felt her sit next to him on her side of the bed. "This place is like a vacation every day, you're right. But it's busy and we have responsibilities throughout the day. We still haven't gotten our full day of complete relaxation after years and years of wanting it."
He moved his head towards her and she whispered. "Keep your eyes closed."
He felt something smooth and slightly heavy placed in his hands. "Gretchen is coming over today to take care of breakfast clean up, and hang out. She'll handle anything that might come up. We have a full fourteen or so hours to have our completely relaxing day, so I thought a combination of both my last relaxing day and yours."
He felt something placed on his head, and had his first thought of what was going on.
"Okay," she said. "Open them."
His eyes first glanced down at the baseball glove in his hands, emotion overtaking him. "Chicago Cubs at the San Francisco Giants this afternoon, seats right on the third base line," she whispered.
And when he looked up he saw she'd dyed her hair back to the color he remembered. He reached out to touch those dark strands gently before pulling the hat from his head and looking at the Cubs emblem on it.
She blinked back tears at the look on his face. "We'll explore San Francisco, go to the game, have dinner in the city. We can even see a movie if you want before heading home."
He moved and crushed her in a hug. "Emily," he whispered.
And she didn't say anything about that. She laughed against his shoulder. "I've never been to a baseball game and I have no idea what in the hell I'm getting into, but I'm sure we'll have fun. We always do. I had to ask a guest here about the third base line and where to buy tickets. I can't hold you by your legs while you try and get a foul ball. You're on your own there."
He laughed and touched her hair again before kissing her.
"OK?" she asked against his lips.
"The best. We've waited a long time for this."
A/N: One more chapter, I think. :)
