.

...

Seeing that Barbara was not embarrassed at all but rather interested and not just listening for the sake of being polite Tommy continued.

"Looking back I think Helen and I... we've been friends, nothing more. Well, best friends but mostly nothing more. We've had our time when we were in love but I think it was a short period. It wasn't meant to last. Not even when we've tried for the second time. We still had our different daily routines and it mostly had been... well..." ...sexual needs?

He was silent for a while. She was alone, I was alone, we were still married after all. We've met simply... "...out of habit I'd say. We've never reached a love-level again like it had been at the beginning."

He paused again.

"I hadn't realised it then, or actually didn't want to realise it. We were married. Full stop! It had to work." he sighed and shook his head, staring up into the sky. "Realisation just slowly crept into my brain. Something between us wasn't working right anymore."

And she even started to make jokes about 'my whatever-she-said Sergeant Havers' and pitied me for being stuck with Havers in some tiny mobile home.

"She had hit me deeply with some remarks about my friends."

By the cautious glance he shot at her Barbara could tell that he was talking about her.

Tommy sighed.

"Before she died we hadn't had the time to sort it out, but I guess, or merely hope, we'd felt the same about our relationship. Well, we'll never know for sure now, will we?"

He showed a bitter smile. "But anyway, when she was... shot..." he swallowed and suddenly remembered another shot. He searched for Barbara's eyes as if to make sure she was there and alive. "I've lost one of my best friends."

Barbara reached over and stroked his upper arm in a gentle encouraging manner. It had come out of the blue and she immediately was shocked about her own boldness, about the contact, so she retrieved her hand and crossed her arms in front of her chest.

Tommy's skin prickled where she had touched him. Though he told himself that she must have meant it simply as a friendly and reassuring gesture it was very clear to him who it was who had placed this caress on his arm.

He cleared his throat and smiled at Barbara.

"Someone then told me that there would be a world out there." he said. "I think I finally understand." You're my anchor to the real world.

They shared another deep look without words. In their memories both were back on that bench on the hill.

"Hm." Barbara nodded and took a sip from her wine.

Despite their serious conversation and all of Tommy's confessions her thoughts had quickly turned when she had found herself drowning in his dark eyes again.

Tommy catched himself bathing in the green of her eyes and his thoughts turned to Cornwall's green and pleasant hills. Before he could do something stupid he quickly went on talking.

His mother had always endorsed his support for Barbara. She had been happy that her son had found a loyal friend and she had liked Barbara from the first moment they met.

"Even when it had been a little awkward on both sides." he winked. He told Barbara that his mother always thought of her as a good grounded influence on her son. Someone who talked back, someone who did not care about his title or money, someone who soothed him.

"I soothed you?" Barbara asked doubtfully. What is he trying to say? "With insubordination?"

"Bollocks." Tommy said and shot her one of her 'Oh, please!'-glances. "You soothe me with being so grounded. Artless. And you... I don't know..."

He raked his hair unsure what to say that did not sound awkward or trite. "...you are so you."

And I am so dim-witted sometimes. he thought and took a sip from his wine. And Daze had let him feel her own opinion on that matter when he had been there the previous two weeks.

Tommy told Barbara that Daze, perhaps because of her problematic relationship to her son, perhaps because of the general differences she had with Helen, always had kept some slight distance towards his wife. For his mother's liking, as sophisticated as she might be, Helen always had been too distinguished, a little more posh and even stiffer than Tommy.

"More posh? Is that possible? So you both were quite a match after all, weren't you?" Barbara chuckled, trying to push the conversation to some easier point.

"Not as much as I wanted us to be." Tommy let go a deep sigh. "In fact now, looking back, I think as lovers we didn't match at all."

And Helen had made too many comments about Barbara and poked fun at Tommy about his friendship to his DS. But he never would tell her that.

"Say, wasn't it a certain DS who talked me into this?" Tommy joked.

Both remembered a conversation on a window sill when Tommy had been in one of his moods and totally distracted from their current case by his thoughts about Helen and Barbara had spelled it out for him that he loved Helen.

"I didn't talk you into this, Sir." she objected. But I should've kept my mouth shut anyway.

"Well, probably not." he agreed with a nod. I talked myself into this.

He said it aloud that he probably was talking himself into this relationship with Helen. "I probably had mixed up friendship with love."

Tommy shrugged his shoulders.

He shot a sideglance over to his sometimes so insubordinate Sergeant Havers, to the crazy stubborn woman next to him, to the fierce, strawberry haired lady.

Barbara. He pictured her when she had leaned against the stem of the chestnut tree in his garden, her eyes on him like she had tried to seduce him. And how he suddenly could tell her things he never would have dared to share with anyone. Yes, this feels quite different. I don't feel 'just friendship' towards Barbara. I already love her.

Tommy smiled when he recognised the little rosy blush on her cheeks as if she had heard his thoughts..

While pretending to look out into the garden Barbara tried to hide her sideglances to Tommy, to his poncy Lordship, to the eloquently handsome man next to her, to her sometimes so bossy DI. He's not mine. she scolded herself. And did he not just gave a hint that their friendship should remain a friendship?

Barbara recalled the drops that ran down his chest when he stood in the middle of his living room with nothing on but a towel, a smug smile in his eyes that showed how he liked to be undressed by her looks. She swallowed and felt her cheeks heaten up. And what sort of things she suddenly could talk about without being embarrassed to the bone. Well, it seems like it's already too late for 'just friendship'. I already love him.

Just to say something and to take up the thread of their conversation she admitted that she maybe did play a little initial role in his relationship with Helen.

"...but I'm probably the worst advisor when it comes to relationships."

"Don't say that, Barbara." Tommy said with some indignation. "You know that's bullshit."

Barbara cringed by his nontypical choice of words and turned her face to his.

He smiled reassuringly. "You're witty. You're strong. And your instincts are good and reliable." His voice died away. Maybe it is not quite so clear when it comes to your own needs, your own emotions.

Tommy wanted to take her hand and squeeze it but thought better of it and stopped halfway, so he just dropped his hand on the bench between them.

Barbara decided to keep her mouth shut. She felt a little awkward with his compliments and kept her flushed face away from his. And she was well aware of his hand so close to her.

"You're always a good advisor. It always comes from your heart." Tommy said gently. "You're grounded and realistic. And you've been right then - I did love Helen, though for a working marriage I should've been in love with her. Which I wasn't. Well..."

He stopped talking when a clear thought formed in his head. I think I'm in love with you.

He harrumphed, then raised his glass with just the remains of some white wine to Barbara. "Here's to you!"

Silently she drank a toast to him. If you'd ever know.

.

...