AN: I'm back on track with the story and should be posting once a week since I'm working 4 10 hr days during the summer. Cal is having a hard time with all the conflicting emotions…things might get a bit rocky for our couple…or they might not. Thanks for reading! :o)

Chapter 12: Torn

Cal had his head tilted to the side and watched as Gillian entered the room with her heels dangling from her fingers and her posture relaxed. Watching her slowly enter the office, it struck him how much smaller and more vulnerable Gillian seemed tonight. He couldn't ever remember her being in such a state. Not even the night that she had come apart in his arms and the whole nature of their relationship changed. That night she still had the inner strength that seemed to have vanished from her as she ambled past him. She let her heels drop near the side of her desk and stared out the window for some time. He dropped his feet from the desk and shifted around to watch her.

Finally, she turned and faced him. Her eyes were still glassy and red; her makeup was washed away, showing the small imperfections a good cry will leave behind. His heart broke for her and his mind raged over the truths revealed, yet she had never looked more beautiful to him than she looked at this moment. He knew in his soul that this was the true Gill. His Gill. The entirety of the woman that he had been in love with for so many years.

"Nice to meet you, love."

A smile played at the corner of his mouth as he flopped his head to the other side, changing his viewpoint. His eyes roamed over her face and then her body as he drank in the real Gillian Foster. He thirsted for her as a man in the desert thirsts for a single drop of water. He tried to study all of her at once - the slight shrug of her shoulder as she bore his scrutiny, the hint of a frown as her mind worked out what to say to him, the love radiating from her eyes with an intensity he had never felt from her before, and how she crossed her arms in front of her the way she did the night he showed up on her doorstep. His hazel eyes darted back and forth as he took in her presence.

"Enough, Cal. I'm not one of your studies."

His eyes shifted and locked on hers. His grin widened a bit.

"You are now, love. Like it or not."

She sighed and shook her head. He knew those gestures well and it was a comfort to him that there was truth in her mannerisms when she reacted to him. There was a foundation of truth between them, albeit a narrow one, and he hoped that would be enough to anchor them during this storm. This day had already dragged on forever and it was clear to him that she was not going to start the conversation tonight. The roles between them would be reversed. He was usually the one clammed up, leaving her to draw him out of his shell. He needed to get her talking again.

"Well, what a shitty day this turned out to be."

He watched her as she nodded, not saying a word. He bared his teeth.

"You're not going to make this easy for me, are you?"

She met his eyes and straightened up a bit.

"I don't want to hurt you anymore."

He studied her and found nothing to show deceit, but that gave him little comfort.

"Cal, we both know that you're not going to find what you are looking for. Stop reading me and listen to me. I'm done hiding from you. What you see is what you get."

Despite everything he felt for her, the anger was surfacing again and he was too tired to resist any more. He wanted answers and this is how he got them.

"You don't want to hurt me anymore? That's rich coming from you."

He watched her shrink again before him, but it didn't faze him.

"I find out today that my wife cheated on me, the bastard took photographs to blackmail her with, and Emily might not be my biological daughter. But that's not all. Oh no, it gets worse. My best friend. My partner. My lover. The one woman in my life I trusted with everything that means something to me is at the center of it all. You..."

The venom in his voice was not lost on Gillian. Cal stalked back and forth, stopping to point at her as he turned his wrath to her actions.

"You. I don't even know who you are. You're a bloody stranger to me. You betrayed me. You lied to me for years. To ME! And I didn't have a fucking clue."

Cal wasn't sure who he was angrier at - Gillian for hiding everything or himself for not seeing her lies and half truths. He turned back to her and got right up in her face, head tilted and teeth bared.

"What gave you the right to make all those decisions in our lives? Tell lie after lie after lie? Did it even happen the way you said or were you and RJ an item? Did you push him to blackmail her to get to me? Did you fuck him too? I bet you two planned..."

"Don't you finish that sentence, Cal Lightman, or I'm out of here. Everything I did, everything, was out of love for you and Emily. You're angry and have every right to be. You could send me away and never speak to me again and I would deserve it."

Cal clenched his fists as Gillian got up in his face and started poking him in the chest, pushing him back into her desk.

"But you have no right, NO RIGHT to imply that I had anything to do with RJ's blackmailing Zoe or them getting together. You know what kind of person I am. Despite all the lengths I went to hiding this from the three of you, you of all people know that a leopard can't change its spots and a person can't completely mask the essence of who they are."

His breath caught in his chest as her fingers hovered over his lips. He was trembling from the anger and adrenaline surging in him. Her touch froze him in place and the sound of her voice sent a chill down his spine.

"You're angry. You lash out when you're angry; say hurtful, mean things. I've taken enough of yours and everyone else's shit over the years. I'm done. The next words out of your mouth will decide whether we work through this or not."

As her fingers dropped from his lips, he stared at her and felt conflicting emotions.

"Choose your next words carefully, Cal."

Something snapped inside of Cal at those words and his mouth took over.

"So that's it then? The controlling one has spoken again. Making more decisions for me?"

"No...You're free to choose. And I am free to choose not to be verbally abused by the irrational, paranoid ranting of a man blinded by rage, justified or not."

Cal paced before her, trying to get a grip on his emotions. He knew that he was on the verge of blowing what small chance they have to overcome what happened.

"Cal?"

He noticed the softness in her voice and it was soothing to him. He sat on the edge of her desk as she straightened out his shirt and pushed his hair out of his face.

"Do you honestly think that I had anything to do with Zoe and RJ getting together or blackmailing her?"

"Fuck if I know..."

He looked at her as she searched his eyes to find the truth. She moved to the desk, wrote a note on a piece of paper, folded it and handed it to him. Confused, he watched her exit the room without a word.

He flopped in the chair again and waited for her to return. He ignored the paper, leaned back letting his arms dangle and closed his eyes. After a few deep breaths he fell into a light sleep and the paper slipped from his grasp to the floor.