Well, we're there. The final chapter. Hope you enjoy. Apologies for it lacking in smut (You know who you are!) but maybe in the next one.
Clarity And Salvation
Chapter Fourteen
Grace hovered outside Boyd's office, her long dark coat buttoned around her, waiting for him to acknowledge her. She had been standing there for a full two minutes, watching him read, his fingers gently massaging his temples, his glasses slipping further and further down his nose. He looked calm and so deep in concentration that she hadn't wanted to disturb him, but she couldn't wait any longer. "Boyd."
"Hi." He glanced at her attire, his eyebrows quirking up in surprise.
"I don't want to be here for this."
Boyd waited a beat, not completely surprised by her reaction. She had practically sequestered herself in her office all day, going over work record sheets from the secure unit, typing her assessment for him and trying, he knew, to remember some small detail about a man who she had obvious had an effect on. Her work was technically complete but he needed a little more from her. "You know him better than anyone." He held up the manila file containing her report.
She chuckled coldly. "I don't want to know him." It was all so abstract because she had been inside his mind, had read about his relationship with the prisoners and his girlfriends suicide the previous years. She just had no recollection of the small man that Spencer was bringing in.
"Grace!"
Dropping unceremoniously on to his couch, she pulled her bag in front of her, protecting herself from an invisible threat. "He's a cat, bringing his mice home for mummy. He led us to six bodies, Boyd, all displayed for me. It doesn't matter that he only killed three of them, he knew about the others, he wanted to kill more, for me. Maybe you're right, maybe they are all sick and twisted." She felt like a failure. All three victims she had sat in a room with, listened and tried to help. The knowledge that there had been more bodies lying in unmarked graves while they sat through therapy and were released as treated was a little too much to take in.
When he had started the cold case unit he had never anticipated that it would become so personal, but all of them had histories and successes. He probably should have known. The last time he had seen her so unravelled she had almost been killed, him too for that matter. Back then his first thought had been to be a friend and protect her, this time all he wanted to do was hold her. "Don't you want to know why?"
"No," she replied emphatically. "I don't want to know why now or how. I just want to go home."
"I need you in the interview." She looked horrified at the prospect. He had planned on having her observe the interview and to prompt him on what to say.
"No." She glared back at him. "Sometimes you ask too much."
He studied her face, saw the exhaustion and the look of finality he recognised from the mirror when cases got too much.
"You have everything I can give you in the file."
She closed her eyes, her arms wrapping tighter around her body, effectively protecting herself from the world, and he knew that he couldn't put her though it.
"Will you at least wait in your office? Have a drink and wait for me, just in case."
"Boyd!"
"You should be here. What is it the Americans call it? Closure? And being at home, alone, will only make you wonder what's happening here."
She rolled her eyes, too many cases, too many quotes being thrown back at her. "I'll give you an hour then I'm going home." She rose to her feet wearily and headed back to her office, exchanging his couch for her own, knowing that an hour would surely turn into two.
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Twenty minutes later and Boyd still hadn't started the interview. Grace had finally moved from her couch to grab a drink. She made her way back from the coffee maker, her ears automatically pricking up when she heard Boyd's voice. He was clearly talking on the phone, his conversation loud enough for anyone close by to catch.
"Yeah, I know. I would have liked to have come over. You could have taken me for a sandwich. But she's been through a lot. The break in, the murders . . ."
It didn't take a genius to figure out who he was talking to and Grace didn't like the drift of the conversation.
"I don't think it's a good idea to leave her right now. She's been there for me and now it's my turn."
She made her way back to her office and grabbed her belongings before walking out past his office, the fresh cup of coffee discarded on her desk, his obvious pity too much for her to deal with.
Boyd laid down his phone and ran his fingers through his hair. It hadn't been the most difficult conversation of his life, he believed that might still be to come, but it was necessary.
"He's in the interview room," Stella announced, peering around his doorway before moving back to tell Grace. Her eyes scanned the empty office and she shrugged.
"Ok, You observe," Boyd called, focused on the suspect and practically marching towards the interview room. "Spencer, you're with me."
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Boyd had been surprised when he'd finally gotten out of the interview and found Grace's office in darkness. He'd known she hadn't wanted to sit in but he had thought he'd talked her into at least waiting around for him. It had taken nearly two hours to get everything he needed to ensure that Math Tomlinson would be spending the rest of his life under psychiatric care and that Grace could live without fear but he had expected she would wait. "Did Grace leave?"
"Why? Did you do something to piss her off?" Stella asked, packing the contents of the board into a plain cardboard box.
He raised an eyebrow, amused by her.
"Well it's not beyond the realm of possibility," she shrugged, her small grin etched across her face.
That much was true he had to acknowledge. He did have a way of saying the wrong thing to her or doing something she found less than favourable. But he had been trying of late, more touchy feely, less bull in a china shop, and despite the previous days fight he had thought they were progressing.
"The case is closed. She can go home," Eve offered, a wry smile on her face.
The prospect hadn't actually occurred to him. "Well I'm off too."
"Night," they called in unison, watching as he practically ran out of the building.
His apartment was lit up like a lighthouse when he arrived home, every lamp on, every door open. Grace was in the spare room, opening drawers and doors and making enough noise to wake the dead.
"What are you doing?" he asked, his tone bordering on accusation.
"Moving back to my house." She threw another sweater into the bag.
He chuckled bemused. "Can't that wait until tomorrow?"
"No," she replied vehemently, anger and confusion fighting for control of her body.
He wasn't sure why she was ticked off, only that she clearly was. "This is stupid, Grace."
"Yeah, well maybe I am stupid." At her age she should have known better than to let her feelings get away from her.
He threw his hands in the air, a gesture that was meant to provoke a reaction. "Women," he muttered under his breath.
She turned angrily. "Sorry?"
Ordinary men would have hesitated, would have considered carefully the next few words out of their mouth. Boyd was anything but ordinary. "You're all the same. There are all these unspoken rules. We ask how you are, you say fine. We just learn what to do to make you happy and the next minute it's the wrong thing to do. It's like it doesn't matter how hard I try, I'm never going to get it right."
She threw the closest thing at hand and it missed by miles.
Boyd had never walked a way from a fight in his life, in principle. In fact he thrived on it. Arguing with Grace normally didn't have that major an effect on him, they were friends after all who had disagreements like everyone else. This time he sensed it was different, that their friendship, their working relationship, everything was on the line. Silently, he left the room and walked through the apartment to the kitchen. Opening the cupboard, he took out a bottle of red wine he had bought especially for her and poured a glass, waiting and hoping she would follow.
"She wanted me to go over there for a few days. What you overheard was me making an excuse not to go," he ventured when she appeared in the doorway.
"No, what I overheard was you telling your girlfriend that you had a colleague staying and you felt like you had to stay."
Inwardly he smiled, knowing that he had guessed what was bothering her. Outwardly, he sighed, desperately needing to find a way out of the conversation before he said the wrong thing. Of course if he was reading the situation right, and he hoped he was, Grace was jealous. That meant only one thing.
"See, I'm right."
"Grace."
"No, Boyd, I'm done." She began to walk away.
He took a deep breath. "It was the easier option."
She stopped moving but remained with her back to him.
"I've never really had to tell someone it was over. People generally leave me. My wife, my girlfriends, Mel." He took another deep breath. "And now you."
His words had her trying to catch her breath.
"Although in your case it's probably a good thing you're leaving." He was raising his voice at her, he knew, and that never drew good results, but he couldn't help himself.
Grace turned slowly, wrapping her arms around her body, indicating nothing. "It is?"
"You make things complicated." There were so many adjectives he could have used but that seemed to sum it up in one.
She rose one eyebrow, challenging him to continue.
Boyd rubbed his hand across his face. There was a line between them, one that had become blurred since the break in, one that he hoped he wasn't imagining disappearing. So usually self-assured he wasn't used to honesty, and he wasn't used to leaving himself open to rejection.
Grace took a step towards him, her body language softening. "You don't exactly make life easy."
He shrugged nonchalantly.
"And I don't think I like being your excuse for dumping your girlfriend."
Boyd almost smiled at the way she snarled 'girlfriend.' "You are the excuse," he said softly, almost inaudibly. Not exactly the most romantic way of trying to tell her how he felt but then they had never been conventional.
Silence echoed in the apartment.
"Ok, not so much the excuse as the reason."
"Something I said?" Grace asked, practically holding her breath as her heart beat a little faster.
"You'd probably put it down to projecting or an attachment disorder, but there's this thing."
"Sounds nasty," she quipped, fleetingly wondering if the temperature had actually dropped in the apartment or if it was a sense of foreboding.
Boyd decided to chance it. If he was totally off base with the changing nature of their relationship she would walk away and over time he would stop missing her. If he was right, his future was going to be quite a roller coaster. "Would you like to go out, have dinner or something?"
"Boyd!"
"Not now. I mean we could if you want," he stumbled, suddenly feeling vulnerable. "But maybe another time, the two of us. And not in the middle of a case.
She didn't want to tell him that they always seemed to be in the middle of a case. "You're blustering again."
"I should probably talk to someone about that." He unconsciously walked towards her, grinning inanely and briefly leaving his emotions totally unmasked.
"Yes, you should." She gave him a tentative smile, not sure what would happen next but for probably the first time in her life wanting to be the risk taker in the relationship. "Not right now. Sometimes you should just stop talking."
"See now I'm confused. What should I do?" He was on a roll. In his head he was planning to tell her how he felt, to suggest that they try a date or two, maybe even apologise again for seeming to undervalue her. She had effectively stopped him.
"Peter."
His name coming from her lips conveyed the mixture of emotions he was fighting with and he closed the distance. "If I make a complete idiot of myself, forgive me."
"This could be the stupidest thing we've ever done," Grace whispered when he was barely inches from her, his proximity sending shivers through her.
"Not doing it could be even stupider." He stared at her, realizing that they were about to jump off a cliff.
"If you're going to kiss me you should just do it," she said in a rush of words, suddenly feeling sixteen again but without the awkwardness. "If you weren't maybe you should do it anyway."
Boyd's eyes twinkling were the last thing she remembered before her eyes fluttered shut and he kissed her for the first time. His smile was the first thing she saw when they needed to breath.
Grace took a deep breath and rolled over until she was on her side. She still couldn't quite believe that they had kissed or that she had ended up in his bed, him holding her while she slept. But it was real and he was asleep beside her, his hand in hers.
Lightly, she leaned in and brushed her lips against his, pulling away almost immediately.
Peter moaned lightly and she smiled before leaning in and kissing him again, teasing him with her lips.
Boyd didn't want to open his eyes, didn't want her to stop, knowing that they hadn't talked about what came next or how they were going to do this. As she pulled back again he tangled his fingers in her hair, tugging her back for a kiss, knowing that whatever happened this was the way he wanted to wake up.
The End