"Dr McDonald?"

Casey looked up into vivid green eyes set in one of the most attractive faces she had ever seen. She blinked and stood awkwardly, her magazine dropping to the waiting room floor and her purse rapidly following it.

"Robin Hargreaves. Head of Trauma." The tall man said cheerily pushing his hand out for her to shake, but then catching her fingers and bringing them up to his lips.

"Dr Hargreaves. Thank you for agreeing to see me." Casey stuttered and bent quickly to pick up her purse. She didn't notice him check out her backside and by the time she straightened he was all decorum.

"Oh no! It's Robin. And thank you for agreeing to come in. Dr White was very complimentary about you when we spoke on the phone. He seems to think that we would be lucky to have your expertise on our staff." He said flatteringly.

Casey blushed. "Dr White has a habit of exaggerating."

Robin smiled slightly patronisingly. "Not by much. I've read your resume. You've made quite a name for yourself in London."

Casey shook her head. "I was just in the right place at the right time."
"Steven said that Trauma is a kind of personal quest for you."

"I lost a brother to a GSW." Casey said simply. Lost a brother, gained a…whatever.

Robin nodded sympathetically. "Well let me show you around."

For the next forty minutes, Casey was shown around the ER and Trauma departments of the hospital by Robin Hargreaves. He was a decent guide and seemed a nice guy, and although he was about seven years older than Casey, he was easy on the eye. In different circumstances, Casey might have found his flirtatious nature attractive. But she was here for a purpose…and a person. She was here for Derek – and that changed everything.

After a tour of the lower areas of the trauma unit, Robin took Casey further up into the hospital to show her some of the areas the trauma patients were released to when they have been stabilised and assessed. These included ICU and High-Dependency.

Robin led her through the maze of corridors with a practiced ease and into an area laid out in such a way that Casey didn't need the signs to know that it was ICU.

"We're quiet today." He said, and the nurses' station did seem quite laid back for once. "The rush from the weekend has gone and we are just handling a couple of car crash victims and a gun shot wound." He pointed to the whiteboard behind the desk listing the patients. "Jason Ransome" was the last on the list.

"Gun shot wound?" Casey queried. Robin laughed.

"Ah yes…your interest in GSWs. You'll like this one. It's a complex case. Would you like to review the patient's notes? I can't take you in to see him. He's under police protection right now."

Yes! Casey did a silent fist-pump in her mind.

"The notes would be just fine." She said calmly. "I'm always interested in complex cases."

"Well when we've finished here, I'll take you across to geriatrics and show you the gangrenous foot that results when a seventy two year old man cleans his hunting rifle without checking if it's loaded, and then leaves it too long before he seeks medical attention."

"Thanks!" replied Casey, inwardly grimacing. Rotten flesh was one of her reflux triggers. Derek Venturi – you so owe me!

To which her own mind replied, "Owe" or "own"?

Since Derek had woken yesterday, he had managed to get out of bed and even take a brief shower. Casey had helped him into the bathroom, and actually offered to help wash him until he had shooed her away with indignation.

"You just keep your "doctor's" hands to yourself." He insisted, causing her to giggle behind his back although she was secretly relieved. Despite her reticent comments about "naked Derek", and the fact that she was being truthful when she described his…asset…as "normal", size didn't matter to Casey and Derek naked was very distracting.

As for Derek…the idea of getting naked in front of Casey while he was conscious didn't appeal; or at least not while she was playing "doctor". Correction: not while she was playing doctor in this context.

Shoot me now. Derek's brain screamed. I will not fantasise about Casey.

Too late. The shower would have to be a cold one.

Once he was clean and dressed in the new clothes she had bought him they had spent the whole afternoon chatting about friends and family the way they had done before - when Derek was Mikey and they both had secrets. Now the conversation was more open, more honest…well at least as far as talking about everyone else was concerned.

At about 5pm. Dr Steven White (Casey's friend and co-worker in London) had phoned back to "Calam" with the news that she was waiting for. She had an interview the following morning with the Head of Trauma at Jazz's hospital who had been Steven's mentor at his first post-graduation position – in Ottawa.

It had taken quite a while for Casey to reassure both Steven and Derek that she wasn't really planning on moving to Ottawa; Derek's face was a picture when she told him she was going to ask for an interview! Instead, although she only explained this part to Derek and not Steven, the idea was that an interview would inevitably also include a tour of the hospital's trauma areas – and maybe the opportunity to get an update on Jazz's health, without alerting anyone to Casey's interest in the one specific patient.

Casey was grateful that neither of them asked where the idea had come from.

She might have convinced them it was a spur of the moment thing, but the reality was Casey had been curious about the Ottawa hospitals since the moment Derek reintroduced himself into her life. She wasn't lying when she said she wasn't planning to stay in Ottawa…yet. But she was gradually realising the more time she spent with Derek, the harder it was going to be to walk away.

At the moment, Derek was waiting for her to return from the interview to their hotel room, hopefully with news of his partner. Despite the pain, he paced the floor watching the door impatiently while she was gone. It wasn't only Jazz's health and welfare he was concerned about but Casey's too. She was getting caught up in his world which both worried and pleased him. Just because Derek couldn't have Casey in his life didn't mean that he didn't want her there.

At 12.30pm, the hotel room door opened and Casey walked in carrying promising-looking paper food bags, and with an air of smugness about her.

"Lunch!" Casey announced, holding up the package.

"And?" he pushed.

Casey smiled, rather impressed. Derek normally put food before everything else. It was nice to see that didn't include his friends and their well-being. She placed the food bags on the side and turned to face him.

"Massive bone injury with associated soft tissue damage. When he was admitted he had a pulse-less, insensate left lower extremity with an entrance wound on the anterior lateral aspect of the thigh, just above the knee, and a larger posterior medial exit would. He was given Ringer's lactate, packed red cells, and plasma as part of the resus process and…"

Derek held up a hand. "Can we have the Cliff's notes version please?" he asked.

Casey chuckled. "You mean "Trauma for Dummies – abridged."?"

"I mean is he alive?"

She frowned. "You think I'd joke about it if he wasn't? What sort of person do you think I am?"

Derek sighed and sat down shakily on the bed. "Sorry. Tell me."
Casey moved to sit down next to him. "It was touch and go for a while but he's alive, they've externally pinned his leg and providing the infection-prevention procedures continue to be effective the worst he should have is a limp. They say he came in with a tourniquet round his thigh…was that you?"

He nodded. "I was worried he'd bleed out. I know it's a last resort approach but there was so much blood I could tell pressure points wouldn't work."

"You saved his life Derek. How did you know about that?"

He shrugged. "A bit of training…a bit of experience." He said cryptically.

Casey bit her bottom lip all trace of her previous good humour gone.

"What?" Derek asked, seeing the sadness in her face and not liking it.

"It's nothing…just, sometimes I feel like I don't know you anymore." She whispered. Derek took her hand in his own. "Right back at ya, princess." He said equally softly and then rallied. "Although I'm still my usual charming self. All pranks, innuendo and raging appetite…did you say something about "lunch"?"

Casey groaned and batted him on the arm affectionately – for them. And then she stood up and went to wash her hands so that she could dish out the food.

They ate sitting together at the little table again and Derek asked Casey more about her morning.

"So. How was the hospital?" He asked (almost) between mouthfuls.

"Impressive. They have equipment there we only dream of, and my current department isn't small. The staff seem nice, and Robin was charming."
"Robin?"

"Head of Trauma…the guy that interviewed me."
"Your interviewer told you to call him Robin?" Derek asked his face suddenly serious.

"Yes. He was really friendly, really approachable and totally gorgeous!" Casey enthused.

"Did he introduce you to Batman?" Derek asked and there was a definite increase in the force with which he chewed his sub roll.

Casey didn't notice and continued her breakdown of the visit – and Robin's attentions.

"I mean, clearly the man is respectful. Not many men kiss your hand rather than shake it."

"No because most normal women see it as a blatant come-on and knee you in the balls if you try it." He pointed out.

"Meaning?" Casey asked archly.

"Obviously, that you aren't normal." He smirked, loving the fact that he was pissing her off in the way that only he could.

Truman who?

Casey clenched her jaw and breathed in deeply through her nose and suddenly he realised he had gone too far.

"You're an idiot, Derek! I've been nothing but helpful to you in the last two days – despite you being mean to me only hours before. Today I even inspected (at rather close range) a particularly disgusting case of gangrene - all in the cause of finding out how your partner was. I thought we'd grown up and moved past all the arguments we had as teens. I thought we were adults now. Instead I find you are the same moron I always knew and loathed!"

She got up to storm off but Derek caught her by the hand.

"You can't have it both ways Casey. You complain that you don't know me anymore and then you tell me off for being the same guy I was back then. Which is it? Do you want the old me or the new me?" His eyes burned into hers.

Casey sat back down again.

"I'm sorry." She said. "I just don't think I know how to talk to you without an argument. When we talked that night at the party, I thought it was a sign that we could be different with each other. After you died I regretted the way we had been in the years before - so much. When you came back into my life I hoped it was a new start. But now I find myself…"
"Slipping into old habits." Derek finished for her.

"Yes. Old habits are hard to break."

"I'm a habit?" he smirked. Casey rolled her eyes at him.

"You're something I want to break." She grinned. Derek threw the arm from his good side around her shoulders.

"Thanks. You're rather irritating too." He said kissing the side of her head.

"Oh?" Casey chuckled.
"Yeah. Like a rash. A constant itch that I…" He stopped and looked at her in panic.

A constant itch that I want to scratch.

Casey's eyes were also wide as she too got the famous double entendre.

"…I mean…" Derek struggled.

She threw him a lifeline. "I get the message." She said with a dismissive wave and his heart started beating again – just a little too fast.

And she had got the message. Clearly, judging by his panic over a slip of the tongue, Derek is horrified at the thought of something more between us.

She wasn't sure why her overall reaction to that was one of deep sadness.

Derek's heart-rate slowed as Casey "saved" him and he looked away. He couldn't believe his mouth had started to form the words other parts of him were wordlessly projecting (though fortunately it was only the internal organs). It was one thing to know that he felt something for Casey. It was something else to begin to tell her that. He couldn't do that for two reasons: because it was Casey and because being close to Derek might kill her.

He risked turning his eyes to her again and saw the sadness was back. He didn't want that either so was forced to speak.

"We're friends, Casey. We aren't teenagers and it isn't a battle anymore. So what if we can't lose the snark in our conversation? At least we are still talking. If this was serious…the disagreement I mean…we wouldn't be talking. I wouldn't have started emailing you as Mikey, I wouldn't have come to the hotel and we wouldn't be having this conversation." He squeezed her against him a little too roughly and winced silently through the pain.

Casey met his eyes and he saw the glitter in her own, of tears as they were shed. Carefully, he raised his spare hand and brushed the side of his thumb across her cheek bone.

"Don't." he whispered. "We're good. We will always be good. No matter how much we argue." He frowned. "Besides we both know I don't do tears."

Casey smiled weakly and her hand lifted to cover his. "I missed you so much. I missed all your stupid "male code rules", all your obnoxious quirks. I even missed all your stupid nicknames for me."

"I missed you too…" he said softly kissing her nose, and sounding sincere till he smirked. "…Mac the Quack." He finished, and both their hands dropped with the words.

"Der-ek!" Split syllables just like before but it too was soft and she was smiling at him all the way to her eyes which were still locked onto his. "How long did it take you to come up with that one?" she asked. Their voices were still quiet.

Derek's grin widened. "About five minutes after I found out you were a doctor. I have others…you want to hear?"

"Probably not."

"Aw! Go on. Dr Death, I'm sure you'll like them."
"Derek…"

"And of course you're an MD which makes you Casey MD MD…so good they named her twice!"

"It's McDonald, Derek, not MDonald."

"Oh of course…I forgot you're Dr Ronald McDonald of the Golden Arches Medical centre. Can I have fries with my gall-bladder removal?"
"Cholecystectomy, Derek."

"Gesundheit! Best not get that one wrong, I always hoped there would be little Dereks one day."

"If you weren't already injured you'd need a trip to the ER right now." She warned, but she was struggling to hold in the laughter and they both knew it.

"Tell me," said Derek. "Are you still as ticklish as you used to be?"

Casey shot off the bed.

After that little incident, Casey decided an unoccupied Derek was asking for trouble. On the television cabinet was a little card advertising the hotel's "games console" service – whereby for a fee you could hire a games controller, access to a games console and a library of games. She made a call to reception and they spent the rest of the afternoon playing Mario Kart.

With the medication, and the full scale resumption of their usual banter, it was easy for Derek to forget about his side hurting, or the pressing need for him to retrieve some protection from his apartment. But later on, while Casey was brushing her teeth he thought about it more. With the consideration of the problem in detail, he also realised that it wouldn't just be his backup gun he would be retrieving from his apartment...it would be his life. The time had come to move on…and move out. He sighed. And somewhere along the line he needed to say goodbye to Casey again.

It was with that in mind that he sat in bed waiting for her to emerge from the en-suite. When she did, no doubt she would go to bed in the little armchair where she had spent the last couple of nights. This was despite his suggestion to her that they change to a twin-bedded room or ask reception for a trundle bed. Casey insisted the former would draw attention to them and the latter would just be uncomfortable. Even though he privately thought the chair was worse, Derek gave up.

The bathroom door clicked emitting a cloud of steam, the light flicked out and Casey appeared. She was dressed in a satin nightshirt tonight, her newly brushed hair falling in waves down her back and her face bare of make-up although he could see the trace of some sort of cream substance on her skin. She crossed the room to supervise his last remaining breathing exercises of the day and to check if he needed more pain meds.

"I'm good. I'd save them for the crick in the neck you're going to have tomorrow."
"I've been fine the last two nights." She protested.

"Yeah but you look like shit now." He lied.

Derek caught her hand with his own and softened his tone. "If I promise you can practice your surgical technique if I screw up will you sleep in the bed tonight please?"

"I'm fine in the chair."

"And what if I need something in the night and you're over there?"

"You'll throw something heavy at me like you normally do." She pointed out.

"I'd rather just elbow you in the ribs."

Casey sighed. "I might hurt you if I turn funny."

"You already have turned funny, princess. It's a lost cause."

"Moron."

"Keener."

"Lamebrain."

"Princess…" he started. "…sleep with me." And then he winked.

Casey stepped forward and leaned over him, their faces only centimetres apart. "If I suddenly stripped my clothes off and jumped on you, you'd be out of that door faster than you could say "My grandma has a crush on you." So stop it with the innuendo."

"Innuendo? I just asked you to sleep in my bed Casey. Why do you need to lower the tone?"

"With you Derek, the tone never gets above crotch height."

"Ooo. Casey! I didn't know you knew words like that!"

"I'm too tired for this."

"Fine. Now come to bed."

Casey blew out a deep breath of frustration and her face was still so close to his, her minty breath teased his nose.

"Behave, Derek." She said, and rounding the bed, she climbed in.