"So, can I tell you something?" Derek leans against the island in Wes' kitchen while Casey resets platters of cheese and various unrecognizable finger foods.

"Something tells me that even if I say no, you're gonna do it anyway." Her words are cutting, but the way she meets his eyes, smiling up at him, is entirely soft. A peace offering of sorts.

"I talked to Marti after that last interview. You know, the one where—"

"I know the one," Casey says, pushing the closest platter away from her with more force than necessary. A handful of cheese cubes tumble off the pyramid in the middle. "And?" she prompts.

"The fam was all watching the game together." Derek steps closer. Hip to hip, they lean up against Casey's workspace with their arms folded. Tucked away from the party, the kitchen pulses in almost-silence. Derek shoves his hands in his pockets, rocking on his heels. "Apparently Nora regrets pushing us apart. She thinks we're inevitable."

Next to him, Casey forgets how to breathe.

"Dad agreed. Marti thinks the whole thing is hysterical—you know, in that way that it's really not. No word yet from either Ed or Liz, but I suppose you'd hear from Liz first since—SpaceCase?"

Casey has started shaking, literally vibrating, swinging her head back and forth and she's muttering under her breath.

"Are you—? Use your words now." He moves to stand in front of her, two hands on her shoulders to steady her.

"Are you fucking kidding me?" She looks at Derek, pleading fury in her eyes. "Who does she think she—why hasn't she—are you—no. No."

Derek chuckles. "Sort of exactly my reaction," he says. He moves his hands to her waist, steps his toes in between hers.

"Why are you telling me this?"

"Because it's our family and I—" Derek fights a grimace off his face. He won't look at her. Even still, Casey watches as he loses the battle. He touches the ends of her hair, working the strands between his forefinger and thumb. "I can't deal with it alone."

Casey looks up at him. The corners of her eyes are pricked with tears. "I can't deal with it at all." She extricates herself from his grip with an apology. "I should really bring these plates out."

Derek follows at her heels, helping to carry two extra platters without her even having to ask.

...

Casey stands in the middle of the party fray, trying to forget. She can still feel the press of Derek on her hips, his quiet voice, that blasted admission of I-can't-deal-with-it-alone.

How dare they? Casey seethes. If her mother really wanted to make amends, she'd come out and say that to her face. Fly a plane to New York on her knees and beg. The years they've wasted. The time.

She has spent so much energy being nervous, agonizing, throwing up excuses as to why not because it all made her feel safe. But this? She's not safe, she's missing out.

Across the crush of the party, Derek catches her eye. He's wrapped up in the attentions of some puck bunny, pin-straight hair, mythic raccoon eyes with heavy, doting lashes. She has thin hands like feathers on his shoulders. And he looks at Casey, eyes huge as hers and pleading, get me away from her—I can't. Casey smiles, blows him a kiss. He chokes on it, brushing it off his lips when it lands, grinning—smiling huge—the girl oblivious to the whole thing. Casey nearly doubles over in the force of her laughter.

She tried being happy without him and for a while she was okay. But now that he's back, what is okay when being with Derek, even just flirting with Derek, thrusts her whole life into technicolor?

Derek is back to mouthing messages at her in desperation, the girl showing him things on her phone, looking up at him in between the flicking of her thumbs. His smile at her is plastic-wrap tight. His lips for Casey say 'save me, save me.'

Casey walks through the crowd, parting like morning-glory petals in the dew. She sidles up to Derek, slips her hand in his back pocket. She bypasses the girl, her voice fuchsia-bright, "Der-bear, I've been looking for you everywhere!" she nuzzles his cheek, kisses the corner of his mouth before she directs her attention to the girl.

"Sorry to interrupt, I'm Casey."

They fumble around their drinks trying to shake each other's hands. And the girl probably shares only a handful of words before she gets the message and pretends she's been called away.

"Thank you," Derek says as soon as the girl is out of earshot. He steps back, out of Casey's space. "Really. You're a lifesaver."

Casey takes his hands, pulling him back. "Ask me again."

Here in the centerpiece of the party, they are pressed together close. Casey's heart beats across the inch that separates them, like a plea.

Derek blinks, "What?"

"That day in the apartment. The ridiculous bachelor pad with the windows." Her whole body is pressed up against his, her lips near the shell of his ear. The music thumps up against them. Her heart is fast in the trap of her chest.

Derek nods, "Yeah?"

"You were going to ask me to move in with you." Casey steps back, better to look him in the eye.

And Derek can't hear her, not really, not the way he wants to when she kind of smiles and says, "Ask me again."

He digs his hand into his pocket, a smirk tugging gently at the corners of his lips. He leans in, chest to chest so that she can hear him clearly. Derek presses something into her waiting hand, locking his fingers with hers around his gift. "It's a good thing I had these made then." He pulls back. His grin is full. "Do you want to come and see? They won't miss us here."

Struck still, Casey runs her thumb along the edges, feeling metal and the jagged edge of teeth. The two keys are warm with promise in her palm. When she looks up, the front door is closing on Derek's back. She starts forward, following Derek out onto the front steps. "Where?"

"A few blocks; ten-minute walk."

Casey pitches forward, rocking on her heels. "What are we waiting for?" She steps out the front gate, standing on the sidewalk, cold, but too excited to go back for her coat. "Which way?"

"Left," he says, and then it begins.

...

He walks two paces ahead of her the entire time, while she peppers him with questions he answers by laughing.

The house—house! Casey effuses—is set back from the sidewalk with ten steps leading up to the front door. Sweeping Brownstone walls and three stories of bay windows. She wraps her fingers around the wrought iron railing and tries not to swoon. Casey steps with her back to the front door, looking down the steps at Derek. Her palms are flat against the mahogany and slowly, Derek rests his hands on her hips.

"It's beautiful."

"I know." He twists his own key in the lock. And then, right hand still on her, he asks, "Ready?"

When she nods, Derek leans in and slowly, kisses her through the doorway. And she's torn, with her back against the bannister, between seeing the house and his fingers in her hair, down her back, tucked inside her pockets. She pulls away slightly, pressing her mouth along the line of his neck just below his ear. But she is tense, her muscles long and clenched in excitement and nerves. Casey can't decide where to put her hands and she flits between his shoulders and the small of his back, Derek's biceps and the crest of his hipbones.

Derek steps back consciously, stills her hands in his larger ones. "You feel like an octopus. Relax, you can—we have—if you'll give it to me, well—" he smiles, can't look her in the eye to finish his sentence. Derek, bashful, is such a sight. "We'll have the rest of our lives."

Casey lets out all of her breath at once. "You bought us a house—"

"—Excuse me, I bought myself a house, I have just—"

Casey dangles her keys in front of his face.

"—Offered you my spare keys, you know, in case I lock myself out—"

"Derek," she snaps. "There are so many things to see. You and," she dips her two fingers into his front pocket, tugging him back into her space, "You and the whole house and I'm coming to realize how much time I've wasted making other people happy. It's just a lot. I want everything now."

Derek holds out his arms.

"So maybe if you just—" She slips her hands up underneath his shirt and begins to unbutton it, "take this off, and give me a naked tour…" Casey laughs. "Then we can do two things I want at once."

Derek stares at her as she pushes his shirt from his shoulders. When she starts to ruck up the tee underneath, he scoops her up and carries her to the second floor.

"Living room, second bedroom," he lists, swiveling her around presumably so that she can see the space. But her nose is pressed into the small of his back, his arms around her knees, she can't see squat.

"Derek," she protests, drawing her finders up his sides, squeezing where she knows he's ticklish.

"Casey," he answers, squirming.

"I can't see anything."

"You'll see what's important."

Which is when he rounds the stairs to the top level. Derek deposits her, gently, to the floor. There is a small landing and then a door. Outside of the master suite, her back up against the bannister again. Derek in his teeshirt, the V at his clavicle, the flutter of the hemline at his hip bones. She runs a hand, a few fingers down the center of his chest, stops below his navel and, "Can we just—I really, just. Want to see." She steps out of the circle of his arms and reaches out for the door to the bedroom. Derek follows.

...

It takes over the entire floor. Up until now, the rooms have been empty, left entirely undecorated. He has a handful of glasses and a set of dishes in the kitchen, but other than that, the walls echo with the emptiness of their home.

Derek watches her make directly for the windows alongside the bed, the only piece of furniture he's put in the entire house yet. It is a wide, ridiculous thing, California King and plush with pillows and an indulgent duvet. The room is shrouded in moonlight, silhouetting Casey agains the window and for a moment, his breath slows. he's afraid to believe they are here.

"So?" he prompts, leaning against the doorjamb, arms cross and with one ankle tucked behind the other. "Do keep in mind that you haven't seen your closet yet."

Casey is smiling when she turns around. "Don't think it hasn't escaped my attention that the only piece of furniture in this entire place is a bed. What are you expecting, Derek?"

"A good night's sleep," he says, and doesn't move off the door frame.

Casey walks to the side of the bed closer to Derek. There is nothing between them now. "I was hoping for something else."

He feels her like a hook around his solar plexus, reeling him in. The air is heavy. his pulse is slow. "Yes," he breathes, and then his hands are one her hips.

And they stand close enough now that they don't even have to speak. Their voices only sound with the force of the breath in their throats. And Casey says, "Are we really doing this?" even though her fingers tap dance along his rib cage, the musculature in his chest lined strong and sharp between his breaths.

"I'm doing this," Derek says. he holds her full in his hands, cradles the small planes of her body between the breadth of his fingers. "Are you doing this?"

Casey takes her two fingers up to his lips, ends with her thumb and cups his cheek. "I think I'm in love with you."

"You think?" Derek steps back, holding her at arms length. He speaks fully now, his voice at a normal volume. "You think? Okay?" He topples her backwards onto the bed, followers her onto the pillows, settling straddled across her hips. "Do I have to be the bigger person here?"

Derek knows what she is feeling, but her wants her to say it, because he needs to know she believes it.

...

He is stunning are argumentative and everything she never dreamed of for herself. But pinned beneath him on this bed, in this house he bought for them, looking up at his smirk and fluff of hair, she gets it. He's not perfect, he's not even perfect for her, but he's real. They are real.

"I'm in love with you." Casey says, but before all of the words are out of her mouth, they are kissing, deep, sitting in each other's space and moving—frantic, slow—until Casey has got him pressed up against the headboard, her thighs open around his lap. Her hands up under his shirt and her face slack with the awe of his presence.

Casey has hated hockey in every moment except this one. It broke him and left her heart on ice. But it brought them back together, delivered him to her bed—their bed in this bright and hopeful room—all skate strong and toned. She drags her hands upward, lets her fingers touch everything, all of his sharp lines and hard naked skin that thrums the pulse though her veins.

He leans forward and she tears his shirt off, all fingernails along his back, desperate breaths. Derek kisses her then, drowning. Casey's heart strains just below her skin. There is an unbearable tease in the way her shirt separates them. She feels like all of her senses are concentrated where ever they touch, but there is too much fabric, just miles of it. She reaches for her hemlines. And Derek groans like even seconds apart are seconds too many. He flips them, "Let me do it."

And then, with her head in the cloud of pillows, he licks wet lines up her torso, between her breasts, over the spread of her collarbones. Casey writhes under him. She pops the snap of her jeans, disentangles herself from her top, presses the bow of her hips to his in such a way that she loses her breath.

She moans his name, heady. "Fuck, oh my god."

"Its Derek, just Derek."

And god, fuck him for still being able to be clever when every part of her body is focused on the sweet heat of his skin where it touches her.

"What the fuck was I doing all this time," she babbles.

His fingers trace the lace edges of her underwear, purple like her bleeding heart.

"Thinking I didn't—ah—want you."

He peeks up at her from between her legs, blown pupils—stupid, infuriating, egotistical, incredible, incredibly perfect smirk at his lips, so close to hers. Casey mews for him. Derek doesn't even have to voice it, so he doesn't.

And Casey rolls her eyes, rolls her entire head, nudges his cheek with her thigh. She reaches out for him, sitting up and pushing him back, her hands on his face and his chest and Casey smiles. "Yes, Derek." Hand on the center of his chest, she straddles him, her panties forgotten and she pulls his briefs out of the way before teasing him at her entrance, her first tight around the base of him. "I need you, okay?"

Derek presses inside of her and they come close. Derek wraps himself around her, all hot warm skin. He kisses Casey, uses teeth on her bottom lip, sucks it into his mouth.

Their pace is torturous. They spend long moments pressed into one another until Casey moans, fists her hand into his hair at the back of Derek's skull. Derek works faster then, and Casey keens, holding onto him with her nails. She curses in a stream and begs, "Yes, there. Keep-" She can't get close enough. Until everything is happening all at once and Casey is coming all around him, the motion of her hips slowing, but not stopping.

Derek grips those hips and holds her to him.

"Fuck," she says, "I can't stop."

"Then don't."

And its only a few seconds then, before her skin is alight, the slide of their bodies together and the places his nails bite into her skin. Casey can't breathe enough air to keep up with her breath. He fucks into her tight heat, filling her in places she didn't know where empty.

"I think—oh my god, fuck, Derek. I think—" Her whole body shakes around him, their hips snap together frantically. Her words dissolve into moaning.

"Come on, Case, yes. Hold on. I want to make you come again, please. Don't stop."

She loses everything with the second one, screaming—her whole body bowstring tight, the waves of it crash through her with the force of a hurricane. Deep inside, she feels him follow her, and she tries to watch his face, but can't possible manage her eyes open.

Coming down, she pants, keens, octopus tight around him, and Derek collapses, hands falling from her back, her breasts, fingers light on her knees, head in the pillows, he grins, exhausted.

Casey sighs, "Fuck, Derek." She steadies herself with a hand on his chest until she falls beside him, "I—"

"No," he hushes, "No more talking, we'll freak out later, okay?"

Casey nuzzles into his side. "I was just going to invite you to have a shower with me, but that can wait until later too."

...

Derek cracks open a single eye, and finds Casey staring up at him, her smile gentle and assured. So he's not on the rink, and he hasn't just won the cup, and she's not looking down at him from the stands, cheering. But this? Naked and exhausted and face to face with the only face he wants to see, this is better.

...

End

...

I hope you've enjoyed the ride. And thank you for coming along with me.

Epilogue forthcoming.