A/N: So, to conclude Missed Opportunities, Daisy and JellyBean over at the forum asked all the authors who participated in the story to write a final chapter about how House and Cameron consummated their relationship.

I just want to say thank you to Daisy and JellyBean for organizing this unique project. I'm thrilled to be lumped together with these other amazing authors, whose talent for heat and love and sweetness far surpass some of the steamiest Harlequins. I'd like to dedicate this story to them, the ones who understand what it's like to unleash our obsession on the willing masses, not for recognition or praise, but just because we love the show and the characters on it. Cheers, ladies!

A Cheesy, Romance Novel Ending

The soft summer breeze caught in Cameron's locks as she stepped out of the hospital into the night. The moon was high in the sky, bathing Princeton in an eerie bluish light, and the stars spotted the heavens, like millions of twinkle lights were hung just for her. The familiar sights and sounds of the hospital calmed her, kept her grounded, despite her head and heart wanting to be in the clouds. The sweet aroma of an unknown flower scented the air around her, and she breathed in deep with her eyes shut tight, the world exactly the same as it had been every night before this one. Except for one huge difference. All of her daydreams of the past week and her desires of more than three years had culminated into one defining moment, when House asked her to stay.

She sighed as she imagined him coming out of the hospital doors, the very ones she stood by now, walking up behind her and slipping his arms around her waist and planting soft kisses on the back of her neck. The fine hairs there would stand up on end as his scruff lightly scratched her skin. She would lean back into him and he would pull her close, humming softly a tune she didn't recognize. She could almost feel the brush of his breath across her sensitive skin as if he were actually there, holding her like she had always imagined he would. Hoped and prayed that he would.

And she couldn't hold back an exhilarated smile when the real thing limped up and did just that.

"Ready to go?" he asked, his entire body vibrating against her back as he spoke. As unfamiliar as their stance was, Cameron couldn't help but realize how perfect it felt to be in his arms, how perfectly their bodies fit together... She closed her eyes and shuddered in delight as she imagined another way they would fit together, but managed to nod in response to his question instead of taking him right there on the sidewalk. He pressed one last kiss to the sensitive spot below her ear before pulling back and starting towards her car.

He stopped dead when he felt her slip her palm into his, looking down at their clasped hands as if the notion of hand-holding was an insanely alien concept. She realized that no matter how unfamiliar this situation was for her, it was equally unfamiliar to House. Maybe even more so, because she had practiced a thousand times in her dreams, and she could only hope that he'd done the same. Cameron smiled at him and squeezed his hand reassuringly, encouraging him to look up at her.

And the thing that shocked her the most, the thing that filled her heart to bursting, was that he squeezed back.

She drove her car in silence, not in awkwardness or discomfort, but because there was nothing left for her to say. She had said it all, and he had as well. Within the silence, the air between them cracked with electricity, with anticipation. So much so that when they pulled up in front of House's apartment and Cameron moved her hand to put the car in park, the sheer proximity of her arm to his thigh caused a jolt of static to jump between their bodies. Perhaps it was pent up energy that had been building for the past three years, or perhaps they both knew what was about to happen and it was bigger than the two of them could even begin to comprehend.

Cameron stepped out from behind the wheel and into the night once more, and started towards the door. She listened for the three-legged gait to follow her to the stoop, but stopped when all she could hear was the rumble of a passing taxi. From her spot on the lowest step she turned to face him. "Are you coming?" House stood still for a moment, watching the tip of his cane as it prodded at a littered soda can on the pavement. He seemed to be deep in thought and melancholic, and Cameron was instantly concerned. She stepped down and moved in front of him, forcing him to meet her eyes as they pleaded with him.

"What is it?" she asked.

"Were you really going to leave?" he asked, so quietly, so unlike House.

"Yes," she answered honestly. He looked down at her, his expression unreadable, and Cameron felt an overwhelming need to clarify. "House, I've been in love with you for three years." He opened his mouth to say something, but she shook her head slightly to signal him to wait until she finished. "I have. I know you think it was an adolescent crush, or Stockholm Syndrome, but I can assure you that my feelings were, and are, pure." He nodded in acknowledgment. "But a girl can only hang around and wait for so long before they realize they have to move on."

"So you reached that point," he said, more of a statement than a question.

"Yeah," she nodded sadly.

House let out a weary breath and shook his head solemnly back and forth. "I'm sorry. It just hit me how close I was to losing you."

Cameron's heart swelled in her chest, threatening to cut off blood flow to her head. She smiled and laid her hand over his heart in hopes that he could feel it all the way to his soul. "But you didn't," she whispered.

He gathered her close and hugged her tight, chin resting on the top of her head, and willed himself not to let out the tears that threatened to fall. Cameron couldn't hold back though, and House could feel her joyful tears soaking through his shirt and dampening his skin. She felt silly, like she was some kind of heroine at the end of a cheesy romance novel, but she couldn't care less. She was holding the man of her dreams in her arms. She was allowed a little romance.

House cleared his throat and backed away, keeping his hands on her waist while looking up and down the street. When he saw no onlookers he smiled down at her and kissed her sweetly, before pulling her towards the door.

They managed to enter the apartment and stumble to the bedroom with relative ease, their seemingly attached lips even more of a hindrance than his cane, which lay forgotten on the floor inside the front door, would have been. They stopped just inside the bedroom door and House pushed his hips against hers, his arousal more than apparent between their two bodies. Cameron's stomach flipped at the feel of his hard length against her taut abdomen, and it only made her kiss him harder. House's tongue slicked across hers, Cameron cupping his head in her hands to hold him in place, as if frightened to let him go. The heady sensation of oxygen deprivation made her swoon and forced her to take a step back and suck in a shuddering breath, touching her fingers to her swollen lips.

"I'm just going to run and freshen up," she said, stepping back once more. If she wasn't careful this would be over faster than she even thought possible and she wanted it to be slow. Sweet and slow. And when House nodded, she knew he understood her need. "I'll be quick," she said as she turned into the bathroom and shut the door behind her.

He heard the taps squeak as she turned them on, and he lowered himself to the bed as the water fell onto white porcelain. He imagined her splashing the cool liquid onto her perfect face, cooling the flush on her skin that he had put there with his kisses. He closed his eyes and saw her undressing slowly, first her blouse and then her skirt, and neurotically folding them and placing them in a neat pile on the stool. He chuckled to himself as he imagined what her body looked like under those clothes. Would she have freckles? A birthmark? Would her skin be as smooth to the touch as it seemed to the eye?

After toeing off his sneakers, House kicked his legs up onto the bed and leaned back against the dark wood of the headboard, and when the bathroom door opened his jaw dropped to his chest. Cameron stood in the doorway in nothing but her bra and panties, which left absolutely nothing to his already overactive imagination. She saw him staring and became insecure under his gaze. "What?" she asked, folding her arms over her chest, which, instead of hiding her body, only enhanced the swells of her breasts. When House didn't say anything she blushed scarlet and dropped her gaze to the floor. "What are you staring at?" she whispered.

House shook his head, pushed himself up off the bed and stalked towards her, his eyes burning with fire so intense Cameron thought he could set her alight. He took her wrists and pried them away from her body, then trailed his burning gaze from the top of her head to the tip of her toes and back again. "You're stunning," he observed as his gaze returned to hers. A smile tugged at her lips as House lowered his mouth and captured her in a searing kiss.

She let him snake his hands around her back, where his long fingers toyed with the clasp of her bra. When she had been freed of the scrap of silk and lace, House leaned down and captured her rosy nipple in his mouth, tonguing it into a hardened nub. Cameron sighed and placed her hands on his shoulders, squeezing firmly every time he grazed her with his teeth. When he felt that the one breast had been sufficiently aroused he moved to the other one, repeating his oral ministrations until her other nipple matched the first. Cameron took the opportunity to lift his tee-shirt over his head, and House only broke contact for a moment before continuing down, lowering himself to his knees in front of her.

As his tongue circled her navel, he tugged at her panties and pushed them over her slender hips. He placed a soft kiss on her waiting mound, and Cameron couldn't help but push into him in response. He chuckled as he spread her legs further apart, then pressed another kiss to her sensitive nub, reveling in the small gasp that escaped her lips. He slipped an exploring finger into the depths of her folds and found that she was already wet and ready for him. Her muscles were already beginning to flutter around him, so he withdrew, with a small whimper from Cameron, to prolong what would undoubtedly be an amazing experience.

With one last kiss to her nub, House stood up and gathered up her hand, pulling her towards the bed. She lay down in the middle of the mattress, noticing that the sheets smelled like House. The scent was almost as intoxicating as the man himself. House removed his pants before lowering himself on top of her. His erection was evident beneath the thin fabric of his boxers, and Cameron could feel herself swelling at the thought of him inside her. She rolled her hips and House sucked in a breath before rolling his hips right back. She felt her resolve slipping, her previous need to take things slow fading quickly into the background as House crushed his mouth against hers once more.

As if reading her mind, House shed his boxers and settled between her legs, nudging them farther apart with his knees. She could feel his length against her entrance, coating him in her wetness. He positioned himself then looked into her eyes, and when she nodded in encouragement he pushed his tip into her, slowly and surely enveloping himself in her warmth. He stopped when he could go no further, filling her so full that she gasped. It was better then she had imagined, the perfection of their joining, and she truly couldn't believe she had waited so long.

House began to rock within her. She was hypersensitive to his touch, every nerve ending in her body tingling. As the pace quickened their breathing did as well. Cameron managed to wrap her knees around his hips, pressing him in and meeting his thrusts. Their bodies were plastered together from head to toe as the heat built in both their bellies. Cameron was so close she could almost taste her orgasm, but held herself back so she could press her lips against his ear and breathe, "House."

He stiffened and growled, then thrust deeper than he had before, emptying himself into her in sharp spurts. The thought that she had brought him to such pleasure with only a whisper of his name pushed her into her own climax, her inner muscles contracting around him as he slowed his thrusts, staying buried within her as her body flooded with the heat that had exploded from her core. Their breathing slowed and he slipped out of her before gathering the blankets around them and pulling her close.

House lay on his side, his left arm a pillow for Cameron as she tucked in against him and wrapped her arm around his waist. In post-coital bliss, her whole body was more relaxed then after even the most expensive massage. House's hands were on her back, lazily running up and down the staircase of her spine. As sleep descended on her she prayed that this hadn't been a dream that she would be in this exact position when they woke in the morning.

And she knew she would, because all of the missed opportunities had concluded with the biggest of them all: The opportunity to love House and be loved in return.

... Written by Caustic Chick (check out her other stories!!)