He came back home to a quiet house. He tread lightly through the stone floors of the house, finding Sarah and her puppy snuggled up on the couch with Rachel watching "Old Yeller" on DVD. He smirked at Sarah, because their little inside joke about rabies was now funny to them all. She smiled back. From her smile he knew that Dani had found a useful and constructive outlet for her anger. Rachel waved but did not engage him, she simply pointed to the patio.
He found Dani on the patio staring out at the hills. She was dripping with sweat and she had obviously been running. Her iPod lay on the tabletop nearby, but for now she was listening to the sound of the wind. She was dressed in tight black shorts and a white tank top. She looked hot, both sexually and physically, but he made a point of forgetting his arousal until a more appropriate time. She sensed him behind her and glanced briefly at him before returning to her study of the horizon.
"Hey," he opened softly.
"Thank you," she was genuinely grateful for the relief he provided by taking her mother home. She was in a better place now emotionally and he could sense it.
"Your house?" he questioned in a light joking tone.
She snorted a short laugh. "You would focus on that aspect. Not what she's done."
"What she did…was stand by her man," he offered a polite defense.
Her double take and scoff made him explain further.
"It can't have been easy for a Persian woman to marry to an Irish Catholic cop…"
"…who abused her, who belittled and berated her," she continued. She shrugged and exhaled, "I know, I know."
"You have that Irish temper of your father's," he noted.
"Smart move though…sending the kid," she tipped her hat at his technique for defusing her anger.
"You'd have kicked MY ass," he laughed. By the time he finished the comment he was standing behind her trailing his fingers down her bare arms. "She's brave like you," he noted of Sarah. "And she knows you love her and you'd never hurt her."
"Is that what you told her?"
"Um-hmm," he confirmed in a low tone getting closer to her. "So….your house?" he revisited his initial comment.
"Aren't you the one who keeps asking me to marry him?"
"Aren't you the one who keeps saying no?"
"If I said, yes….you'd shit a brick," she taunted.
"Try me," he teased back and then they were at the edge of the precipice again.
"Fine," she said.
"Fine," he repeated.
Empty air hung between them.
"I need a shower," she disconnected.
"Wait," he called after her. "Did you..? Are we…? Did you just say yes?"
She didn't stop, she didn't answer, she just kept right on walking.
He stood alone on the patio in the hot sun replaying that conversation in his mind. After a moment, a grin began to creep across his face; one that nothing could erase – not today. His partner had just consented to marry him; he was sure of it. There was no date set, no arrangement made, no profession of love, just agreement that they were now…and would be in the future together. For as long as they both shall live, if Charlie had his way.