Laura looked at the text message from Jean curiously,

* See you in Robbie's office at 5pm? *

Laura had thought that they were all meeting at the pub, in fact she was sure of it. Thoughtfully, she replied in the affirmative to Jean then called Robbie,

'Lewis.'

'It's me.'

'Hello, Laura, what can I do for you?'

'Is James within earshot?'

'Yes.'

Laura thought for a moment then said,

'Are the arrangements for later still the same?'

'Yes. Why?'

'Jean just sent me a text suggesting meeting in your office at five instead.'

'She probably just forgot,' said Robbie.

'Maybe... Anyway, as long as nothing crops up, I'll come over just before five.'

'All right, love, I'll see you then.'

James gazed at Robbie speechlessly, struggling to contain his emotions. Not only was Robbie solving a major problem for him, he was making it seem as though he would be doing Robbie a favour. James had been looking at bedsits because he couldn't afford to stay in his flat but those that he could afford were dismal. And Robbie was acting as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Looking down at the floor, James said,

'Thank you.'

'You don't need to thank me, lad, it'll stop me from worrying, knowing that you're making sure that the place is all right.'

Since Robbie appeared to have virtually no attachment to his flat, which he had bought simply to escape from the memories of Val that haunted him at their old house, James knew that this was a lie. Blushing, James said,

'You don't need to take care of me, S... Robbie.'

'I know that, James. I just want to lend a helping hand.'

'Lend a helping hand?'

'It's what mates do for each other, isn't it? You'd do the same for me.'

James smiled and nodded.

'Agreed then?' said Robbie.

'Agreed.'

Jean closed her laptop with a sigh of relief, it was finally time to leave. She looked at the pile of files on her desk with frustration; she'd been so distracted by thoughts of James that she'd got virtually nothing done. Thank goodness she could finally sort it out. Jean picked up her things and left, closing her office door with a decisive snap.
When she got to Robbie's office, Laura and Julie were there as well as Robbie, Rachel and James. Jean chatted idly with Laura whilst James cleared up his last few items. Once he'd finished, she checked her watch then said,

'I make it five past five. Do you agree, Doctor Hobson?'

'Yes,' said Laura, puzzled but checking her watch anyway.

'Good. That means that you are no longer Sergeant Hathaway, James. Have you handed in your warrant card?'

'Yes, Ma'am.'

'Not 'Ma'am' any more, James; you're officially a civilian now.'

'Yes... Chief Superintendent.'

Jean looked at James in exasperation; he was looking at the floor rather than at her, unlike everyone else in the room, all of whom were clearly wondering if the stress had finally got to her, making her state the obvious. She walked across the room, invading James' personal space, making him look at her, then said,

'You are without a doubt the most annoying man that I have ever met.'

Robbie opened his mouth to defend James but Laura shook her head, putting her hand on his arm, so he subsided.

'Did he tell you what he did, Robbie?'

'No, Ma'am.'

'He wrote me a love letter.'

'A love letter, Ma'am?' said Robbie blankly, wondering why Jean was telling him this.

'A passionate and very... imaginative love letter,' said Jean, 'which he put on my desk on Tuesday morning.'

'I see, Ma'am,' said Robbie, shooting Laura a puzzled look.

Behind them, Julie took out her phone and sent a rapid text to John and Alex,

* Get in to Insp Lewis office now! Silently! *

Then Julie casually moved into a good position for taking photos and waited.

'Do you see? Because I don't.'

Jean turned back to James and said,

'What were you thinking? A love letter like that to a colleague? If I'd taken it to the chief constable you'd have faced summary dismissal. You would have lost your pension and it would have ruined your chances of getting another job in Oxford.'

'I was fairly sure you wouldn't do that,' said James.

'Were you? Why?'

'Because you deal with problems yourself, you don't hide behind the chief constable. If you'd been angry about it, you would have summoned me to your office and dealt with it.'

'All right but why write it anyway? Why not just tell me?'

'Because I'm terrible at talking to women.'

'You talk to women all the time; colleagues, witnesses, lawyers. You're patient and sensitive with them; it's one of your strengths.'

'Yes, that's easy. I meant, if I find a woman attractive and try to talk to them about something other than work, I always say or do something incredibly stupid.'

'You mean you can't chat up women? But you flirt with Laura all the time.'

'Yes, but that's different; I don't see Laura as a woman.'

Everyone in the room flinched as Laura said coldly,

'Thank you, James. So what do you see me as? A man?'

'No, sorry, of course I see you as a woman. I meant that I don't see you as an attractive woman.'

Jean closed her eyes in disbelief and Robbie prepared himself to intervene as Laura said,

'That's so much better. You have remembered that I'm one of the only people in the country who can kill you and dispose of the body without leaving any forensic evidence at all?'

Horrified that he'd upset one of his closest friends, James stammered,

'I meant... it's because of Robbie...'

Everyone looked blankly at him for a few seconds then Jean said,

'Do you mean that you don't allow yourself to see Laura as an attractive woman because of the friendship code? You see her as unavailable?'

'Yes.'

Everyone relaxed and Laura's expression changed to one of amusement so Jean allowed herself to get back to the letter, saying,

'So you can only flirt with women who you're not interested in?'

'Yes.'

'But writing is not a problem?'

'I've always been able to express myself in writing.'

'Well, it certainly was a very expressive letter... All right, I can almost see the logic in that, but why not wait until Saturday to give it to me?'

'I thought it would put too much pressure on you if I was stood in front of you when you read it.'

'That's a valid point but why not post it?'

'I thought it might not get to you before Saturday.'

Jean narrowed her eyes suspiciously; that was definitely not the reason. She glared at him but he met her eyes stoically and she knew that she wouldn't get a better answer from him. Irritated, she said,

'I know they call it 'snail mail' now but they don't literally give it to a snail you know.'

James just looked straight ahead so she continued,

'So why not put it on my desk today? Why Tuesday?'

'I wrote it on Monday night.'

'Yes, James, I had worked that out.'

'I couldn't concentrate with it in my pocket.'

Jean walked closer to him and James backed away, ending up with his back against the wall. Putting one hand on his chest, she said,

'You couldn't concentrate? Do you have any idea how distracted I've been since Tuesday? There's an enormous pile of files sat on my desk and it just keeps getting bigger and bigger because all I can think about is you and that damn letter!'

'Sorry.'

James didn't even attempt to sound sincere and Jean's eyes narrowed again. Putting her other hand on his chest too, she said,

'Well tonight I'm going to get my revenge. I'm going to make sure that you spend the entire evening as distracted as I've been since Tuesday. Starting now.'

Reaching up, Jean pulled James' face down to hers and kissed him. James froze for a split second then responded, moving his lips against hers. Jean had a moment to realise what a good kisser he was before her body took over and she was melting against him, running her hands through his hair and across his shoulders. James put his arms around her, pulling her into his body, using one hand to hold her there whilst the other moved to her head, gently stroking through her hair. Jean was dimly aware of cheers and catcalls but the desire shooting through her body made it easy to ignore them until she felt James' other hand slowly moving up towards her breast. Reluctantly, she broke the kiss and pulled back slightly. James kissed his way along her neck, saying,

'You're so sexy.'

Jean stifled a moan as James nibbled at her pulse point, pushing at his shoulders and saying,

'James, we've got an audience.'

Blushing fiery red, James released her, saying,

'Sorry, I forgot.'

'You forgot? James, we're in Robbie's office with... seven... other people.'

Jean raised her eyebrows at John and Alex but before she could ask them how they came to arrive so opportunely, James said,

'I know. It's... um...well, when you're in the room everyone else fades into the background. I only notice you.'

Jean blushed and smiled softly at him, feeling her heart melting. She pulled him towards her and they kissed again, tenderly at first but it quickly became passionate. This time, Jean was brought back to herself by Alan Peterson's voice saying,

'What's going on?'

He was immediately hushed but it was enough to remind Jean that she had no intention of going down in the annals of police history as the first senior officer to have sex in front of her colleagues. Pushing away from James firmly, she said,

'Time for the pub.'

'I'll...uh...be there in a minute,' said James awkwardly.

Jean looked puzzled for a moment then her eyes drifted downwards, seeing the bulge in the front of his trousers. Smirking, she said,

'We'll get the drinks in. Robbie, make sure he doesn't try to slip off.'

'I don't think there's any risk of that, Ma'am.'

Jean gathered the others up and left, smiling smugly.

Robbie smiled at James and said,

'Looks like you're in for an interesting evening.'

James smiled wryly and said,

'You don't happen to have a bucket of ice on you, do you?'

'No. And I suspect she'd just see that as a challenge anyway.'

'True.'

'You happy about this, James?'

'Yes...very. I just wasn't expecting...'

'No, I can see that. That must have been some letter you wrote.'

'Well, I always did come top of the class in English.'

James' voice was flippant but Robbie replied seriously,

'Good idea to play to your strengths, lad. She seemed pretty pleased with the letter to me; something to use again, mebbe.'

'Do you think she really was? Pleased, I mean.'

'No doubt about it at all. I've never seen Jean look so happy. Why did you give her the letter on Tuesday?'

James suddenly found himself pinned by Robbie's stare and knew that Robbie wouldn't be fobbed off so said,

'It was because of what you said about the best revenge being to forget Collins and then Laura pointed out that I was in a unique position to help Jean. She meant as a friend and at first I was going to offer Jean that but then Jean rang and invited me to dinner so I decided to take a risk and tell her about my feelings and see if I couldn't take Jean's mind off Collins at the same time.'

'I'd say it worked. From what she said, she hasn't thought of anything else since Tuesday.'

'So Collins loses.'

'Yes. Seems like you found the perfect revenge.'

'I think so.'

James' voice was calm, with none of the dark anger that had been worrying Robbie so much. Smiling, Robbie said,

'So time to let Jean have her revenge then. If you think you're up for it?'

Robbie grinned as James blushed at the double entendre,

'You're really not helping, S...Robbie.'

'Wasn't trying to. Come on, let's not keep them waiting.'

Smiling, walking shoulder to shoulder, they headed to the pub.

Author's note: I had originally intended to end it here but do people want a chapter on James' leaving do and what happens afterwards? Leave a review and let me know. No reviews = no more chapters.