Inside, I'm dreaming I'll be alone with you again

And I can still hold you like I held you in the end

This time Cat isn't alone. Spencer is there wrapping his arms around her like a makeshift straitjacket as she trembles away like a child. She is convinced that this is just part of the dream too, one of those waking dreams, but she doesn't care because she feels safe and happy and she hasn't felt that feeling enough to question it. Then he strokes her hair and she smells his skin and she knows he's actually there.

"Why did you come back?" she asked him.

Spencer seriously considers the reason why. He surprised himself with this decision, his feet deciding to take him on the walk back to her apartment. Their apartment.

"Because you're right," he replied.

She stumbled to a seated position. "Right about what?"

"I don't think we're the same," he qualified. "But you are still the same person that you were yesterday and the day before that. And I do still love you. Even though I hate myself for it."

Cat shrugged. She'll take what she can get.

"But you need to be honest with me."

"Is this a sting?" Cat asked in earnest. "Is SWAT on their way?"

Spencer laughed. "God, I wish they were. Maybe then I wouldn't feel like such an idiot."

Cat frowned.

"I came back for you because I still love you, despite my best efforts. But I need you to be honest, if you're even capable of that."

"I'm not a monster," Cat replied. "I may have done monstrous thing, but I'm still just…me."

"Show me that you're capable of being upfront with me. Don't leave anything out."

And so she did. She told him about the work she did with Andy before she went solo, the online network with other hitmen with particular specialties, the rush that she got when she killed someone, and how she felt bad about it. She told him that before she met him she hated every man she came across on the street, and when they first met she wanted to crush that perfect bone structure of his for getting in her way.

In return, Spencer told her his truth. Because after all of that, he understood that they weren't entirely dissimilar. He had dark thoughts like that before, he'd had cases where people got off and he felt like they needed to be punished. He thought about his father and Gary Michaels and the time that his mom thought it never got that far but it did.

"We're all one bad day away from becoming like you," he said, thinking out loud.

Cat laughed. "Well I wouldn't go that far. There's something to be said for doing it right and doing it in style."

Doing it right. That was important.

"If I'm going to get involved with your life like this, you need to communicate with me," Spencer told her. "No secrets. Even if they are just little white lies that can't happen."

"Get involved?" she wasn't entirely sure what he meant, and frankly she was more of a soloist than a team player anyway.

"I can't have this coming back on me. I can't spend the rest of my life in prison," Spencer said.

Cat scoffed. "Oh, please, you wouldn't last three months in prison."

Spencer glared at her.

"Fine," she conceded. "Communication, honesty, blah blah blah…"

"Cat, I'm serious," he pleaded.

She sighed.

"I don't want you going to prison either. I don't want to lose you."

She smiled at him, partially because she knew that she had him so whipped and partially because it was perhaps the single sweetest thing a person had ever said to her.

"This isn't how I planned for this to go at all," Spencer said, opening his eyes wide. "But since we're being honest and getting it all out on the table, I figure it's now or never."

They were already sitting on the ground, so he strangely shifted his weight over to one knee in a haphazard attempt at a proposal.

"I have a bad knee, so…"

"Sure."

"Sure what?"

"Sure, I'll settle for you," she said. "I mean, marry you." She shot him a devilish smile and for one of the first times early that morning he smiled back at her.

"Phew," Cat said, releasing tension from her back.

"What?" Spencer asked.

"I swore you were gonna come back and put a bullet in my head."

Spencer smiled coyly. "I thought the same thing."

There they were, two of the most complicated, emotionally damaged people in the DMV metro area and they somehow found comfort in one another. Even though they were kind of fucked up.

"For the record, though," Cat continued. "I did consider it."

"I know," Spencer said, putting his arm back over her shoulder.

A/N: Thank you for reading! If you enjoyed, please leave a comment. This is a rare pairing and there aren't many fans of it, so every comment means a little bit more. :)