Ray sat down next to Sonny as he was listening to his music. They had spent the past two months in Jalalabad, and it had been so far the longest time Sonny and Emily had been apart since they had moved in together, three months earlier.

Sonny removed his headset and looked at Ray. Ray in turn looked around discreetly, making sure that the others were asleep on the other side of the plane or busy enough to ignore their discussion.

"How is she?"

Sonny smiled. "Good. She's impatient for me to come home."

"I bet. She and Naima have been keeping each other busy from what I hear."

"Oh yeah, I heard about a lot of baking and she's also been helping out at the hospital."

Ray smiled. "Why doesn't that surprise me? I'm glad that she found something to occupy her time."

"Me too. I was actually worried about her going crazy away from the Navy."

"You never told me if you met Zoe and Julia?"

"Yeah. Emily and I went up to see both of them at Brown the weekend before we deployed."

"How did that go?" asked Ray genuinely concerned. He knew that teenagers could give new partners a hard time.

"In all honesty, it went much better than I expected. But then again, we didn't blindside them and Emily had already introduced me via Skype. They are great girls. Emily has done a good job raising them."

"You know she'll never stop to amaze me."

"I know, not a day goes by where I don't consider myself to be a lucky man."

Ray nodded and looked around the plane again.

"We land in a couple of hours. Emily will be there?"

"Yes. She says it's time, so we'll just be ourselves and the others will just have to deal with it any way they see fit. We just decided not to do the press conference and photoshoot."

Ray laughed as he patted Sonny on the shoulder and then stood to go back to his place and get some sleep before they returned home.

Naima stopped in front of Emily's house and honked the horn. Emily came out wearing a pair of light blue jeans, an olive-green off the shoulder top and brown flat sandals. Her hair that had grown a bit more since she had left the Navy, cascaded over her shoulders instead of being in a strict bun or braid. She was wearing her aviator sunglasses and looked amazing.

She opened the door and sat down next to Naima. They hugged.

"How many times did you change the outfit?" asked Naima jokingly as she put the car in gear.

"4 times," replied Emily as she shook her head. "How pathetic is that?"

"It's not. I actually find that sweet that you're worried about what to wear at your first post-deployment pickup."

"It was way easier when I was in uniform."

"I think Sonny won't really care what you're wearing," she paused as she eyed Emily, "and I imagine you won't be wearing that for long."

Emily laughed.

"Well that all depends in what condition our men are going to be. For all we know, they'll crash the minute they are home."

Naima nodded. "Yeah, that's also a possibility. Are you nervous?"

Emily tilted her head to the side as she looked out the window as they got closer to the base.

"A bit, but for some reason, I think the moment I see him, that will disappear."

Minutes later they pulled up to the parking lot. Emily had come over with Naima as Sonny had left his truck in the parking lot, it was easier to head home in one car than two and in all honesty, the minute he stepped foot in that parking lot, she wanted to spend every minute with him. They stepped out of the car and walked over to the Stella, Emma, Mikey and Nathalie, Jason's new girlfriend to say hi.

They all talked for a while as they watched the plane approach for landing. Once it landed, it stopped and after a few minutes of being immobilized the door opened and Emily slowly retreated from the group and headed for Sonny's truck.

The minute it was all the way down, Sonny put his backpack on his back and grabbed his duffel and stepped down.

"Hey Sonny man, you in a hurry?" he heard Clay ask.

"Blondie, you've got no idea," replied Sonny as he continued in his stride.

Jason looked at Eric that was at his side. "I've never seen him this eager to be home. What's gotten into him?"

"I guess he's happy to be home," Eric said as he too continued walking.

Sonny entered the parking lot. Grouped together were most of the families talking.

"Sonny," said Stella and Naima as they saw him.

"Ladies," he answered just as Naima put herself to the side, allowing him to set eyes on the only person that mattered to him in that parking lot. As he did so, seeing her took his breath away.

The rest of bravo team arrived in the parking lot.

"Hey, Emily is here," said Clay in a matter-of-fact tone of voice and slightly surprised.

Emily and Sonny smiled at each other as he neared her and his truck.

He stopped a few inches away from her and took a long lingering look at her. "Wow…" he said with a sigh.

"What?" she asked in a quizzical way.

He shook his head slightly as he looked at her again. "You just look so… Wow…"

He let both his bags fall to the ground as he filled the gap between them and without a care in the world, because the minute he saw her, the others had somehow disappeared, he took her in his arms and kissed her passionately.

Jason and the others who had been somewhat busy with their own families and girlfriends, shifted their attention toward Sonny's truck. Some though it was strange that Sonny had disappeared, other's that they didn't hear him speak and others that Emily hadn't greeted them or Eric yet.

"Well, I guess that would explain why he was in hurry to get off the plane," said Clay as he put an arm around Stella.

"Well, I'll be damned," said Trent as he, Brock and Full Metal exchanged amused and surprised looks. "looks like our Texan has found himself a decent cowgirl!"

"When did this happen?" asked Jason apparently ticked off and not as amused as the others, as he watched Sonny and Emily put his things in the back of the pickup and talk. "Three months and she's picking him up.. Wouldn't get too worked up over it. That will fizzle out. They've got nothing in common."

Eric and Ray looked at him.

Eric didn't really appreciate his snarky remark. "You know Jason, sometimes it takes more than things in common to make a relationship work. I guess the advantage they have is that they've been together for more than a year and from what I know, I don't think they are anywhere close to fizzling out."

Jason's eyes grew wide open upon hearing what Eric had just said. He watched silently as Eric joined Sonny and Emily and the others.

"Aren't you going to say hi to Emily, dad?" asked Emma.

"Nah, they're busy, I'll catch up with them later," he said as he looked at her, then Nathalie and they got in his truck and drove away.

More than a year, he kept playing it in a loop in the back of his head. His question was still unchanged, 'when did this happen?'. How? Why? Where? Had Emily cheated on him? Was Sonny the reason why she broke it off with him? He needed answers and he would get them.