Chapter 26: Paranoid

Since Meredith Grey appeared in his life, Derek's existence could be compared to a roller coaster ride, a constant series of successive ups and downs. Unfortunately, since yesterday evening he was at the low. He felt as though he fell from a cart to the ground several hundred feet below. After an unidentified person walked on them in the supply closet, Meredith made a hasty escape and was inaccessible ever since. He was reduced to spend a lonely night at the trailer, sexual frustration and the fact that someone got an eyeful of his naked being the least of his concerns.

Derek drove into the parking lot apprehensively. He was aware all his future, all their future, depended on the identity of the person who saw them. The gossip mill could be already in the full swing, pulling him and Meredith down, mostly Meredith. The two of them, the chief and the head of a department, in the state of undress, locked in a tight embrace in a tiny room… it was going to be one of the greatest scandals in the history of the hospital, possibly devastating Meredith's credibility. He was safe to be sure, but Meredith… His consciousness panged guiltily, doubly so because he was selfishly much more concerned about what it meant for their relationship than for her job.

He was in luck. He saw Meredith's Porsche and his girlfriend herself leaned into the car, looking for something. He pulled into the free spot next to her. Despite her flawless looks, she must have been equally distressed as she noticed him only when he jumped out of the car, standing face to face with her.

"Crap!" she exclaimed, her hands flying to her sides.

"Crap?" he repeated trying to read her expression.

"I've got to go," she shot quickly and hurried towards the entrance to the hospital.

"Can we talk about it?" he ran up to her. "About that someone and what they saw?"

"I don't need to talk about it!" she replied icily. "I experienced it! Naked!"

"If I was a better guy, I'd walk away," he started.

"Yes, you would!" she nervously pushed the elevator button.

"But the thing is, I'm not a better guy," he quipped, "and I have no intention of walking away."

"Listen," she narrowed her eyes at him and hissed, "it's my career that's at stake here and I won't allow anything-"

"Dr. Grey, Dr. Shepherd," greeted Mark, slowly approaching the elevators with a coffee in his hand, already in his scrubs. "Another lovers' quarrel?"

They looked at him quickly, anticipating the worst.

"Excuse me?" Meredith gritted icily. "Did you imply something?"

"I… I didn't," assured her Mark with a frown. What ruffled her feathers? Dr. Grey never took his jokes badly, even the dirtiest ones.

"Then, what did you mean by that?"

"Nothing, absolutely nothing," he squirmed under her glare. "It was just an innocent joke."

"Then don't do that!" she barked. "You've got a sick sense of humor. I'd better take the stairs…" she muttered and stalked off.

"What the fuck, Mark?" Derek shot at him angrily.

"No, what the fuck, Derek?" growled Mark eyeing his friend. "What the fuck is going on between you two?"

"We can't stand each other," he lied quickly, calming himself down. It looked like a false alarm. "When did you get here?"

"Today?" asked Mark with surprise. "About an hour ago. Why?"

"What did you hear?" demanded Derek promptly.

"About what?" frowned Mark.

Derek felt his pulse return to normal. Mark didn't know anything, which meant his usual source of information, the nurses, didn't know anything either. Then... who did?

Meredith paced her office nervously. There was no way she could concentrate on work for long. Mark Sloan didn't know anything, or he would say it straight into their faces. The rest of the hospital seemingly didn't know either. She knew that before she even got to her office. Nothing changed in the way her employees were looking at her. The juicy gossip clearly didn't yet make it to the general public. Why? Maybe it was a friendly person. She snorted; she could count friendly persons on the fingers of one hand. Maybe they wanted to gain some advantage? Information was power.

There was light knocking on the door and Addie's head peeked inside," Hey!"

"Addie," breathed Meredith. The advice of the best friend was infallible, and she always sought it in moments of crisis. But she kept Addison in the dark about her relationship with Derek to begin with… She would turn out to be a mistrustful, ungrateful bitch…

"You're not too busy for me, I hope?" smiled Addison waling in, in her street clothes.

"You're going home?" asked Meredith, trying to appear normal.

"Yeah, I haven't even had the chance to ask you how was your trip to LA?" went on Addison. "You got yourself busy instantly with your obsession."

"What do you mean?" demanded Meredith with a note of panic on her voice. It couldn't be Addison who saw them, could it? She would certainly be discreet; the secret was safe with her. But she would surely have told her directly what she saw, wouldn't she? Of that, Meredith wasn't so sure anymore. She didn't say a word to her about her secret boyfriend. Maybe Addie decided to play the game?"

"Well, you went to surgery the minute you got back," Addison eyed her friend suspiciously. "With the man you claim to hate like no one else, I figured your trip must have been stressful."

"You know, Addie," said quietly Meredith. "I am kind of busy, can we talk later?"

"I.. sure," she frowned. "Are you all right? You look kind of awful."

"I'm fine," said quickly Meredith.

"Fine," Addison nodded knowingly. She knew her fake sister was hiding something important form her; it wasn't the first time. But she desisted; there wasn't a way to make her talk.

Meredith leaned heavily against the railing on the staircase landing overlooking the lobby. She stared coldly over the heads of her subordinates as though wanting to discover which one of them held the dangerous knowledge. One of them… one of them discovered her romance with Derek. One of them walked on them while in one of the most compromising positions one can imagine. She detested being dependent on anybody, regardless whether it was a friend or foe. The realization that someone held her in their power was insupportable.

"Dr. Grey?"

"Yes, Dr. O'Malley," she sighed tiredly and faced her deputy.

"I reviewed all the offers from potential suppliers," he announced. "The prolongation of the contact seems the most reasonable option, they give us the highest discounts since we're their-"

"I trust you, Dr. O'Malley," she cut him short. "Take care of everything."

"Yes, Chief," he nodded and blinked at her uncertainly. "Dr. Grey, you look tired. We have a slow day and I took a longer shift today. Why don't you go home and… or… see somebody…?"

"See somebody?" she squinted at him sharply. "Like who?"

"Uhm, I thought… your boyfriend… maybe?" he stammered out.

She clenched her jaws. Could it be George O'Malley? It made sense. Sometimes it felt as though he was her shadow, finding her at most unexpected places in the hospital to sign documents or approve of some decisions, even though she made sure for her secret dates with Derek to stay secret. He wouldn't tell anybody because he was her guy…

"Why would you think I have a boyfriend?" she asked coldly.

"Uhm… I… I… why wouldn't I?" he answered with a question. "You're a wonderful woman… er… person…"

"Thank you, Dr. O'Malley," she said dryly. "Off you go."

She once again gazed down on the bustling lobby. She was going paranoid, everything she heard seemed to have a double meaning. Where did her cool and indifferent judgment go?

"Seeing that you have time for anybody else, you can spare me, your boyfriend, five minutes?" Derek stood beside her on the landing, his arms folded on his chest. His voice was calm, but a barely noticeable strain informed her that he was too reaching the breaking point.

"Here? Here you decided to corner me?" she hissed at him. "In front of everybody? What are you, an exhibitionist? Did you enjoy it last night, to have your pants down before an unexpected audience?"

He couldn't control the laughter that erupted in his throat and directed several curious heads from downstairs to look at them.

"Because I didn't," she whispered indignantly. "And shut up!"

"No one knows anything," he argued sobering up.

"Almost! Almost no one knows anything," she corrected him and decided to abandon the landing as they were attracting too much attention. "Remember that someone walked on us when we were almost in the throes?" she snorted under her breath.

"That little almost again," he chuckled and followed at her side. "Pity we weren't, I'd say. At least, there'd be some fond memories."

"Great that at least one of us finds it funny," she bit back.

He caught her tightly by the arm and pinned her against the wall in the deserted corridor. "I don't find it funny," he gritted through his teeth, his patience finally gone. "I don't find it funny at all. It fucking pisses me off."

She stared at him with wide eyes. If she thought she had seen him angry before, she was sadly mistaken.

"I-"

"No!" he silenced her. "Now you're going to listen to my bitching. You've been treating me like crap, like it was my fault. But you know what? The fault is mutual, we both didn't think about locking that door. And you know what? It's our mutual problem, not yours exclusively. You would know that, had you bothered to talk to me. But you're only verbose around me when we're having sex. I think the words I hear from you most often are harder and faster."

She opened her mouth to retaliate but she couldn't find the words other than she was ashamed of herself. She really was.

They heard footsteps and fragments of conversation and they sprang apart. Meredith took advantage of his sudden hesitation and made her escape. She couldn't bear to be around him. Her career and reputation might be crumbling down because of him, because of his sweet talking that convinced her to continue their fling. But more than him, she blamed herself, she was angry primarily at herself. Because she didn't lock the door. Because she started this thing to begin with, she let herself move the focus from her job to her private life, worse even, she let them mash together. She let herself care too much for that kind, intelligent, sexy man now she couldn't bear to be apart from.

Another fight of two neurosurgeons brought about only mild interest amidst the onlookers. They witnessed so many spats since Dr. Grey's arrival at Seattle Grace that it just didn't make any difference.

"God, they're getting boring," commented Cristina sipping at her coffee.

Izzie chuckled at her friend, "Yeah, I wonder who's gonna crack first."

"Hard to tell," shrugged Cristina. "But when they do, we'll be scraping the rests of the other one from the wall."

In the meantime, a pair of shrewd eyes observed carefully the angry exchange between Dr. Grey and Dr. Shepherd and shook their head disapprovingly. Stupid neurosurgeons with overblown egos. They either shouted at each other or humped each other. Something had to be done about it.