Title; Third Time's the Charm

Author: Shaneequa

Disclaimer: I don't own JAG, NCIS, or anything. This is fanfiction.

Summary: Fix it! For Let Fate Decide NCIS LA 11x1.

A/N: Here is my first fanfic after years of not writing. This is un-beta'd. All mistakes are mine, so please be gentle.

The italicized are the script from the episode. I have plot bunnies for more one-shots with this universe so if you want to see those, leave a review.

Mac listened intently as the NCIS team regaled her of their stories together, a wistful smile on her face. Their adventures reminded her of the ten years she spent with Harm and all the shenanigans they got themselves into. Inevitably, everything in her life lead back to Harmon Rabb Jr, it's what made it so difficult to get over him.

She took a sip of her drink and noticed that she was out. "Anyone want something else to drink?"

"Yeah I'll take one of their mojitos," Callen said, raising his glass. Everyone else shook their heads content with what they currently had.

"Coming right up," Mac said, excusing herself from the group and walking towards the bar. She wondered what Harm and Hetty were up to. She was reminded of Hetty's words nights ago. But the final chapter isn't written yet. She was mulling on that statement when Harm walked up to her.

"What are those?" Harm asked walking up to the bar.

"They call them their signature Mojitos."

"Mojitos in a dry country, I wonder what's in them," Harm said skeptically examining the blue drink in front of him as Mac sipped the drink to try it.

"Mm, sugar. Lots and lots of sugar… yeah," Mac said. Then sighed. "It's been nine years, Harm."

"I know."

"Why?" Mac asked. Nine years, ten hours, forty minutes, and twelve seconds, exactly when she wired him the money from selling their home in San Diego and haven't heard from him since then. They never ran into each other; not at little AJ's graduation from Annapolis, not at any one of Mattie's recovery milestones. They were satisfied with never seeing each other again, because, out of sight, out of mind. They wouldn't have known that a random case for NCIS would be what brought them together after almost a decade.

"I… I mean, I thought you were happy in DC," he admitted, hoping she did not read into the statement. Of course he's been keeping tabs on her, asking Bud and Harriet how she was doing and updates from Mattie. "I was deployed."

"Yeah, but that's not why," she pressed.

"Then, why?" he asked, interested to hear her theory, and if he was honest with himself, just wanting to hear her voice again even if what she would say may not be what he wanted to hear.

"We're scared," Mac started.

"Mac... I... look … I don't…"

"It's... the only reason that makes sense. We never gave it a shot, a real try. We never put our all because we're scared to."

It was true, and they both knew it. They spent five years, happy, really happy that they were finally together. Yet both of them kept each other at arms length because they were scared to be truly happy. They were scared that they would lose each other so they kept a part of themselves protected. The irony was, in the end, the thing they feared, what was holding them back happened: they lost each other.

"Mac you know…"

"Don't worry, I'm not standing here in front of you asking you to be with me. I just want us to acknowledge why we're here tonight as colleagues, and not husband and wife," Mac stated. She would never ask him to be with her, not anymore, not again. It seemed that she was always the one who had to make the first move and she was tired of that. She vowed when she moved to DC that she would move on, and never put herself in that position again.

Harm, on the other hand, wished differently. He wished that a part of her was asking to be with him again because every time he saw her face, albeit on the screen, his heart stopped. She was still breathtakingly beautiful. Even more so now that he knew the ins and outs of her. Mac was the one person he thought that when they finally got their heads out of their sixes that they would be together forever. Eternity. How naïve of him to think so, it turned out.

There was a pause in the conversation and Mac knew it was time to change the subject.

"I didn't know that uh you and Hetty know each other."

Harm chuckled. "We didn't about until five minutes ago."

"She uh she's something else," she responded, thankful that he took the bait to change the subject to neutral territory.

"She is. She suggested I put in for a leadership position at NCIS division, San Diego or the contingency response team," Harm admitted.

"Wow, prime assignments. How would that fit in with your Navy commission?"

"It wouldn't."

She nodded. "Be good for you: plant some roots. It's hard to do that in a carrier."

"But I love the carrier," Harm stated. He loved the carrier life, it gave him a welcome distraction from the empty home that awaited him stateside. He dreaded his six months on shore duty because everything reminded him of what he had lost with Mac. Additionally, he was being primed to come back and be the assistant JAG as a Rear Admiral with his carrier experience once he was done with this tour.

"Yeah it's always moving," Mac observed, not knowing what else to say to continue the conversation. After nine years, she found it hard to believe that there was nothing they could talk about. But there was too much tension for small talk, and too much history to ignore.

"Mac what are we doing?" Harm said circling the conversation back to them. The conversation wasn't over, and maybe, this was what he needed. He was not getting younger, he definitely was not getting any happier than the five years that he spent with Mac.

"I don't know, but uhm," Mac stated.

"But what?"

"We're way past letting fate decide."

"So let's decide. Right here," Harm stated. "What do you want?"

"It's never been about what I want Harm," she responded. "You know what I've wanted, for almost three decades, you know what I've wanted."

"God, it's really been that long huh?"

"Yeah."

"I…" Harm started, unsure how he was going to finish the sentence. There were too many emotions threatening to bubble up. Emotions that he successfully ignored in the last nine years, but they were threatening to explode in the middle of a dry-bar in a foreign country.

She nodded her head and picked up the drink to go back to the team and Hetty. Mac passed him slowly, a sad smile on her face.

"I will always love you," Harm said just as she was almost out of ear shot, their backs to one another. She stopped, and he continued. "Please, Mac. I just want us, again. I'll try harder, I'll give it everything I have."

"Harm," she whispered unsure of what to say next. She was being honest that she wasn't there asking for him to take her back. She was happy where she was, in DC with her extended family. For the past nine years, she has made a life that was the best she could have without him.

"Please," he said, turning to face her.

"Are you sure about this?"

"You said so yourself, Mac," Harm started. "We never actually gave it our all because we were scared, and it made us lose each other. Why don't we give it our all this go around...third time's the charm?"

"Third time's the charm."

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