1630 Hours

CIA Headquarters

Langley, Virginia

            Harm sighed as he remembered that fateful day last spring—the day that had turned his life around.  After he told her that he had given up his commission to come find her, she had been . . . different.  Reserved.  Less willing to talk to him, tell him what she was thinking.  She had looked at him, though.  A lot.  The look on her face was not something Harm had enjoyed.  Fear.  No, he thought for the hundredth time.  Not fear, terror.  Sheer terror.  He hadn't understood it at first—really didn't get it.  Gunny had explained it to him.  She was seeing Mic in him.  Mic.  He was the only man willing to give up everything he held dear for her—at least, the only man until Harm had dropped everything to save her.  He could understand that.  She was scared that he would . . . what?  Ask her to marry him?  Use it as emotional leverage?  He didn't know.  All he knew was that he loved her.  He had loved her enough to follow her, and then . . . nothing.  The admiral had asked him, before he left, what he was going to do when he found her.  He hadn't gone in with an answer, and he hadn't come back with one.

            He hadn't seen her in almost two months.  He thought back to when, exactly, it was.  He had gone over to Bud and Harriet's to drop off a file from one of his last cases at JAG for Bud to look over and, eventually, deposit in the JAG archives.  Mac had been babysitting little AJ; Bud and Harriet were at Lamaze classes.  Why they needed Lamaze classes was beyond Harm—they'd gone through two births already.  He felt the small twisting in the pit of his stomach when he thought of Baby Sarah, so small, so helpless.  Similar to the feeling he got when he thought of "his" Sarah.  She wasn't surprised to see him.  Well, she wasn't surprised from what he could tell—but then, she wore such a mask those days he couldn't read anything her in her face—not a pleasant experience.  She had just accepted the file and sent him away.  Hadn't invited him in for coffee, hadn't told little AJ that "Uncle Harm" was here, just accepted the file and went back inside.

            Oh, they'd played phone tag a time or two, but never connected.  Harm wondered if she really wasn't home that much, and where she was if she wasn't home.  He hoped that she was at work, or maybe visiting Porter Webb.  He knew that he didn't want her to be out with other men.  Selfish of him, he knew, but there it was.  Gone were the days of her stopping by his house to discuss a case, or vice versa.  Of course, that was because they didn't have any cases together anymore.  He was at the CIA after taking the Director up on his offer, and he was working quite a bit with Catherine Gale, learning the ropes.  Catherine was nice enough, but she wasn't Mac.

            Harm couldn't think of Catherine without thinking of his "marriage" to her.  Mac had found it mildly amusing, and was not surprised to hear that Catherine was still blond.  He remembered her wry smile as she murmured that "It figures."  Of course, that had been before he told her that he had resigned . . . .

            Catherine's mother had died while he was in Paraguay.  He felt awful that he couldn't go to the funeral, but she had understood.  Hell, she had told him point blank not to feel bad, that she really didn't need him at the funeral.  She had told her mother that he had been called away on a case.  She believed her.

             That day Catherine had walked into Mac's hospital room in Bethesda was surreal.  It seemed to be the mirror image of him walking into Mrs. Gale's room at St. John's.  Harm had been dragged into that hospital room, while Catherine had forced her way into Mac's.  Harm was in Mrs. Gale's room under false pretences, while Catherine, well, had made no beans about her reasons of being there.