Lee swore to himself as he made his way back to his office. He had finished the schedule a little earlier than he had expected, giving him a moment to take that much needed shower. About halfway through it, he remembered he had forgotten to hand the updated schedule off to one of the CIC officers so the XO could approved it. He had barely dried off before he threw clothes on, and he could still feel a few stray beads of water dripping down his neck.

He shut the hatch of his office, but that was as far as he made it. He wasn't alone. "What the frak are you doing, Kara?" he asked, not sure if he wanted to know the answer. She was sitting behind his desk with her feet kicked up.

"Anders told me he was taking a position on Cloud 9 about an hour after you two had a little heart to heart. I was wondering if you knew anything about that."

Kara watched as Lee's face filled with confusion. "I didn't say anything to him."

"He said you talked about me." She kicked her feet down off the desk and stood up, slowly moving to stand in front of him. "Now what would you two have been saying?"

"He wanted to know about the history everyone kept saying was between us," Lee answered.

Kara stared at him for a second, surprised to realize that he was telling the truth. Anders must have gotten frustrated with the two of them. That had to be how their whole conversation started. "Yeah, he told me that. I apologized for not telling him everything about Zak outright."

"You had a right to wait. I mean, it's kind of intimidating. Anders shows up in a new place to find his girlfriend could have been the daughter of the Fleet's commander."

"I doubt your conversation centered around the Old Man," Kara said, inching close enough that she could smell the soap he had used. It was the same stuff the rest of the pilots used, but somehow it always smelled different on him. "From what I heard, it was mostly talking about how loved I am."

She watched Lee go pale and realized that Anders had been telling her the truth. Lee had actually told Anders he loved her. "Loved by Anders, I mean."

She saw Lee's face drop and wondered if maybe he had been happy that she might know how he felt. The silence filled between them as they both searched for their next words. Kara knew Lee expected her to keep on teasing him, but right now, it really wasn't in her. Teasing Lee, something she usually had so much fun doing, would be easy if only she wasn't so fraking nervous.

"Anders cares about you a lot," Lee said. "I wasn't sure about him at first, you know."

"He loves me enough to want me to be happy. It's something I can admire in a man."

Lee felt his jaw clenched. It figured that something he had struggled so hard to do would end up making the other man look good.

"I admire it even more when the man doesn't tell me he wants me to be happy, when he just makes sure that I am." Kara reached her hands out to rest on his chest before turning her eyes up to look into his. "You know, I could really love a man like that, Lee."

Lee didn't know what to say. He was pretty sure she was implying that she loved him, but with Kara, things were never that cut and dry. She wasn't the type of woman who would just take something if she wanted it, especially at the expense of others. If Kara loved him, she would have had to send Anders packing, and Lee knew Kara would never hurt the resistance leader like that. No, she was definitely not talking about him.

He pulled away from her touch to lean against his desk. "So I assume Anders is going to be a part of a lot of shuttle runs from Cloud 9 to Galactica from now on?"

"No. I don't think he'll be coming back to Galactica any time soon."

"I don't understand," he said, shifting back to sit on the desk. "It sounded like things were finally going good for you, so why would Anders transfer to another ship where he couldn't see you when it would be so easy to stay on Galactica?"

"Because he saw what made me happy," Kara answered honestly. She walked over to take a seat next to him on the desk. "You know, we never really talked about what happened on Colonial Day."

"What does that have to do with Anders?"

"Everything," she admitted. Her hand reached out to rest on top of his on the desk. "You know, I spent that whole night waiting for you to show up so you could see my dress. All I wanted was to see if I could put that fraking annoying smile on your face."

"Fraking annoying?" he said, feigning offense.

"In a way that makes you too damn cute," she said, smiling at him brightly.

"Too damn cute?"

"Would you stop rephrasing everything I say with a question?" she said, smacking him on the shoulder.

"Sorry," he whispered, turning the hand on the desk to intertwine his fingers with hers.

"I'll forgive you if you promise to be honest with me." When he gave a small nod, she hopped off the desk and moved to stand in between his legs, letting their joined hands rest on the top of his thigh. The two pilots stared at each other for a moment, and Kara could feel the temperature begin to rise inside of her. His eyes were burning right through her. "A man looks at a woman the way you're looking at me, Lee, and the woman starts getting ideas."

"Ideas?"

Kara smirked. "I thought you said you were going to stop doing that."

"I'll stop after this one. Ideas?"

She nodded. "I could play coy with you or tease you like I normally do, but I'm tired of it, Lee. I thought I was happy being with Anders because it was the first time I've smiled in so fraking long. I brought him back to the Fleet, and it seemed like my life just kind of clicked into place." She ran her hands up his chest to rest around his neck and sighed. "It took me this long to realize that my happiness had absolutely nothing to do with Sam and everything to do with you."

"Me?"

She glared at his question. "You're making this hard for me to say."

"We always seem to have trouble saying things to one another," Lee pointed out.

Kara stared at him a moment before shrugging. "Then, I guess I'm going have to do this without words."

Lee barely had time to breathe before she had leaned forward to pull him into a kiss. Her lips were feather light against his, and he knew it was taking all the courage she had to do this. Kara had always been such a frail little girl under her tough warrior exterior. He let his hands come up to wrap themselves around her waist and pull her further in. When she had settled in against him, he moved his hands up her body. When they brushed along the sides of her breasts, she opened her mouth in a small gasp. He took full advantage and deepened the kiss.

Lee could feel the shift come over her as she realized he wasn't fighting her in any way. Her hands grabbed the bottom of his tanks and, with more force than he thought she had in her, ripped them off of his body. They fell to the floor before he could even grasp what she had done. He choked on the words he had been about to say as her lips came down to crush against him again. Distracted, he didn't feel her hands move back up to his chest until she had pushed him down. She moved to straddle his body on the desk, and a little voice in the back of his head wondered if he should have taken the time to lock the hatch.

As Kara's hands traveled down his body and rested on the zipper of his pants, reality hit him hard. "Stop," he whispered against her lips. "You need to stop this, Kara."

Kara sat up and stared at him in disbelief. After all that, he was still going to push her away?

"We can't be doing this. I promised Anders."

"Promised Anders what?" she asked.

Lee tried to think of what he could tell her while still keeping his promise to Anders, but thinking was becoming increasingly hard. She was still straddling him on top of his office desk, after all. No amount of willpower would help him forget that little fact. "I told Anders that I wouldn't stand in the way of your happiness."

"Who said you're standing in the way?"

Lee chuckled as she put her hands on her hip and gave him a rather irritated look. "Look at us, Kara," he laughed. "I think Anders might have a problem with me taking advantage of his girlfriend."

"I want to be really clear about something, Lee. I am the one taking advantage of you."

He was about to tell her that from his perspective it didn't matter who was taking advantage of who, but she had leaned down to nip lightly at his collarbone. When the nipping started involving her tongue, all thought left his head.

Kara slowly crept her way up to his lips again and smiled as he let out a soft moan against her lips. The words came out before she could think twice. "I love you, Lee."

Lee's eyes shot open, and all kissing and touching ended. "What did you just say?"

"That's what this was all about," she said with a smile. "I wanted to let you know that you weren't alone in the love department."

"I must be dreaming," Lee declared.

"Do you often dream of me straddling you on top of your desk?" she asked. When Lee just raised his eyebrows at her and nodded, she chuckled.

"I love that smile," Lee said, reaching up to trace her lips with his fingertips. "I don't get to see it very often."

"Is it only my smile you love?" Kara asked.

"No. I pretty much love all of you."

"It seems like everyone on this ship knew that you loved me except for me."

Lee reached up to push her hair out of her face and smiled. "That's because everyone else is a lot smarter than you."

Kara punched him hard in the arm, causing him to wince in pain even as he began to laugh. She felt his arms pull her down against him and sighed as he began to kiss where the side of her neck met her chin. She could feel herself shiver against his hands as they worked their way up and down her back. This time when her hands went down to his pants, he didn't push her away.

Lee was about to pull her tanks up off her body when the hatch door creaked open. They both froze as the XO entered the CAG's office.

"Sorry to disturb you two," Tigh said gruffly. "But your father wants that flight schedule now."

Lee grabbed on to Kara and lifted them up on one side. He grabbed for the papers underneath his body and held them out to Tigh. "Here you go, sir."

Tigh took them out of Lee's hand. "You two might want to lock the hatch next time you decide to defy military policy." Kara nodded and gave him a stiff salute, earning herself a glare. "By the way, Starbuck, you're wanted in the hangar bay."

Kara held in her groan until the hatch door banged shut.

"Come on," Lee said, sitting up so she could slid to the floor. "I'm sure the Chief could use your help getting that downed Viper back into the air."

Kara nodded and leaned down to pick Lee's tanks up off the floor. Tossing them his way, she asked, "What are you up to for the next few hours?"

"I have to fly the midnight CAP, but until then, I've got some downtime. Why do you ask?" Kara smiled at him innocently as she moved to open the hatch. "Kara…" Lee said tentatively. He never knew what she was thinking.

"Have you ever fraked underneath a Viper?" She grinned at him wickedly before slipping out into the hall.

Lee stared around at the mess they had made of his office and suddenly felt the urge to laugh. For once, he didn't care that his life had turned itself upside down yet again. He was actually starting to like the feelings living in chaos brought him. Getting to his feet, Lee tried to figure out if Kara had been serious.

In the end, it didn't matter. He was willing to give it a shot either way.

As Lee made his way down to the hangar bay, he silently thanked the gods for answering the hope he had had for years. Kara was finally free to be his.