"Lisa." His back was to her, his eyes still closed. He heard her breath catch in her throat. She hadn't expected him to be awake.

"Feeling better, Greg?" She joined him under the covers.

"I suppose," he said without turning around. "Why did you send Wilson here?"

"I couldn't get away and didn't know when I would be back," Cuddy said as she curled up next to him. "One fire turned into two fires and then they threatened to turn into a raging inferno. You know how it is. Anyway, Wilson is your friend. I figured he'd want to check on you."

"He knows."

"Knows what?"

"About us."

"How?" she gasped. "Did you tell him?"

House chuckled then turned on his back. "Wilson is a lot of things but a total moron isn't one of them. He's a man who has tried to hide many affairs so he is more than capable of spotting two people trying to hide an affair."

"I should have known," she sighed heavily.

"If he blabs I'll just beat him to death with my cane."

Cuddy couldn't help but laugh at that. Slowly she reached out and lightly stroked his cheek, watched in amusement as he broke out in gooseflesh, more than pleased when he didn't push her hand away. Either he was still too tired to care or he was just letting himself enjoy the moment. Cuddy hoped it was the latter. House always seemed to deny himself many of the simple pleasures of life as if he were undeserving of them. Try as she might to break him of this practice, she found the pain, misery and all around stubbornness that drove him to it ran so deep she doubted even House could see the bottom.

She remembered his comment from the other night about his leg looking like 'roadkill'. He hated it, but the hate wasn't simply directed at the leg itself or the pain it caused him. More than once House had let it slip that he felt a freak. He didn't like her seeing his leg, he made that very clear. Of course, Cuddy didn't care what his leg looked like and, of course, he didn't believe her. One night she had had enough and asked him, exasperated, "Why won't you believe me. Because you can't or you won't?" He quietly replied "I can't because I won't." and refused to speak about it again.

Through it all there was a strange flipside; there were times he would go out of his way to indulge and charm her. As a lover, well, he gave as much as he took, if not more. Many nights they ended up a panting, tangled, wonderful mess on the bed. It appeared her pleasure was the one thing he couldn't deny himself. Then there were the Godivas that arrived at her house at random intervals, his was of letting her know he was thinking about her without using so many words. For her birthday he sent over a huge bouquet of red, white and pink roses. The card read "I didn't know which color you liked best."

The moment passed. He gently but firmly brushed her hand away.