A/N: Canis the dog in this story is no relation to Canis the dog in my story "The Day Before You Came"...I just liked the name, so I re-used it

"You haven't changed much in here," Bobby commented inanely as he followed Alex into her apartment later that morning. A photograph of her nephew that hung on one wall had been replaced by a newer one, and her couch had been moved to the other side of her living room and pushed against the wall, but other than that, her living space looked just as it had during the many nights he had spent there over the years.

She glanced over her shoulder at him, then followed his eyes to the couch. "I needed to make room for my nephew and the dog - not necessarily in that order."

"The dog?" Bobby blinked. Her nephew was old news, but this was the first he'd heard of a dog.

His question answered itself a few seconds later when a black dog that looked like it hadn't quite shed its gangly puppyhood padded out of the bedroom toward them.

"Dog," she repeated, nodding to the animal. "Canis, actually."

The puppy perked up and trotted over to her, letting out a bark that sounded too big for his body at the sound of his name.

"You didn't need to translate," Bobby said with a slight smile, studying the four-sizes-too-big paws the dog sported. "I understood it in English. What is he?"

"Annoying, is what he is," Alex said with a sigh as she walked further into the apartment and scooped the puppy off the ground, ignoring the fact that he was getting too big to be picked up that way. "Sorry. I, uh . . . I forgot you didn't know I had him. Canis is his actual name, and we think he's mostly great dane."

"Who's 'we'?" he asked, suddenly and irrationally afraid that he was about to hear about a boyfriend of some kind who had gifted her with the dog.

Pressing her lips closed and pulling her head back to avoid getting her teeth licked, she waited until Canis had thrown his paws over her shoulder and settled his muzzle into her neck before answering Bobby's question. "He was a present from my sisters last Christmas - he came from a shelter - and we weren't sure how big he was going to get, so my mom did -" Her voice cut off abruptly then as her brain caught up to her mouth, and she lowered her face into the dog's fur, mumbling, "Never mind."

Carefully setting down his bags, Bobby moved toward her. "Your mother did what?" he prompted gently, taking the dog from her arms so he could see her face. "It'll get easier, Alex," he said when she didn't respond. "Give it time."

"I don't want to give it time!" she burst out, startling both him and Canis, who yelped loudly in Bobby's ear. "I just want my mom back!" Dropping her head into her hands, she squatted down where she stood, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees. "And I know how stupid it is to say that," she added, mumbling into her hands.

"Alex . . ." He released the dog - who immediately circled around to try to lick his mistress's face - and lowered himself to the floor next to her. "It's not stupid," he told her as he tried to pull her trembling hands away from her face without using too much force. "It's . . . a perfectly valid feeling."

"Don't psychoanalyze me, Bobby," she said as she allowed him to draw her hands down and hold onto them. "That's not what I need right now."

"What is it that you need, then?" he asked quietly. "Tell me and I'll try to do it."

"I don't know." Shaking her head, she tried to retrieve her hands, but found them locked in his tight grip. "Stop it."

He obediently released her hands, but moved his hands to her knees instead of withdrawing them completely. "I'm here to help you, ok? When you think of something . . . let me know."

She stared down at the floor, trying to make some sense of the thoughts swirling in her head and, at the same time, trying to will her hands to be still and stop making her weakness visible. "I'm sorry about Maggie," was what she eventually managed to get out of her mouth, visibly confusing Bobby with the non sequitur. "She's . . . we're all upset. You're just an easy target to take it out on."

"She never liked me much to begin with," he pointed out with a shrug. "I should be used to it by now."

"Bobby, no. She liked you just fine until . . ." She broke off and shook her head, thinking better of what she had been about to say. "You know what I mean."

"Until I turned into a self-centered jerk?"

That startled a laugh out of her. "Sort of," she admitted without looking up. "But I've explained it to her. She just, uh . . . she gets angry to help her deal with bad things, whereas Laurie cries and I . . . disengage. And like I said, you're an easy target for someone who wants to be angry."

"You explained it to her?" he echoed. "How did you manage to do that, when I can't even justify it to myself?"

Slowly raising her head, she met his eyes and then looked away again. "Look, Bobby, I . . . I can't be angry anymore. I don't have the energy to fight with you while I'm crying for my mother. Can we just . . . not discuss it?"

There was silence for a second as he tried to process that. "Get up," he ordered gently then, climbing to his feet and holding out a hand to her. "Whatever makes things easier for you, we can do, Alex. You don't have to ask me for it."

Taking his hand, she allowed him to do most of the work of getting her to her feet, and a few seconds later, found herself standing only inches from him, their tightly clasped hands between them. "Come on," she said, quickly stepping back and giving his hand a tug. "I'll make some coffee. You probably haven't eaten anything today, either."

Bobby followed her silently into her kitchen, with Canis trailing behind. "You don't need to make anything, Alex. I can just -"

"Be quiet," she admonished without looking away from the cabinet she was searching through. "I have to eat too; I might as well feed you while I'm at it."

"Sorry. Do you . . . want any help?"

"No. Sit, Bobby. You dropped everything to come all the way out here; now you deserve to rest." She finally fished the coffee can out of the back of the cabinet and set it on the counter. "Breakfast is going to have to be toast, anyway. I don't have anything else."

He looked at her worriedly. "Is that normal for you?"

"I eat just fine," she said defensively, anticipating where he was going with the question. "You're sitting right in front of me; do I look like I've wasted away to nothing? No, I don't. What is it with you people?"

"What people?"

"You! And Webster!"

Making a conscious decision not to argue with her, he shifted topics. "How is it working with Webster? Less infuriating than with me?"

She looked at him in surprise. "You weren't infuriating. Well, not much past the first few weeks. Ok, and occasionally after that." Rolling her eyes as she realized the absurdity of what she just said, she shrugged. "Webster's ok. It's interesting to find myself being the unorthodox one in the partnership, I can tell you that. How about you? What's Riley like - besides 'nosy'?"

He watched her set a pot of coffee brewing, trying to keep his mind in the present and not let himself think about the familiarity of their positions. In the past, she might have teasingly plopped herself down on his lap while they waited for their morning coffee. Today, she leaned against the counter, watching the black liquid fall as she waited for him to answer her question. "Riley?" Bobby managed after giving his head a shake and telling himself to snap out of it. "Uh, he's ok. He's actually one of the better partners I've had, besides you. Well, at least if you don't count the nosiness. I really am sorry about that, by the way. I don't know what made him think -"

She cut him off with a dismissive wave of her hand. "Whatever it was, you must be a carrier, since your mom caught it too." Not waiting for his response to that, she turned back to the counter and picked up the now-full coffee pot. "You still drink yours the same?"

"My mom . . ." he echoed with a groan. "I'm even more sorry for that. I can't believe she thought it was a good idea to send you a letter . . . pleading my case, or whatever it was she meant to do."

"Coffee, Bobby. Answer my question about the coffee. We can talk about your mom after I have caffeine in my system."

He blinked. "Uh, yeah, I drink it the same. Look, why don't you, uh. . . let me take you out to breakfast? You did say you have no food . . ." he said cautiously as he took the mug she handed him.

"No." She picked up her own mug and did her best to hide her face in it then, not wanting him to see the pain in her eyes. "But thank you for the offer," she added a second later, realizing how abrupt her refusal had probably sounded. "I just . . . don't feel like going out."

Of course she didn't, he mentally chastised himself. The woman's mother had just died, and all he could do was sit here and make it sound like he wanted to go out on the town? What the hell kind of support was that, to offer to her? "I'm sorry. I . . . didn't think."

Alex just nodded and took another sip of coffee. "Tell me more about Riley. Did he mention to you that he called me a 'cracker'?"

"A cracker?" he echoed. "As in, a redneck?"

"No, I think he meant something more along the lines of 'firecracker.' He was impressed for some reason when I told him to tell me why he was calling or hang up."

Bobby couldn't hold back his smile, even though he knew it was inappropriate. "He's . . . pretty unconventional, himself. He probably thought he'd found a kindred spirit. I'm surprised he didn't say anything more offensive than that."

Turning away from him, she studied the calendar the hung on her wall, not really seeing it, but wanting to keep her eyes busy. "No, he wasn't offensive. He was too busy prying."

"Prying?" He got to his feet and crossed the kitchen to stand a few feet behind her, close enough that she felt his presence but far enough away that he wasn't impinging on her personal space. "He told me that all he said was that he thought you should call me."

Oops. It hadn't occurred to her that Riley would have kept the important parts of their conversation from his partner, although in hindsight it made perfect sense for him to have done so. "Well, he wasn't prying, I guess, so much as making guesses and hoping I'd confirm or deny. And then, uh . . ." She might be sealing Riley's fate by bringing up this one, but she wanted to know too badly to hold it in: "He said something about a picture."

Jaw tightening, he carefully set down his mug and shoved his hands in his pockets. "That was not part of the story he gave me. What . . . uh, what about the . . . uh, a picture was he saying?"

She glanced at him, reading the signs as if it were yesterday that she'd last seen them. "Calm down, Bobby. All he said was that you had a picture of me that he'd seen you look at." She suppressed a sigh of relief when she saw him relax slightly. "I guess I'm just curious about what the picture is."

"It's . . ." He shook his head emphatically. "It's nothing. Just an old photo."

Alex studied his face, although she didn't need to see it to know he was hiding something from her. After a second, she just sighed and shrugged. She didn't have the energy or the will to play twenty questions with someone as closed-mouthed as Bobby today. "Oh. Ok. Listen, we should . . . I mean, I don't know what you're comfortable with doing while you're here, but I have to . . ." Forcing herself to a stop, she took a steadying breath. "I have to meet with my family this afternoon. To talk about . . . arrangements. I don't know whether you'd mind coming or if you want me to go alone."

She wanted him to go to a meeting of her family? All of whom would probably be furious at her for having brought someone so disliked into their midst? "I . . ." He swallowed nervously. "I don't think . . . I mean, I'd just be in the way. I certainly have no say in any of the decisions you'll be making."

She nodded quickly, telling herself that it was juvenile to want him there with her whether he had any part in the discussion or not. "Ok. I . . . ok. That's fine."

It wasn't fine, and he could see that written all over her face. "Look, Alex, I'm sorry. It's just -"

"It's fine," she said again. "Like I said, it's a matter of what you're comfortable with."

I'm not comfortable with any of this! he wanted to say. I'm not comfortable with your sister, I'm not comfortable with your grief, and I'm definitely not comfortable with trying to figure out what the hell I'm doing here, in your apartment, in your kitchen, standing two feet away from someone who doesn't want to know I still love her!

"I'm sorry," was what he actually said, though, feeling like a broken record as it came out of his mouth. "I just don't -"

"I said that it's ok, Bobby." She forced a casual smile. "I'll be just fine going on my own, I promise."