Christina lay awake in Burke's arms. The clock had just turned to 3:00am, and she had yet to fall asleep. Luckily for her Burke had passed out immediately after they had finished making love. She wasn't prepared to answer his questions yet. Well in truth, she wasn't prepared to lie to him again. Her past was something she just didn't want to revisit, not with Burke, not with anyone. And if that meant having to stay quiet about Devon, then that's what she would do. Besides, Devon wouldn't dare actually hurt her for fear of Burke finding out. She could handle this.

"Christina." She heard Burke's faint whisper in her ear.

"Hey." She responds softly as she turns in his arms to face him.

"Why aren't you sleeping?"

"Well Dr. Burke, I can't seem to fall asleep. What would your brilliant doctor mind prescribe for such a problem?" she asked laughing.

"Maybe it would help if you talked about what's on your mind." He responded seriously.

"Burke, not now." Christina quickly became agitated, which made Burke sit up in bed.

"Not now, not now! That's all I ever hear from you! When does not now become now Christina!" Burke said angrily. Christina was alsoquickly escalating from agitated to extremely angry.

"God why do you always have to do this? You always have to ruin a perfect night with one of your 'serious' talks. Just mind your own business!" She yelled back. She knew she was being unfair but at this point she was beyond caring.

"Mind my own business? Did you really just say that? Christina, You are my business!" he shouted the last part to try and get through to her. His response was met with silence. Burke took a deep breath.

"Why can't you just let me in? Let me help you." He was pleading with her.

"I don't need your help! I'm fine! I can handle this!"

"Yeah I can see that, you're handling it very well." He responded sarcastically.

Thiscomment causedChristina toget up out of bed.

"You know what, I don't need this right now." She said as she began searching for her clothes.

"Christina" he sighed. "What are you doing?"

"I'm leaving." She said as she zipped up her jeans. Burke immediately got out of bed.

"No your not." He said grabbing hold of her arms.

"Yes I am. Let go of me Burke." When he didn't comply she squirmed out of his grasp.

"Christina, it's 3am. Where are you going to go?"

"Wherever I don't have to deal with a smothering, overprotective, boyfriend." At this point she was fully clothed and grabbing her purse off the chair.

"Christina!" He shouted as she made her way out of the bedroom. He followed her into the hallway as she headed for the door.

"Christina!" he shouted once more, but her only response was slamming the door behind her.

Burke stood in complete shock. He had to go after her. They had to talk this out. But how? She always refused to talk about anything, this wasn't going to be any different. He was so worried about her. He then quicklydecided to go after her. He rushed into the bedroom and started throwing on clothes. As he was pulling on his jacket he heard his beeper go off. He pulled it out of his pocket and saw that the hospital was beeping him 911.

"Perfect" he mumbled as he grabbed his keys and headed out the door.


SGH

Burke walked in the Emergency Room doors and was met with complete chaos. Out of the corner of his eye he caught Bailey's small frame scurrying by.

"Dr. Bailey." He shouted getting her attention. "What the hell happened?"

"Multi-car accident on route 87. And with St. Joe's Memorial still being quarantined, we're getting all the victims." She explained. "Everyone's been paged. Christina didn't come in with you?" she asked confused. He became uncomfortable at the mention of Christina, and turned his eyes toward the floor.

"Uh…ummm, I don't know where she is." Burke mumbled.

"I'm right here." Christina said rushing through the doors. "Sorry I'm late, there's a big back up on 87." She explained.

"No kidding." Bailey says sarcastically. "Get to work!" She barks at her intern, ignoring the tension between the couple.

"Yes ma'am." Christina says as she hurries toward the locker room without so much as a glance in Burke's direction.


6:00am SGH

Five surgeries in 2 ½ hours, and Burke was exhausted. He managed to save 4 out of the five patients. The fifths injuries were just too extensive and they lost him right on the OR table. The one thing Burke was thankful for was that it had kept his mind off Christina for a while. The hospital had finally died down and in a few minutes he'd be heading back to his empty apartment. He had decided to be patient, something that he had been doing a lot of the past couple days. He would wait till she came to him, which could prove to be a long and painful process but he was through forcing her into things. She would come to him when she was ready. He just prayed it would be before he retired. He entered the men's room as he contemplated the situation and found himself faced with the cause of his problems. Burke's expression changed from thoughtful to irate in a matter of milliseconds.

"Dr. Burke." Savage acknowledged as he dried his hands with a paper towel. "Crazy morning wasn't it?" Burke wasn't impressed with his attempt at pleasantries and walked up to within inches of the intern forcing Savage to crane his neck to look up at his superior.

"Listen Savage, I'm only going to tell you this once. I don't know what happened between you and Christina, but I'll tell you this, I love her and she means more to me than you could even imagine. So if I EVER find out that you hurt her, either physically, or emotionally, I don't care if its something as small as you giving her a paper cut, I'll mess you up so good your mother won't be able to recognize you. Do you understand me?" Burke finished, satisfied with the fear in the eyes of the intern.

Savage wasso caughtoff guard by Burke's threats that all he could do was nod. Believing he had gotten his point across, Burke straightened himself and walked back out of the men's room.