A/N: Hughville and I would like to thank everyone for your awesome comments with chapter one :) We're currently working on the third story that will wrap up the series. We love our trilogies! ;)

Chapter Two

"How did the meeting with the board go?" It was the first thing Wilson said when House came upstairs to borrow some extra sugar for his coffee.

"Fine."

"Did you get the department?"

"Yep."

"Wow. That's great. And is Cameron going to run it with you?"

"Yep."

"I love these one word answers."

"I'm tired!" House repeated, a little louder. "I'll tell you about it later. Now I just want to go to bed."

"I would have thought you'd celebrated with Cameron in her bed."

House shot Wilson a glare. "Be careful, Wilson."

"Got shot down, huh?"

"Fuck you."

Wilson merely chuckled as he topped up his coffee. "See ya, House," he said as his friend left the room.

"Bye Wilson."

XXX

On Monday night, House showed up at work with a tray of coffee for himself and Cameron, and found her in the ER.

"Coffee time," he said as he placed the tray on the desk.

"Thanks, you are a lifesaver."

"So glad to see you're talking to me."

She pursed her lips and took her coffee. "I didn't say I wouldn't talk to you. I just won't talk about anything to do with a romantic relationship between us."

"So, what?" he asked as he took his coffee cup. "We're friends? Colleagues? Friendly colleagues?"

"We're friendly colleagues."

House snorted. "Yeah, we'll see how long that lasts. You want me. You want me bad." He smiled at her and walked away.

She stared at him as he began pulling charts and checking on patients. She did want him. The problem was that she wasn't sure he wanted her in the same way. She wanted more than a casual relationship. She wanted to live with him or maybe even marry him. She knew he wanted to sleep with her but nothing beyond that. Sleeping with him would definitely scratch the itch for both of them but she knew it wouldn't be enough for her. Shaking her head, she took her coffee to her office and tried to concentrate on the pile of paperwork in her inbox.

Later, House found her at the nurse's station. "So, they found us an office for our department. Well, it's two conjoined rooms. One is the actual office, and the one next to it is the conference room which will be perfect for DDX's."

"Where is it?" she asked.

"The fourth floor. Want to go see?"

He seemed excited, something she'd never seen before and it was almost infectious. He was like a little boy on Christmas morning.

"Yeah, I could use a break."

They took the elevator up to the fourth floor. It wasn't a place House was familiar with, as he'd never had a reason to go up there, but it was a nice area and the offices were large. He stopped at the end of the hall and looked at her expectantly, anticipation shining in his eyes.

She pushed open the door to the largest room. The blinds were closed so she crossed the room and opened them. The lights from the parking lot lit the room enough so that they could see it. There was a small kitchenette in the far corner. The room was big enough for a conference table, bookshelves, maybe even a desk.

House took her hand and led her into the smaller room. There were glass walls and doors everywhere. They would have almost no privacy.

"I thought this could be the main office," he told her as he bounced lightly on the balls of his feet.

Cameron looked at the orange wall, the large window, the outer wall which was also made of glass and then the door leading to a balcony.

"Your office," she said.

"No," he said flatly. "Our office."

"There's not room for two desks and it's too small to use for differentials."

Looking over her shoulder at his face, she pasted a smile on her face. "It's perfect. I don't need a desk. I'll have my tablet. It's perfect."

"I'm going back to work," he told her.

"Greg!"

He stopped with his hand on the door. "I get it. You hate it. You said perfect twice. I know what that means."

"I got demoted. Did that ever occur to you?" she asked in exasperation. "I'm no longer a department head. I'm basically your assistant. The team of doctors who end up working in this department will defer to you. You will be in charge. I won't. So forgive me if I'm not overwhelmed with joy. Obviously I've done something wrong for them to demote me." She shook her head. "I've worked here for years. I started out as an intern in Immunology. Then they promoted a man over me. A man with less experience. Do you know what they told me? He had a family to support and I didn't. So, I went to work down in the ER. I know the reason I got the job as head of it is because a woman was running it and the ER doesn't bring in any money."

She could feel the anger welling up and didn't want to take it out on him. "We should get back to work. I have an applicant coming in to work with me later this morning so I'll be working a triple."

Brushing past him, she opened the door and walked to the stairs. She didn't turn back and he didn't follow her.

XXX

House left at the end of his shift without saying anything. Cameron knew she hurt him but everything she said was true. Somehow they had to get past it or they wouldn't be able to work together. She knew she'd be the one let go. House more than proved his worth to the hospital. So, she would apologize and hope that he could forgive her. As she worked with the chirpy redhead who hoped to replace her, Cameron found herself growing more and more annoyed. The woman knew almost nothing about emergency medicine and was more concerned about not getting anything on her designer shoes which she insisted on wearing with her scrubs. Cameron saw one of the board members watching from the doors to the main lobby. They looked at each other and the older woman shook her head before approaching the applicant. Cameron was relieved when the redhead was sent home.

At ten fifteen, House arrived with coffee and a white bag. Once he changed into his scrubs and came back, he crooked his finger at her. She smiled slightly and walked over to the nurse's station where he waited.

"I got your favorite coffee and those weird cookies you like so much," he told her. He tapped his cane on the floor and then looked at her. "I didn't think of the new department from your point of view. You aren't my assistant. We're going to run that department together. The board may have treated you shitty, but I haven't."

"I know," she said softly. She looked up at him and grinned saucily. "You just keep sexually harassing me."

He reached out and tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear. She shivered and blew out her breath as fire raced through her.

"Haven't heard anything from HR about it," he said with a slight grin. "Oh, and there is room for two desks. I figured it out. You need a desk and we need to be able to talk to each other in private where the team or case aren't concerned."

"I don't know…"

"Come on, I'll show you."

"I'm busy, House."

"Too busy to check out our new office?" he asked, pretending to be put out. With that sad puppy dog expression, he looked too adorable and she couldn't say no. That in itself, she realized, would be another problem to add to her list of ways House affected her.

Sighing, she nodded and followed him into the elevator. "We need to hire a team," he said. "You know what would be cool? Doing it Survivor-style."

"No. We are not doing that. I'm not wasting valuable resources and pissing off the board just so you can have fun."

"Having our own department will be fun," he pointed out as the doors opened and they stepped out.

"We're not hiring a bunch of people only to crush them by firing them. That's mean and it's unfair. You might be in charge where the DDX's are concerned, but I also have a say in who gets hired and I say we're not doing that."

"Killjoy," he muttered as they approached the office. The blinds were all open and she noticed there were now two desks in the room that faced each other. She noted that neither of them would have their back to either door. Oh great, she thought to herself. Now I'll be forced to look at him all damn day. How am I supposed to get any work done? Maybe she could get some pretty paintings to put on the wall behind his desk so she could focus on something other than his gorgeous face. There was also an Eames chair with an ottoman which she could only assume was for him. She noted there was room by the window for a smaller chair that she could relax in or sleep in when they had a particularly challenging case.

House watched her and was intrigued by her reaction, even though she didn't say anything. "What? You don't like the layout? We can move things around…"

"No, no, it's fine. It's a good use of space. I imagine we'll be spending more time in the conference room anyway. What do we need in there?"
"A white board, to write down ideas, a coffee machine, fridge, mini-bar…"

"We're not stocking this place with booze," she told him with a slight grin.

"You're just not going to let me have any kind of fun are you?"

"Do you want this department to be running in a year or not? Because having booze in the fridge isn't going to help."

"You could do with a tall stiff one. And by stiff I mean…"

Cameron turned and started to walk away. He was getting to her and she had to leave or she'd succumb to it. "Time to start work, House. Let's go."