A/N: Hope I didn't keep you waiting for this update too long. Life has this annoying habit of getting in the way of my writing. Thank you for your lovely reviews, roz, alix33 and AvaniHeath. They made me happy.

A special thank you to AvaniHeath for her beta skills and general wonderfulness!

Enjoy!

Disclaimer: JAG is property of Donald P. Bellisario. I'm only borrowing.

5 Everything has changed

They stopped for lunch at a little diner in the middle of nowhere. Mac parked the car beside a truck and got out, breathing in the pleasantly warm air that smelled of summer. It did nothing to clear her head, however, and when Harm slammed the passenger door shut, she flinched. As she locked the car and followed him across the parking lot, the gravel crunching underneath her feet, she hoped that he hadn't seen her reaction.

But then, he already knew that something was wrong, so it didn't matter either way.

At least he'd let it go when she'd told him to. For a moment—a moment that had lasted barely a second but had felt much longer because of the panic closing around her chest—she'd feared that this time he'd lose his patience and push her until she surrendered. She had no doubt that he'd be able to extract whatever information he wanted if he truly tried; he knew how to make people talk and he knew even better how to push her buttons. It was to his credit that he hadn't tried, but even Harm's patience had limits and she wondered how long it would last.

A bell chimed quietly above the door as Harm pushed it open, letting her enter first. The waitress, a young woman in her early twenties with short-cropped black hair and silver hoops dangling from her ears, turned at the sound, pausing in her task of refilling the coffee pot. "Sit wherever you like," she called from behind the counter, gesturing at the free booths. Then she frowned when she got a proper look at them and her hands stilled. "I'll be with you in a minute. Can I get you some coffee?"

"Sure, thanks," Mac replied.

She smiled. "Coming right up…Ma'am." She added the 'ma'am' as an afterthought, her voice hesitant as if she wasn't quite sure about the correct form of address.

As soon as they had found a place to sit, the waitress appeared at their table and set down two red mugs that matched the vinyl covering the seats. "I just made it," she said in a cheerful tone as she poured the coffee while trying to be inconspicuous in her scrutiny of both of them. "May I bring you anything else?"

As they ordered, Mac didn't comment on Harm's choice of lunch and he didn't comment on hers. He just sat there, drinking his coffee as he gazed out the window into the parking lot, watching a group of teenagers that stood clustered around a blue pick-up truck, cheering at each other while they were smoking. Mac's stomach dropped. She missed the banter that usually accompanied the meals they had together, but with the way things were between them right now, it wouldn't have felt right.

She never should have kissed him.

But she had and now she had to figure out where to go from there. The thought of cutting Harm out of her life made her throat close up. What I want most is to never lose you, he'd said and the truth was that she didn't want to lose him either. Part of her knew it was inevitable. She knew they'd drift apart eventually until the spheres of their lives no longer collided outside work, maybe not even there. She hadn't given much thought of how things would change after the wedding, but change they would. And there would be no place for Harm in her life then.

There couldn't be. She owed that to Mic.

"Where are you headed?" the waitress asked when she brought their lunch. "We don't see a lot of the military around here."

"Norfolk," Harm said.

The girl's eyebrows knit together in concern. "It's awful what happened there today," she said in a subdued voice, all cheerfulness gone. She clutched the empty tray to her chest, absently playing with her earring. "That poor woman. It's been all over the news." She jerked her chin at the tiny TV on the counter that Mac hadn't noticed before. The volume was down, but as the service photo of Florence Acker hung in the right upper corner of the screen, Mac had a pretty good idea what the anchorwoman was talking about. "Isn't a naval base supposed to be safe?"

Mac looked at Harm and by his frown, she could tell he was thinking along the same lines. It seemed like they media hadn't yet realised what had been so clear to both of them from the moment Acker had told them that his daughter had disappeared off the base and then brought back to her quarters. Only someone who was intimately familiar with base security and its weaknesses could pull off something like this. Which, in turn, meant that their perpetrator was most likely military as well. As soon as that bit of information leaked, the media would be all over this like vultures over a cadaver. SECNAV would pitch all kinds of fits once he got wind of it—it was a PR disaster. Mac didn't envy the NCIS agent in charge. If he screwed up or didn't deliver results fast enough, his career might suffer a blow from which it probably would never recover.

You just had to love politics.

They ate their lunch in silence. Mac's appetite still hadn't returned, but she forced the burger down anyway. Halfway through their meal, Harm's cell phone started ringing. He took it out of his pocket reluctantly. "I need to take this," he said once he'd checked the caller ID, not sounding particularly happy. "I'll be right back."

"Hey," he said as he made his way outside. "Thanks for calling me back. Yes, I…" The door closed behind him, cutting off his voice mid-sentence. Dropping her burger on the plate, Mac watched as he paced along the front of the diner, absently running his hand through his hair. Was that Renée calling him?

None of your business, she reminded herself. She pushed the plate with the half-eaten burger away and sat back, arms folded in front of her chest. Why couldn't she let go? Why couldn't she move on? She'd tried. God, how she'd tried! But then she caught him looking at her like she was the centre of his universe and it all came rushing back, feelings she was fighting so hard to keep at bay flooding her mind until her world didn't make sense anymore.

"Damn you," she whispered. Anger flared in her chest, hot and irrational. It wasn't his fault that she couldn't get over him, but why did he have to make it so difficult for her? He'd missed his chance. He'd pushed her away. Now he had to live with the consequences.

Are you sure he's the one who can't live with it? a voice in her mind whispered. You kissed him, remember?

Lifting her head, she looked directly into Harm's eyes; caught up in her own misery as she was, she hadn't heard him come back. His lips curved into a sad smile that told her that he knew exactly what she was thinking, and her anger evaporated, leaving only bleak despair behind.

oOo

Renée was understandably unhappy.

"I didn't exactly have a choice," Harm said defensively, having trouble keeping his voice even. He didn't want to go into this right now. Part of him felt guilty about having to cancel their date, but mostly he was glad that he wouldn't have to see her again until Thursday, which made him feel even guiltier. Renée deserved someone who actually wanted to spend time with her, someone who made time for her. Of course, it was true that he'd had no choice as far as this assignment was concerned, but he wasn't all torn up about it either. Which said more about his relationship that he cared to think about at any given moment. Sooner or later he'd have to make a decision, but not right now. Not while he was on his case and not while things between him and Mac were this weird.

"I know, I know," Renée admitted. She sighed and he heard a door close, the falling and swelling of voices cutting off. "Just my luck, I guess. You wouldn't believe the day I'm having." Something scraped over the floor. "Any idea when you'll get back?"

"Thursday at the latest, maybe sooner," he replied, relieved. A voice in his mind nagged him to ask her about her day—obviously, she was upset about something and it didn't just have to do with the fact that he was out of town—but he didn't want her to launch into a lengthy explanation.

Some boyfriend you are.

"Depends on what we'll find," he made himself add; he didn't want to sound like he was trying to get rid of her. "Chegwidden wants us to look into a homicide."

Silence at the other end of the line.

"You still there?" he asked.

"Yes, I'm still here." Another pause, and silence again except for an even tapping sound, fingernails drumming on wood. "I assume when you say 'we', you mean you and Mac?" By her tone alone he could tell that her perfectly shaped eyebrows were arched disapprovingly. Unlike this morning, she didn't try to hide her irritation.

"Renée," he began, the anger he suddenly felt only poorly concealed. He wasn't in the mood for this right now, with Mac acting weird and the ME photos still fresh on his mind. He was also painfully aware that he had no right to be angry with Renée for being jealous—especially considering that it wasn't exactly unjustified—but he pushed the thought away. He'd deal with it when he got home, when things hopefully had gone back to normal and when Mac was her old self again.

Assuming that's going to happen, he thought as he glanced over his shoulder, studying Mac's face through the window. She was unhappy and it tore at his heart the he was the reason for it. That she was the one who'd initiated the kiss didn't matter; he still felt responsible. He thought he understood now why it was bothering her so much. Why it was worse for her than it was for him and why she couldn't seem to put it out of her mind.

Because she'd initiated the kiss. She didn't feel guilty only because she'd kissed him—she felt guilty because of what it implied. Of what it said about her relationship. And it was one thing for Harm to question his relationship to Renée, but quite another for her to question her's to Mic.

Because he wasn't planning on marrying Renée in two weeks.

"I have to go," he said into the phone. He didn't want to argue with her; he just wanted to be left alone so that he could focus on this case. And on Mac.

"Of course you do," she retorted, in a chilly tone. "Fine. Bye." With that, she hung up and he was left standing in the parking lot, feeling a strange mixture of relief and anger that was directed at himself more than it was at her.

"Damn it," he cursed under his breath, sliding the phone back in his pocket. The teenagers eyed him curiously from across the lot, one boy even going so far as to point a finger at him. Harm surmised that they weren't used to seeing people in uniform, other than their local sheriff. Forcing a smile, he waved at them before he went back inside. The waitress peered up from behind the counter when the bell chimed, but when she saw that it was just him, she went back to whatever it was she was doing.

Mac seemed to be done with her burger, which sat half-eaten on the plate in front of her, her crumpled napkin on top of it. She didn't acknowledge him when he slid back into his seat; she was gazing intently at the metallic surface of the table and probably hadn't noticed his return. For once her emotions were plain on her face—a certain sign that she thought she was still alone—and changing in rapid succession. Sadness followed by despair followed by anger. He wished he could make it all go away. Wished that he hadn't let her slip out of his reach.

But even more he wished that he hadn't ended what they could have had before it had even begun.

A/N: Please let me know what you think!