Author's Note: I feel I'm being unfair to this story in favor of "Salam" (which is getting most of my attention at the moment). And everytime I try to wrap this thing up, it still feels unfinished. I'm looking at a maximum of eight chapters. Right now I have about six. I'll try to wrap this up fast, I have a good idea of an ending in mind. Anyways, enjoy this story.

The apartment was filled with steam. Greg coughed and went down the hall, finding the source of it. He had been in Sara's apartment plenty of times by now and knew the way even though he couldn't see far in front of him. All the while his mind was racing fast ahead of him, a part of him already at the end of the hallway and in the bathroom with Sara, or something that resembled Sara in his mind, but in actuality couldn't be her. Blood, tears, and razor blades entered Greg's vivid imaginings, his mind reeling back to his memories of Woodward and that hideous tape Sasha Volkov had made. He hoped against all hope that the scenarios in his head were far from reality. And he had just stood outside her door while she was doing all this to herself? He already felt the guilt twisting heavily in the pit of his stomach for a sin he wasn't even sure had been committed.

As he neared the bathroom, he forced himself to calm down. Maybe it wasn't as bad as he thought. Maybe she was still alive, maybe he could save her…

He finally reached the bathroom, which had an open door. The sound of crying both reassured and frightened Greg at the same time. "Sara?" he called into the forest of mist. She continued to sob so Greg continued into the bathroom, waving at the thick steam as he approached the closed shower curtain. His fingers rested on it momentarily, thinking it best to call her name again lest he frighten her out of her wits. "Sara?" When he received no reply, he slowly opened the shower curtain.

She was sitting there in the corner of her shower completely naked, her knees drawn up to her chest as she cried and the water poured over her. Greg was so struck by this he entered the shower without even thinking to turn off the water and kneeled down next to her. "Sara?"

She didn't even look up at him as she continued to wail into her knees. Greg stared at her in shock for a moment before it even occurred to him to reach up and turn off the unforgiving torrent of water that was now soaking them both. "Sara!" he said again, hoping now that the water wasn't drumming in her ears she would reply. There was still no response from her for a while, so Greg simply waited until she was ready to acknowledge him. Finally, when she had composed herself a little she looked up at him, and Greg was sure that not all of the droplets collected on her red face were from the shower.

"I read them, Greg," Sara whispered at last. "Those hideous words he branded me with… I read them."

Greg's heart melted to hear this news. "Come here, angel," he said as he enveloped her in his arms. She instantly threw her arms around his neck and he held her quivering cold body close to him, trying to make it warm again. He couldn't believe that she'd gone three months without looking at the scars on her thigh until now. "What made you read it?" he whispered into her ear. She was shaking violently in his arms and her skin was icy to the touch. Greg wondered how long she had sat in the shower until the hot water abandoned had her.

"I— I don't know…" she muttered. "I w-was just w-washing and th-then I r-realized th-there it was! Right on m-my leg and I n-never looked at it b-b-before."

Greg wasn't sure if she was stuttering because she'd been crying, or because she was so cold. He softly rubbed her back and tried to sooth her. "It's OK, angel, I'm here."

He held her there in his arms, stroking her hair and whispering sweet and calming words in her ear. He hadn't seen her cry in three months, not since they'd both woken up at the hospital together. She hadn't even mentioned the Volkovs to him since the event. Sara much preferred to pretend the event had never taken place at all. It had made her cold and aggressive, but she was also passionate and laughing again so Greg hadn't pressed the matter.

But now, he saw what all that bottling away had done to her soul until she had finally broken down in her own shower.

After what seemed like minutes, but could just have easily been hours, Sara finally stopped crying, but didn't pull away from Greg's embrace. Instead, she simply whispered in his ear. "Wow. This is awkward."

Greg couldn't help but laugh. "Relax," he said. "It's not like I've never seen you naked before."

She pulled away from him and smiled up at him with sad eyes. "Maybe that's true," she said. "But I'd still feel better if we were both similarly dressed."

"I could get naked if that would help," Greg offered with a playful smirk.

Sara smiled bashfully and looked away, her arms withdrawing from Greg's neck as they wrapped around herself in a vain attempt at modesty. Taking this as his cue, Greg stood up and reached for a towel on the rack handing it to her. She smiled gratefully up at him as she wrapped herself in it and unsteadily rose to her feet. Greg offered her his hand, which she took and he helped her out of the shower. He snagged a towel himself, and wrapped it around his shoulders as he led Sara into the hall.

"Wait in the living room," Sara told him. "I'm going to get dressed, and then I'll make us some tea."

He nodded. "I'd like that."

She looked at his wet clothes with an amused smile. "And… I'll bring some of your spare clothes out so you can change."

Greg hadn't want to mention the fact that he was wet, but was very glad she acknowledged it. "Thanks," he said and she headed for her room.

As Greg made his way to the living room, he felt a wave of utter relief wash over him. When he had first broken into her apartment, he had feared the worst. It was true, seeing her broken in her bathtub hadn't exactly been a beautiful sight, but it was much better than the alternative his mind had formulated. But Sara would never commit suicide, he told himself as he came to the living room. It just wasn't in her, that sort of thing. Greg doubted she'd ever even considered it.

Not like he had.

Greg shook his head to clear it and made for the couch before stopping in his tracks and narrowing his eyes. There it was, that brown and gray monster he had met in the hallway.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he asked the tabby, who just stared at him smugly, I told you so scrawled across its whiskered face. "I hate you so much," Greg muttered, shaking his head. He looked over at the door, which was still open. He didn't need to use his CSI skills to guess how the cat had gotten in. Rolling his eyes, he prepared for battle as he approached the cat. "OK, you mangy feline," he said. "This living room isn't big enough for the both of us."

The cat simply meowed in reply and stretched out on the couch lazily, mocking him.

"Oh, you think that's funny, do you?" Greg said. "I'll show you funny."

He launched himself at the couch and the cat jumped up, landed on his head and scrambled down his back before running to the door, where it slowed and sat in the doorway, its tail curled calmly around it as it watched Greg fall over the couch and hit his head. As Greg looked at the terrible tabby, the cat smirked at him in victory before flicking its tail at him and trotting out into the hall.

"Gr…" Greg muttered as he got to his feet. He rubbed his head on his way to the door where he closed it. He noted that it didn't stay closed. He reckoned that was his fault and decided he should at least offer to pay for a replacement door.

"Greg?"

He spun around at the sound of her voice to see her standing in the hallway wearing a white tank top and sweat pants. She held some of his folded clothes in her arms. He grinned at her. "Hey, angel. Feeling better?"

She nodded with an appreciative smile. "Much," she said.

He approached her, but hesitated before touching her until he received the go-ahead from her. He took the clothes from her hand and set them down on the couch. He kissed her lightly before wrapping his arms around her waist. "You look gorgeous."

"What was going on in here?" Sara asked. "I heard… meowing?"

"Aw, don't worry about that," Greg said, pulling away from her. "I remember you promised me tea?"

She nodded. "I did," she said, moving past him into the kitchen. Greg stretched and turned towards the spare clothes. He stripped off his soaked t-shirt and tossed on the clean black one with Led Zeppelin scrawled across it. He stepped out of his stiff jeans and pulled on the fresh pair, shaking out his hair. He then headed back to the couch where he lounged until Sara returned with a tray and set the tea down on the coffee table. Greg made room for her on the couch, but she instead took a seat in an arm chair and looked at him as she sipped her tea. Greg felt as if she was studying him like he was some sort of animal. Her behavior made little sense to him these days.

"What did it say?" Greg asked slowly, unable to contain his curiosity.

She finally tore her eyes away from him and stared down into her tea. "It's not what it said that bothered me," she replied. "It just brought back all the things I thought I'd gotten over."

"You've been so stoic for the past three months," Greg said, shaking his head. "You can't have been over it by now." All of a sudden, he found himself getting emotional, his utter shock at her impassivity finally shining through. "I mean, my God, Sara, just how do you do it? Please, tell me, because there's no way I could ever be like you."

Sara nearly choked on her tea. "Be like me?" she spluttered. "Greg, you don't want to be like me, all cold and detached all the time!"

"How do you do it?" Greg repeated. "Because I would love to forget, I really would, but I just can't, even…" But he wasn't strong enough to admit to that yet. "Even when I talk to Amy, I just can't seem to work through it."

Sara shrugged, still looking at her tea. "Sometimes," she said, "it can be as simple as refusing to be a victim."

Greg didn't understand. "What do you mean?"

Sara sipped her tea and looked up at Greg. "I refused to think of myself as… a victim," she said simply. "What happened, it was unfortunate, it was an accident, and… there was nothing I could have done to prevent it. But it happened, and I can't change that. And he's dead anyways, so I don't have to worry about him… and Vera is in jail…" She trailed off and then looked up at Greg with a shrug of her shoulders. "Easy as that."

Greg leaned forward and put his forearms on his knees as he examined the broken woman before him, trying to figure her out. He spoke softly, so as not to come off as accusing. "Sara, you were crying in the shower for almost two hours. I don't mean to sound like I'm telling you what to do… but that doesn't sound like dealing with it to me."

Sara set down her tea and nodded, calmly. "I thought that since he was dead, that I killed him, I had killed all the things that he stood for, all the pain that he caused me. But he haunts me like a ghostly fire. And those words he carved into my thigh are like the chains which bind his restless spirit to me…"

Greg wanted to know what those words said, but knew Sara wasn't going to reiterate. "It's funny, isn't it?" he said instead. "You threatened to haunt him, instead he haunts you…"

Sara stiffened at these words and her eyes darted over to him, her demeanor suddenly cold and sharp. "What did you say?"

Greg looked at her, wondering what he'd done wrong. Hadn't Sara said that to him once? All of a sudden, it hit him. Sara hadn't told him about that conversation. He had seen it on the tape. Sara's rape tape. "I, uh… isn't that what you told me you said to him? You vowed to haunt his ass?"

She wouldn't buy it. "You saw the tape, didn't you?" she whispered, her voice flat and dead.

Greg looked away from her. He didn't know what to say. He couldn't lie to her. But he couldn't admit that he had seen her at her weakest point. Somehow, he felt she would never forgive him for this.

"You did, didn't you?" Sara urged. "How else would you have known what I'd said."

"I've never been more enraged in my life," Greg whispered, tears beginning to sting at his eyes as he stared at the coffee table, "then when I saw what he did to you."

Sara stood up and collected her tea cup and saucer. "You haven't touched your tea," she noted tonelessly.

Greg shrugged noncommittally before reaching for his cup and lightly nursed the still steaming liquid. "For what it's worth," he said, looking up at her, "I still think you're the most incredible person I've ever met."

Sara looked over her shoulder and smiled at him as she went to the kitchen to wash out her cup, but Greg saw there was nothing in her eyes when she did so. "Do me a favor," she called from the kitchen. "Go to the TV and put on the Princess Bride for me, would you?"

Greg smirked, taking this request as a sign of forgiveness. "Sure thing, angel!" he replied as he jumped up and obliged. He grabbed the remote and hit play, knowing Sara would be out shortly, and kicked his feet up on the coffee table with his arm stretched out across the back of the couch.

When Sara returned, she decided to accompany Greg on the couch this time and sat quite close to him in front of the arm sprawled out on the back of the couch. She leaned her head on his chest, so Greg drew his arm around her shoulders, reassuringly rubbing her arm. He wanted her to feel safe with him more than anything else. He wondered what had changed in her after she had found out that he'd seen her at her most vulnerable. It was miniscule, but he had detected a slight change in the way she looked at him, the way she spoke, and even the way she acted. After her break down in the shower, she looked like she was beginning to open up to him again, but upon his revelation that he had seen her tape, she was stone-cold-Sara again.

When Princess Buttercup was riding through the woods, a ripe target for kidnapping, Sara began to softly kiss his neck. At first, Greg didn't react. He wasn't sure what she was doing. He let her lips tickle his neck and shoulder. The way she kissed gave him goose bumps, not to mention his neck was a very sensitive area for him. He closed his eyes and gently stroked her hair. He tilted his head back and smiled as she moved up his neck, nibbling briefly on his ear, before he turned to meet her lips with his. He entangled her in his embrace and she lay down backwards onto the couch, compelling him to follow her lead.

Soon enough, the movie was forgotten, and Greg found himself lifting her white tank top up until she caught his hands and looked at him with desperate eyes.

"Slower," she pleaded, and he cooperated, pulling her shirt back down, content to just be with her. But soon enough, it was her hands tugging at his shirt, which he helped her in getting off. He still didn't dare mess with her clothes, at least not until she unbuttoned his jeans and he kicked them off, but he remained in his boxers, which were slightly damp still from the shower. He contemplated helping her out of her shirt again, only something seemed to change in her that caught him off guard. She flipped him over so she was on top of him and her style went from timidly gentle to furiously passionate as she ravaged him, her tongue swirling in his mouth. She began to kiss his neck again, this time with much more force as her hands raked down his sides almost painfully.

This abrupt change in attitude made Greg suddenly very uncomfortable and he caught her hands in his. "Sara—"

"Let me go!" Sara growled, ripping her hands away. She looked down at him, breathing hard as he stared up at her in fear. Her anger seemed to dissolve into horror. "Oh my God, Greg…"

She began to cry and Greg immediately reached up to reassure her. She fell back on top of him and he wrapped his arms around her, whispering into her hair. "It's OK, angel, you're with me now."

And he held her there on the couch, wearing nothing but his boxers, until she had finally fallen asleep. Greg let her rest on his chest as he finished the movie alone, just content to have her close to him and finally sleeping peacefully. When the credits began to roll, he reached for the remote, trying not to move so as not to disturb Sara and turned off the TV. He turned to his girlfriend and kissed her gently on top of her head before letting sleep claim him as well.