Again, big thanks to anyone who read and reviewed the previous chapter.

Chapter 2

As much as Olivia was enjoying Peter's poorly concealed jealousy, she was well aware she was still trapped in a storeroom with him for the duration of the night, and so she very deliberately looked away from his stare and tried to think of a topic that wouldn't cause too much controversy between them.

"What's your favourite TV show?" she finally settled on a question, despite having very little time for anything other than the news.

"At the minute?"

"Yeah" she answered, not really caring either way

"Lost."

"Polar bears on an island?" she crinkled her nose in disgust and he chuckled,

"Spoken like a true critic who's never seen a single episode. Trust me, it's good."

"I'll take your word for it." she sighed, and he shook his head slightly,

"You don't know what you're missing." He said firmly. He hesitated before his next question, most likely wondering how to phrase it, until finally he spoke "If you could go back, knowing what you know now, would you still join the FBI?" It was an odd question, and she gave it the full consideration it deserved before she replied,

"I think so." His head titled in a way that was just begging her to go on, and so she threw him a bone, "If I'd never joined, I'd never have met some of the most important people in my life. John and Charlie would still have died; I'd just never have known them. And you'd just be living your shallow, meaningless life in Iraq." She was only half joking about the last part, but he smiled good naturedly. Still, she wondered what had caused him to ask such a question to begin with, and if he was still having doubts after all this time,

"Do you like working for the Fringe Division?"

"I think so. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a big fan of the near death experiences and I still wish we lived in a world where it wasn't necessary, but I'm glad you fetched me from Iraq." He gave a small, lethargic sigh, a mixture of exhaustion and defeat before he continued, "It's nice to have a purpose again Olivia, and I guess I have you to thank for that." He favoured her with one of those wonderfully intense stares. The type that made her feel like she was the one woman in the entire universe that mattered to him in that moment. He allowed her a few seconds to absorb his words before he continued,

"Where do you see yourself in ten years?" his voice was soft, but that didn't prevent her from rolling her eyes at his quite frankly, boring question.

"This is beginning to sound like a job interview, Peter" she complained, but he looked at her obstinately,

"Answer or veto."

"Honestly? I think you and I will both be dead in ten years." She knew that was far from the response he had wished for, but she'd promised herself at the beginning of this game that she would be as honest as she could with him. However when he didn't react, she frowned, "That wasn't the answer you wanted." He raised an eyebrow to her statement of fact, and asked,

"Is that a question?" It almost felt like he was mimicking her earlier response, but unlike him she didn't bite.

"Just an observation." She shook her head, before realising she didn't actually have anything else to ask, so she relented, "Go on then. What did you want me to say?"

"I didn't have anything in particular in mind. I just want you to be happy" he said without any sense of embarassment. And the look in his eye was just so tender that she found herself agreeing with him,

"I want you to be happy too."

"Well mission accomplished." He smiled, stretching out as he spoke, "Working here, with you- it's been good for me. Do you want kids?" His sudden question threw her and she stumbled over it,

"Not right now" he gave her a look that said that much was obvious, and embarrassed, she corrected herself, "Well, maybe someday. If I met the right man and there was no impending apocalypse, I don't see why not."

"I think I feel the same." He confessed, "Up until last year, children were never exactly part of the plan. I was afraid that…" he broke off and she nodded, understanding exactly what he meant. Afraid he would be a disaster as a parent; afraid his children would grow up as unloved as he had felt; afraid he would turn into his father, "Well I was just afraid. Meeting Walter again helped, I think. And now I could see myself having children, with the right woman of course…" He fell silent, but before she could ask a question in return, he gave a long yawn that she couldn't help but mirror. It couldn't be that late she reasoned, but she understood why living with someone like Walter would take up a lot of energy.

For the moment, the questions ceased, and the spell she had found herself under whilst playing their game faded. Slowly, she began to become more self aware again and quickly realised that she was beginning to lose the feeling in her leg from sitting still for so long. There was nowhere else to go, however, except for the frankly uncomfortable looking chair, or Peter's side of the room. She was also growing steadily colder, and it was on that basis that she made her decision.

"Are you cold?" she asked abruptly, and he shook his head in response,

"Not particularly. Why? Are you?" despite intending to deny it, she nodded, "Come here then" he told her, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world

On any other Sunday night, she would have told him she was fine where she was, but being trapped in this little enclosed space was making things so much different between the pair of them. He was asking her things she had to suppose he would never dare to under normal circumstances, and she was answering them with very little thought. The game was serving its purpose, however. She truly felt that in a way, she knew him better than she had before they started all of this, despite nothing overly intense being exchanged.

And so she shuffled around the room until she was sitting by his side. While she'd moved, he had shrugged off his peacoat and put it over her like a blanket. After a second's hesitation, she rested her head on his shoulder. Strictly speaking, she shouldn't, but she silenced her doubts by reminding herself that this wasn't an everyday situation. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see his hands hovering, unsure whether or not he could put an arm around her. In the end, he compromised, and allowed his right to remain loosely by his side while he faux-stretched with his left and allowed it to fall around her shoulders. She had to hide a smile at his juvenile move, not wanting to embarrass him now that he was sharing his body heat with her.

They remained still and silent for an immeasurable period of time. She'd told herself firmly that she would only sit with him until she'd warmed up, but now that she was actually in the moment, she found that he was a lot more comfortable than any wall and despite herself, she felt her eyes growing heavy.

"What time is it?" he reluctantly lifted his left arm just long enough to peer at his watch in the poor light before he returned it to it's original spot, this time his fingers trailing lightly up and down her upper arm, through the fabric.

"About half ten" she was surprised, in a way that so much time had passed already.

"I guess we really will be stuck here until tomorrow," she sighed, but although she had hoped that someone would have passed their door by now, she was beginning to think she could quite happily spend the remainder of the night sitting with Peter like this.

"It's your turn" she remarked, despite not really remembering whether it was or not,

"You want to keep playing?" he asked, and she shrugged against him. It had served well in passing the time thus far, and so she could see little reason to stop until she couldn't think of anything more to ask.

"Okay…" he paused as he thought, and out of the corner of her eye she saw him smile, "Got one. What was you first impression of me?" she smiled back, for an entirely different reason. That was an easy one.

"I think my exact words were misfit, nomad and massive pain in the ass."

"Gee, thanks" he said dryly, but she shrugged again,

"You did ask." She smiled, "And you were a nomad."

"That one, I'll give you, but the other two were a tad harsh, don't you think?" His tone had elements of light teasing in it, but she sensed that he had expected an answer along the lines of finding him tall, dark and handsome, and her critical opinions had stung, so she smiled

"I don't think you're a misfit anymore. These days, you're more normal than me."

"True." He nodded, "Plus I trust you don't think I'm a huge pain in the ass anymore."

"Sometimes I do" she remarked, "But sometimes you can be really sweet too, so it balances out." His smile was nothing less than radiant. It seemed he'd taken that as more of a compliment than she'd intended, but she refrained from antagonising him again, at least for now, because a question had just popped into her head.

"When did you realise you liked me?" His hand ceased stroking her shoulder for a moment and she realised her question had thrown him through her unfortunate phrasing,

"As opposed to when?" he asked carefully,

"We both know you hated me from dragging you away from your oil deal in Iraq." She prompted.

"Oh" he said, and his fingers resumed their absentminded dance against her, "I never really disliked you. I remember being surprised that you tricked me. Impressed, even, but I certainly never hated you. And that just makes me want to ask you the same question…"

"But you can't" she finished for him, smiling sweetly, "Hey, they were your rules, remember."

"Something tells me I wouldn't like the answer anyway" he grumbled and Olivia chose not to tell him that she'd ceased disliking him the moment he'd fetched her a coffee and told her about his debt to Big Eddie, and she'd started to like him around the time he decided to stay in Boston. And she'd realised that she liked him a good while after that, when Rachel started paying him entirely too much attention for her taste.

"I'm gonna ask you something serious now" he said after a moment of silence, "I don't want you to joke, or laugh, and I don't want you to lie to save my feelings, okay?"

"Okay" she nodded, sitting up properly and pulling out of his grasp, so she could look into his eyes, hoping he could tell she was taking whatever this was seriously.

"Do you think I'm a good person? I mean I'm trying, God knows I am, but I'm not like you." he spoke with such real concern that she felt she wanted to do nothing more than lavish him with praise, because although he could be arrogant as hell, she knew he could be ridiculously insecure at the strangest of times, and it seemed that this was one of them. However she knew he'd asked for her honest opinion, and so she gave him the bad with the good,

"You've done a lot of bad things, Peter. I mean, we before met I never would have classified someone like you as anything other than a petty criminal. You were involved in some shady deals with some even shadier people, and if you'd never done anything wrong, you would never have believed the FBI had a file on you" she reminded him, "And even now, there are some days that I half expect Big Eddie to turn up with a shotgun looking for you. You're certainly more interesting than the average civilian consultant to put it lightly, Peter." He broke the stare, looking down at the floor,

"I'm really hoping there's going to be a 'but' any time now." he grimaced, and she spoke again, emphasising the first word,

"But now I do know you, and I like what I see. You're brave, and you're loyal, and you're just so ridiculously, unabashedly clever… And you look after me. Don't think I don't notice, because I do. You're good Peter. Or at least, you're good enough for me."

"Thank you" he spoke in little over a whisper, but she could sense his gratitude, and it embarrassed her a little. Shrugging, she smiled,

"It's true." He was giving her that look again. The one he'd given her when she'd been lying in that hospital bed and she'd told him he was good at looking after the people he cared about. It was the look of pure, unadulterated adoration that had terrified her before, but she found herself warming to now. Without thinking, his tongue snaked out between his lips and wetted them, and she felt her heart quicken from both excitement and terror as his eyes flicked down to her lips.

He wanted to kiss her, that much she knew for sure, but even after all these rounds of loaded questions she didn't know exactly how she felt about that. They both sat completely still for a few seconds, Peter obviously wanting some sort of sign she wasn't going to shoot him down, Olivia just too nervous to give him one. After too much hesitation on both their parts, Peter gave her a small smile and looked away and with a strange mixture of relief and disappointment, she did the same. The moment lost, she leant back against the same wall he was sitting against, this time keeping space between their bodies.

She risked a glance, and saw Peter was looking straight ahead and very deliberately not at her. Swallowing hard, she sought hard for something to say to re-establish the conversation, but she came up with nothing immediately.

Sometimes Olivia just wished she could be the girl who could sleep with her cute co-worker without a second thought.

Thanks for reading. I hope you'll favour me with a review :)

Next chapter should be up on Saturday, I believe.