Title: Officer Down

Author: innocent choir girl (ff-dot-net), shannyfish (From Out of the Lab/Miami Heat)

Summary: This is a fanfic based on an episode that was supposed to be shot in season two where Calleigh is shot and Horatio has to face how much she means to him, but since that never ended up being taped, I'll make up my own version ;)

Category: Ship Ahoy! Calleigh/Horatio

Genres: Angst, Case, Character Study, Drama, Friendship, Hurt Comfort, Pre-relationship, Suspense

Characters: Calleigh Duquesne, Horatio Caine, Frank Tripp (Other)

Warnings: None

Rating: PG-13

Chapter: 4 "I Need To"

Author's Notes: none

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Friday - 1400EST

South Miami Hospital

Warmth and light danced across her face, and Calleigh was forced to roll her head to the side to escape it. She heard something, but kept her eyes shut. She felt weird…and she was trying to figure it out before inevitably opening her eyes to see. The noise…she could finally make it out as her name…and she knew someone else was there. Her brain though wasn't keen on decoding who the voice belonged to for her. She opened her eyes and when she only saw a medical stand that held a device that was monitoring her vital signs; she turned her head to the side until she saw the person in her room. A small smile spread across her face. "Hey…" she whispered and realized how weak her voice sounded when it finally came out.

"Hey," he responded with a bright smile.

She felt his hand wrap around hers and place a gentle kiss on the top of it. "What-what—"

"Shhh… Sweetheart, you should rest…"

"Horatio," she whispered squeezing his hand. There were so many questions she had, and waking up in a hospital was disorientating to say the least.

"You were shot…" Horatio started to explain. "You lost a lot of blood. The doctors put you into a coma to stabilize you… That was five days ago…" He reached out with his other hand and brushed some hair from her face, "You're going to be just fine now, Calleigh…" He knew that now that she was awake, that things would be fine. That was the one thing they had been waiting for… The operation had gone well, she had stabilized, but her still unconscious had left them all frazzled with worry.

Never had Horatio felt so worried. It was like his heart had been yanked out, his chest had hurt and he hadn't been able to breathe well. He had hardly slept, and when he had, it had mostly been in the chair at Calleigh's bedside. He cared about her far more than he was supposed to…than the police department really allowed him. But who choose who they fell in love with? Did they expect him just to remain miserable all of his life? But then the people he loved did seem to end up hurt or in bad situations… Calleigh faced that danger everyday being a CSI, and she was a target with just being who she was…would loving her put her in much more danger?

He smiled as he just watched her. It felt like he hadn't seen her bright eyes in months…and yet it had been merely five days… He had thought that he'd never see them again…but here they were…open and quite alive. Waiting for her to wake up had been the easy part…she had been stable. The wait for her to come out of surgery and to stabilize had been much harder…and he had ended up in isolation most of that time not wanting to let the others see his true emotions…or the emotions he was realizing meant more than he had originally thought.

Love.

Love was a gift.

He had been lucky enough to be given the gift to love women…to bring love into Marisol's life, and to bring love back to Yelina with Ray, but this…Calleigh was his gift of love for himself… She was the one that he truly loved with all his heart, and he wasn't sure if he could wait any longer…if he could stand to see something take her away from him before he'd had the chance to tell her exactly how special she was to him.

"I should get the doctor," he finally said realizing that they'd want to know that she was awake…of course that meant leaving her to the doctors to examine….

"Wait," she whispered not feeling up to being poked and prodded and questioned by doctors about how she felt.

"I thought I'd lost you…" Horatio whispered as he stared into her eyes. He'd lost so many… Speed. Marisol. Ray. Losing Calleigh would have been losing his heart… "And I promised myself that I'd tell you how much you mean to me when you finally woke up…" he continued as his voice broke a bit and his eyes watered over.

"Shh…" she soothed pressing fingers from the hand he had been holding to his lips.

"Let me," he whispered against her fingertips. "I need to say it."

Calleigh frowned a bit, but moved her fingers away from his lips. They had always had a quiet understanding, at least she thought so, that there were feelings there…but that they couldn't be expressed. Two CSIs being in love wasn't something that exactly worked well in a police department…let alone if internal affairs were to find out…

"I love you, Calleigh… I love you so much that I thought I was going to die if you didn't make it…" Horatio confessed, his voice quiet and sincere. "I don't want to wait… I don't care about what the department will say… I want us to have a life together…I know we can have a relationship and work without letting things get into the way. I love you, and I want to marry you." She was his best friend, she knew him better than anyone… She knew his heart. She knew how he operated. She had been there for him in the past, and he knew she'd always be there for him. Telling her that he wanted to marry her didn't seem like such a big leap since they had practically been dating those past years… They'd most likely spent more hours together than they had with anyone else.

Her eyes looked far more surprised than Horatio had expected. Of course, she had just woken up after being shot and being unconscious for five days…. It was a lot for anyone to take in after that amount of trauma…but he didn't want to keep it a secret anymore. He had finally realized it. He had to tell her…maybe not to hear it back, but to know that she knew… The sound of the door opening alerted him to the fact that they weren't alone, the question now was if it was one of the others or if it was a doctor or nurse.

"Horatio, you really should shower, sleep, and eat. Calleigh's not going to want to see your ugly face if you're not clean and those bags under your eyes are at least half the size they are now. Some sun wouldn't hurt either," Frank said as he wandered in, and moved the curtain back. He was surprised to see Calleigh awake. No one had called him, and he started to wonder how long she'd been awake. "Calleigh…Honey, it is great to see you awake," he said after a minute of taking it all in.

"Why don't you tell the others, Frank?" Horatio suggested.

He took that as a queue that he needed more privacy, but it was the time for that now. Once the others arrived, there wouldn't be anytime for privacy with Calleigh. "Alright," he said and headed out into the hallway to make his calls.

"Your dad's been really worried about you," he said stroking her hair. "I'm going to go now. I'll come by later…we can talk then." He didn't want to make her feel pressured to say anything now; especially since he knew she was just waking up…

"Horatio-" Calleigh started.

"Shhh…" he whispered as he pressed his lips to her forehead before leaning his own gently against hers. "You rest… Kick them out if they make too much noise… I'm sure Alexx will supervise," he told her before placing a gentle kiss on her lips. Moving away from her felt painful…he so desperately wanted to spend more time with her…but he also knew it was really time for him to go. They'd have their time later…

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TBC…