A/N: I wrote this ages ago but could never decide how to finish it so it's been languishing in an 'ideas' folder, but I've been reading some Flack/ Angell fics recently (particularly sarramaks and foxdvd) and it inspired me to dig this out and write the final paragraphs. Its a bit different in style (for me anyway) so with a sense of trepidation I'm posting it. Let me know what you think!

Disclaimer: I dont own CSI:NY

Warning: I'd rate this as a strong T

Summary: If Flack had ever given it more than a passing thought he would have said that he absolutely expected to fall in love at some indeterminate point in the future...

Falling

If Flack had ever given it more than a passing thought he would have said that he absolutely expected to fall in love at some indeterminate point in the future. He would also have said that he expected that being in love, and having someone love him, would bring a sense of peace to his life; that it would provide a calm place to come home to after battling through a daily maelstrom of crap. But he hadn't really given it much thought; just assumed that by the time he hit his early 30's he'd be ready to settle down, would meet the 'right' girl, and then slip gently into a grown up world of mortgages and PTA conferences.

He had been in love once, or so he thought, when he was 17. She was the 29 year old daughter of his parents next door neighbour; recently divorced and given to wearing clothing his mother considered 'inappropriate', and bright red lipstick that she had no hesitation in labeling 'slutty'. To this day, a blow job from a woman wearing red lipstick had him hurtling back to those hot summer afternoons when Mr Foster took a nap and his daughter took 6ft of raging hormones to her bed. She'd toyed with him through July and August, teaching him how to bring her to a shuddering climax, then left with the most careless of goodbyes as the leaves began to turn. By then the image of a glamorous seductress had faded to one of a woman desperately clinging to her youth, more likely to inspire pity than a hard on. Of all the lessons she had taught him, the difference between lust and love was one of the most useful; that, and how to go down on a woman.

Since then his heart had remained relatively intact. A romance with a fellow probationer had threatened to develop into something 'serious', but coming home early one day and finding her in bed with the cable TV guy had ended that relationship. His hurt pride had been assuaged by throwing the guy bodily onto the street; his heart, he was pleased to discover, had been only slightly bruised. For a while after he avoided the dating scene unless the need for sex was greater than his desire for a night with the boys, drinking beer and watching what ever sport happened to be showing on ESPN. On those nights he simply took himself down to one of a hundred bars where the women understood the deal on offer and didn't expect him to stay for longer than it took to get dressed after fucking them. But one night stands had never really been his thing and so he'd quickly fallen into a pattern of casual relationships that varied in length but that had all ended when the girl involved realized that no real commitment was forthcoming.

There had been a few women who had made more of an impact on him than others, although strangely they were the ones he hadn't screwed. Aidan had become a good friend once he had got used to her smart aleck ways and she had realized he wasn't hitting on her. Why he hadn't he couldn't say: even then he'd had a preference for tall leggy brunettes and she had fitted the bill to a T, but somehow, once the distrust was gone, they had slipped into a brother sister relationship that worked for both of them. Then there had been the crush he had developed the first time he had looked up from a rotting corpse, recently fished out of the Hudson, to see Stella Bonasera striding towards him. She had fuelled many a fantasy when his bed was empty and the need was there, but even that had faded over time and now the teasing bantering friendship, with the hint of something more, was enough for him.

The bomb blast had changed things and it had been a while before he'd felt like dating anyone, but when he had taken the plunge he had quickly discovered that a 'hero', especially one with the scars to prove it, had women lining up to 'comfort' him, and who was he to complain if the 'comfort' involved them getting naked? But the revolving door approach to his love life had quickly lost its attraction, especially when he lost his partner in crime. Danny's long and careful courtship of Lindsay had initially amused Flack, and then left him feeling strangely restless as he became aware that something was missing from his life.

And then he'd met Jessica Angell. Well, not exactly met her, more he'd become aware of her; started noticing when she was in the room; paying attention to what she was wearing and when she changed her hair; started taking any and all opportunities to pass the time of day with her. Eventually, when he'd realized that all other women paled in comparison, he'd found the courage to ask her out and to his eternal shame and her intense amusement he'd fluffed the carefully rehearsed lines which had been intended to sound casual but instead had made him sound like some love sick adolescent. Fortunately, once she'd stopped laughing, she'd said yes.

If Flack had ever given it more than a passing thought he would have said that he absolutely expected to fall in love at some indeterminate point in the future. What he hadn't expected was that when that time came it would be an all consuming, life changing, mind altering experience. No gentle fall into an easy life with the 'right girl'; instead he'd found himself engulfed in a fire that had consumed all that he had been before until, from its ashes, a new life had been born with a woman who intrigued, enchanted, enthralled and captivated him; a life that was challenging and unpredictable; a life that gave him everything he had never realized he needed.

A life he was only half of, but which made him complete