She'd showered and changed and fussed about waiting for him to come. All too soon she heard the bell ring, her mother at the door, their muffled voices, and then her mother calling to her, "Laura, Inspector Lewis here to see you." She sighed and eyed the window of her room. She'd gone out it and down the wall more than once in her younger years, but talk about appearing foolish. Her luck he'd be standing under it watching her make her way down if she tried it. Better to face the music. She stood, turned to the door, and there he was.

He nodded his head in greeting.

"Robbie," she murmured.

"Your mam said I should come on up…" he explained. He rubbed a finger under his eye…how many times had she seen him do that? A hundred? A thousand? He'd been part of her life for such a long time; he'd watched her grow up into her role as forensic head, and she'd watched him grow into an inspector. To one degree or another he knew the struggles and victories she'd had along the way; and she knew his…all too well. The pain and sorrow that had lined his face and eaten away at his joy in life leaving him vulnerable and lonely. "Nice lady," he added when she wordlessly stood there looking at him.

He stuck his hands deep into his pockets and walked over to her. She sat down on the bed, but he stayed standing…waiting for an invitation like the gentleman he was, she supposed. She didn't give him one. He'd insisted on this meeting over her objections, he could stand then.

"Laura?" he asked uncertainly.

"What was it you needed to say that couldn't wait?" she asked her voice hard to keep the tears from leaching through.

He rubbed the back of his neck. "I didn't mean to…intrude…I just—"

"What?"

He frowned down at her, weighing her up she thought. Deciding best how to deal with her like a recalcitrant teenager. But that wasn't what he was doing at all she realized as soon as he started talking in a low cautious voice.

"Needed to see you. I never did…you know. After Hathaway had gotten you out. There was Charlotte and Vince and by the time things were sorted they'd already taken you away…and they wouldn't let me see you in hospital, of course…and you were gone before I was there in the morning." He'd needed to see her. "I went by your house, the mortuary…everywhere I could think—should have thought you'd come here, but…I wasn't thinking all that clear, was I? Hathaway figured it out, of course—you know him. I was all for coming then, but he thought I should wait for you to call…" He'd needed to see her and he hadn't been thinking all that clearly when he'd been worried about her.

"You are all right, aren't you? The doctors said you'd be fine and all…but," he put his tongue into his cheek and looked for all the world like he frequently did when something had brought up the memories of his wife.

She swallowed and assured him she was fine.

He smiled gratefully at her and let out a puff of air, and she thought it wasn't so much at her 'I'm fine' as it was the softened tone she'd used to say it. As though he'd been afraid she'd never drop the affront to give him the time of day. "That makes me feel a bit better, then," he said.

"Only a bit?"

He gave her an awkward grimace and nodded. "Only a bit…there's all the rest still to come."

"The rest? You mean the bawling out for not just letting you do your job? Running off without letting you know where I'd gone even though I'd yet to give my statement?"

"No. None of that. The groveling apology for…well, you know."

"What? Following procedure? Pursuing enquiries? Doing your job?"

"Well, I didn't quite get the impression that's how you saw any of that."

"No. I guess you wouldn't have, but…I've come around. You can skip the groveling if you let me do the same…"

"You don't owe me an apology, Laura. All the same," he said with a small grin, "if it gets me off the hook, we can say you do."

"All right, then. All better now?"

Author's Note: In the world of canon, I suppose he'd have to say, "I reckon so," and we'd have to leave them there having tea with her mum, not to be seen again until the memorial service; but…I didn't buy it when I saw it and I still don't. So…

"Not to speak of."

"What? There's more?"

"Well, that's the question, isn't it?"

"What do you mean?"

"I guess…I'm wondering—hoping more like…if there can't be more—for us like. If you can forgive me doubting you…and if you could, well…you know—see us as something more than…ah, better we just leave, eh? Pretend I didn't say any of that."

She laughed then. And the laughter and the tears that she hadn't quite managed to swallow down both came bubbling out in a confusing muddle. "I'm not sure you did," she told him though how he could understand her through all that she didn't know. She swallowed hard and opened her eyes wide and gathered up some semblance of control before she stood and said, "But, if you were meaning to say that you want something more than being just…how did you put it? Colleagues and friends—well, I don't know about you, but I feel very much better."

"That is what I was meaning—" he looked doubtfully at her and she stepped willingly into his embrace. He clutched her almost painfully close, and she was surprised at that. "I was so afraid when I knew you were out there somewhere in the dark…and I couldn't get to you," he said, and then she understood. "I thought…you were going to die, and I'd never have a chance…never get the chance to—well, I never thought you'd be interested like—and I was afraid to take the chance. That's really why it wouldn't wait until tomorrow. I needed to—tell you. That I love you, that I don't want to lose you…that I don't know if I—"

"You don't have to," she assured him. "I'm here, very much alive, and I love you too…have done for ages now—how could you have thought I wasn't interested?" She put a hand over his mouth and said, "Don't answer that. Not now."

She kissed him then, and she thought she might have shocked his old-fashioned sensibilities a little as he pulled back and said, "We probably should remember that's your mam downstairs." She shook her head at him and laughed and that was all right because they'd have the rest of their lives to put that right.

(What can I say? Two romantic type stories in short order—married off my oldest not quite a month ago, suppose that explains it.)