Disclaimer: I do not own GI JOE. Thanks to Little Lady Hawk & Beck for beta reading!

No Turning Back from Here

She woke up the next morning wrapped in his warm arms. She took a moment to relive last night in her mind. She was tempted to wake him up and devour him but Mother Nature called. She'd gone from a long, hard run to fast, passionate, mind blowing sex without taking a breather. She'd pretty much collapsed after round two. She smiled remembering how he'd filled up cup after cup of water from the bathroom tap for her to drink. She closed her eyes and shuddered when she remembered the tender care he given her afterwards. The man had magic hands. If she had a knot in her body it was from round three and not anything that had come from the days of hard work and stress before that. She silently turned and disentangled herself from his body. She'd flipped the covers back and had one foot out of bed when she found herself jerked back into the bed with his hard body slamming down on top.

"I thought we agreed there was no turning back."

"We did."

"You're sneaking out of bed."

"I was trying not to wake you," she hissed, quickly becoming tired of his accusations.

"Let's get one thing perfectly clear, Shana. We started something last night and it is not finished; not by a long shot. If you try to run I will catch you, I don't care how long your legs are, how fast you run, or how many black belts you have! I will throw you over my shoulder and not let you go until you're between me and the nearest flat surface."

She narrowed her eyes, "I need to use the bathroom. That's why I was 'sneaking' out of bed. I had every intention of coming back. I may, however change my mind. We either go forward as partners, Hauser, or we call it quits right now. I'm not following orders in bed!"

He stared at her for long moment before rolling over. She jerked the covers back and slammed the bathroom door. When she came out some time later he'd stirred the fire and was leaning against the mantle lost in thought.

"I'm sorry for assuming you were running," he said, looking her in the eye.

Her anger deflated, "Yeah, well you know what they say about assumptions…"

His mouth quirked up in a smile, "Yeah. Truce?"

"Why don't we just get back in bed and start the morning all over again?"

"I like that idea."

Unfortunately they hadn't been back in bed all that long before her phone started to ring. As she had left it in the bathroom the night before it kept ringing.

"Ugh, it's Sean, I know it is. He'll keep calling back and calling back until I answer," she threw the covers back and hopped on her tiptoes to the bathroom to fetch her phone; muttering under her breath the entire time. "Geez, could these floors get any colder?"

"Sean, do you have any idea what time it is over here?"

"No, should I?"

She jumped back in bed and pulled the covers over her shoulders, "If you're calling me then, yeah, you should!"

"Oh, sorry. Look, Ash isn't retuning my phone calls and she won't open the door."

Shana rolled her eyes, "Duh, you cheated on her moron, that's not going to make you her favorite person at the moment."

"I didn't really cheat!"

Shana felt her body tense, "You got drunk and let your fiancé's worst enemy seduce you, how is that not cheating? What happened to the remorse you were feeling earlier?"

"She won't talk to me and it's not like we were exactly engaged anyway."

"You worthless jerk! What do you mean not exactly engaged? Everyone in Atlanta knew you had the ring and dinner reservations at her favorite restaurant. What were you going to do, not propose?"

"You're my sister; you're supposed to be on my side. Tell me how to fix this damn it! What do I need to do, spring for a dozen roses? Fine, if she'd answer the damn door I'd do it!"

Shana flinched at the tone her brother was using, "She's my best friend, Sean! She's practically my sister! Our families are inseparable; hell, the two of you have been inseparable since we were all in diapers together! This is how you're going to talk about the love of your life? You really are pig, Sean! I can't believe I'm related to you! What do Frank and Brain have to say about this? They can't be in support of what their little brother is doing!"

Conrad let out a ragged breath and drew his hand over his face. Was the man really that stupid? Stupid or not he was upsetting Shana and he wasn't having that. Not now when he'd finally gotten her where he wanted her-in his arms, walls down. He held out his hand and impatiently wiggled his fingers.

"Give me the phone, Shana."

She wrinkled her nose, "Why?"

He held out his hand for the phone and stared at her. Green shirts had wilted under this stare but it didn't seem to have any impact on her, "Let me have the phone, Shana."

She let out a breath and rolled her eyes, "Conrad wants to talk to you." She slapped the phone in Conrad's hand and flopped back on the bed. Maybe he could talk a little sense into her hapless brother.

"Hey man, you got some advice for me?"

"Yeah, grow up and stop being a selfish prig."

"Hey, you can't talk to me like that! You don't even know me! Who the hell are you to…"

"Listen up ass wipe I met you once and thought you were a fairly decent representation of your family; not as wise as your father and not as smart as your older brothers, yet you had potential. You've screwed up and it's your fault so be a man, tell Ashlynn you were wrong. Apologize, let go of your pride and beg. "

"I don't beg for anyone!"

"Shut up!" Conrad commanded in his fiercest CO voice. "Do you want to bring shame to your family? Is this how you want your father, your brothers, your sister to think of you? As some worthless coward who was too proud to admit he'd done wrong, too self-absorbed to try and make amends?"

Sean didn't have any quick comebacks for what Conrad had just said. "No," he said quietly. "That's not how I want people to think about me."

"Good, then man up and go make things right."

"Hey, are you like my sister's boyfriend or something now?"

Conrad once again ran his free hand over his face, "Boyfriend? What are we in high school? I'm her man and that's a hell of a lot more involved than 'boyfriend' so go solve your own problems and stop upsetting your sister."

Sean let out a gasp, "That sounded like a threat!"

"If you need to interpret it as such then go ahead," He ended the call then turned the phone off and tossed it on the nightstand.

She smiled up at him, amused, "My hero."

"You got that right, babe." He leaned over her, "Now, where were we?"

She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and brought him down for a kiss, "Right about here."

They spent the next few hours blissfully wrapped up in each other until a fist hammered at Conrad's door, "Hey you two, if you can tear yourselves away from bed and each other for half an hour, Allie's fixing pancakes and the coffee is hot."

Conrad retaliated by hurling a shoe at the door. They could hear Dash laughing good naturedly as he left.

"So? Food?" he asked, his stomach rumbling in encouragement.

An amused smile tugged at her mouth, "I think you may need something to build your strength back up…you…uh…had quite the workout last night and this morning."

He pulled her close and kissed her teasingly, "And I'm hoping you'll put me through my paces again later this afternoon…"

She brushed her mouth over his, being careful not to get too wrapped up in the kiss, "Sounds like a plan."

Dash was helping himself to another pancake when Conrad and Shana finally made it downstairs. He smiled until his grin turned into a smirk, "So, making up for lost time huh? Must have been pretty good from the way you were carrying on last night."

Shana turned beet red, "I thought the walls were thick."

Allie whapped Dash on the hand with her fork, "Behave. The walls are plenty thick and even if we had heard you, which we didn't as we were on the other side of the castle, you've listened to us enough times, we wouldn't hold it against you."

Shortly after breakfast they split up to work on the house. Allie dragged Shana into town to help pick out curtains. Dash and Conrad worked their way through a to do list Allie had left for them. They met back up for dinner and the couples retired early. The next few days went on in much the same fashion. Allie had set Shana to work installing the new curtains.

Dash walked into one of the refurbished bedrooms and found Shana installing a curtain rod with a power drill, "Hey, you're getting pretty handy with that thing."

Shana smiled down at him, "I'm a fast learner."

"Apparently so and I know Allie appreciates your help, especially since it meant giving up time with your family."

Shana shrugged, "I saw them a few months ago when we had to fly civilian and had a layover. Allie's been drooling over this place for months. It's nice to finally get here and see the place for itself. It really is nice, Dash." She stepped down from her chair to admire her handiwork. "And since you happen to have walked in at the right moment, you get to help me put the curtains up."

"Lucky me," he replied in a deadpan voice.

"It's not that hard, just spear the ring on the end of the hook."

He eyed the curtains suspiciously. He considered making an excuse to get out of it but he'd wanted to talk to her anyways, "This doesn't seem like a manly task."

She snorted, "Ha, you just want to help the contractor bust down chimneys and walls."

He shrugged and flashed his devil may care grin, "Demolition is fun. Besides, it's the only way to get to the pipes that need to be replaced."

"So did you get lost on the way to the demo?"

He laughed, "No, I was actually looking for the drill."

"Oh, you mean my drill?" she asked innocently.

"Your drill? Since when did it become your drill?"

"Since I found it."

"So what, finders keepers?"

"That's right. I needed it, it was there, no one else was using it."

"But now I need to use it."

She laughed, "Sorry, you'll have to find another one. Allie has me on a tight schedule. I've got three more rooms to finish before lunchtime! If I don't finish, she won't feed me. Then I'll have to cook something myself."

"And risk dying of food poisoning?"

"Hey, I can cook a few things!"

"Uh, huh. Luckily for you, Conrad is a pretty decent cook."

"Good, one less thing for me to worry about."

"You know, Shana, there are a lot of jerks out there but Conrad isn't one of them. He's a good guy."

She smiled, "I know Dash, and I know I'm lucky. I'll take good care of him."

"Isn't he supposed to say that about you?"

"So, we can take care of each other. Now, ready to hang this sucker up?"

"Ready when you are."

"Hey, Conrad…"

Conrad stopped as he passed Allie's office door, "Hey, need something?"

"Yeah, I need an opinion on the estimate to fix the chimney in what was Shana's room. You've taken a look at it and I'm thinking you told me you helped your uncle fix his once upon a time."

Conrad stepped in and took a seat across from her, "Good memory. Let me see the estimate?"

She passed it across the desk with a smirk, "You know; it's nice to be on this side of the desk for a change."

"Enjoy it while it lasts. When we get back to base things go back to normal and you have to take orders from me."

"Oh I fully intend on using your free labor as much as possible over the next few days."

He quirked an eyebrow at her, "Vacation, remember?"

"I remember."

He passed the estimate back to her, "It seems fair but I'd get a couple of other estimates just to be sure. I imagine Shana's chimney isn't the only one that needs to be fixed."

"Mmm," she answered noncommittally.

"Why do I sense I may be wrong on that thought?"

"I haven't the slightest idea."

"Uh, huh, I smell a rat or a matchmaker anyways."

"You should be grateful; without that leaky chimney you'd be sleeping alone."

"I didn't say I was ungrateful."

"Have you talked about what will happen when we get back?"

He shrugged his shoulders, "I've mentioned it a time or two. She immediately changes the subject."

Allie smiled, "She's a work in progress, and with all works in progress, you have to be patient with them."

"Patient has just become my new code name."

She was still laughing as he left the office.