A/N: Happy Monday :D In answer to your questions from a few weeks ago, I'm going to the University of Hull but the campus in my town. I'm going to study English Language and Literature. Don't ask me what I'm going to be doing with my degree. I don't know.

Anyway, I'm not sure if I'll finish chapter 21 in time :\ If not, I'll post an AN with an update :)

Chapter 20

Gabriella swirled her orange juice around her glass and watched Troy's movements as he washed the dishes. She'd been quiet ever since they'd come from the beach but Troy didn't seem to mind. He'd worked around her, preparing a chicken salad, whilst making light conversation about nothing in particular. He would touch her arm as he passed or hold her hand whilst they ate. They were simple actions that replaced the comforting words he was afraid to say out loud.

It had been hard for her to relive such a horrific and devastating time in her life. But she'd realised that it didn't matter if Troy couldn't empathise with her. She was relieved that he could now love her knowing exactly who she was. No secrets. What he saw was what he got. And she liked that.

"Troy?" she murmured as she watched him place their crockery back in the cupboards.

He wiped his hands on a dish cloth as he turned to her. He offered her a hesitant smile. She knew that he was unsure what to say. Who wouldn't be? She was just thankful that he hadn't said It's okay. "What is it, Brie?"

She sipped her orange juice, keeping her eyes on him. "I don't want you to look at me any differently than you looked at me yesterday." She sipped her drink again, feeling the chilled juice sooth her nerves. She looked away when she felt the prick of tears behind her eyes. "I don't want you to stop loving me because of this."

Troy folded the cloth and set it on the island as he walked around to her. He took her glass out of her hand, setting it on the counter. He smiled softly as he wrapped his fingers around hers and helped her to her feet, all the time giving her comforting, welcoming smiles. His hands rested on her hips, his touch lighter than a feather. He focussed on her eyes as he slid his hands around to slide beneath her shirt, touching her bare back.

He sent her a crooked smile, one that made her remember that Troy was nothing like her ex-husband. She believed that Troy could love her no matter what; he'd always stand by her.

"Nothing can make me stop loving you, Brie," he whispered, kissing her temple. "I love you just like I loved you yesterday. Isn't that all that matters?"

She leant up on her tiptoes and brought him down for a kiss, revelling in the serenity she felt in the protective circle of his arms. For the first time since her daughter's death and her subsequent divorce, Gabriella wasn't worried about things going wrong and causing a relapse. She pulled back and buried her nose into his neck in an attempt to be as close to him as possible. "I love you, too," she whispered. She pulled back to look up at him. "You know when you found out about my addiction?"

He nodded slowly. "Yeah, you'd had a bad day the day before."

She sighed. "That day...It was Alyssa's birthday. I mean, maybe I should've called in sick but I figured if I occupied myself, it wouldn't be as bad."

Troy kissed her hair and then rested his chin on her shoulder. "I'm glad you didn't call in sick. We probably wouldn't be like this if you had."

She muttered an incoherent agreement into his shoulder as she melted into his arms. Just earlier that day, she had confessed to him how quickly something can devastate you; it only takes a moment to have something torn away, something you worked so hard to achieve. But there was something she hadn't told him. It was something she'd almost forced herself to forget. Although it took only a moment to give you a reason to cry and break down, it took even less time to fall in love.

Troy pulled back and slowly tugged the bandana from her hair, letting her curls tumble around her shoulders. Letting the rag of material fall to the floor, he brought her soft curls over her shoulders, framing her face. "Do you remember the first day we met? And I was a really big bastard to you?"

She smiled. "I remember. You were a sick, chauvinist pig."

He chuckled and nodded. "I recall you insulting me in Spanish. When I tried to apologise, you said that 'I'm sorry' are just words and not an apology. I don't know if it counts after everything you've told me, but I really am sorry for the way I acted."

She slowly shook her head as her fingertips danced across his cheek, tracing his cheekbone, his jaw, feeling his rough stubble beneath her touch. "You apologised when you didn't run away."

He held her neck, memorising the spark in her eyes, the curve of her mouth, the way their hearts beat in sync. "Brie, how many times do I have to tell you? I could never run away from you because I'm in love with you and there's nothing that you or I can do about it." He tilted his head towards hers, being pulled towards her like metal towards a magnet, the ocean towards the moon. He pressed a kiss to her lips, finalising his promise to her.

Her fingers dug into his shoulders, afraid that the electricity, the passion, the pure love in his kiss would make her knees give way. For so long, ever since she'd walked into his garage on that first day, she had always felt inferior around him, feeling like all he'd ever see her as was a woman mechanic. But now, as his hands pulled the material of her shirt into his fists, trying contain his evident need for her, she realised he was finally seeing so much more than a mere woman mechanic.

He was seeing her as Gabriella; a woman.

Gabriella pulled back, taking a moment to catch her breath. It wasn't that they had spent a particularly long time kissing. In the rare moments they had spent alone, they had shared kisses that lasted much longer. But the fireworks that had ignited between them like a display the Americans create on the fourth of July, and the sheer electric current rushing through her veins like a bolt of lightning had her heart working overtime, knocking every last logical, rational thought and every atom of oxygen from her body.

It was like she was drunk on something other than alcohol.

Her fingers tugged playful at the short hairs at the base of his neck; her eyes constantly locked on his. She felt her stomach lurch, as if she was finally letting herself go, letting herself fall into him. "Just for the record," she whispered, "I'm in love with you, too."

That was all it took. Troy kissed her again and lifted her off the ground as if she was nothing but a feather. He felt her wrap her legs around his waist, wrapping her body around his as they were a jigsaw puzzle; both had rough and worn edges, both felt incomplete. But when they were together, everything fell into place. He ran his hands from the hem of her shorts to the crook of her knee, feeling the strength there. Despite her love of cars, he could tell that she walked most places.

He stumbled out of the kitchen, heading in the vague direction of his bedroom. All he could think about was the way her body moulded into his, the way her hands felt against his neck, his chest, his shoulders, the way her lips felt against his. She was his. For twenty years, all he'd thought about was Andy. And now he finally someone else to care for.

Troy staggered past the settee, fumbling to a stop when his foot locked on something, preventing him from continuing on his way. He stopped the kiss and looked down to untangle his foot from his son's backpack strap, all the while muttering half-hearted curses about Andy's carelessness. Whilst Troy was not kissing her, focussing on untangling his foot, she turned her attention to his ear, his neck, his shoulder. When he was free, he turned back to her, already craving her addictive kiss, and started stumbling to the bedroom.

He kicked the door shut as an afterthought before they tumbled onto the bed; a sailor's knot of human limbs. He pulled back to look at her, pushing her bangs from her face. "That was a lot more romantic in my head," he confessed.

Gabriella giggled tantalisingly, slipping her hand beneath his shirt to touch his well defined stomach muscles. "Doesn't matter," she whispered breathlessly. "Just make love to me."

Gabriella took a swig from the bottle of whiskey and hiccupped. She erupted into giggles as she fell onto her sofa, clutching the bottle to her chest. She sang along to the loud music, one of her old Billy Joel CDs. She was out of beat, about ten seconds out of sync, and she kept being interrupted by giggles and hiccups.

This was the way she liked it. When she turned her head, she saw her coffee table, littered with empty cans and glass bottles she had yet to discard of. She also spotted a silver photo frame, capturing a beautiful moment of her daughter's smiling face. Instead of crying, instead of feeling physically sick with grief from the memory of watching her daughter die, she giggled. She turned back to the ceiling, kicking her feet in the air to the beat of Billy Joel's voice.

Taking another swig of whiskey, she felt the warmth sooth and heat her throat. Nobody understood. Nobody could ever understand what she was possibly going through. But that was okay. Because Jack did. Jack bloody Daniels understood how she felt and he made her forget. That was what she wanted.

A knocking at the door made her take another gulp of alcohol that she honestly thought she needed. She rose unsteadily to her feet and stumbled through the hallway to the front door, pulling it open. She giggled when she saw Alejandro. He should've been familiar to her. But after a year of no more than flying visits, it was almost like she was looking at a stranger. Through her drunken haze, this thought made her giggle again.

She leaned against the wall and took another swig of whiskey. "Hey," she slurred. "Alejandro." She sighed. "My dear, dear brother."

Alejandro quirked an eyebrow, glancing from his sister's face to the bottle in her hand. "Can I come in?"

She nodded clumsily as she turned around and stumbled back through to the lounge. She threw herself back onto her sofa and watched Alejandro slowly survey the scene before him. "Join the party. It's me, Billy and Jack." She hiccupped and held the bottle out for her brother. "Have some?"

Alejandro tentatively took the bottle from her and weighed it up in his hand. Turning away from her, he launched it at the opposite wall, pausing to watch the shards of glass fall to the floor and the whiskey stain the white wallpaper and cream carpet.

"Why'd you do that?" she protested, getting clumsily to her feet. "That," she exclaimed, pointing at Alejandro, "was a waste."

Alejandro slowly turned to her and even through all of the alcohol pumping through her veins, she had to sit back down from fear of the sheer anger in his eyes. "A waste?" He spoke slowly, letting the syllables hang in the air between them like the mobiles that Gabriella had bought for Alyssa. "Gabriella," he snapped, "I might as well go out, buy a gun and go ahead and shoot you. I'll end it for you, shall I? That's what you're doing, aren't you? You're drinking yourself into an early grave, I might as well speed it up."

Gabriella had to look away from her brother and at the bottles which cluttered up her coffee table. She wanted so desperately to forget everything. It was better when she forgot. But, Alejandro was asking her to live with the pain she'd worked so hard to push away.

He sat down next to her and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "Gabriella, please listen to me. I'm no expert with livers. You know that I work with kids. But you're not doing your liver any good. You're killing yourself."

"Then, let me," she whispered, looking down at her hands.

Alejandro stood up and walked over to her stereo. "You won't listen to me, maybe you'll listen to one of your heroes." He flicked through the tracks before he sat back down beside her again. He let the slow introduction of Leningrad fill the room. "Gabi?"

She turned to him at the sound of his voice. He sounded quiet, forlorn. She had a sudden flashback from when they were little, playing with Addie in the house and someone, somehow, broke Maria's favourite vase. Even all these years on, nobody quite knew the details. But when Maria had asked them all what had happened, Alejandro had sounded terrified. Like he had when he just said her name.

"What?" she muttered.

He looked across at the opposite wall where he'd thrown the whiskey bottle. "I can never understand what you're going through. And I don't try to understand, either. But you can't throw your life away because of this. You have every reason to be strong and get on with your life."

She shook her head and turned away. "Like what?"

Alejandro gave a harsh laugh. "Mum, Dad, Addie, Shar, Zeke. Me. Gabi, I was three when Mum and Dad came home with you and even then, I promised myself I'd always protect you. So far, I've done a pretty crap job. Please let me help."

Gabriella felt tears roll down her cheeks, staining her shirt. "It hurts so badly, Alex. I miss her so much."

Alejandro wrapped her in his arms and let her cry into his shoulder. "I know you do. But you can't live like this. You just can't." He pulled back and wiped her tears away. "I really miss my sister. I don't know why bad things happen to good people but you just have to believe that something good comes from it."

She curled into his embrace, letting her salty tears mark his shirt. "I need help, Alex. Please help me."

Gabriella shuddered awake and after a few moments realised she was in Troy's arms, in his bedroom. She watched his sleeping features as she recalled the events which followed that confession: numerous visits to an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting, endless appointments with therapists and continual checkups with medical personnel for the state of her liver.

"Are you okay?" Troy muttered. His eyes were still shut tight but he tightened his hold on her.

Gabriella thought about the words Alejandro had said that fateful day: you just have to believe that something good comes from it. She settled into his arms and closed her eyes. "I'm absolutely fine."

As consciousness crept over Gabriella, she found that she was surrounded by a comforting warmth. But, more than that, she felt a sense of completion, as if what she and Troy did, the ultimate thing that lovers can do to show the depth of their connection, was always supposed to happen from the very moment they met.

She was acutely aware of eyes on her. Perhaps it was a stray remnant of her dreams, but she curiously cracked one eye open anyway. She tilted her head, peering through her fuzzy vision, blurry with sleep. She found Troy staring at her with an amused smile, one of his arms casually draped around her shoulders.

She immediately shut her eye again and buried her face into his shoulder. "Stop staring at me," she muttered.

Troy chuckled and tightened his hold on her, dropping a kiss to her tousled hair. "Can't help it," he whispered. "You were wonderful."

She draped an arm over his stomach, aching to be as close as physically possible. A sigh escaped her lips, brushing over his skin. "You were wonderful, too."

She finally opened her eyes and let her vision adjust to the darkness. Moonlight filtered through the blinds at the window that were fluttering softly from the night time breeze. She tilted her head to look up at the man who had stumbled into her life, made a bad first impression, listened to the nightmares of her past, and had, at the same time, unwillingly captured her heart. His facial features were illuminated by the milky light of the moon, accentuating the precise slope of his nose, the delicate crows' feet at the corners of his eyes, the sharp line of his jaw. It was as if he was made of liquid marble. She noted how in the soft lighting of his room, she could see tiny flecks of grey in his hair.

She felt him weave their fingers together and looked down to see their interlocked resting on his stomach. Considering Gabriella's naturally darkly tanned skin tone compared with his pale complexion, it would seem easy to distinguish between her fingers and his. But for Gabriella, at some point during the night, it became impossible for her to see where her skin ended and his began.

Shifting her eyes slightly, she spotted Troy's scars. They scattered his chest, shoulders and neck. They were all fairly small, probably unnoticeable except that she had just spent the entire night memorising every inch of his body. They were tiny pink marks, some longer and darker than others. But they were there. And she loved every one of them. She didn't know where they came from; she hadn't asked. Although, she suspected that Troy had seen the question in her eyes.

"It was a car crash," he murmured, looking out towards the window. "I was in a car crash when I was seventeen. The windscreen shattered and the majority of the glass fell on me. But, that's not important now."

She smiled softly up at him in the soft light. His eyes were smoky and dark, like the day he'd explained who and where Andy's mother was. She could tell that whatever had happened that day, whatever had caused the car accident, was difficult for him. And she wasn't about to ruin a really beautiful night by pressing on the subject matter.

"And what is important?" she murmured.

"You," he whispered. "Considering my choice of women in the past, and subsequent reason why I should never be with a woman ever again..."

"And your bromance," she mumbled as if it was a serious contribution to the conversation.

He frowned at her. "I'm not gay."

She giggled tantalisingly as she reached up to stroke his cheek. "Believe me, after your performance last night, I'm convinced that you're most definitely not gay."

"I've been trying to tell you," he murmured, kissing her palm. "But considering every reason I had to not fall in love...you had to come and make me fall in love with you."

"You make it sound like I actually did it on purpose," she observed. "Like I chose to do it. Believe me, I didn't. I mean, I get no perks from it, like we said, because Jamie and Andy would get jealous. The only thing I get out of falling in love with my boss..." she paused to look up into his eyes, "is you."

"Is that enough?" he whispered.

She sighed softly as she ran her hand over his chest, feeling his muscles twitch beneath her touch. "It's more than enough."

They lay in silence for a moment, savouring the peace that they felt. "Thanks for the Spanish lesson last night, by the way."

Gabriella frowned and tilted her head to look at him. "What are you talking about?"

Troy laughed to himself. "Brie, you were speaking Spanish the entire time. I didn't have a clue what you were saying!"

She twisted to bury her blush into his shoulder. "Oh my God. That's so embarrassing."

Troy smiled to himself. "Hey, it just made you way sexier."

She sighed and turned to look at him. "You should know that I don't speak Spanish with every guy I sleep with."

He quirked an eyebrow and seemed to ponder that for a moment. "Is it good when you do?"

She smiled and reached across to touch his cheek. "It's very good when I speak Spanish," she whispered.

Troy mirrored her smile and leaned down to kiss her.

Gabriella rested her hand on Troy's arm. "How's Steph?" she asked politely.

Andy's eyes darkened. "Never, and I mean never, say that name to me ever again," he hissed. He threw the rest of his coffee down the sink and left his mug on the counter. With a final dark look at Troy and Gabriella, he stalked over towards his bedroom.

Troy instantly got to his feet and followed his son. "Andrew Bolton, you come back here and apologise to Gabriella," he yelled.