Nick took the phone a little awkwardly but could see there was no way out this time.

"Natalie?"

"Hello Nick. Maura said you'd call back but I wasn't sure..."

"She didn't get a chance to deliver the message, I've been busy tonight. But here I am."

Silence, then...

"Look Nat, I'm not really happy with the way I - we - left things. I imagine you're calling so we can talk some more about it."

"Well it was just so... abrupt. I read your note, and it made sense, but there are other things to consider or at least to discuss, don't you think? I don't want to upset Maura but we have been friends for a long time and I just think there's more to talk about."

"I agree, my note was not entirely fair to you. And Maura wants us to talk."

"She gave me that impression. In spades."

Maura had heard enough from Nick's side of the conversation to decide to leave him alone to talk. But she turned on a dime in the living room door when she heard,

"Why don't you come down here for a few days. We have a lovely old farm house with lots of room..."

He was cut off as Maura snatched the phone from his hand and told Natalie, "He'll call you back." Then she switched it off and held it in a death grip, declaring "No. That is not going to happen."

To say he was taken aback would have been an understatement.

"Have you lost your mind?" Nick demanded. "You wanted this! Do you hate Natalie so much you can't stand the sight of her?"

"Of course not. But I won't have you bringing your eternal dance of doubt to our new life."

She paced the living room as if seeing it for the first time.

"We have a life for both of us now, not me sharing yours, or you adjusting for mine, it's us, and it's new and if it's going to work you cannot... you can't... contaminate it with the perpetual, plutonium half-life angst that you and Natalie carry with you like Typhoid Mary carried the plague. You have got to make it clear, both of you, you have to step up and accept right out in the open what is not possible. You've both been avoiding it so long..." She sat down in the armchair. "You have to make it right, both of you."

"I've made it clear," Nick reminded her, "Nat and I have covered this ground before."

The frustration his certainty triggered made Maura feel like her head would explode.

"Right! You've 'covered this ground' until there's a trench worn in the earth but still you've never said it out loud, I know you haven't. Until you say it out loud it will not be real. You want to protect each other so much, from being hurt, from being forced to declare yourself, you just won't say the words!"

Now it was Nick that was losing patience. "What words?"

"That you will never be mortal again. That you and Natalie will never have a life together. You have to look each other in the eye and admit it or this will haunt us like a ghost, and we have too many ghosts to deal with as it is. You have to do it, and I won't let you bring it here, I won't."

"I'm not saying you're wrong..." Nick began after a moment of thought. "It's all true, we've been protecting each other even if we know the truth. Is that so bad, not to want to hurt her more than I have already?"

Maura moved to sit next to him.

"Life hurts sometimes, Nicholas. Maybe it's been so long and you've lived so many lives, you've forgotten it's a given. Sometimes the only way to heal is to rip the bandage off once and for all. Yeah it'll hurt like hell, and maybe bleed, but once it heals it's done. It's done."

The look on Nick's face was one of recognition, of sadness, of so many things that Maura understood even if she couldn't separate them all.

"I'll help, I promise," she told him.

He locked eyes with her. "Who'll help Nat?"

Maura grabbed his hand and leaned closer. "You're not the only person in her life, Nick. You owe it to her to let her find out for real."

Nick sighed. "Okay. Okay. So you're saying I should go to Toronto to talk with Natalie, make a start to settling this for good."

Maura stood and looked down at him. "I'm saying you shouldn't come back until you do."

"But what if..."

"I know. What if you make the same mistakes again, what if what if. Well if you don't do it this way the 'what if' will live here with us and I can't live that way. This has nothing to do with trusting you or loving you, it has to do with reality. And the reality is, you gotta do this if we want to have a life here. I'm not making life rules here, I'm just recognizing them." She glanced out the front window. "It's almost sunrise, you go on up, you've had a long day. I'll take care of the shutters and grab a couple bottles from the studio and meet you upstairs." It occurred to her she hadn't even brought up the news about Eric and his Prized nature. That could wait, she thought, there had been enough "new" to deal with today.

But Nick was shaking his head. "No, I'll spend the day in the studio and leave for Toronto at sunset." She looked surprised and was about to speak, but he stopped her. "Sweet it's clear you've given this a lot of thought, maybe you've been forced to for a long time. I have a lot to get straight in my own head. Before I bring it to Natalie I'd like a chance to sort it out on my own." He kissed her for good measure. "I have clothes and things in the studio. I'll pack a small bag and fly myself there, no need to take the car. Best to get this done sooner than later." The last few words he seemed to be saying to himself. He walked to the front door, Maura trailing after.

"Nick, let me..."

He turned on her and said sharply, "I don't need a keeper!"

She'd said that to him often enough in the past, when he'd tried to stay too close.

"Right," she responded in a quiet voice. "I'll see you when you get back then."

He reached a hand out and cupped her cheek.

"I love you, Maura Logue faux Knight," he whispered with a wry, pained smile.

He left before she could reply.

Maura shut the downstairs shutters by habit and brought her coffee mug to the kitchen, only to find Lacroix seated quietly at the table. She started, thinking to herself does he look uncomfortable?

"Well isn't this nice, you got the whole floor show."

"Not by design," he told her honestly. He'd have had to have been in the next county for his vampire ears not to hear their conversation in the quiet of this area. "I've come only to ask if I may spend the day in your gardening shed. The presence of sharp stakes notwithstanding, it seems to be secure against the light. And tomorrow evening you can accompany me to the purchase meeting in town."

She thought about this for a moment. He had every chance to mock her, to throw Natalie and Nick's connection in her face, to taunt her with the possibilities that awaited them in Toronto. To suggest Nick might never return.

But he didn't. He sat patiently awaiting her answer.

Aw shit.

"That's okay, we have a guest room upstairs. The shutters aren't automatic but they're light-tight." She led the way wearily to the second floor. "Up there on the left, it's the library most of the time."

As she entered the master bedroom she heard, "Merci Maura." And responded in equal, quiet kind, "De rien, Lucien."

She dropped her clothes on the floor, too tired to put them away, and slipped a nightshirt over her head. The old, thinned-out one that said "The Dark is Afraid of Me." She hoped it would make her feel braver than she felt right now.

She crawled into the middle of the (big, empty) bed. She didn't cry. The risks she was taking went beyond tears.

Nick called Natalie on the studio phone.

"Nat, it's me. Change of plans. I'll be coming up to Toronto tomorrow night, I'll meet you at the 'office'." AKA the morgue.

"She really hates me, doesn't she?"

"No, Nat, she doesn't. She hates what's happening with us, that's all."

"And what's that?"

"We'll find out when I get there."

de rien: it's nothing, you're welcome