When they woke on Sunday it was almost lunchtime. They lay in bed quietly, touching each other, learning each other's bodies, but in a relaxing, soothing way, not one designed to inflame passion. House was both a little regretful and a little relieved. The activities of the past twenty-four hours had been more than he'd got up to in a long while and he wasn't sure he could do it again. He didn't want the embarrassment of starting something only to find he wasn't "up" to the challenge, so he didn't push. He made a mental note to get Wilson to prescribe him some Viagra – it would be a hellish conversation to have with his best friend, but worth it if it meant he could continue to have sex with Kitty like they had the previous night. And there wasn't anyone else he could ask unless he went to a clinic somewhere and they'd bother him with the whole medical history crap.

Kitty eventually got up and made them both coffee and toast, bringing it back to bed. "Just as well we showered last night. Otherwise this bed could be very rank."

"It already smells like a bordello in here," House answered.

"Know what one smells like then, do you?" Kitty asked archly.

House figured it probably wasn't a good idea to go anywhere near the topic of paying for sex. "This bed smells like sweat and sex with a faint whiff of beer and pizza. I kinda like it."

Kitty snorted a little laugh which House took as agreement.

She stretched and House wondered if she was about to get out of bed. But instead she turned and snuggled against him, and her feet – cold from going to the kitchen to make breakfast – tucked under his calves for warmth.

"Hey, your toes are like icicles," he protested.

"Crappy circulation," she said matter-of-factly. "It's the price you pay for getting breakfast in bed. Deal with it."

"Is there any pizza left?" House asked.

Kitty shrugged. "Dunno. Why – still hungry?"

"Thought I could introduce you to my personal speciality, one-hundred-and-one ways with cold pizza."

"Sounds revolting."

"You'd be surprised."

He paused for a moment taking a sip of the coffee she'd made, but then resumed talking in an off-hand tone. "Speaking of revolting, you've had raw, undiluted baby juice running down the inside of your thighs twice now. Should we have that conversation?"

"What?" Kitty sounded genuinely confused and slightly appalled.

"You know, the thing that brought us together in the first place. Unplanned pregnancy."

"Oh." She frowned. "Has anyone ever told you that you have a way with words?"

"Frequently."

She shook her head, smiling slightly. "Well, I hardly think it's remotely possible anyway, but I'm on the pill. And on the other side of things, you don't have anything to worry about. It's been a long time since I . . . and before that . . . I'm usually pretty careful. Very careful. You bring out the reckless in me."

"You don't have anything to worry about from me either." House knew it wasn't necessary to articulate the particular terms of his sexual interactions with the paid help. They wouldn't play without a condom anyway, regardless of which particular orifice he was going to stick it.

They fell silent for a while. Unlike last night, today House was keenly aware of the elephant in the room and knew it had to be addressed. Now that he'd sated himself – for a while at least – his intellectual curiosity had resurfaced. He knew it was going to ruin this little cocoon of glowing, post-sex contentment, but, as always, his curiosity wasn't to be deterred.

"Although I'm not at all unhappy with the way things turned out, I actually came here yesterday to ask you more questions about Andrew," House said, trying to keep his voice casual. "I looked in—"

"What do you want to do today?" Kitty asked, interrupting, patently ignoring what he said. "I need to go to the grocery store and I was thinking of going to see the sculpture exhibition at New Hope, but the weather might not be—"

"Kitty!" House rolled over and pushed her away from him. He was annoyed by her ignoring him and, more vaguely, unsettled by images that had just invaded his mind at her words. Images of waking up next to her on a Sunday, an ordinary Sunday, and planning a trip to the grocery store or an outing to a park. Something about it was terrifyingly enticing.

"Of course we could always spend the day in bed," she said giving him a desperate, fake grin.

He could see the panic in her eyes, the desperation that he not do this, that he leave it alone. But he couldn't and she had to know that.

"Kitty, I said last night that we could ignore everything until today. Well, now it's today." He stroked her arm as if calming an injured animal.

She closed her eyes briefly and when she opened them again her expression was resigned. She sat up a little in the bed and tucked the covers around herself protectively. He noted that she was careful in ensuring no part of her body touched his.

House sighed in frustration. He was sorry that she was upset, but he wasn't about to forget everything that had happened, everything that had brought them together in the first place. She held the answers to his questions. That was all there was to it.

"You told me on Friday that Andrew talked about me."

She gave a curt nod and stared straight, not turning her head to look at him.

"I need to know more about what he said."

"Why?"

"I went through that box of papers he left me. It was . . . interesting."

At that Kitty did turn her head to look at him. Her eyes held curiosity this time. Good, House thought. He needed her to want to understand this too. She'd ignored it and buried it for too long.

"Interesting how?" she asked.

"It was all kinds of stuff related to my life. Yearbooks. Journal articles. Newspaper clippings. Photos."

"Really? He'd been collecting them?"

"Looks like. Dating right back to when I was a child."

"I wonder if his family knew about it?"

"Me too. When do you think they found out I existed? Do you know if his wife knew about me back then?"

Kitty took in a deep breath and let it out in a long sigh. She shook her head. "No, I don't think they did. Well, I'm pretty sure Miranda and Denis didn't. Rachael – I don't know." Kitty bit her lip, and paused, frowning in concentration. "Actually, now that I think about it, she might have."

"What makes you say that?"

"She . . . didn't like me."

"No kidding."

Kitty gave him a grim smile. "At first I guessed it was because she thought I was Andrew's mistress. I only met her a few times – after I first met him, Andrew invited me to a couple of functions his family attended as well. I went along thinking that they'd know why I was there, that they'd understand I was Andrew's . . . protégé. It wasn't a secret that he was funding my education and that he'd helped my mother. I thought they'd be kind of proud of him – you know, like I was a personal charity case."

"But they didn't see things that way?" House guessed.

"Miranda and Denis were polite at first, but then they simply ignored me. Despite the fact that we were all adults, I wondered if they saw me as a rival for their father's affections. You know, a 'child' he'd adopted despite having two of his own."

"And Rachael?"

"Rachael was blatantly rude. After inviting me to a couple of things with his family, Andrew stopped. I was never sure if Rachael made him stop inviting me or if he just realised that it was never going to work. And I wouldn't have gone if he'd asked anyway; it was too uncomfortable."

"So why do you think Rachael knew about me?"

"She said something funny to me one night. I don't remember exactly, but she said something about my mother – she was implying that my mother and Andrew had had an affair. At first I was baffled – Andrew never even met my mother – but then I thought about it later. I wondered if she was insinuating that I was Andrew's daughter from another woman and that's why he was supporting me."

"But why do you think that meant she knew about his affair with my mother?"

Kitty shrugged. "I don't have any concrete evidence. It was just the way she said it. I thought it was a strange conclusion for her to jump to – if you're going to be suspicious of a relationship like mine and Andrew's it's far more obvious to think that I was his mistress, isn't it? I mean, that's what you thought, wasn't it?" She narrowed her eyes at him.

House shrugged. Of course he had.

Kitty continued her train of thought, nibbling on one fingernail for a moment. "But perhaps it's a very easy conclusion to reach if it's not the first time your husband's done that to you. So perhaps Rachael had good reason to think that about me."

"Hmm." House thought Kitty's reasoning sounded logical. But then if that was the case, why had Rachael been so loving towards him at the will reading? There were still a lot of things about Andrew Barnes and his family that didn't make sense. "What else did he say about me?" House asked, changing the subject.

"I didn't know he had a box of things about you. But he was very proud of you. He knew a lot about your career and how successful you'd become at a young age. He kept telling me that you were world-famous in your field."

"You said he thought he'd ended up with the wrong son."

Kitty snorted. "Denis takes after his mother in both looks and attitude. He's fat, lazy and pretty slow on the uptake. I ended up doing the graduate course that Andrew had tried to get Denis to do, only Denis dropped out after one semester. I still remember how proud Andrew was when I graduated," she added quietly. A little smile played on her face for a moment, then she shook her head as if to clear the memory and returned to her recollections of Denis. "Andrew tried to give him a role in the business, but Denis messed up everything he was put in charge of. From what I understand he's mostly involved in the Barnes Trust now, the charitable side of Andrew's business. I imagine Andrew put him there because he can't stuff the family fortune up too badly when he's only dealing with the Trust."

"And Miranda?" House felt a strange sensation when he remembered the people they were talking about were his half-brother and -sister.

"I don't really know what Miranda does – I'm not sure she does anything besides shop and have manicures and go to parties. I've always been under the impression that she's not a well woman. I don't know what she suffers from, but Andrew always said she was delicate."

"Hmm." House rolled onto his back and stared up at the ceiling, thinking everything through. It was entirely possible the conclusion he'd reached at Wilson's was correct: Andrew Barnes had taken in Kitty to try to substitute her for the son he wished he had. But he wasn't sure how to say that to her. Could he really turn to her and blurt out: Kitty, I think Andrew Barnes only messed with your life because he couldn't be part of mine.

Jesus, what a price she'd had to pay.

"He really made a difference to your life, didn't he?"

She nodded. "He paid all my mother's medical bills – they would have been six figures alone – my tuition, the rent for the apartment I lived in while I was at school, all that."

House was confused. Andrew Barnes as a man didn't make sense in his head. On the one side was a man who freely gave time and money to charities, who followed the life of his estranged son at a distance, and who rescued a sad, struggling girl and helped her get on her feet. And on the other was a lecherous old man who took pleasure from humiliating a woman he'd treated as a daughter.

"So you felt you owed him."

She nodded. "I told myself that it wasn't much to ask, for everything he gave me. Of course now I . . ." She sighed. "I don't know. Would I have made a different decision if I could go back now?" She looked up at the ceiling as if it held the answers. "I honestly have no idea."

"What exactly did Andrew make you do to repay him?" House sat up in bed and looked down at her, putting one hand on her chin to force her to look at him. "I want to know."

"What?" She shook her head. "No, you don't need details."

"What did he make you do?" House repeated, more forcefully. "Don't you get it? That asshole who made you do those things was my father. I have to know!"

Kitty sat up in bed facing him. This time House was too wrapped up in the conversation to notice her naked breasts.

"You don't want to know, Greg." In contrast to his anger, her voice was quiet, controlled. "You'll never be able to un-know it. I don't want you to know those things about me. I don't want to be that person for you."

House opened his mouth to protest but then closed it again. Perhaps he didn't really want to know. Knowing exactly what kind of acts his father had asked her to perform wouldn't necessarily help in understanding why it had happened in the first place. And he didn't want those images in his mind the next time he had Kitty's naked body writhing beneath him.

Slowly he nodded. "Okay."

They sat in bed, staring at each other for a while. House had no idea what was going through her mind, but he was feeling a miserable churning of guilt, disgust for Andrew Barnes, and confusion about his growing feelings for Kitty. As usual, he hadn't really thought past the point of getting the information he needed and getting the lay that he needed. Now that he had both of those things, he wasn't sure what to do. The information still needed to be sifted through and pieced together and the sex had only whet his appetite for more. Soon. And lots of it, as soon as he got that prescription organised.

Then he remembered. He was the Chair of the PRC for the next year. Kitty was its Executive Director. It wasn't how he usually liked to do things, but he had time to work this out – year if he needed it. Of course, it would drive him mad if he didn't figure it out long before then, but the point was it didn't need to be solved right now, today.

He smiled and lay back on the bed.

Kitty cleared her throat. "I think it's time for you to go home," she said hesitantly.

He turned to look at her and she pulled the covers up to hide her naked chest. "Why?" he asked. Hadn't she just been talking about spending the day together? He was disappointed; he'd just starting thinking about what he could do to her without a Viagra.

"Please?" He voice shook a little. "This has been a very big weekend for me, Greg. It's stirred up a lot; I just need some time . . . on my own."

"Yeah, okay." House knew he'd see her tomorrow. Because he'd decided he would. He got out of bed with a groan, his leg letting him know that he'd done more physical activity than it appreciated. He slowly got dressed, not caring that she was watching him.

As he sat down on the bed to put on his shoes, Kitty reached over and put a hand on his back.

"Greg?" she asked softly.

He shoved his foot into the shoe and turned to her.

Her face was the picture of uncertainty. She might be asking him to leave, but he knew that she was just as keen for a repeat performance as he was.

He didn't answer her, just put his hand to the back of her head and brought her head to his for a kiss. Her lips parted under his instantly and her tongue pressed against his, telling him so much without words.

House let the kiss go on, but pulled back when he felt his pulse begin to rise. He didn't need to get all heated up just as he was about to walk out.

He stood up and walked towards the door.

"See you tomorrow, Kitty," he said softly, and then let himself out.