Casey opened her eyes and her heart stopped.

The room she was in was monochrome, cold as the deep freeze and the pictures on the wall told her she was back in London. Wanting to have her fears disproved she edged backwards in the bed, hoping to find reassuring warmth and comfort; to find Derek.

When she met nothing only more cold bed-linen she turned over reluctantly and looked at the empty space behind her. The emptiness of her situation pressed into her like the compacting walls of some horror movie: A movie about life without Derek; without the man she believed she had just made love to; without the man she could admit now that she loved.

Casey began to shake and new tears of grief began to trail down her cheeks.

Desperate to find some trace of Derek alive, she threw back the covers and stepped out of the bed and the cold immediately hit her. Frowning she looked down at herself, and saw only goose-pimpled flesh where she was expecting pyjama pants.

She was naked.

Casey was confused. She never slept naked – not even on the hottest day of the year when the air con was broken. She always wore something, even if it was a slip and panties. After all what if there was a fire? What if she lost consciousness and had to be removed from the apartment over a fireman's shoulder, carried down the ladder for the entire street to see?

The sensation of air on skin made her gasp.

Not Real? Her mind queried. Derek wasn't real?

What about the last "memory" she had of him; of his body leaving hers, but not going far. Of the way he lay beside her post-coital and the sense of loss she felt at the tiny distance, even though he pulled her close, held her tightly, and kissed her neck softly muttering "You're everything, Casey".

She was everything? Well so was he. He was her strength and her support and at the suddenness of his absence, Casey collapsed to the floor, her body a sad, cold weeping mess.

Not Real.

She glanced around the room, seeing all her things lining the walls. Her bookcase was full of books she thought she had taken to Ottawa. The rug on which she was sitting was currently beside their bed in Ottawa…wasn't it? In London, on the floor, Casey buried her head in her knees. Her naked toes clawed at the fibres of the rug as her sobbing racked her whole frame.

Not Real.

Could she really have lost him again? Was the whole of the last four months nothing but a fantastic dream turned into a sick nightmare? Had that bullet taken him from her for real the way she had first thought? Would she never feel his lips on her skin and his fingers on her naked body? Had she really made up the joyous, ecstatic home-coming sensation of Derek's body connected to her own?

Not Real. Not Real! NOT REAL!

The voice inside her head got louder and louder. And as her mind reminded Casey of more amazing memories of the past four months; of what it was like to be loved by Derek – to lose Derek all over again, Casey's crying got louder.

It's not real! The voice insisted.

But it looks it. She replied into the space where her head was buried in her knees.

Sweetheart, you're having a nightmare. Whatever it is it isn't real!

Casey frowned. "Sweetheart?" She queried, wondering since when dis-embodied figments of your imagination suddenly started addressing you in such a familiar way.

A warm arm curled around her waist on the bed and Casey started as she realised her position had completely changed.

"I can come up with a different term of endearment if you like. How about "Snuggle bunny"?"

Casey turned in bed. "You call me that and I'll never sleep with you again." But she was smiling with relief. She was still naked and slightly cold, but she was in bed, in a room filled with colour and the space beside her was far from empty.

Derek laughed. "Fine. But I think Mac the Quack isn't appropriate anymore. Unless you want to bring your scrubs into the bedroom." His thumb and indicator finger made an "V" against his chin. "Hmm role play…"

"Der-ek!" She mock-smacked at him. "You always have to lower the tone, don't you?"

"If it makes you smile after a bad dream…yeah." He said pointedly. Casey sighed.

"Sorry."

"Stop the press! One of us just apologised to the other! The world must end right now!" He joked, determined to see the worry disappear from her face. The sight of Casey trembling in his arms, sobbing had been heart-rending.

Casey smacked at him. "Are you always this chirpy after sex?"

"Are you always this violent?" He said laughing, catching her wrist and wincing at the same time.

"Only with you." She grinned sweetly. Derek leaned forward and kissed her. For a moment, Casey forgot her own name.

They pulled their mouths apart reluctantly only when the need to breathe got too much. Derek brushed a thumb over her cheek.

He frowned. "What was it about? The nightmare I mean."

Casey shook her head. "Nothing."
"Casey…" Derek warned. "Don't shut me out."
"It's not that. I just think your ego might inflate to the point where there isn't room for me in this bed."

Derek snorted. "Honey, there's always room for you in this bed."

Casey rolled her eyes. "You're predictable, Venturi."

He curled an eyebrow. "Really? What am I thinking now?"
"No…Derek. I'm tired." She guessed.

Derek laughed, somewhat uncomfortable at the accuracy of her guess. "Now who's the one with the massive ego?" He chuckled pulling her on top of him because he was an optimist. "Tell me what the nightmare was about or I start tickling."

Casey rested her elbows on his chest. "Is that supposed to scare me? Only I have to say right now…you're more Crusty the clown than Chucky."

"Hey! Crusty's scary as fuck! He has green hair and smokes a cigar…and has an unhealthy interest in kids."

Casey said nothing, she just looked at him while she waited for him to realise what he'd just said.

"I mean…" he stammered.

She grinned. "You're as incompetent as me when it comes to witty comebacks."

Derek stroked a finger against her collarbone. "Actually I thought we were both rather good at it."
Casey raised an eyebrow. "Are we still talking about humour?"

Derek smirked. "No."

"Der-ek!"

He chuckled. "Your anger is curiously alluring."

"Fuck off!"

"I'm trying." He promised suggestively wiggling his eyebrows. Casey rolled her eyes and Derek started to comb his fingers through her hair. "So how come you haven't freaked out yet? We had sex."
Casey's eyes widened dramatically. "We did? Wow! I must have slept through it! Was it good?"

"Hey! I'm going to take offence at that!" Derek said. "You could not have slept through such an amazing experience. He rolled them over so that his body was once again pressed on hers. It was a pointed reminder of their activities of two hours ago. Casey felt his renewed arousal with a sigh; very pointed reminder. She bit her bottom lip and tried to ignore the interest her body was screaming at her. Derek had been right. She could never have slept through that. They were very good at sex together. Inexperienced though Casey was, being intimate with Derek was second nature: A very passionate second nature.

Derek looked down at her. "The nightmare?" He questioned. Casey sighed.

"The usual."

He frowned. "That this is all a dream?" He asked.

Casey often had nightmares about the reality of their new life. She had woken him crying in her sleep more times than he could remember. But most of the time all it took was an arm around her waist and soft words in her ear for her to turn and return to sleep.

Tonight had been different. Tonight had been more dramatic. She had thrashed around in the bed beside him. She had screeched his name. And her sobs had torn a hole right through him.

He wanted Casey to be happy, especially tonight. He didn't want her to be in pain; to him, tonight signalled the start of a new beginning for them. He expected her to be cautious, hell he even expected her to freak out but Derek knew how to talk her out of that. He didn't want her sub-conscious to start weighing in, putting nightmares in the way of their happiness – her happiness.

"I'm here." He said and kissed her neck. "I'll always be here."

Casey's eyes widened, her jaw set and she sat up suddenly, violently dislodging his body from where it covered hers. She pulled her knees into her chest and turned her back to him.

"But you won't be…will you? That's the whole point!" She snapped.

"Casey…" Derek warned but she wouldn't let him finish.

"You can couch it in words of seduction all you like Derek, but leaving me for my own safety is still leaving me."

Derek took a deep breath, because he knew she was right. How could he say that she was important to him and then say he wasn't prepared to have her around him? Spike had talked to him about it, Jazz had talked to him about it, but mostly, he had listened to his own conscience – his own common sense. He couldn't live without the woman in front of him, so how could he trust anyone other than himself to look after her?

Her back still faced him, but the idea of speaking the words he knew he had to speak was still daunting. He'd spoken them before to someone else– but it had been a different situation and whilst he had meant the words at the time, he knew now that this sensation was completely different. This time when he said it he meant it with every single part of him: his heart, his mind and his body.

Derek leaned forward and pressed a kiss to Casey's naked shoulder.

"I'm not leaving." He said softly. "I'm not leaving you and you as sure as fuck aren't leaving me." He continued the small kisses on flawless skin. "I panicked." He said. "I didn't think. I didn't have the opinion that counted – your opinion. But I do now."

Derek slipped his arms around her waist from behind.

"You need to understand something before you make a decision about our future." He said, brushing her hair to one side and kissing just behind her ear. "Because it is our future, not just yours."

Casey turned around, giving him the benefit of the doubt, yes, but also desperate to hear him say something that would justify the trust she was so keen to place in him.

"Go on." She said looking up at him like a small child.

He smiled and took both her hands in his.

"I want to protect you." He said. "I want to behave like a caveman, brand you like a tyrant, I want to label you as mine." He paused. "But I also want to care for you. I want you to care for me. I want us to have a future yet I know that you can't give us a future if I don't give you some freedom. The decision is yours, Casey because much as I know what I should do, I also know what I want to do. I should push you away but I want you near by. So you make the choice." He sighed. "But before you do, you need to know something."

"Oh?"
Derek closed his eyes. "I'm not fucking around with this, McDonald. This isn't some stupid fling where I stick up two fingers to convention. I'm not doing this because sleeping with my step-sister makes me badass."

"I never said…"

"No. I know. But you need to know…" He stopped. "Shit!"

Casey moved closer to him and put a hand on his arm.

"Just say it, Derek. I won't hate you for it."

He looked at her as though she was speaking a foreign language and then he chuckled.

"No I guess you won't." He mumbled something about Prince fucking Charming and pity being worse than hate.

Casey smiled. "Believe it or not, Derek, you were hardly the person I thought of when I pictured Prince Charming…and by the way, your language sucks."

He looked at her. "I still love you though. Fairy tale or not."

Casey froze her heart pounding.

"You love me?" She asked in disbelief.

He shrugged. "Seriously. You think I'd let you screw with my apartment, my routine, my life if I wasn't in love with you?"
"Oh."
"It's okay if you don't feel the same yet… I just wanted the chance to try and build that with you."

Casey said nothing. She picked at the bed clothes beneath her.

"You never cease to amaze me." She said softly. "You're the most irritating man on the planet. You shake up my world in ways I never believed possible. You make me be someone I never dreamed I could be." She looked up. "And yet, I've lived a life with out you and I can't ever do that again. God only knows when it happened, but somewhere along the line I fell in love with you too." She admitted. "The only future I have is with you."

Derek wordlessly pulled himself back in the bed to rest against the head board and then he held a hand out to Casey. She took it and crawled forward to sit between his legs.

"We're going to argue, constantly." She pointed out.

"I know. But there's always the making up." Derek commented wrapping his arms around her and kissing her shoulder.

"One day we may have to tell our parents." Casey pointed out.

"Serves them right for springing their marriage on us." He murmured into her skin.
"Ed and Lizzie might be upset."
Derek laughed. "One of them will be. The other will be glad they won the bet."

"Marti will be surprised."
"You don't know our little sister very well…but I do wonder what Sam would say."
Casey looked back at him. "You might want to wear body armour for that one. Sam has taken on the Derek Venturi "No one messes with Casey other than me" role."

Derek raised an eyebrow. "Who died and made him king?"

They looked at each other and grinned.

"I love you, idiot." Casey said affectionately.

"Not as much as I love you, keener."
And then Casey twisted in his arms and let Derek kiss her.

It was a while before he released her and both their hearts were racing.

"What time do you have to be at work tomorrow?" He asked, suddenly practical.

"Two in the afternoon." Casey replied, slightly breathless. "You?"

"Lunch time."
"I'll have to come with you then." Casey commented.
"Oh?"
"Spike wants to see me. I said I'd come in."

Derek frowned.

"To discuss my protection." Casey explained. "I made it clear that I wasn't going back to London."

"You're so stubborn." Derek commented.

"When it comes to you, yes."

"I guess I only have myself to blame."

Casey smiled. "Yes you do."

Derek played with her hair lying on her bare shoulders.

"You realised I'm fighting a losing battle right now." He noted.

"Oh?"
"You're naked. So am I."

Casey glanced at the ceiling, but only because it teased Derek.

"It's the middle of the night." She pointed out.

"But we can lie in tomorrow."

"And tomorrow you'll want a quickie before work."
He raised one eyebrow. "Your point is…?"

Casey chuckled. "Der-ek!"

"What? You're hot," He said stroking her breast. "I'm horny." He traced a line down to her navel. "We're in love." His fingers curved around her hips and began an upward movement on her thigh.

"Why do I get the feeling this is always going to be an argument I'll lose?"

Derek tilted her chin up to meet his.

"Because it's an argument already lost, honey. It was lost the moment we met. Neither of us could win on our own…but together…"

He kissed her sowly. "Together we'll conquer the world! Muha ha ha!" he laughed in a silly voice.

"Derek?"

"Yes Casey?"

"Shut up and kiss me."