What is Not Understood

By Kadi

Rated T

Disclaimer: This is not my sandbox, but it is my favorite place to play.

A/N: All Season 5 Spoiler Warnings remain in effect.

Chapter 8

The news of Captain Patrick's arrest in the murder of Trina Shiloh, and the many other charges that he was facing, came as Sharon was preparing to send her team home for the evening. With no other cases pending they had finished the paperwork that was left incomplete in the wake of Andy's arrest. There was plenty enough work to keep all of them occupied throughout the day, when the reports were finished, they had turned their attention to case notes and filling out information summons from other divisions and the DA's office.

It was difficult not to think about what they would rather be doing, but they had to trust that Chief Howard knew what he was doing, and that he had the right people involved. Sharon expected, now that the case was nearing completion, that she could anticipate having Andy home that evening. There were a few things that she wanted to discuss with him.

Sharon dismissed the rest of her team and then she made her way home just as sedately as she was able. She didn't want it to look as though she was rushing, even when that was exactly what she was doing. She was surprised, however, to find Andy's car parked in its usual place when she arrived. She had hoped to arrive first. She wanted the opportunity to change and get her thoughts in order before spoke. She made her way into the darkened house and found nothing at all amiss on the first level. Sharon left her purse in its usual place and slipped out of her jacket as she made her way upstairs.

There was a lamp on in their bedroom, and she admitted to herself that the sensation she felt in her stomach was nervous energy. Sharon moved quietly into the room and let her gaze wander the interior. There was a damp feeling in the air, and it mingled with the familiar scents of Andy's body wash, it was sandalwood and something else that she couldn't remember at the moment. Her gaze was drawn toward the bed. Andy was sprawled there, across the bottom of the mattress, as though he had been sitting on the edge of the bed while dressing and had leaned over. He was swearing a pair of comfortable, old sweat pants that had ridden low on his hips. There was a t-shirt on the mattress beside him, but it didn't look as if he had quite managed to pull it on.

Sharon drew a breath as she moved closer. He had an arm thrown across his face and his face tucked into the crook of his elbow. His bare chest was rising and falling evenly, and the soft sound of his snoring filled the otherwise silent room. A smile tugged at her lips, even as her vision blurred with tears that she blinked back. He must have been exhausted, she thought. They had only just wrapped their own case after several long nights and then the intrusion into their lives by Robbery Homicide. She also knew that he couldn't have slept well the night before, if he had slept at all.

She gathered the towel that was left on the floor beside the bed and carried it back into the bathroom to hang on the hook beside the shower. Sharon caught sight of herself in the mirror and sighed. Andy was not the only one exhausted by recent events. She forced herself to look away. Yes, she was pale and drawn, and there had been better days as far as aesthetics were concerned. Sharon swept her hair behind her ears and slowly peeled out of the blouse and skirt that she had put on that morning. She walked back into the bedroom and claimed the t-shirt that he left laying on the bed. Sharon slipped into it before she turned off the lamp and climbed onto the mattress beside him. She caught the corner of the duvet that covered the bed and drew it over both of them as she settled on her side, pressed as closely to his back as she could manage.

As her legs tangled with his and her arm settled around his waist, she exhaled a breath that she hadn't realized she was holding. It felt as though the weight of it had been pressing down on her for the last few days. She could almost feel her body melting into the mattress and the warmth of the man in front of her. She tucked her face against his back, lips gentle against the back of his shoulder, and was just closing her eyes when a hand caught hers and she was pulled impossibly closer. He mumbled sleepily, but did not let go of her hand. He drew her arm up his body and tucked their joined hands against his chest. He burrowed into the bed and she smiled as she turned her face into his neck. "I love you too," she whispered. Her eyes were already closed, but with that, she was able to sink peacefully into oblivion with him.

When Andy woke some time later, he had no sense of time. He knew only that the room was dark, he was warm, and he had a face full of hair. He pushed the dark strands away from his face and let his eyes blink open. He didn't remember Sharon coming home, but she obviously had. He had planned to take a shower and shave before he saw her again. His back was hurting like hell when he sat down on the edge of the mattress. He only intended to stretch out for a couple of minutes, to rest the muscles that had spent one night too long on an uncomfortable jail cot. Apparently he had dozed off. Instead of waking him, she had joined him.

Andy lifted his head and propped it in his hand. There was barely enough light to see anything in the room, but he could just make out Sharon in what little illumination existed. In sleep her face was relaxed, but there were still tense lines around her eyes. She had put his shirt on, and as his hand wandered down her torso, he smiled at the realization that there was little else that she was wearing. His fingers found the hem and slipped underneath it. His touch was light as his hand moved slowly upward, fingers dancing across her stomach He lowered his head and turned his face into her neck.

He nuzzled gently, lips soft. He heard her sigh, and then hum. She shifted beside him, back arching as she moved closer. Andy grinned against her skin. He kissed his way along her jaw to her chin. He heard her sigh again and lifted his head. Andy watched her lashes flutter and then her eyes blink open. He studied her in those first seconds, watched the line form between her brows as she wondered where she was. Then it smoothed out as the initial disorientation cleared, and a smile curved her lips. Her eyes blinked against the darkness of the room and she turned her head toward him. His hand splayed across her stomach, thumb moving in a simple, light caress against her warm skin.

"Hi." His voice was thick, barely above a whisper.

"Hi." Her eyes closed again but the smile remained. She lifted a hand to his face. The two-day-old scruff that covered his jaw tickled her palm. She hummed again. She was warm and drowsy and floating just a little on the familiar and comfortable sensations of having him beside her.

Andy chuckled. She was sliding back under. He moved again and lowered his head to her stomach. He kissed a path slowly upward from her naval to her ribcage, until the muscles beneath his mouth were dancing and he heard her laugh at the feel of his stubble against her skin. Her hand moved into his hair. Andy tugged the t-shirt down again and lowered his head to lie against her stomach. His arm wrapped around her hips and thighs. "Missed you." It was more than just her presence. He hadn't realized just how much he had come to rely upon her counsel until he didn't have it.

Her fingers were combing through his hair. Sharon opened her eyes again. Light from the window was reflected in the silver strands of his hair. "Me too," she murmured. He was only gone a day, but she understood his meaning. From the moment that he agreed to help Sergeant Staples, there was a wall between them. A wall that she hadn't even known existed until later, but it was there.

They questioned at the start of this relationship that they could keep their work separate from their personal life and vice versa, but even Sharon had thought of it in terms of Andy working for her. She had questioned it in terms of discipline and sending him into the field. She wondered that he could take orders from her all day and would want to be with her in the evenings. She hoped they could separate the two. Sharon never thought of the possibility of Andy being pulled from her department and put on a different path, even temporarily. Certainly, there were things that they could not talk about, but she had taken for granted that they were things that she could not reveal to him. It never occurred to her that he might be tasked with something that he could not speak to her about.

Sharon wondered again that she had grown complacent. Perhaps she was even a bit selfish. She had taken for granted that he would be faithfully hers, at work as well as at home. He would do his job, and he would do it well, because he was sworn to and he was dedicated. Like her, being an officer was part of him; he didn't hesitate to do the right thing when it was placed in front of him, even when it meant things might become personally uncomfortable for the both of them.

"I'm proud of you," she told him.

His head turned. He looked up at her. "It was just another dirtbag, Sharon." Andy didn't see it as particularly wonderful. He did what he had to do. They got a killer and a bad cop off the street.

Her hand moved. Her thumb traced the outline of his cheek, the familiar lines and dips. "No," she said quietly, "for keeping me out of it." She could only just make out his hooded gaze in the darkness of the room. Her thumb traced the line of his jaw. "I'm sorry," she whispered; for not trusting him, even for just a short time.

"No." He lifted his head. Andy moved up her body to loom over her. Her gaze followed him and he held it. "I'm sorry," he said. "I knew what would hurt, and I used it." He knew, only days after their argument, that those feelings would still be raw, even if they had little to do with him and everything to do with her past. He poked at that wound, prodded it, and used it to his advantage in a situation where he needed people to question that he was actually guilty of a crime that he could never commit.

She had no answer to that. Sharon simply drew a breath and exhaled slowly. He rolled away from her and moved to sit with his back leaning against the headboard. Sharon followed him. She sat beside him, hands in her lap. "I don't think that this was a situation that we could have prepared for or anticipated," she said carefully.

"We needed time," Andy explained. "I knew the minute that we had to move we weren't going to have a lot of time to pull the pieces together. Everyone was going to look to you. We keep this," he gestured between them, "us, out of work as much as we can. No one knows what we're like together, and that's how I like it, but…" Andy broke off with a sigh. "We already suspected Patrick. I needed him to think that you were questioning it too." He looked over at her. "But I didn't want to lose you to it either." It was, maybe, the hardest juggling act that he had ever done. He had to make her doubt him, so that others would doubt him, but he needed her to trust him too.

Sharon moved then. She slipped beneath his arm and turned her body so that she was lying against his chest and stomach. Her arm wrapped around his middle and she settled with her head against his chest. His skin was still warm beneath her cheek, despite the chilly night air in the room. "You didn't," she promised. "I am right here, Andy. When I stopped being angry at you for using our personal life against me," she explained, because the truth was, she had felt that anger initially. "I realized how necessary it was. We knew that our lives would overlap occasionally. I accepted that I couldn't keep this out of our work completely…" They were not robots. They couldn't only love each other behind closed doors, but it was their behavior that defined them.

His fingers combed through her hair. Andy studied the top of her head. "It wasn't supposed to be our work, though." He sighed again. "We just can't control what kind of morons other people are."

"No." She turned her face into his chest. She smiled against his skin. "That we definitely cannot do."

Andy drew a breath. His fingers moved along her hairline in a simple caress, downward to her neck, and back through the thick strands of dark hair again. "How pissed off is the kid?"

Sharon groaned. She shifted against him again, wriggling closer. "Cops always lie," she said, repeating what Rusty had said to her on the phone when she filled him in on everything. "He will be okay. He believed in you. He was more worried than anything. I sent him to stay with Gus, so we kept him as separated from all of it as we could. This was Rusty's first undercover assignment. He will come around."

"I'll make it up to him." Andy tipped his head back and closed his eyes. "I was really hoping he wouldn't be home when it all went down, but the damn kid has the worst timing sometimes."

"Mmhm." Her nails raked through the hair that covered his chest. "He really does. Gets it from his stepfather." When his fingers moved against her neck, teasing skin that he knew was ticklish to the touch, Sharon moved away from him. She rose onto her knees and moved to straddle his lap. "I think," She said carefully, making sure to word her statement just right, "that you should be more concerned with making it up to me."

"Oh yeah?" His hands settled against her thighs. Andy slid them slowly upward, beneath the t-shirt, and to her hips. He gave a tug and pulled her closer. He watched her bottom lip go between her teeth and heard her breath catch as she settled against him. "I was thinking too," he rumbled.

"Were you?" Her lashes fluttered and her voice simpered sweetly. "What were you thinking about, hm?" Her hands were against his sides. They moved slowly downward to the waist of his sweats, which were already sitting low on his hips. Her fingers dipped teasingly beneath the elastic.

"I was thinking that it's cold," he explained, "and I want my shirt back." His hands splayed the expanse of hip, thumbs dipping into the apex of her thighs. She hummed again and he felt anything but cold. God almighty but the things that sound did to him.

"Oh," she said. Sharon looked down. "This old thing?" She tugged at it with two fingers and looked up at him through her lashes. Sharon watched him nod. Even in the faintly illuminated room she could see his eyes burning. She shrugged. "Okay then." She caught the edges of the old, faded and comfortable cotton and pulled slowly. Sharon slipped it up her body and over her head. Then she held it in front of her, dangling it between her fingers. "There you go."

Andy grabbed it in one hand. He curled his arm around her waist and sat forward so that they were nose to nose. The corners of her mouth were twitching. His eyes narrowed. He grumbled her name as he twisted. He pressed her into the mattress beneath him and turned his face into her neck. He nuzzled, the contrast of prickly, two-day-old stubble against her soft skin made her squirm against him.

She was laughing when his head finally lifted. She met his gaze and they both slowly sobered. They stared at one another. Sharon lifted her head and met him half way when he sought her lips. They moved together more slowly as her legs curled around him. The playful laughter was forgotten as long sighs and quiet moans filled the room.

The rising of the sun on a new morning found them in their bathroom. The air was thick with steam after their shared shower. They moved around each other with ease as they went through their usual morning routines. Sharon caught Andy standing at the vanity, still only clad in the towel that was wrapped around his waist, a hand rubbing at his scruffy jaw and cheeks. She shook her head at him. She was nearby, rubbing moisturizer into her arms, while she too was still wrapped in only a thick towel. "That has to go," she told him. She was going have a hard time covering the whisker burn that it had left behind on her neck and chest.

He slanted a look at her. His dark eyes gleamed. "I don't know," Andy grinned. After only a couple of days it was already growing in pretty thick, if with a bit more gray than he would prefer. "I think I like it."

Sharon's arms dropped. She turned where she stood to look at him more fully. There was a bland look on her face. She shook her head slowly. "Uh uh." She pointed at him. "There is a lot that I will accept and put up with because I love you, but that," her finger made a circular motion at his face, "is not one of them."

"Oh yeah?" He reached out and curled his hand around her wrist. Andy tugged her over to stand in front of him. "You sure about that?" His face dipped toward her neck and shoulder again. He grinned as she tried to dodge him, but found herself trapped between his body and the vanity. He laughed when she pushed against his shoulders and slipped his hands down, underneath the towel, to grip her thighs. He settled her on the vanity in front of him and stood between her legs. "Put up with?"

There was a challenge in his gaze, but the corners of his mouth were trying to twitch toward a grin. Sharon hummed. "Yes." She turned and reached behind her on the vanity. Her hand curled around the cool can of shaving cream. She squeezed it into her hand. Her eyes were dancing when she smeared it across his face. Sharon watched his eyes narrow and his nose wrinkle. She smirked as she lifted his razor.

He pulled her closer to the edge of the vanity. His hands remained at her thighs. His fingers stroked the soft, exposed skin in a simple caress, sliding from knee to hip and back again. Sharon smoothed the shaving cream over his cheeks and jaw, and the underside of his chin. Then she tipped his face to one side and went to her task. He watched her eyes narrow and her bottom lip get tugged between her teeth. Andy couldn't help himself. "Can you even see?"

Her eyes slid to his and her brow arched. There was a warning in her gaze. She held the razor up between them. She only hummed at him before her attention shifted back to the scruff that she intended to be rid of. His life was in her hands. He chuckled quietly and let his hands slide to the tops of her thighs. His thumbs moved inward, across the much softer, more sensitive skin and he heard hear indrawn breath. Her gaze didn't waver again, though. Her hand remained steady as the blade was drawn across his face.

Her skin was still flushed from the shower, from the heat and humidity that remained in the air. Her hair was beginning to curl as it dried. His eyes tracked the line of her neck, the graceful curve of it. His eyes followed the path to the tops of her bare shoulders, and further down to where her towel began. When she turned to rinse the razor in the sink, the towel slipped just a little. Andy's hands had continued to caress her thighs, thumbs dipping every inward. He was so busy gazing at the cleavage that her towel was giving him a view of that he jumped in surprise when the back of the razor smacked the top of his hand.

Andy looked down into glittering eyes. "We don't have time for that," she warned, one corner of her mouth lifting into a crooked smile. "Now stop moving." Sharon cupped his chin in her hand and drew the razor across his skin again. She was intent on her task and trying very hard to ignore what he was doing with his hands. She wrapped her legs around his and hooked her feet behind his knees. She rubbed her lips together and concentrated on breathing, even as the heat in the room seemed to increase. He was smirking at her. Sharon continued to ignore him, or at least pretend that she was.

While she finished with his face and moved on to his neck, Andy busied himself with trying to part her towel. She smacked his hand again and he only grinned. He tugged it open and let it drop. Andy clucked his tongue. "Oops."

Sharon rolled her eyes at him. "You can be such a juvenile," she remarked, but with more than a little fondness. She pushed the razor into his hand and captured the edges of her towel. Sharon nudged him away from her and slid down off the vanity. "Finish up. As much as I might want to play with you right now, we really do not have time."

He caught her around the waist as she moved past him. He dropped a kiss to her mouth before he let go of her again. Andy laughed as she walked away, wiping shaving cream off of her face. Her towel hit the back of his shoulders a moment later and he snorted. "Who is the juvenile now?" He tried to catch a glimpse of her in the mirror as she walked away from him, but she had already moved out of view through the bathroom door. Andy shook his head and leaned forward to finish shaving.

They both finished dressing for the day without any more interruptions. As they were headed down to have breakfast before leaving for the office, they met Rusty coming in the front door. He made a face at them. "Gus told me that I'm supposed to ask you what kind of bird doesn't fly."

Andy rolled his eyes as he stepped off the stairs. "Kid still wants to be a comedian." He dropped his jacket over the newel post and continued on toward the kitchen. "I ain't laughing. Little psycho."

"Says the one who spent the night in jail," Rusty called after him. He turned his attention back to his mother, who was now standing in front of him. She didn't look happy. Rusty shrugged. "What?"

"This is nothing to make jokes about," she told him. Sharon folded her arms across her chest. "It was a very difficult case, and what Andy was required to do was not simple and it was as hard on him as it was for us. I would appreciate it if you could be more understanding."

"Sure." Rusty shrugged again. "I will do what I can to make things easier on the jailbird that you are marrying." When her glare hardened, Rusty lifted his hands. "Last one, I promise."

"See that it is." Sharon moved around him and followed Andy into the kitchen. She stopped on the way and collected his things from her purse. She laid his wallet and phone on the counter beside him and dangled the bracelet in front of him.

"Hey, I was wondering what you did with that." Andy took it from her, gladly, and stepped away from the coffee maker to slip it on while she took mugs down to fill. While they waited for the coffee to percolate, Andy captured her hand. He grinned as he slipped his ring off her index finger. "That's mine too," he teased.

Her lips turned down in a playful pout. "I was starting to get used to it." She moved in to his side after he finished slipping it on and lifted her face to his.

"I thought we didn't have time for that." He grinned as he kissed her. Andy heard Rusty grunt behind them and pointed a finger at him. "Not a word, little comedian. Not one word." He kissed Sharon again before stepping away from her. "Cereal or eggs," he asked.

Sharon looked at her watch. She sighed. "Cereal. I have a meeting with Chief Howard first thing. I expect it will be the full briefing on your involvement in the Shiloh murder investigation."

"Try to go easy on him." Andy filled only two bowls with cereal when Rusty declined. "It's not his fault that you find me so irresistible."

She snorted as she filled their cups with coffee. "You are on a roll this morning."

Andy turned and spread his arms wide. "I have two whole days worth of juvenile behavior to catch up on."

It was really best not to encourage him. Sharon turned away from. She was shaking her head, but that did not stop her from smiling widely at his antics. She handed a cup of coffee to Rusty and walked over to stand at the center island with her cup. Andy placed the cereal in front of her and moved around to stand adjacent. "It will be interesting to hear his explanation, at the very least," she said, speaking of the Chief again.

"You're a tough audience," Andy pointed out. "He better make it interesting. There should be tales of my heroics. I expect a poem."

Her lips pursed. She pointedly ignored him as she looked across to where Rusty was seated at the bar that separated the kitchen and living room. "So how was your evening with Gus? I hope that he isn't too put out with us."

"Are you kidding me?" Rusty laughed. "He's trying to figure out how to trade places with me. Gus adores you guys. When I told him that it was all just a huge undercover thing, he thought it was the coolest thing that he had ever heard."

"See." Andy pointed his cup at Sharon. "Gus would write me a poem, I bet."

She rolled her eyes at him. Sharon took two bites of her cereal and placed the bowl in the sink. "I'm going to work," she decided. "Try not to be late. Rusty, I will see you this evening, barring any unforeseeable changes."

"Like murder, mayhem, boyfriends getting arrested." She glared at him as she walked past and Rusty grinned. "She keeps walking right into these things," he told Andy. "I'm just supposed to let them lay there?"

"I know." He shrugged as he lifted his coffee cup. "I'm fairly certain she's not as amused by it as we are. We might have to force ourselves to stop."

"Yeah." Rusty's head tilted. "But, if you don't, you could write a book about the whole thing. We'll call it… Jailhouse to Doghouse, one man's journey to sleeping in the guestroom."

"You're not cute," Andy decided.

"Yeah. I sort of am. That was way better than the poem thing."

Sharon could hear them devolve into bickering as she gathered her purse and jacket. She shook her head as she headed down the hall. Once she was in her car, she let out a breath that she had not realized that she was holding. That had gone well. At least Rusty was not overly angry with them, and if he was upset, he was keeping it to himself. Andy on the other hand… Sharon let her forehead drop to rest against her steering wheel when she realized just what his good mood would mean for the day. She could lock her office door but the glass wasn't exactly soundproof. She would still end up hearing him bicker with Provenza for the remainder of the day. It was going to be an incredibly long day.

She wouldn't trade it for anything else.

They could not always anticipate the twists and turns along the path that they were traveling, they could only hold on to each other and hope for a greater meaning in all of the things that they could not change. For all of the things that they could accept, for all of the moments that they could shape and change, and make their own, they had only to hold on tighter, to trust and have faith. It was not a simple thing, life. It was not always understood. It simply was.

~FIN

This concludes our tale. Thank you all so much for all of the kind words. It has been wonderful.