A/N: Merry Christmas, readers! Your gift is a longer chapter. I'm sorry it wasn't up sooner; FF net apparently took a Christmas holiday of its own with regards to letting people post. Enjoy! The scene after this is one of my favorites in the story.

(H/C)

"And he's a horsey, too!" Rachel hadn't run down yet explaining all the great qualities of Grandpa Thomas to her other grandparents.

She'd said that earlier, but Cuddy hadn't latched onto it in the first moments of homecoming. Now, she suddenly wondered. "What do you mean he's a horsey, Rachel?"

Rachel hopped down from her perch between the Cuddys, temporary abandoning the stuffed Ember, and trotted across to Thomas' chair. "I can ride! Be a horse again, Grandpa Thomas."

"Not right now, Rachel," he said. "Some other time, okay?"

"You were riding him? On his back?" Cuddy hoped she was misunderstanding. She still cringed at the memory of the sight of Thomas' badly battered and lacerated back, and that had only been two months ago. She still wouldn't have given her husband a sharp squeeze right over his freshly healed ribs. She'd last insisted on inspecting Thomas' back a few weeks ago, right before he went back to St. Louis for the last time to get the house closed out, and while healed over, it definitely did not look 100% good as new yet.

"Me, too," Abby put in. "Bad horse!" She scrambled down from Cuddy's lap to cross to her grandfather herself and glared at him, hands on hips. "You forgot how to go!" For Abby, explaining a system and then violating it was a hefty sin.

Thomas faced her seriously. "I'm sorry, Abby. That was when your other grandparents came, so we had to stop our game. Next time, I'll do what you tell me."

"The girls were riding you?" Cuddy tried to clarify.

Susan shook her head. "Yes. Him right out there in the front yard on his hands and knees as we drove up and both of them on his back."

"At the same time?" Even worse. "Thomas, you shouldn't have done that."

He gave her a reassuring smile, but Susan spoke before he could. "Of course he shouldn't have done that. They might have fallen off and gotten hurt. Besides, what would people think?"

Thomas couldn't help replying to that, though his tone was still mild and friendly. "They would think we were playing, that's all. It was a fun game. Nobody got hurt during it, Lisa."

She forced herself to stuff down further interrogation until later, not wanting to agitate the girls by getting them worried about Thomas physically. At that moment, the front door opened, and House limped in, making no effort at a sneak approach as she had, but his strides were heavy and slow.

The girls charged over, Rachel winning the race. "Daddy! Grandma and Grandpa are here!"

"I saw their car." He picked up his older daughter and gave his in-laws a cautious nod as he hugged Rachel.

"Hello, Greg." Susan stood up, coming over to take her turn in the hug line. "We hadn't planned at first to stay long, but we wanted to stop by to make sure you were okay after your . . . accident." She managed to make herself use Thomas' word for it again.

"I'm fine, Susan." He put down Rachel and picked up Abby, then finally submitted with a martyred expression to Susan's hug, which he knew was unavoidable. She was at least careful as Cuddy had warned, and after releasing the squeeze, she ran a hand along his left side lightly.

"Are you sure you're all healed up?"

"I'm fine." His patience was never long, but he was trying to act routine for the sake of the girls.

Abby tugged at him as Susan stepped back. "Up, Daddy!"

"You already got up." He picked her up, though, giving her a second hug.

Abby looked at her new grandfather. "Grandpa Thomas 'prised them."

"I'm sure he did. They hadn't met him yet." He limped over to Cuddy's chair; walking while carrying Abby was getting harder. He hoped it was just some deconditioning after his "accident." It hadn't even been possible for several weeks recently. He made a mental note to practice more; he couldn't lose that, not yet. Cuddy scooted over to the edge of the seat so they both would fit; fortunately, neither of them was overweight, though it was still tight quarters.

Once he was seated, Cuddy leaned in for a quick kiss of her own. "We ordered a pizza, Greg. It will be here in about five minutes."

He nodded, not even remotely hungry. Rachel made a quick, excited circuit of the living room. "Pizza!" She retrieved her stuffed horse and then ran over to climb into Thomas' chair.

Abby, still nestled in her father's arm, looked back at him. "Grandma and Grandpa don't like 'prises," she announced with toddler wisdom.

House had to smile. "I'm sure they don't. I don't blame them." He looked over at Thomas. "So you've all been talking?"

"Rachel has, mostly. We're just getting to know each other a little." House found the reassurance he sought in the old man's steady eyes. The girls were okay. No doubt there would be hell to pay later, but for now, at least, it wasn't calamity. Yet. He was glad Abby had found an explanation that for the moment she was accepting.

At that moment, the pizza arrived. Thomas jumped up with an apology as he moved Rachel aside to go collect the boxes and pay. She hopped down and followed him to greet the pizzas in person. Rachel was always fascinated by the delivery people, apparently considering this some sort of magical power, that there were people in the world with the ability to produce pizzas on demand and others less gifted. Of course, they had eaten pizza out, but those didn't come to the door in boxes.

House and Cuddy looked at each other for a long moment under the cover of activity, and with a sigh, Cuddy stood. "I'll get some drinks. We might as well eat in here." Susan and Robert both couldn't hide the air of faint disapproval. Cuddy could not remember once eating a meal in her living room growing up; meals were formal and at a table, and furthermore, you used the correct silverware in each instance. That was how it should be done. Even now, under her husband's tutelage, eating in the living room still could feel a little jarring to her at times, not that she didn't enjoy it. In fact, she did enjoy it, slowly learning to relax and appreciate that even meals sometimes could be an informal and enjoyable family activity and not a process that needed careful administrating, nor one that she had to feel guilty for failing to perform to her mother's standards.

She was hoping the more comfortable environment might help the meal along tonight. Not that the situation was likely to get anywhere close to comfortable, but she thought it had a better chance in the living room than in the kitchen, and she was worried about her husband. His leg was obviously hurting him tonight. She collected plates (in deference to her parents), napkins, and drinks, making a few trips back from the kitchen as Thomas set up a pizza buffet on the coffee table.

House set Abby down and heaved himself to his feet, retreating to the bathroom on pretense of using the facilities. Actually, he didn't want to take his meds in front of his in-laws. He'd done so several times before by now, but somehow, tonight, it seemed even more like starting off at a point of weakness for the ultimate conversation that loomed ahead. He sorted out the pills and stared at them before taking them one at a time. The Voltaren was indeed an improvement on the former ibuprofen, but the biggest difference was not in his leg. He'd discovered as the explosion damage healed and gave way to the everyday complaints that the new prescription worked better on the nagging aches in his right shoulder, knee, and foot, signs of the inevitable arthritis that he knew he was doomed to given his gait. Far more than the universal aches and pains of aging lay in the future for him, no way around that. But maybe this would buy him a little more time of being able to walk and carry his daughters. That was worth even having to explain himself to Wilson if the oncologist pushed. At least he hadn't refused to write the new script yesterday.

With a sigh, House exited the bathroom, returning to the others in the living room and still calling himself a coward, though still at least not in John's voice. Robert and Susan were filling their plates slowly. Thomas had already sat down in the recliner with a joint plate for himself and Rachel and was helping her with bite sizes, looking thoroughly at ease at the moment, so much so that House would have liked to hit him if he hadn't realized it was an act. Cuddy was getting some pizza for Abby, who as usual wanted both a little veggie lovers and a little meat lovers. She always had to live with one foot in each world, sampling all the options, almost visibly comparing, wanting all possible data before she made her final decision. House collected two pieces for himself, the minimum necessary to shove down with the meds, he thought, and he'd do well to finish that. Finally, he limped back to the chair, and Cuddy and Abby both waited and let him get installed first before joining him.

The Cuddys had known long since that mealtime conversation must be casual around their son-in-law. Thanks to that damned Patrick and their own supplemental observations on a few other matters since he had opened their eyes, they now knew far more about House than he wished, though at least they didn't judge him for it. Now Robert opened a frivolous topic, a joke and a few questions about Belle, but he was trying a little too hard.

Thomas stepped in. Taking control of the conversation firmly and building off Robert's attempted entrance, he launched into various tales of the stable cats at Ember's former barn. He could describe each feline personality so distinctly that the cats themselves could almost be seen prowling around the living room among the listeners, and he could make even small events - a mouse in the tack room, games with the lash of a whip - into near verbal movies. A watch carelessly set aside by the owner while a horse was given a bath on a hot day led to a barn-wide search with all the dedication and clues of a Sherlock Holmes mystery. Irresistibly, the girls were drawn in, soon even Abby watching him more than her other grandparents and hanging on each word of the story. House himself could almost forget the coming storm, and to his surprise, he finished his two slices of pizza before he realized it and even let Cuddy talk him into a small supplemental third. He had to hand it to the old man; he had a way with words when he wanted to use it. Even Robert and Susan looked impressed in spite of themselves.

As the meal finished, House knew it was his turn. After carefully washing off the pizza grease from his hands - approaching his beloved baby grand was only a few steps below scrubbing up for surgery - he settled in for an evening concert. His playing to his ears was a little stiff, not at his best tonight, but Rachel and Abby were both enthralled as usual. He pulled them in with frisky, fun pieces they knew, then skillfully gradually switched the tempo. They were already well past bedtime, and though a valiant fight was put up with the adrenaline of the evening, eventually both of his daughters were sound asleep. House softly finished his current selection and sat still, staring at his hands.

Cuddy stood. "Time out," she said firmly, looking at her parents. "We'll talk after I get them down, not until then." The Cuddys and Thomas nodded, and House pushed himself up, suddenly wanting to escape briefly as much as help. He picked up Abby carefully as his wife took Rachel. Getting them into PJs and tucked into bed was accomplished in near silence; Cuddy kept both ears peeled toward the living room, but for the moment, her mandate was obviously being obeyed. No interrogation, no conversation at all. Once the girls were in bed, Cuddy turned to her husband. "I'm sorry," they both whispered simultaneously. The required embrace and kiss were observed, but tonight, they were too aware of the ticking time bomb in the other room to truly enjoy them.

"It's not your fault," she insisted after they parted.

He shook his head. "I was being a coward."

"Greg. . ."

He interrupted her protest, suddenly wanting to share this new experience, and he wanted to share it with her above all. "And that's me saying that. Just me."

Her eyes widened as it soaked in. "Really?"

"Yeah. But I was still a coward."

She gave him another embrace with more in it that time, and he felt her pride coming through her hands, pride in him that was sweeter than he could find words for. Just for a moment, he let himself enjoy it. Might be the last thing he enjoyed tonight, after all. "Better go face the music," he mumbled into her hair.

She let go, carefully shutting the nursery door. With mutual reluctance, they walked back down the hall slowly into the hard-held silence.

Side by side, they squeezed back together into the chair. Cuddy wished she were at any board meeting in her entire hospital career rather than at this one. She opened her mouth, but even before the words found breath, Robert took his first shot. "What proof has this man given you for his claim?"

Sputtering in surprise, it took her a few seconds to reply. "What proof? He's . . ." She looked from Thomas to her husband. The outward resemblance was only superficial and might be called coincidence, but the longer you watched them together, the more things came out, mannerisms, ways of thought. Secure in the fact, she had trouble not seeing it anymore.

"Have you done DNA tests?" Robert persisted.

"No, but I'm perfectly willing to if Greg wants it." Thomas was courteous, but he still drew the line that this was up to his son, not to his son's father-in-law. "I went to basic training with John and then was stationed with him once a few years later, and that's when Blythe became pregnant. She always said there had never been anyone else."

"So you slept around with married women a lot, did you?"

Thomas was unruffled but direct. "No. It was just the one time."

Robert switched back to his daughter. "Have you at least had a private investigator check into his background?"

"Yes," Cuddy snapped, already fighting to keep her temper. "We did a full investigation." She wished her husband would speak up. A moment later, as House looked at her, she remembered that Thomas hadn't known yet about Lucas' assignment last summer. She tried to channel Patterson and regroup. "Dad, this is Greg's father. We're sure of that. But like I told Mother a while ago, I'm sorry you had to find out about it this way. We weren't trying . . ." She skidded to a halt there as her mother glared at her.

"Oh, don't waste time telling us that you weren't trying to keep it a secret, Lisa. Obviously, every phone call we've had for the last two months, you were doing nothing but trying to keep it a secret."

"Longer than two months," Robert said. "Rachel said she met him back at Blythe's funeral."

"The girls have only known who I was for two months," Thomas said, with a quick glance at his son first for unspoken permission. "There are many, many people who don't know yet, and Greg and Lisa wanted to work out the adjustments for themselves at their own pace without the world getting involved. There was a lot of media after the explosion, and that made things more difficult. I had never told anybody myself until a couple of weeks ago, and only my best friend knows now. I am sure that you would have been told soon, but I'm sorry as well that it happened like this."

Susan looked back at her son-in-law. "About that explosion, you obviously didn't just run into each other at the track like the TV said and you decide to ask Greg's opinion. How much of the public story was true?"

Cuddy seized the moment, seeing an opportunity to emphasize Thomas' heroic actions. He had saved many people's lives, her husband's included, even if his most personal action wasn't public knowledge. "All of it, Mother. Except that he and Greg were spending a day together instead of meeting there by chance. Everything else you saw about Thomas on the news was true."

Susan unfortunately didn't look impressed. "Including that Greg was just there enjoying the races, and it was you who got him involved in everything else in the first place? He wouldn't even have been caught up with that lunatic's plan at all if you hadn't pulled him in. And you're trying to call yourself a father?"

"We didn't know what would happen," Thomas pointed out. "If we had, several things would have been done differently." House flinched, tightening up suddenly beside Cuddy, and Thomas noticed. "But working with Greg that day is not something I regret. Nobody knows the future."

"Your own son," Susan insisted. "You put him into danger."

"Wouldn't be the first time, apparently." Robert jumped to the crux of the matter. Cuddy had known this was coming at some point in the conversation, but she'd still hoped she might just possibly be wrong. "If you are his father, then where the hell were you all his life growing up? Why didn't you do something?"

Thomas' voice was full of regret. "I didn't know. If I'd had any idea, I would have killed the bastard."

"But you knew he was your son? Or at least believed he was?"

"I knew he was my son," Thomas confirmed. "But I wasn't around . . ."

Susan cut him off. "Why not? How could anybody watch that monster and not know? While he was doing things like. . ." She looked at her son-in-law, realizing how much he had tensed up.

Cuddy was holding his hand tightly. "That's enough, Mother. We don't need a list."

"He should have known."

Cuddy tried to calm things. "Mother, Thomas was never stationed with them after Greg was one year old. He only visited every other year or so for a day. Remember, Blythe missed it, and she was there full time. In fact, Blythe even. . ." She stopped. Her husband's fingers had twitched in hers, just faintly, but she felt it. A silent plea. Not right now. With a mental grumble at his insane loyalty to his mother, which even now cropped up at times though it was finally being balanced somewhat by acknowledgement of the negatives, she left the subject. "Thomas was only there intermittently. He didn't know."

"So how long has he been around full time?" Robert asked.

House finally spoke up, his voice taut. "He moved up this last week."

"How do you jump from visiting every year or so in oblivion in childhood to living just a few neighborhoods over?" Susan demanded.

Thomas tried again on a calm explanation. He could tell they were reacting as much out of their hurt at the surprise as they were to the facts, and he wasn't sure how much they were ready to hear. But he also realized just how hard this conversation was on his son. He carefully tried to keep the emphasis on his own role, not on John's. "I had always stayed in the background because Blythe was married, and I had no idea of the truth. And yes, I agree that I should have noticed. I'd do anything to change that, but I can't." That last sentence was addressed to his son, not to the Cuddys, but then he turned back to them. "I never realized what had happened until I saw the media surrounding the Chandler trial. Then I came up to hear the evidence myself, because I hoped the press was just exaggerating things. That's when I re-entered Greg's life."

"But that was last July," Susan said. "That's ten months ago." She looked at her daughter reproachfully. "You've been hiding him from us for ten months?"

"Mother," Cuddy snapped, "it was Greg's business, and it was something he needed to work through himself. Unfortunately, we did have to leave you out while we got to know each other, but believe me, we weren't sitting there that first night after court plotting how to avoid telling you. It was just private."

"But we're family," Susan countered.

"Besides," Robert put in, "an objective observer as a voice of reason on the outside is a good thing to have. Especially with something this big. We deserved to know."

Cuddy shook her head. "There were other needs that came ahead of yours," she insisted. "I apologize that it had to be that way, but it did. Greg and Thomas deserved to work things out between themselves without interference."

"We're not talking about interference," Susan insisted, "just about watching out for your interests."

"Greg and Lisa have been watching out for their own interests," Thomas emphasized. "And for the girls. Eight months between us meeting in court and the girls finding out who I was; they weren't being rash. They had every right to go slowly."

Susan wasn't ready for calm discussion yet, he realized. "Those are our grandchildren."

Thomas couldn't resist the answer, polite but rock solid. "They're mine, too."

Susan sputtered indignantly. House had been sitting on the edges to this point, trying to push back the memories of his childhood or at least the terror associated with them and doing a pretty good job at it, but suddenly, unexpectedly, he was gripped by another memory that was far younger. Blythe, just last December. Blythe, sitting on that couch right about where Susan was sitting now, and family discussions about as pleasant as this one going on, the emotional currents slowly accelerating. He still didn't know that it had contributed to her death. But he didn't know that it hadn't.

"Do either of you have any health problems?" he blurted out. He'd already interrogated the old man a few times in the preceding months, as well as heard the doctor who examined him in Philadelphia after the explosion. He felt fairly secure in the medical status there.

Cuddy looked startled, not having noticed the parallel herself until then. Thomas, who didn't know the full story of Blythe's visit and the joint sessions with Jensen, still knew enough to follow the thought. Susan and Robert both looked bewildered.

"Greg, what on earth does that have to do with anything?"

House leaned forward, his eyes boring into her, his muscles almost crackling with tension. "Do you have any health problems?" he demanded.

Robert answered just to settle him down, obviously not seeing the relevance. "I've got a little arthritis, Greg. You know I had that hip replaced back when Abby was born. And we're both on blood pressure pills, but pretty much everybody our age is on blood pressure pills. We're fine." Susan looked across at Thomas as if wondering, even hoping, that he was on blood pressure pills, anything to temper the image of him on all fours prancing in the yard with vigor while two toddlers were on his back.

House abruptly felt that he was suffocating. They'd just admitted to even more than his mother ever had, and she had sat there looking just as healthy as they did, and she was dead. And he still fought with the feeling at times that he had contributed to that. Not again. He couldn't do this again. "We aren't going to have a fight like this," he stated.

"But we need to talk about things," Susan said, but she was looking concerned now. "Are you all right, Greg?"

He jerked his hand free of Cuddy's and stood. "We aren't doing this," he reiterated. He limped toward the back door, needing to remove himself from whatever might be about to happen, fully admitting his cowardice, but he didn't care. He could not go through this again. The door shut firmly behind him.

The remaining four adults sat in silence for a moment, and then Susan jumped to the attack, glaring at Thomas. "You've got that poor boy all tied up into knots. If you had any idea what was good for him. . ."

Cuddy shot out of her chair like a rocket. "Mother, shut up." Susan obeyed, startled. "Mother, Dad, I want to speak to you in . . . the first guest room." She started to say our bedroom reflexively, but she didn't want their intrusion in there this evening. "Come on."

Susan looked toward the back toward. "Maybe you should go check on Greg."

"No, he needs a few minutes by himself." He had gone out the back door, not the front, a difference that wasn't lost on Cuddy. He wasn't leaving the house or the situation, just trying to get a little distance to regroup and once again climb over the memory of his mother's death. She was concerned about him, but she could do far better work on her own at the moment with a few good, home truths for her parents. Besides, he had reminded her of Blythe now. Which was ridiculous; it wasn't likely to happen again that a parent would expire basically in front of them, but even so, the conversation hadn't been getting anywhere, and she wasn't going to let it escalate like that last session with Blythe had. Enough. "Come on, Mother, Dad." They stood slowly, and Cuddy took three steps, then turned back quickly. "Thomas, don't leave." That sounded a little dictatorial even to herself, and she tried to soften it. "Please."

His eyes met hers with a sympathetic compassion that nearly overwhelmed her. "I'm not going anywhere," he answered.

She relaxed. She'd meant right now, but it was reassuring to have the general affirmation all the same. "Good. We'll be back in a minute."

They turned into the first guest room, and Cuddy realized only after the door was closed that this was where Blythe had died. She made herself face it, pushing down the memory firmly. It was only a room. That was all. "Now listen. You are not going to drag out every piece of Greg's past to hit Thomas with while Greg has to watch. I'm putting my foot down right now. This is my house. Our house. You showed up here tonight uninvited; Thomas didn't. You don't have the right to tear him apart. Everybody has made mistakes in life, you two included."

Susan straightened up. "So you've just decided to replace us; is that it? You're throwing us out of your life?"

Stressed and worried, Cuddy almost snapped back. So easy to seize the moment, to lash out, and to hell with a year's worth of therapy trying to improve this relationship. Trading them for Thomas sounded frighteningly tempting. It took every ounce of self control she possessed to make her hold back. "No. You're my parents. Nothing will ever change that. And I really am sorry you had to find out this way. It is complicated, and you aren't the only ones in the dark. But we are not going to have more conversations like that one in front of Greg. Not in front of the girls, either. We've worked hard to make this house a refuge for the family. You aren't going to make it a place of conflict."

"Lisa, Greg really is stressed out. I've never seen him as tense as he was when he left."

Cuddy cut her off ruthlessly. "He isn't stressed out over Thomas. I mean, there's stress, because it's a change, but that wasn't what was bothering him then. You know Blythe died here last Christmas on her visit. In fact, she died in this room, in this bed." Robert and Susan both looked around at the bed with an involuntary cringe as if it might still hold a body that they just hadn't noticed yet. "That's what he was thinking of. She died of a heart attack. It was late at night after she used the hot tub, but that's what we started reminding him of. He doesn't want another parent to die here, and as things heated up, he started thinking about heart attacks or something similar. He's still grieving his mother; it was just five months ago. You were bringing it back for him."

Both of them softened a little, sympathetic. "We didn't mean to upset Greg," Robert said.

"Well, we aren't going to from here on. We will not dissect the past; that's too much for everybody. And we aren't going to continue conversations if anybody at all starts to get upset. Period. We aren't going to remind him of things. He's had to deal with too much in life already. If you can't agree to that, you can leave right now." She faced them squarely, not giving an inch. "Whenever you visit this house, from tonight on forever, you will treat everybody else here - including Thomas - respectfully and courteously. Even if you don't feel it, when you're under our roof, smile and pretend. Is that agreed?"

They both nodded grudgingly, and Cuddy was grateful for their regard for her husband. She knew only that had earned their vote of cooperation. "We would like to stay around for a while," Robert said.

Cuddy sighed. "Why didn't you call first?" she asked.

"We didn't think we had to," Susan said. After a moment, she yielded under her daughter's eye. "I thought you were hiding something," she admitted. "I thought it was about Greg being hurt worse than you two had told us, never suspected this, but I was afraid if I gave you advance notice, we couldn't see him, and you'd just have some excuse that he was busy. Robert suggested calling you last night. I was the one who insisted on springing the surprise." Even in the admission, she couldn't resist a look at her husband. "You told me I was imagining things."

"But you shouldn't just drop in on people from out of state. Even family. Do you realize what tonight is?"

"Friday?" Robert offered.

"This is our weekly date night. Greg and I ought to be out right now having dinner and seeing a movie. We had reservations at a restaurant. It's our special time together; we look forward to it all week. The point is, you don't know what somebody else might have had planned if you just turn up. You're disrupting their life blindly."

"Could you still make the movie?" Susan suggested. "We can watch . . ." She trailed off with a look through the wall at the living room.

"No. I mean, technically, we could, but we aren't going to. Neither one of us could possibly relax and enjoy it tonight at this point. And then you just invited yourself to stay, right in front of the girls, again without checking with us at all."

Robert still looked suspicious of the stranger in the next room. "If you're determined that he's here, we do need to get to know him. We're all family, after all. Apparently."

"Yes," Cuddy said firmly. "We are family. Including Thomas. He isn't up for election; the decision is already made. He is here, and that's not going to change. Only he's still trying to be respectful of our privacy and that this is our home. He's been so careful about it this last week since he arrived full time." She sighed again. "If you two want to get to know Thomas, not to put him through the inquisition but just to get to know him, I think that would be a good idea. He's a neat guy." She also knew that they would never just give up and go away, not right now. Their trip next week was as irrevocably canceled as her date tonight. Some time sizing up the new grandfather would have to be allowed. "But you aren't staying in this house."

They had been relaxing, sensing concession, but the spines stiffened again at the end. "So you are kicking us out."

"Call this an object lesson to the girls. You can explain to them how impolite it is just to drop in on somebody without warning and invite yourself to stay. Plus, like I said, Greg has enough tension right now, and you're already reminding him of Blythe. I don't think he could relax with you sleeping here at this point. She died in her sleep. If you want to stay for a few days, get a motel room somewhere, and we can have dinners, and you can spend some time with the girls. Some time, not all of it. We need time to ourselves, too. I'm not trying to throw you out of my life, but right now, you do not need to be staying in this house. In a few months, for another visit, where we know about it up front and agreed, sure. Another thing is Abby. She's getting way too perceptive. Until you guys make peace with Thomas, I don't want you in full-time contact with her. She and Rachel don't know anything about John yet."

"Of course not," Susan agreed, and Robert nodded. Neither of them wanted to hurt their granddaughters, nor their son-in-law.

Cuddy started to feel like she might have actually won her point. She was afraid to let go quite yet, but at least this was progress, far better than the previous interrupted confrontation. "Thomas is a good man. If you give him a chance, I think you'd like him."

"He strikes me as a bit of a salesman so far," Robert admitted. "He's so smooth talking with those girls. And you should have seen him prancing around the yard." He couldn't resist a quick rub at his artificial hip. "Even you thought that sounded wrong, Lisa. It does seem like he's trying to get in tight with them as a way to get a hold on Greg."

"No," Cuddy answered. "He's respected Greg's limits on them every step of the way. And those limits have been steep. He did not have an open door to their lives; it was months after the trial before he even knew their names. Yes, he's good with people. But that's him. As for prancing around, the only reason I reacted to that is that he hurt his back badly in that explosion just back in March. That had to be a little painful for him still. But he was doing it anyway as a game for them. That was his only motive, just because they were enjoying it." The silence extended for a moment. "Stay in Princeton for a few days and watch him with the girls and with us. You'll be impressed if you give him a chance. But we are not going to have fights in this house over the past," she repeated. "That subject is closed. Period. Greg doesn't need that. And you act perfectly pleasant in front of the girls at all times. Okay?"

"All right," Robert agreed gruffly.

"We only want what's best for you and Greg and the girls, Lisa," Susan told her.

"This is what's best for us. But it's still a big change." Cuddy suddenly felt exhausted. "I'm sorry I had to keep this from you until now, but there were reasons." She turned for the door, and her parents fell into step behind her.

The house was soundless as they stepped out. It took Cuddy a few steps into the living room to realize that Thomas wasn't anywhere in it. Belle had reappeared, sitting in the recliner he had occupied and looking disapprovingly at the threesome.

Robert made his own quick visual survey of the room. "Cut and run," he said with the tone of a verdict signed, sealed, and delivered.

Cuddy shook her head. "He wouldn't. He's got more courage than anybody I've ever met except for Greg." She walked over to the window and looked out, but the sight of the BMW was only confirmation of something she already knew. "His car is still in the driveway," she told her parents. "Wait here." Leaving them with Belle, she headed for the back door herself.