A/N hello everyone! I had a rather difficult technological week, my laptop died completely unexpectedly and I had to buy a new one... I am VERY glad I write in google docs which backups automatically or else I would have lost everything and I wouldn't have this to post today... so here's your friendly reminder that if you don't already do it make sure to back up your stuff regularly! As always thanks go to Alexandra926 for being awesome :D

It had taken all morning and a large portion of the afternoon to get Eliot's, or more accurately William Pratt's, discharge paperwork completed and signed off on, but he was finally a free man. He thought he was going to go crazy sitting through the cavalcade of doctors and specialists parading through his hospital room. All of them insistent on giving him strict home care instructions (which he would only loosely follow), physical therapy programs (which he would ignore in favor of his own routines), and mandatory follow up appointments (which he had every intention of skipping entirely).

But now he was finally out, dressed in his own clothes, sitting in his own truck, driving back to his own house. He'd been escaping a POW camp the last time he'd been this happy to be free. He could not wait to go home and finally be alone. Well, Parker would be there, but Eliot didn't count her as an intrusion, he'd long since become accustomed to having her in his personal space.

What was more important was that he would finally be free of nurses bugging him every four hours for his vitals, and free of his other teammates' constant hovering. He appreciated that they cared, but enough was enough. Both Sophie and Hardison had made overtures about wanting to come and help him settle in back home, but he had put his foot down in staunch refusal. He had assured them that all he was going to do when he got home was take a shower and settle into his own bed, and he most certainly didn't need an audience for that.

However, as excited as she was to finally be going home, there was one thing that was nagging at the back of his mind.

Eliot glanced over at the woman in the driver seat, who was currently tapping her fingers on the steering wheel and humming off-key to the country rock song playing on the radio while they sat at a red light. Sensing his gaze, she looked over at him, and gave him a soft smile before the light turned green and they continued to inch their way through the daily Boston rush hour traffic. She was obviously just as pleased to be out of the hospital as he was, but he couldn't help but wonder if the discussion he'd accidentally overheard between Nate and Sophie the day before, had any grain of truth to it.

The nurse had been wheeling him back to his room after his last set of scans, when he'd unintentionally eavesdropped on a conversation where Sophie had expressed concern that Parker had some misplaced guilt about his injuries. And that perhaps that was the reason she'd been so focused on him, and why she was being so insistent about being the one to help him recover. They'd noticed his return before Nate could respond, but it hadn't escaped his notice that the mastermind wasn't exactly jumping to allay Sophie's worries.

Not one to let these kinds of things stew, he decided to just ask her about it.

"Hey Parker?" he asked, getting her attention. "You know my accident wasn't your fault, right?"

"You got shot, Eliot. I wouldn't call that an accident," she replied dryly.

Of course that would be the portion of the sentence she would focus on. "Whatever, but you do know it's not your fault?" he asked again.

She gave him a look like she wasn't sure if they should have released him from the hospital. "Obviously. I wasn't the one who shot you."

Eliot rolled his eyes. That's what he got for eavesdropping on Sophie and Nate.

"Why would you ask me that?" Parker asked, genuinely confused.

"Something I overheard Sophie say to Nate," he said dismissively, carefully adjusting the sling that was supporting his bad shoulder so the strap wouldn't rub against his neck. "She was worried you might feel guilty about me getting hurt or something, and that's why…" he trailed off, feeling stupid for even bringing it up.

"That's why, what?" she prompted.

Eliot sighed, she was gonna make him say it. "And that's why you stayed at the hospital and why you said you'd stay at home with me."

"Well that's stupid," Parker said, bluntly. "Why would I do that? Is that a thing that people do?"

"I don't know, Parker," Eliot said, seriously regretting starting this conversation entirely. "I guess. Maybe."

They drove in silence for another block and a half, before Parker spoke again.

"You took care of me when I got sick after the job at the canyon place, but you didn't give me the flu," she pointed out, trying to work her way through it. "That was that guy on the plane's fault. Or maybe even Nate's, for making us stay out in the cold all night. But you're the one who helped me get better."

"It's the Grand Canyon," he corrected reflexively, even though her statement made him worry about her motivations for a different reason. "And that's not a favor you should feel like you have to repay. You don't owe me anything."

"What? No, that's not what I meant." Parker let out a frustrated huff, not sure how to express herself. Not even entirely sure she understood what she was feeling exactly. "Why did you insist on taking care of me when I was sick?" she asked, instead.

"Because..." Eliot wasn't sure how this had gotten turned around on him. "I wouldn't have been able to sleep if I didn't know you were being taken care of properly," he admitted honestly. "I didn't like the idea of you being sick and alone."

"But why?" she continued to press. "I would have been okay on my own. It's not the 1800s, I wasn't gonna die from the flu. But you practically kidnapped me, instead of just taking me home like I asked you to."

"I didn't kidnap you," he rolled his eyes.

Parker rolled her eyes as well, because he kind of did, even if she didn't exactly try too hard to get away. "You're not answering my question."

"Because…" he huffed, before trailing off. Just because he understood his feelings better than Parker understood hers, didn't mean he was much better at expressing them. "I just did. Because I care."

"You'd be okay at home by yourself. You've been hurt bad before and figured it out on your own. I know that," she said with a shrug. "But I still want to be there. It's not guilt, it's not payback. It just is," she said, with a decisive nod, clearly feeling that that was all that needed to be said on the topic.

Eliot supposed that was all that she had to say. He happened to be fluent in Parker and was fairly confident that in her own Parker way, she just told him that she cared too. The barest hint of a smile upturned the corners of his mouth as he turned to look out the passenger side window. He'd been pretty sure she did, but it was still nice to hear.

Before he knew it, they were pulling into the parking structure below Eliot's building. Parker took the turns at only ten miles an hour over what she should have, which Eliot knew meant that she was actually using a great deal of restraint. Whether it was in deference to his threats about the way she drove his truck or his injuries, he didn't know, but he'd take what he could get.

As soon as she pulled into the empty parking space next to his Charger, Parker was out of the cab and rounding the back of the truck before Eliot even managed his seat belt. When he did finally manage to ease himself out of his seat, he frowned when he saw what Parker had waiting for him.

"No," he said, shaking his head at the wheelchair the hospital had insisted they take with them.

"Yes," she replied.

"No," he repeated. "I only used it at the hospital because it's policy and it was the only way they'd let me leave. I don't need it."

"Yeah, you kinda do," she retorted. "You're not supposed to be walking that much on your knee yet."

"Parker."

"Eliot."

He sent her a glare that would make hardened killers wince, but she didn't even blink.

"There's no one here to impress," Parker finally said, breaking the standoff they were having. "It's just me, and you haven't impressed me in years."

Eliot's brow furrowed. "Thanks, Parker."

Even she knew that that had come out wrong. "No, that's not what I meant. Lemme try again."

She huffed loudly as she tried to think through exactly what she wanted to say. Words weren't her strong point and she knew it. One of her favorite parts of her relationship with Eliot was that even though he would roll his eyes and tell her she was crazy, or that there was something wrong with her, he also got her. He usually knew what she meant, without her having to spell it out. Sometimes he understood what she meant, even when she herself didn't even know.

But she knew that sometimes words were necessary, and right now it felt important that she get it right.

"I mean... that you haven't needed to impress me in years," she said, amending her prior comment. "I know exactly what you can do and what you're capable of. I'm never going to think you're anything less than the toughest man I've ever known, even when you're all shot up and broken. Trying to get upstairs on your own isn't going to do anything but hurt you, and I don't like watching you hurt," she said frankly and honestly.

The hitter just looked at her for a long time, not saying or doing anything.

"Unless," she felt the need to add, "I'm the one poking at your bruises." Then she reached out with one finger and deliberately pressed on the edge of his black eye.

He flinched back with a glare that Parker returned with a grin. Rolling his eyes, he sighed and sat down in the chair, only pouting and grumbling under his breath a little, as Eliot let her push him through the parking structure towards the elevator and then down the hall to his condo.

Eliot breathed as deeply as his broken ribs allowed when Parker unlocked his front door and he was finally home.

"Shower?" Parker asked, practically reading his mind, already pushing the chair down the hall to his bathroom.

"Hell yes. I need to wash the stink of hospital off me," he said eagerly.

Without prompting, Parker helped him remove his knee brace and the sling for his shoulder, before helping him ease off the oversized, zippered hoodie she'd brought him to wear home, over his casted arm and bad shoulder. Hardison had made a comment about her forgetting to bring him a shirt, but since he currently couldn't raise his left arm above his head, it had been a calculated move that Eliot had appreciated, not an oversight on her part. Once she had provided the assistance he'd needed, but would never ask for, Parker wordlessly slipped out the bathroom door like she'd never been there at all.

Once he managed to get himself into the shower, he didn't want to get out. And between the bench seat, the tankless water heater and the multiple shower heads, there wasn't much reason to. He wasn't sure exactly how long he let the hot water soothe away the sore muscles caused from being stuck in a hospital bed as much as from his injuries. It wasn't until he realized he was starting to prune, that he washed his hair as best he could with two bad arms, and finally got out of the shower.

He didn't even bother to feign surprise when he realized that his favorite pair of pajama pants and a pair of clean boxers had materialized on the vanity while he had been in the shower. Parker had long since proven she was capable of slipping in and out of rooms he was in without him noticing. He carefully made his way back to his bedroom, and was sitting down on the edge of his bed contemplating whether he had the ability to get his knee brace back on by himself, when he heard the front door slam.

"Where'd you run off to?" Eliot asked curiously, when Parker let herself into his room a few seconds later.

"I cleaned out the fridge and took the trash out to the chute," she said, with a wrinkle of her nose, as she dropped the paper bag from the hospital pharmacy and other various medical supplies on the bed and picked up his knee brace.

The sour look on her face told him a lot about the state of his perishables. That was what happened as a result of making an effort to cook food that didn't contain preservatives. Normally, he made a point of clearing out the fridge if he knew he was going to be gone more than a couple of days to avoid that problem, but of course this time there had been extenuating circumstances.

"All the leftovers were bad, so I called for pizza," Parker mentioned, as she wrapped the brace that went from his mid-thigh, down to mid-calf, around his leg. "Too tight?" she asked, once she had the last velcro strap in place.

"No, it's fine," he assured her. "You order from Gino's?"

"Of course," she said, getting up off her knees and sitting next to him on the bed, ripping open the pharmacy bag. "So it'll be here in like an hour."

Eliot rolled his eyes, knowing she was right. Gino's was by far the best pizza in the area, but they made up for it in their slow delivery time. After spending a week in the hospital, though, eating shitty cafeteria food, he was willing to wait for it.

She dropped the bottle of pain pills that they both knew he probably wouldn't take on the nightstand, and grabbed a tube of topical antibiotic out of the bag, quickly reading the instructions before twisting off the cap. Despite the fact he'd been on a full course of IV antibiotics, he'd woken up that morning with the surgery incision over his collarbone looking pinker than it should and slightly inflamed. So the doctor had sent him home with a prescription for antibiotic cream, just to be safe.

"The doc did a good job on the stitches," he said idly, watching as Parker carefully dabbed the cream onto the healing wound. "Probably won't even leave too bad of a scar." Not that he really cared. He'd stitched himself up with dental floss and a sewing needle in dirty motels and safe houses one too many times to care about the aesthetics.

"I like your scars," Parker mentioned off-handedly, as she spread the antibiotic over where he'd gotten shot in the stomach as well.

"Really?" he said, making a conscious effort to not tense his stomach muscles under her feather-light touch. "Why?" he couldn't help but ask. He'd known lots of women over the years who'd had a thing for guys with scars. It had even gotten him laid on more than one occasion, but he had a hard time imagining Parker in that camp.

"Because," she said with a shrug, reaching up to attend to the stitches he had right at his hairline while she was at it. Focused on her task, she was completely oblivious to the way Eliot was carefully watching her face. "Because it means that something bad happened to you, but that you survived and put yourself back together. They're reminders that you healed. I think scars are comforting."

"I never really thought about it that way," Eliot said honestly, as he watched her rip open packets of gauze so she could redress his wounds.

"I have scars, too," she mentioned, as she carefully applied tape to his shoulder.

"Do you?" He'd never really noticed any major ones on her, and considering how blasé she was about clothes, he figured he would have by now. Of course, with skin as pale as hers, they'd be much harder to see at a glance.

She nodded. "Yeah, but I think most of mine are on the inside where people can't see them. I can still feel them though," she said absently rubbing a hand against her chest over her heart, "rough and bumpy where things should be smooth."

Eliot didn't know what to say to that.

"But I don't mind," she mused, finally looking up to meet his eyes while applying the last piece of medical tape to his stomach. "It just means that I'm a survivor, too."

Of its own volition, Eliot's hand moved to cover Parker's where it was still smoothing the tape against his skin, running his thumb over the back of her knuckles. "That you are, darlin'," he agreed softly, keeping her gaze.

The moment stretched out longer than either of them would normally be comfortable with, and Eliot couldn't help but feel like Parker was looking for something in his face. Whether or not she found it, he would never know, because his cell phone rang and shattered the moment.

Pulling away, Parker stood up and gathered the trash left over from his dressings, and Eliot glanced at the phone sitting on his night stand. The flashing caller ID told him it was Sophie and he was highly tempted to let it go to voicemail. But he knew that if he didn't answer she would worry, and she was already itching for a reason to send in the cavalry.

"What is it, Sophie?" Eliot answered the phone, not even attempting to hide the annoyance in his tone.

He was vaguely aware of Sophie prattling on in his ear, but he was more focused on tracking Parker's movement around his bedroom. He rolled his eyes, but didn't protest when she went digging in his dresser for what he knew to be her favorite shirt of his to wear before disappearing into his bathroom. She didn't bother shutting the door all the way and he could hear the water in the shower turn on.

"What?" Eliot growled, cluing back into the conversation happening over the phone when Sophie called his name sharply. "Everything is fine, Sophie. I took a shower, now I'm in bed, just like I told you I was going to do before we left the hospital."

He continued to pay half attention to Sophie, and half-tried to figure out what it was Parker was singing to herself in the shower. He chuckled lowly when he realized she was butchering 'We Didn't Start The Fire', and was substituting things she had stolen, for the actual lyrics. The sound of amusement wasn't lost on the grifter who asked him what was so funny.

"Par-" he cut himself off when he realized he had absolutely no desire or inclination to explain. "It's nothing," he said instead. "And no, Parker and I haven't killed each other yet, since that's what you're worried about."

Sophie tried to deny it, but Eliot knew that's why she'd really called. He heard Hardison shouting about something in the background and had no doubt that all three of them were probably sitting around around talking about him right now.

"I'm hanging up now," he said, over her protestations. "Goodbye, Sophie."

He hit the End button, and tossed the cell phone onto the bed with a spike of irritation. He laid back against his pillows and closed his eyes, silently stewing at the way his teammates were treating him like an invalid. Sure, this was the worst he'd been hurt since they'd formed Leverage, but this wasn't the worst he'd ever been hurt. There was a reason he usually downplayed or hid his injuries from the team. He was the hitter; it was his job to take the punishment. He couldn't have the team doubting his ability to do so.

It wasn't until he realized that Parker was still singing her Billy Joel-inspired ode to crime that he felt the tension leak out of his shoulders, and a small smirk formed at the corner of his mouth. It was just such an essentially Parker thing to do. And as he listened carefully, he was realizing that she was revealing new thefts that she'd never claimed before, at least not to him.

She was singing another round of the correct chorus, which he supposed took on a different meaning when paired with her new verses, when the doorbell rang, announcing the pizza delivery. He was carefully swinging his legs out of bed, so that he could go answer the door since Parker was still in the shower, when he heard the woman in question yelp, what sounded like a shampoo bottle hitting the floor with a clatter and the water shut off. He hadn't even stood before Parker came skittering out of the bathroom blindly, narrowly missing the doorjamb, as she struggled to pull the flannel shirt over her wet body, since she hadn't bothered to take the time to dry off.

"Pizza, pizza, pizza," she chanted, as she dashed down the hall, leaving Eliot shaking his head. She came back a few minutes later at a slightly more sedate pace, since she was now balancing the pizza box, a bag of garlic knots, two plates, two glasses, a two-liter bottle of soda and an entire roll of paper towels. It seemed that all those cons where she'd been forced to be 'the waitress' were finally coming in handy.

"Where do you think you're going?" Eliot asked, plucking the roll of paper towels from the top of the tower so that he could see her face.

"Where do you think you're going?" she asked right back, when he met her halfway to the bedroom door.

"We're not eating greasy pizza in my bed," he said firmly. "I don't eat in bed."

"Come on. Make an exception, just this once," she wheedled, easily stepping around him. "We're having a pizza and pajama party. And it has to be in bed while watching an eighties movie. It's the rules."

"What?" he asked, giving her his patented 'what's wrong with you?' look. "Says who?"

"Says the movie that Sophie made me watch with her while you were in your coma last week," she said, setting her bounty down on the nightstand on the far side of the room, before plopping herself down on the middle of his bed. "I didn't really get the movie, but I know there was pizza and pajamas and a movie."

"Oh, come on," he groaned. "You're gonna get my comforter all wet," he pointed out, since she was still dripping from her shower.

Parker didn't reply and instead made him up a plate and waved it tantalizingly in his direction.

He rolled his eyes and gave in, hobbling back over to the bed and sitting down. "You're a pain in the ass, you know that right?" he said, without much bite.

Parker just grinned unrepentantly and leaned over him to put the drink she'd just poured for him on his side of the bed. When he realized that she'd found a straw somewhere to make it easier for him since he couldn't really grip a glass very well with the cast on his hand, he mentally amended the description to a thoughtful pain in the ass, but still a pain.

"I told the delivery guy that I was surprised how fast he got here," Parker mentioned conversationally, as she made up her own plate. "And he said that next time I should just ask for Joey when I order and he'll get it here even faster."

"He's probably just hoping you'll answer the door like that again," Eliot grumbled, well aware of the picture she made, still wet from the shower, wearing his flannel shirt and nothing else. A wave of protective possessiveness roiled through his gut, and he was tempted to go track down the delivery guy and make him pay for seeing her like that, let alone commenting on it, and he had to remind himself he didn't have the right to feel that way.

"Like what?" she asked naively.

"Don't worry about it," he told her, mentally making a note to be sure that he answered the door the next time they had pizza delivered.

They ate in companionable silence while they watched Die Hard on TV, since it was a movie that they both enjoyed and it fulfilled Parker's requirement of being from the eighties. Once they were done eating, she took the leftovers and the dishes out to the kitchen, and when she came back a few minutes later, she had ice packs from the freezer, which he gratefully took. He'd been more active today than he had been since the accident and he was definitely feeling it. Once she had helped him settle one over his knee, one on his left shoulder, and the third under his right arm where the worst of his broken ribs were, she climbed back into his bed. This time, though, sliding underneath the covers next to him like she had every right to be there. Watching her settle in, Eliot's brow furrowed, but he didn't comment on it.

"What?" Parker asked, when she saw Eliot glance in her direction for tenth time in as many minutes. "Do I have sauce on my face?"

"What? No," he assured her quickly, outwardly focusing his attention on John McClane's exploits.

Inwardly, though, he was trying to figure out why Parker's presence in his bed was tripping him up so badly. It wasn't really any different than all the evenings they'd spent watching TV on his couch, was it? Or even the whole time she'd spent keeping him company while he was in the hospital these past few days. He was picking at a loose thread on the cold pack on his shoulder - Parker's favorite because raccoons are nature's thieves - when it hit him.

Parker was the first woman that had ever been in his bed.

He had made it a habit to never bring women home to his place. He'd go to theirs or even to a hotel, but never to his own home.

Over the years, he had drawn a lot of lines in the sand, he'd built a lot of walls, and yet it seemed like every time he turned around, Parker was there, jumping right over them and knocking them down. And the kicker was that she didn't even have the faintest idea that she was doing it. He didn't know if that made it better or worse.

He stole another glance at the woman who was the current occupation of his thoughts. She was busy critiquing John McClane's air vent traversing skills and he couldn't help the smirk that curled at the corners of his mouth. Deciding that the day had been long enough as it was, he made the conscious decision to let go of any implications of his recent revelation, and just relax against his pillows and finish watching the movie.

By the time the movie was over, and despite the fact that it wasn't what anyone would consider late, Eliot was ready for bed.

"Alright Parker, I'm done for the night," he said, picking up the remote to turn off the TV. The bone-deep exhaustion that always came with healing from a major injury, combined with the fact that he'd expelled more energy today than he had since his accident, meant that he was more than ready to go to sleep.

"Yeah, me too," she agreed readily. She was no stranger to sleep deprivation, but it had been over a week now since she'd gotten her last full night of sleep, and she was looking forward to a solid eight hours in a real bed.

Eliot waited for Parker to get up and leave and when she didn't, he looked at her askance. "I'm going to go to sleep now," he said slowly, in case she hadn't understood the first time.

"I'm not stopping you," she said, in the same tone, still making no indication that she intended to move any time soon.

"That means you gotta go," he said, gesturing to the door.

"But I'm gonna sleep too," she said.

"Well you can't do that here," he insisted. "You have your own room and your own bed for that."

Parker looked at him, then glanced towards the door, and then back to Eliot. "I don't wanna. I want to stay here."

"What? No, Parker," he growled. "I'm not letting you stay here and watch me sleep. That's weird and creepy. Even for you."

Parker frowned unhappily. "I watched you sleep at the hospital and nobody said it was weird."

"That was different," he told her.

"Why?"

"It just is," he ground out. "But I'm home now, and I'm fine, so go to your room so I can get some rest."

Parker's eyes darted around the room, and Eliot frowned when he read the expression on her face. Her eyes had the wild, almost panicky look that she sometimes got, usually when she felt overwhelmed by something that she didn't know how to express. She looked like she wanted to bolt, but was also miserable about that fact.

"What's going on with you?" he asked, his voice soft.

"I want to stay here," she said softly, not meeting his eye.

"So you said. But why?" He was genuinely confused by her actions. This wasn't just typical Parker weirdness, which he was well accustomed to. There was something more going on here.

"Because…." she trailed off with a frustrated huff. "Fine, I'll leave," she said, throwing back the covers.

"Parker," he said, a hint of warning in his tone, before she could disappear. "Look at me." He waited until she reluctantly met his eye. "Now, what's wrong?"

Parker bit down on her bottom lip so hard, he was afraid she was going to make herself bleed. But before she could break the skin, she started talking.

"Your heart stopped!" she exclaimed, the words leaving her in a rush. "For seventy-two seconds, your heart stopped."

Eliot's eyes widened at the force of her tone. He'd honestly not thought much of it after the doctor told him what had happened while he was on the table. They'd gotten his heart restarted before there was any damage, so he didn't see the point of dwelling on it. He hadn't realized it was still weighing so heavy on Parker's mind.

"Darlin'," he began gently.

"And then," she cut him off, not done talking, "when you were in that coma, the doctors didn't know when you were going to wake up. If you were gonna wake up. They just said that the longer you stayed unconscious, the greater the odds that…" she trailed off, not wanting to finish that sentence.

"Parker, I-"

She interrupted again, now on a roll. "So I waited and I watched. There wasn't anything else I could do." Tears started brimming in her eyes as she relived those first few days. "I couldn't leave, because there was a part of me that was so scared that if I stopped listening to the monitors beeping or if I stopped watching your chest rise and fall for even a minute, that maybe they'd stop. Again. And you would be gone. That you'd leave me."

In all the years he had known her, Eliot could count the number of times he'd seen Parker cry on one hand. He just couldn't believe that this time, it was over him. He had a weakness for any woman in tears, but there was something about seeing Parker cry that especially cut him to the quick.

"Sweetheart, you should know that it takes a lot more than a couple of measly bullets and a little tumble to put me down for good," he reassured her. He reached over and took her hand in his as best he could with the cast on it.

"I know," she agreed easily, scrubbing at her face with her free hand, wiping away the errant tears. "It's just…" she hesitated as she once again found herself searching for the perfect words to express her feelings. "I don't want to live in a world that doesn't have Eliot Spencer in it. I don't know how to anymore."

Eliot was actually speechless. He was pretty sure that that was one of the nicest things anyone had ever said to him. Maybe the nicest.

Quite frankly, he'd never given much thought as to how the people around him would feel on the day that he inevitably didn't get back up. While he was always aware that his job was a dangerous one, he wasn't one to dwell on it. And what little he had considered it, he assumed that people would miss the function he fulfilled - an excellent soldier, a top notch retrieval specialist, a skilled hitter - but not necessarily miss him as a person.

But looking at Parker now, it was clear none of those things were on her mind.

Pulling her hand towards him, he placed it on his bare chest right over his heart before covering it with his non-casted hand, ignoring how his broken collarbone protested the movement.

"Feel that?" he asked her, waiting until she nodded before he continued. "Nice and strong. It's not stopping, and I'm not going anywhere. Okay?" He held her gaze until she nodded again, signaling that she understood what he was trying to tell her. "Now close your eyes, I'm not going to be able to fall asleep with you staring at me."

"So I can stay?"

"Just for tonight," he told her, shutting his eyes, an indication that she should do the same. "Tomorrow you go back to your own room."

Parker didn't reply, but he could feel her settling in against the pillow.

And as the pair fell asleep with their hands joined, resting over his heart, Eliot's last thought was, It's just for one night.

A/N And there we have it! Until next time, feed the muse and let me know what you guys thought!