The Skeptic

by alvfr

Joe is building her degree on the premise that werewolves, witches, ghosts - all those things that go bump in the night – aren't real. She chooses the attacks in her own hometown as a case study and gets sucked down the rabbit hole. Her cousin thinks he's a werewolf, this other guy claims to be her mate, and she is just trying to make her next deadline without dying in the process.

85. Chapter 85: The Calm

For once, Joe didn't wake up in a flash. For once, she didn't have a sharp gasp already stuck in her throat or an instant adrenaline spike from some imminent threat upon her awakening. For once, she woke up slowly, fingers and toes twitching before her eyes fluttered without opening. Replacing the sense of panic, a sense of deja vu came over her. Maybe it was the warmth enveloping her, maybe it was her favorite scent permeating the air, or maybe it was the pair of strong arms wrapped around her like the world's most comfortable blanket. In a soft bed. Warm. Dreamy.

Deja vu.

Last time had been at the loft, she mused still in her half-sleeping state, where she had sought out Derek's bed after the worst night in her life and awoken with him to the best morning of her life. A morning that ended disastrously. That alone gave her reason enough to postpone full awakening just a bit longer. She could stay here, either in Derek's arms or at the very least dreaming that she was in his arms, for a bit longer.

She could stay here, curled up against him with their legs intertwined. Breathing in the familiar and still so tantalizing scent that she had long since accepted was everything all at once. That smell that had less to do with her nose and more with her soul. That smell that was gritty red and smooth amber, that tasted like smoked honey and sweet coffee beans, that felt like a brisk day in the fall and freshly laundered sheets.

She could just stay here, with him, for a little while longer. With one of his arms draped over her shoulder, the other serving as a support for her neck. And something tickling the top of her head. It took her a while to realize it was Derek slowly and gently petting her hair. The cadence indicated it was absentmindedly from his side and had probably gone on for some time already. It could continue forever, in Joe's opinion, as long as she lived. Totally understandable why dogs kept begging for it. It felt nice. Safe. Comforting. At least until it stopped.

"Joe?"

Busted. Well, that was definitely Derek's voice, if nothing else. She tried to keep completely still, in a vain attempt to fool his senses into thinking she was still sleeping. Unfortunately, her effort to feign sleep only made her more awake and that familiar sense of dread crept up her spine as she started to remember. Everything that existed beyond the pair of them. All the fighting and panic and close calls and people depending on her to function.

In a whirlwind, every event of the last few days — weeks — months? — span into her consciousness. The vault, the hospital, the woods, the loft, the distillery — they blurred into each other, mixing with every moment she still didn't know was real or not, but wasn't it over? Could it ever really be over?

Now she did wake up in a flash. She sprang up, a sudden rush of cold air between them, and blinked her eyes into focus. "Derek?"

It was undoubtedly Derek, so Joe wasn't entirely sure why she felt compelled to check. Who else could look so thoroughly unimpressed and so impossibly soft at the same time? He looked well, better than she'd seen him in a while — and it had been a while since she saw him in any favorable setting. Bright green eyes, trimmed beard, and a healthy glow to his skin. The only unusual thing was the layer of red tinting her vision and she blinked a few more times to make it go away.

For some reason, that caught Derek's attention and he straightened up from where he had lounged against the headboard.

"Hey," he said and extracted his arm from underneath her, a chill soon following his absence. "You're awake."

Joe's eyes darted everywhere, from the curtained window to the flat-screen TV and back to him. "Yeah. Are we—"

"At the apartment. Yes."

"Where's—"

"Jimmy's staying at the loft with the others."

"And—"

"Your dad's staying with Melissa and Scott. And Isaac. The Stilinskis are at their own home, same with the Argents. Everyone's fine."

Derek was offering answers before she could finish the questions, probably for the first time in his life. Joe slotted this new information with what she remembered. Her comforter fell down as she sat up further and rubbed her scalp, finding her hair so greasy and matted that she barely got her fingers through and she grimaced at how it must've felt to Derek. "Why—"

"You blacked out at the distillery. Our theory is that with the source of your insomnia gone and no immediate threats left, your body took it upon itself to heal. In this case, sleep."

"But why—"

"By general consensus, we thought it would be best if you woke up in a familiar and safe environment."

"Okay, but—"

"And after some really long discussions, we decided I should be the one to stay with you. We make each other heal faster." He hesitated but continued to say: "And, we also figured I'd be best equipped to handle you."

Joe tried to imagine who 'we' were and how those discussions had gone. Then her brain caught up with the rest of his sentence. "Handle me?" she repeated in a flat voice. "How would I nee— you know what, don't answer. I get it. I have not been driving the sanity bus lately and as Scott said, I tend to get mean when I don't sleep."

Combine that with a boatload of trauma and repressed werewolf powers and you got yourself one neatly ticking time bomb. Safe environment her ass. This apartment worked as a fortress to outsiders and could just as well function as a cage, depending on who held the key.

"Healing is, like everything else about us, not an exact science. We thought it was better to be on the safe side," Derek said slowly, so slow it became clear he was searching for the right words to avoid setting off said time bomb. "You've had some nightmares."

"What, like bad ones?" Afraid of what she might find, she still took stock of his entire body in case she had hurt him somehow in her sleep. What she found was in so many ways a lot worse. "Did I drool on you? Oh, that is so gross."

Derek's gray t-shirt had a wet-looking stain sitting conveniently close to where Joe's head had been and now her hand flew up to feel the crusted saliva on the side of her mouth. The horror probably shone in her face because Derek's voice came as fast as it was calm:

"It's fine."

"Oh, come on! That's disgusting!"

Struggling to get out from the covers, Joe noticed she was still dressed in the same clothes from when she blacked out. The fact that she couldn't remember how long she'd been wearing them before that, was also disgusting. With Derek's enhanced sense of smell, she wondered how he could even stand to be in the same room as her, let alone the same bed.

"Joe, it's fine."

To distract herself from the rapid fire of embarrassment coming up her spine, she rubbed away the spittle on her own face. "Uh, no? It's super gross. Don't give me a free pass just because—"

Because I was kidnapped. Because I was tortured. Because I thought I killed Erica. Because I lost my mind. Because I thought I'd lost you. Because I almost killed you. Because my mom died.

"—because of everything," she finished lamely, waving her hand around to indicate the 'everything' in question. "Hang on, I'll get you a new shirt."

"Joe, wait, you—"

She tried to jump out of the bed, found her legs completely non-functioning, and slammed straight to the floor with an embarrassing oof instead.

"—you've been asleep for thirty-six hours," Derek finished in a deadpanned voice, mercifully hidden from Joe's sight at the moment. "Your muscles might need a second to catch up."

"Ya think? Oh shit, this is like the worst case of paresthesia ever." On the floor, Joe flailed around to sitting and tried to shake out the intense tingling from her legs. "Wait, what, thirty-six hours? Are you serious? Is that even possible?"

"You needed to heal."

"Jesus Christ. Wait," Joe popped her head over the edge of the bed so she could see Derek still lounging against the headboard, "so you've been watching me sleep for thirty-six hours? Straight?"

"I have not been watching you sleep." He sounded mildly insulted at the creepy suggestion. "Not all the time."

"Then what have you been doing? Racked up the highest score possible in Angry Birds?"

Derek shrugged and held up a hefty brick of a book that had sat next to him on the nightstand. "Reading."

"Is that The Oxford Handbook of Indigenous Sociology? Dude, that is like a thousand pages and kind of like reading a dictionary cover to cover." Joe still couldn't wrap her head around the time frame, but at least it explained the pile of books and magazines sitting next to Joe's bed. "Thirty-six hours? You must be bored out of your mind."

Derek's face didn't reveal much, but his bright eyes glittered as he said: "I didn't really mind the break."

"Thirty-six hours," Joe muttered again. A lot could happen in thirty-six hours. Too much to even consider. She had to get up and shifted on the floor, finding her legs at least somewhat serviceable. In fact, several parts of her body had started to wake up and demand attention. Back on her feet, Joe wiggled around, trying to alleviate some of the aches and stiffness and suppress some basal urges.

"You okay?"

Of course, Joe's fidgeting would catch his attention. Shit. No use in lying to a human lie detector, so Joe was left with no option but to admit: "I gotta pee."

Derek raised his perfect eyebrows a fraction, glanced at the door to her bedroom, and then back at her. "Okay?"

"No, I mean, I really gotta pee."

"And?"

Joe was doing a little back-and-forth shuffle in front of the bed now. "And you're here."

A slightly exasperated breath escaped Derek as he repeated: "And?"

"And, y'know, you have super-hearing. So..."

Instead of the annoyed eye-roll she expected, Derek seemed to restrain himself and force his face into a neutral expression. "And I'm not going to listen."

"Yeah, see, you saying that doesn't really help."

"Joe, it's a perfectly natura—"

"Could you just go outside for a little while? Stand next to the dryers down at the laundromat or something?"

"No."

"Put some headphones on and play music really loud? I think there's some—"

"No."

"Uh, Jimmy has some noise-canceling earplugs in his room—"

"No. Joe, listen to me, for the thousandth time, our hearing's selective. Please just go."

She really had to go, but stayed in her spot, biting her lip. "Promise you—"

"I promise. Go."

Joe darted out of the room, down the hall, and into the bathroom without further comment. Peeing her pants in front of him was marginally worse than him hearing her pee, after all. She turned on the tap, even knowing it wouldn't help, and tried to think about anything else as she sat down.

The bathroom looked spotless, which normally wouldn't have surprised her considering Jimmy's penchant for cleanliness. Except he hadn't been here since the FBI busted in and made a mess. As far as she knew, anyway, and she giggled under her breath at the idea that Jimmy would take the time to clean the bathroom between escaping from the FBI and getting caught by the Alphas. Which marked the, what, sixth time he'd been kidnapped because of her recklessness? The hushed giggle twisted into a frown. Super funny. Hilarious.

Someone else had cleaned here then. Probably Derek, if he'd spent all that time cooped up in the apartment with Joe drooling and snoring and having nightmares. She couldn't remember anything after hearing Aunt Mel's voice on the phone at the distillery, saying that she was okay. Joe wished she could say it felt like a different life, but it didn't. It felt like yesterday — which it wasn't, but not far off either. No matter how hard she tried, she could not convince herself or her high-alert body that it really was over. That there was no one lurking in the shadows anymore, waiting for her to let her guard down.

Because that wasn't true, was it? There was someone. Even if you ignored Deucalion that her idiot cousin let go, Hallucinate-Kate had been her faithful companion for a while now, but just because she'd gone didn't mean the real Kate wasn't still out there. Waiting for an opportunity to strike.

Was Joe ready to face her?

In the last months, Joe had faced opponents that once could have killed her without breaking a sweat and somehow, Joe had prevailed. Even here, in this bathroom, she'd managed to hold off Jimmy's fully shifted self. There'd been so much blood. The white tiles on the bathroom floor carried no memories of it now, but Joe saw the thick black blood burst from the grout and coil out of the shower drain and run down from the vent and—

Joe shook her head to dislodge the rising scream in her throat and found that her hands had tightened into fists, so much so that her blunt nails dug into her palms. Get a grip, she told herself and went to wash her hands. Her hands that did not tremble even the slightest and she kept her focus on that fact as she opened the door and ran right into Derek.

"Jesus!" Joe snapped and thought her heart would burst out of her ears. "Have we regressed to you lurking in the hallway? What happened to the promise-part?"

"I wasn't listening," he said evenly, not rising to meet Joe's annoyance. "But you were taking a long time and I worried."

He worried? She pushed past him and tried to deflect from her treacherous mind. "Dude, I've been out for thirty-six hours, I'm allowed to take my time ya know." Not waiting for an answer, she stalked into Jimmy's room and flung open his t-shirt drawer where everything was folded neatly and color-coordinated. "Green okay?"

"I don't need—" Derek's answer was cut short by a flying t-shirt in his face, courtesy of Joe's less-than-expert throw. "Thanks." He paused briefly and brought the t-shirt back to his face to sniff it with brows furrowed in confusion. "Why doesn't this have a scent?"

"Oh, uh, Jimmy's really sensitive to what he puts on his body now that he got an enhanced sense of smell so he makes his own detergent that somehow doesn't smell like anything. Don't ask me how he does it, there's like chemistry and stuff involved."

Erica had been equally confused the first time Jimmy washed her clothes, to the point where she thought she was losing her sense of smell. Joe couldn't imagine how exhausting it had to be, to constantly have to block out the scent of soap and detergent from everywhere around them. And yet, she would be lying if she didn't admit that she was a little bit jealous.

"I'm sure he'll make you a batch if you ask nicely. Key word being: nicely."

"We've talked, if that's what you're getting at," Derek commented drily and pulled off the drool-stained t-shirt without any forewarning, baring himself to the room at large and to Joe.

Joe, who averted her gaze so quickly she risked whiplash, forcing herself to study the blank walls in Jimmy's room with profound interest. It was nothing she hadn't seen before, she tried to remind herself. Just Derek's naked chest. Just his warm skin and rippling muscles and coarse chest hair that she desperately wanted to touch and that was not what Derek needed to sense from her right now. Jesus, she had to stop associating trauma with sex. He deserved so much better than to be objectified. He was more than that — so incredibly much more — and was probably disgusted enough with her already. She tried and failed to do the math — had it been a week since she last took a shower? Changed her clothes? Gross. Really, really gross.

For some reason, a pressed silence ruled as Derek slipped on Jimmy's clean t-shirt and Joe dared a peek at him, finding him giving her a thoughtful look in return. She swallowed, hoping to drown both her pesky hormones and the growing awkwardness, and prompted: "You talked, huh? About what?"

"Practical stuff."

Joe waited for him to continue, but he never did. "Sounds riveting."

"It was. I'm going to order some food. Any requests?"

"I'm guessing I'm not leaving the apartment anytime soon, huh? Hide and heal and all that?"

Or they worried she would finally snap for good. Turn on them. Fulfill her potential.

"Just because you're awake doesn't mean you're fully recovered. You're not hiding, Joe," the warmth in his voice made her stomach twist into tight five-fold knots, "just catching up on some sleep. And you need to eat."

"I guess."

"Carbs or fats?" Derek asked as they trekked out of Jimmy's room. Joe just blinked at his question and to her surprise, again, he didn't even give a hint of irritation. On the contrary, he was showcasing a degree of patience she didn't know he even had the capacity of and it was starting to become downright weird. He repeated his question in a softer voice: "Are you craving carbs or fats?"

"Uh, you're not making either sound super appetizing, to be honest. Are those my only options? What about protein? And caffeine?"

"Your cravings are based on what you need the most right now. Protein is a given."

"Caffeine?"

"Is an addiction, not a craving. Come on. I know you haven't eaten for at least thirty-six hours and because I know you, I don't want to think about the last time you ate before that either."

"There was a lot going on," Joe mumbled, feeling the need to stand up for her poor choices. "Don't give me that look. Like you had any semblance of appetite when Cora lay sick?"

"No, but I still ate." He shrugged at her undoubtedly surprised expression. "A bad situation doesn't get better by neglecting yourself. As robust as we are, we require sustenance. Go too long without it, and we crash."

"Same goes for sleep, yeah yeah, I got it." It was almost a week since she last remembered eating anything — her hunger cues hadn't even made a dent in her consciousness, drowned out by the constant pain and fatigue. And now it had passed on to just feeling like an empty paper bag, hollow and thin, minutes away from ripping apart. "I don't really feel like anything, to be honest. I'm sorry, I'm not trying to be difficult, I just…"

Derek nodded as if he'd been expecting this as well. His uncharacteristic patience should have been a welcome change, but still rubbed Joe the wrong way. "What do you normally go for when you want comfort food? What's your go-to hangover food?"

"Chinese," Joe said after a while, thinking back to every late Sunday morning after Alex had forced her to go out. A different life and a different Joe. "General Tso's chicken, beef lo mein and egg rolls."

Preferably cooked somewhere that barely qualified as a kitchen and by a cook who doubled as a walking health violation, but it didn't matter because there were no bacteria in the universe that could survive in the insane amounts of oil. Deep-fried chicken and thick noodles swimming in grease — okay, maybe she could eat.

"Chinese it is," Derek said with a slightly raised eyebrow and Joe remembered they'd had Chinese during their first — and last — date. "I'll order while you take a shower."

Maybe it was because he was wearing Jimmy's shirt and they were in Jimmy's apartment, but Joe got a massive flashback of Jimmy ordering her to shower the morning after she'd shot Derek. They had been joking around, like she hadn't severely wounded an already severely traumatized man and in hindsight, it wasn't funny at all. In an attempt to hide the spikes of guilt tearing through her stomach, she tried to send Derek an easy grin. "I smell that bad, huh?"

"No."

The single word, uttered with such amazing nonchalance, left Joe borderline swaying even while standing still. "No?"

"No, you don't," Derek clarified, if you could call it that, and then turned to walk into the living room while Joe stared at his broad back. Liar. Never mind the general body odor, she was covered in crusted blood, dried gunpowder, and just plain dirt. Reeking, as Jimmy would have put it, and she found herself missing his particular way of making her deal with her issues. But there was no comparing Jimmy and Derek nor the bond she shared with either of them. She could not imagine feeling even halfway as safe waking up with Jimmy as she did with Derek. So she squashed the initial urge to argue — Derek had been incredibly nice ever since she woke up, suspiciously so even — and decided that either way, she needed a shower. She wanted a shower.

She just had to take the stupid shower.

The bathroom was as pristine as she'd left it but somehow seemed bigger now. Emptier. Or was it smaller? Cramped? Closing in on all sides? Joe blinked the intrusive thoughts away, avoided looking at herself in the mirror, and searched under the sink for clean towels. A crack ran diagonally from top to bottom on one of the cabinet doors, courtesy of Jimmy's head when they fought here during the half-moon. Joe shuddered. He'd pinned her down on the white tiles, with his half-shifted mouth growling at her and his claws tearing up her shoulder. About how she'd left both him and Erica, of how she'd made the wrong decision again, about how she'd failed… again.

The towels dropped from her hands and she braced herself against the sink, trying and failing to catch her breath. What was Jimmy's stupid mantra again? Relax, release, ease. If only fighting Jimmy was her worst memory from this bathroom, her treacherous mind added. Before that, he'd laid here in Erica's arms, nearly bleeding out. And before that again, Joe had tried to scrub herself raw in the bathtub, feeling—

No, no, no. It hurt even more to think about knowing the truth. Knowing she was not the only one violated. Knowing that she had jumped to conclusions, blinded by her own pride and anger. And trauma. Let's not forget about the trauma, which of course caused her to hurt the actual victim even more without even asking him what had happened.

Get a grip, Delgado.

The shower seemed like a black hole now, a portal to despair and suffering, and Joe's vision swam trying to get her head straight. A shower, she could handle that. A stupid shower. Just get out of her clothes and turn on the water and get it over with. Two minutes. It'd take her two minutes, tops, and if she dropped washing her hair, she didn't even need to close her eyes the entire time. Come on, she urged herself, you nearly killed the Darach with your bare human hands and you can't even take a goddamn shower to get the blood off your hands? Come on!

"Joe?"

Derek's voice came from the hallway and Joe almost jumped into the sink. She waited for her lungs to catch up before croaking: "Yeah?"

"Where do you want me?"

"What?"

"Where do you want me?" he repeated from the other side of the door. "I'm right here, you're not alone. How close do you want me? Out here talking to you or in there?"

You're not alone. Joe bit her lip in thought, wondering where that had come from. He'd probably smelled her rising emotions, triggered from… okay, maybe from being alone in a locked room. Trying not to dwell on it, she repeated his question in her mind and knew the obvious answer. Even though it took her three tries to say it aloud because she wasn't sure could ask that of him. Except that he had offered and he wouldn't have done that if he didn't mean it and she owed it to him to be honest for once.

"In here? Please?"

"Okay. You wanna unlock the door or just have Jimmy send me the bill?"

Joe hurried to unlock the door, trying not to overthink the fact that she was going to be naked in the same room as him. It sure as hell beat the other option of being naked in here alone. "Thanks."

He entered without any comment, gave her a cursory glance to see if she was okay, and then nodded. The bathroom quickly filled with his scent and calmed Joe's racing nerves. Not that she had anything to worry about from him. Perfect gentleman as he was, Derek placed himself in the corner by the door with his back to her. Ramrod posture and arms crossed over his chest, he looked like he could stand there forever, but Joe figured she shouldn't push her luck and just get on with it. Besides, her relationship with nudity had changed quite a bit in the last few months and it wasn't like he hadn't seen all of her before even if he happened to catch a glimpse now. She peeled off her clothes, leaving them in a pile on the floor, and jumped into the shower without waiting for the water to warm up.

Three seconds in and she realized the water dissipated Derek's scent. She could leave the shower curtains open so she'd be able to see his unmoving shape in the corner, but that would mean dousing the entire bathroom in water. "Uh, do you mind talking?"

"What do you want to talk about?"

That question had way too many answers, including the cowardly one that involved not talking after all. They had so much to talk about, didn't they? Not exactly lightweight stuff either and if Joe had her way, they could postpone those kinds of talks indefinitely. With that in mind, Joe scrambled for any safe topics.

"Uhm, read any interesting books lately?"

No sooner had the question escaped before she snapped her head under the water to drown out her burning skin. That was not a safe topic, was it, considering that Julia had masqueraded as an English teacher when going after Derek. They had probably talked about books the whole time she had him under her spell. Great job, Delgado. Top fucking marks.

"I'm about halfway through The Oxford Handbook of Indigenous Sociology."

Her body filled with a warmth not related to the water spraying over her body. "Really? Any good?"

"No. It's very obvious these academics get paid by the word. It's only marginally better than the magazines I read before that."

Joe gasped from where she was lathering shampoo into her hair, almost choking on a handful of suds. "You've read Erica's magazines?"

"Which is a fact that will not leave this room, if you don't mind."

"No promises there. I'm sure it would make her day to know that."

Derek snorted. "If that's the game we're playing, it'd also make her day to know you drooled on me in your sleep."

Grateful for the shower to mask her scent, Joe rinsed her hair out and used the opportunity to drown her rising blush. Except the heat creeping up her neck was more than that. As mortified as she was about staining his t-shirt with drool — not to mention how he'd been awake and probably felt the wet spot grow bigger and bigger while he read — the familiar spark of sarcasm from Derek's side overpowered it. The endless patience and impossible kindness he displayed was nice, sure. But she hadn't realized how much she missed the real him before now. The argumentative, quick-witted, and strong Derek. Her Derek.

"I didn't mean it like that," he said in a quiet voice after Joe had remained silent for a while. "It really is fine."

"It is so not. Unless you're into that kind of thing, I guess." She rolled her eyes at herself. Again with the sex references. "Which you're allowed to be, obviously. No judgment." Joe mimed choking herself and hung her head under the stream to keep herself from saying anything even more stupid. Thankfully Derek came to her rescue and changed the subject.

"I did give Jimmy's self-help books a go, but they were somehow worse than the magazines."

"Yeah, yeah, you've made your point. There is no real literature in this apartment. Why didn't you just watch TV or something?"

"Because I never watch TV and besides, I didn't want to wake you. You needed — and probably still need — all the sleep that you can get."

"Checks out," Joe mumbled and conditioned her hair while slowly raking her fingers through it to untangle it. "What about you? Have you been up this whole time?"

"No, I've slept on and off. Why?"

Because you seem off, Joe wanted to reply but didn't. It wasn't hard to pinpoint what was bothering her about his behavior. He was being way too nice. Especially considering the circumstances. She knew he could be sweet, but this was on a level that didn't seem like him at all. It was more than she would have expected even from Aunt Mel. Of course, maybe that had been the condition Aunt Mel had placed for leaving Derek in charge of Joe while she recovered. To be super nice.

"No reason," she finally answered. Her words slurred when she rinsed off for the last time, sweeping her hair out of her face as she turned off the shower and hoped he wouldn't call her bluff. Dripping with water, she shivered in the steaming bathroom and remembered the towels still on the floor where she'd dropped them.

Except now a towel appeared from the other side of the shower curtain, courtesy of Derek who was distinctly facing the other way while handing it to her.

"Thanks," she said again, wrapped it around herself, and stepped onto the tiles. "I'm decent," and since Erica abhorred small towels and had done extensive online shopping during her time here, this one covered her from armpit to calves, "even by Victorian standards."

It might have been her imagination, but she swore he took a sharp breath before turning around. His face revealed nothing though and he even met her eyes calmly in the slightly foggy bathroom mirror. For a few seconds, they stared at each other before Joe broke away to conduct a damage inspection on herself.

Ah. Well. To put it this way, she could probably use another thirty-six hours of sleep.

Because not even stage makeup could cover up the intense dark circles still under her eyes, pronounced further by the paleness of her skin, which with her coloring made her gray and ashy. Ghostly, might have been the right word, and she absentmindedly reached for some lotion like that would help.

The movement revealed Derek still behind her, almost in a standby mode. Arms crossed and patiently waiting, but probably hyper-vigilant to her chemosignals. She did her best to keep her emotions in check, to avoid giving him a reason to worry and studied herself in the mirror instead. The familiar and yet so unfamiliar face, completely bare with her wet hair slicked back. The hair, the nose, the furrow in her brow from her dad. Her eyes, her mouth, and the color of her skin from her mom.

Mom.

No sooner had she thought the word before Derek moved, breaking her line of thoughts. He leaned over to rummage through the collection of hair products that had grown tenfold after Erica's arrival. Joe watched with her eyes narrowed, not sure what he was looking for until he appeared to have found it. He took a short whiff of the bottle, apparently finding it bearable, squished a healthy amount into his hands, rubbed them together, and proceeded to rake his fingers through her damp hair.

What — the — hell?

"You okay?" he asked, steady eyes meeting hers through the mirror. Joe had no idea which of her emotions he had caught — there were a lot of them spiking at the same time, the most prevalent being pure shock — but she managed to nod. And he continued putting product in her hair like it was the most natural thing in the world.

She did her best to stay still and not allow her body to shiver at the sensation. It made her heart tremble instead, buzzing through her veins and into every nerve ending available. He wasn't even touching her, not really. Just running his white-coated fingers through clumps of her hair, starting at the bottom and working his way up towards her roots with a focused expression on his face. He separated her curly locks, twisted them around his fingers — Joe had never been so focused on his hands before in her life, had they always been this magical?— and let her curls spring into shape as he let them go.

What — the — hell?

And she couldn't even bring herself to say anything. Both because her whole body vibrated from his care and because her pulse seemed to have rooted itself in her throat. She didn't even want to say anything, afraid it might ruin the moment, except it seemed that to him this wasn't even a moment.

"Is this a werewolf thing?" she eventually asked, unable to bear the pressing silence. And also in an attempt to distract herself from how good it felt with his fingers in her hair. And to keep herself from imagining him doing other things to her hair, washing it for example, after taking a long hot shower together.

Derek's half-shrug was neither a confirmation nor a denial.

She cleared her throat. "Like a grooming thing?"

"It's a trying-to-make-you-feel-better thing," Derek finally answered, swapping out the first bottle with another one. The correct one, even. He must've caught her looking because a half smile flittered over his lips. "I've read at least three articles about curly hair care since I got here. Might as well put the knowledge to good use."

"So, indirectly, I have Erica to thank for this."

No answer, but that might have been because he shifted to squishing the last remnants of product into her curls to further define them. Okay, this was really blowing up the weird scale. Or was it? He'd said something about not neglecting himself, and she suspected that went beyond food and sleep. During the time she'd known Derek, he'd been through some pretty rough shit and somehow always looked amazing. Trimmed beard, perfect hair, and clean clothes. She'd always assumed it was because he was just naturally good-looking, but now it occurred to her that it might have been because he was actively taking care of himself. To help himself feel his best, even in the shittiest of circumstances.

"Hey, can I ask you something?"

For some reason, that made another smile tug at his lips. "Yes."

"Why," Joe knew what she wanted to ask and tried to find a phrasing that wasn't accusatory or suggestive, "were we in a position where I could drool on you?"

As in, why had they been cuddling up on her bed? That they moved her to the apartment in her unconscious state was one thing, but the last time Derek kept watch over her while healing, he'd done so from a chair next to her bed. The only time they'd been in a bed together was when she initiated it. This didn't fit his MO.

Done with her hair, Derek took the opportunity to lean beside her and wash his hands. Which effectively made him dodge the eye contact she tried to make.

"Because," his attention remained on his hands as he now dried them, "as I said, you've had some nightmares. I was trying to calm you down."

"I snuggled up to you, didn't I?" Her breath hitched when he used the second towel to carefully wipe away both water drops and hair products from Joe's neck and shoulder blades. Again, he wasn't even touching her, but the heat from his hands burned through the terry cloth. "And wouldn't let go?"

He closed his eyes briefly, as in defeat, before they broke open again in determination. "Yes. Which is both fine and a werewolf thing. And I don't know."

"What?"

"If you wouldn't let me go."

The door buzzer went off, one or both of them saved by the bell. Joe mulled over his words as she shuffled after him down the hallway and then into her own room, leaving the doors open in her wake to avoid getting that trapped feeling again. Halfway into an ancient pair of oversized sweatpants, she paused as her brain caught on. He didn't know if she wouldn't let him go because he hadn't tried to get away. Okay then. That did make her feel marginally better and less like a creep. Foregoing socks, and trying to ignore the reason for foregoing socks, she slipped on an old tie-dye shirt and trudged back out to catch the last snippets of conversation between Derek and the delivery guy.

"—and as you might notice, I took the liberty of adding my phone number on the receipt. Oh, don't worry, I'm not coming on to you! Not that you're not an attractive dude and all because hello, I have eyes, but I am kind of taken. I just have a life policy of getting to know interesting people. And someone who's willing to tip twenty bucks extra for a cup of coffee is an interesting person, you know? So keep me in mind next time you need something from anywhere, 'kay? You have a nice night now."

The door clicked shut, leaving Derek burdened with paper bags that he maneuvered over to the kitchen island. The smell of spices blended with Derek's scent as Joe trudged after him, mostly focused on a familiar paper cup now perched on the counter.

"Food first." Derek didn't turn around from where he was busy taking containers out of the bags and pushed the paper cup out of Joe's reach. "Then coffee…"

His voice trailed off as he turned around, his expression morphing into something unreadable, at least to Joe. She resisted the urge to fidget, just bit her lip in thought, and waited for him to say something.

At least for five seconds.

"Okay, what?" She had no patience left in her body and he hadn't stopped staring. She blinked, in case she had activated her glowstick eyes without meaning, but the world was in full color. "What? Do I still have drool on my face or something?"

"You're wearing sweats," Derek said, as if that was an explanation at all.

"Uh, yeah? I figured it was take-ou and not fine dining. You want me to go change?"

"No. It's just that you haven't," Derek licked his lips, one of the many minuscule signs that he was off his game for some reason, "really worn that since you came back."

"Sure I have." Maybe not that he'd seen, now that she thought of it. "Not a lot, but I have. Just, leggings are more practical when you have to run and fight and stuff."

"Right." Again with the awkward pauses and Joe narrowed her eyes at him. A sharp intake of breath through a nearly closed mouth before Derek asked: "You do realize that's exactly what you wore the first time I saw you?"

"Really?" Joe looked down at her ensemble. "I guess, if you say so. I don't remember what I was wearing, a little busy worrying about the guy who had broken into our house. Guess my tie-dye made an impression on ya?"

"I remember thinking you weren't expecting company."

The sentence, delivered in his usual stoic manner, made Joe conceal a grin. A glimpse of the real Derek, the one who gave as good as he got, and her heart fluttered in response. Afraid of ruining the moment, if there was one, Joe kept mum and helped Derek pull out all the containers.

"When are the others getting here?"

Derek sucked in another sharp breath. "Not until we're sure you—"

"Oh, I'm not talking about those others. I'm talking about that medium-sized village you've apparently invited over for dinner. Jesus Christ, Derek, this is a lot of food."

And it was. More than a dozen containers filled the entire kitchen island with various delicious scents wafting from each one. No wonder the restaurant had sent along six pairs of chopsticks.

"Most of it's for me," Derek admitted shamelessly. "I've been living on protein bars and jerky for a while now. Yes, " he answered the question lining up at her lips, "I said I ate, I didn't say I ate well. Especially not after coming here since all you have in your fridge is expired cauliflower rice and kombucha."

"Grocery shopping hasn't really been a priority," Joe mumbled and now acknowledged how her stomach grumbled at the sight of all this delicious, greasy food. It shouldn't have surprised her how Derek snapped both his and her set of chopsticks, but the imagery reminded her way too much of their date night. Which wasn't a bad thing, but also only added to the general confusion rolling in her brain. "Do I have to pace myself?"

Derek paused with his chopsticks hovering over some dumplings. "What?"

"Are we susceptible to refeeding syndrome?" Joe tried not to dwell too much over the 'we'-part. She meant werewolves, but it was still strange to define herself as such. No claws, no fangs, no senses, and all that jazz. "Will I get an electrolyte disturbance if I eat too fast since I haven't really been eating at all the last week?"

Judging by Derek's blank expression, it didn't seem like he'd ever heard of that particular problem.

"We talked about it in the vault, you see," Joe said slowly, trying to keep her tone light while dipping her toes into that particular bog of memories. "If werewolves could get refeeding syndrome since we would go days without food. Cora didn't really know so…" She cleared her throat, focusing on the chopsticks in her hand. "And, uh, after Boyd tried to starve himself to death because hey, death before dishonor, we decided… No, I decided, that it was better to be safe than sorry and, y'know, build up his food tolerance slowly or whatever. Not that it mattered, they never gave us enough food for that to be an issue."

Unable to look at him, unable to take his endless senseless guilt, she just continued talking in what she hoped was an even and detached tone.

"I wasn't sure if you knew that. That's why he was so pissed off with me, even before the whole with Erica-dying-but-not-really thing. I made him eat. And that guy is really loyal. To you, not me, which I guess only added insult to injury. And, uh, I guess I don't have to explain to you why I did it or what it feels like, so… yeah, do I have to pace myself?"

It took whatever willpower she had left to look up at Derek's face. Way to set the mood, Joe thought with those annoying knots in her stomach tightening by the second.

Derek seemed to search for his words before finally settling for a tried-and-true one: "No. You should be fine. Dig in."

The poor guy was probably starving. It was the only way she could explain the lack of response to what she'd just told him. Maybe he already knew all of it. Or it was yet another display of that annoying patience that had taken over his being since she woke up. Either way, Derek focused on the food and Joe followed suit. The hot sauces burned her tongue, but it was minor compared to the demanding hunger tearing at her stomach. Joe tried to slow down, to taste the various flavors, but ended up stuffing her face with one grease-laden dish after the other.

On the other side of the kitchen island, Derek ate even faster, devouring whatever container was closest to him in quick order. The apartment fell eerily quiet. Joe hadn't even noticed that it was dark outside, not that she had paid attention when she woke up with the heavy curtains blocking out the window in her room.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Eat."

"I am eating."

"Then how are you still talking?"

"It's a talent," Joe said, a new wave of deja vu washing over her. She decided not to wait for his response this time. "Why haven't you let anyone know I'm awake?"

"Because you're not fully recovered." Derek talked between bites, shuffling food into his mouth as if to get the whole meal over with as fast as possible. "Your body's still in survival mode. I can smell the adrenaline all over you. Most likely, you just need food more than sleep right now, hence why it's important that you eat. My guess is that you'll go back to sleep after."

"I don't want to sleep anymore. I've been out for too long already."

He paused, chopsticks again hovering over the counter, and seemed to consider his words. Whatever she expected — a short lecture about how she needed sleep, a proclamation that she wasn't allowed to leave until she did — it was definitely not: "Erica's been reunited with her parents."

"What?"

"Rob and the Sheriff pulled some strings to close the missing person's case without attracting any attention. Erica, now officially just another teen runaway statistic, is safely back with her family and it seems to be going well."

"So she's okay?"

"All things considered, yes." Derek dropped the chopsticks and wiped his mouth with a napkin. "As for Isaac and Boyd, I'm not sure who pulled what strings, but Melissa has been approved as a foster home for both of them. Jimmy suspects that the Alpha pack emissary had something to with it, a recommendation or something similar."

"Wait, Isaac and Boyd? There's only three bedrooms at that house and they're, you know, growing boys."

"Well, since I'm not qualifying as a foster parent anytime soon—"

"Why? Because you're unemployed and homeless?"

He gave her a level glare, the familiarity of it sending tingles through her again. "Because I'm twenty-three years old."

"You're what?" A long stretch of silence followed while Joe mulled this over. "Right. You're twenty-three. And I'm twenty-three. And Jimmy's twenty-three. No, wait, twenty-four, his birthday's in July. I feel like I'm closer to a hundred, are you sure we're just twenty-three? Hang on, age is weird with werewolves. How long have you been twenty-three?"

Another unimpressed stare. "Since my birthday last year."

"Makes sense."

"As I was saying," his eyebrow raised in something resembling annoyance at her interruption and the butterflies in her stomach did somersaults, "since I'm not old enough to become a foster parent, Boyd will be registered at Melissa's, but stay with us at the loft."

Us?

"Morrell has been kind enough to help enroll Cora at Beacon High."

Right. He and Cora. That 'us'. Joe chastised herself for thinking he meant something else — not that he was the one to decide that anyway — before his words caught up with her. Cora in high school.

"Hoo-boy, I bet she loves that."

"About as much as she loves the fact that I'm her legal guardian now. I'm banking on her taking out most of her frustrations on Jimmy before I get back."

Joe's mouth pulled to an amused smile. "Just tell her the alternative was Peter, I think she'll come around."

Derek did a head-tilt to indicate he got her point and opened a bottle of water that had come with the food. He exposed his throat as he drank, the powerful muscles working as he downed the whole thing in one go. At least Joe was spared thinking too much about it when he offered her a second bottle.

"I'm saving myself for the coffee."

"You're not getting coffee until you've finished this." He raised his eyebrow again in a challenge until she relented and accepted the water. "Anyway, the twins also made it. Getting them to Deaton in time saved their lives."

"Great," Joe muttered into the bottleneck like she hadn't been the one to make that particular call. "They've gone after Deucalion?"

"No, they're hanging around for now." He waited for Joe to finish choking on the water. "But they don't appear to be Alphas anymore. Something took away that spark."

"They were pretty badly injured. Could it be they each sacrificed their spark to save the other?" Joe asked after thumping her chest to get the water to run down the right way. "Twin bond is kind of strong, from what I've heard."

"Maybe. I hadn't thought of that," Derek admitted and for some reason, Joe got that tingle in her stomach again. Like she'd performed a neat trick her handler appreciated. "Either way, they don't seem to be a threat."

"Don't let Aiden fool you. He's a wild card."

"Then we'll keep an eye on him," Derek said in easy agreement and Joe squirmed on her chair from another round of weird tingling emotions. Who was 'we'? "You're forgetting to eat."

"I'm eating," Joe mumbled and stuffed more fried chicken in her mouth. Anything to distract from the way he was studying her and subsequently making her feel strange feelings for the first time in so long. "So Cora's not going back?"

He seemed to wait until he was sure she was actively chewing her food. "Not yet, no. She's agreed to stick around until the end of the semester at least. Other than that, Jimmy's working on a news story correlating with the official statements from the FBI concerning the serial killer."

The silence that followed spoke volumes. Didn't need a lot of imagination to see how it would go. Everything pinned on the actual culprit for once — Jennifer Blake — who was now conveniently dead, no prosecution or trial required. Tied up with a neat little bow and all.

"Dad still in town then?"

"Of course," Derek answered immediately, a furrow on his brow. "You've been out for a day and a half, Joe. Not a month."

"Or three," Joe muttered and regretted it immediately at the look he sent her. "Uh, what happened to the body?"

"Which one?"

"My mom. She said she wanted to be cremated. Please tell me she hasn't been lying in that entrance hall for thirty-six-plus hours."

It took a long time before Derek answered. "Your professor and Morrell dealt with the body. I'm not sure what they did with it. With her."

Dealt with it. Joe waved her chopsticks around, trying to come to terms with it. "Right. Sierra probably knew Mom wanted to be cremated, so it's okay. Did I tell you they were sisters? Everything's a bit of a blur right now."

"No, you didn't." This time it didn't take as long before Derek recovered from whatever he was hung up about. "That makes her your aunt."

"Yeah. It's only fair. You have a creepy werewolf uncle, I get a creepy werewolf aunt." Joe took another sip of water, side-eyeing the coffee that still sat on the far edge of the kitchen island. She pulled a sharp breath before giving Derek her full attention again. "It's the mom thing, right? Why you're being weird right now?"

No answer and Joe pressed on:

"It's weird that I'm calling her that, right? That I'm thinking of her like that? After everything she did? It's weird that I'm sad that she died?"

Derek's eyebrows twisted upwards, softening his face. "No."

"I mean, I get it. She wasn't a nice person. She did awful, horrible, evil things. She skewered you with a steel pipe. Twice." Joe desperately wanted to run her fingers through her hair, lift it from her scalp to cool down, but it was still damp and it would ruin all of Derek's hard work. "And still, after she gave back my memories, I keep thinking of her as Mom. Not Kali, not Catalina, just… Mom. And I'm not sure if she planted it there, on purpose or by accident, or if I'm just a really messed up person with a shitload of issues." Joe gave this some thought and shrugged. "Well, I obviously know I'm a messed up person with a shitload of issues, but..."

She shrugged again and shoveled more food into her mouth for emphasis, not even watching Derek as she chewed without tasting it. Chased it with the last bit of water, not tasting that either. Stupid, really. How many times had she dreamed about this in the vault? About real food and clean water? And now she was just going through the motions without appreciating it. Stupid. Weak. Human. Where was that hate when you needed it? Why did it keep blurring into sadness?

"I think you're allowed to mourn your mother's death," Derek said carefully after a while, expression unknown as Joe still didn't look up, "no matter the circumstances."

The forlorn paper cup slid into Joe's line of view. Not surprisingly, it held what smelled like a double oat milk mocha cappuccino, extra foam. At least to her useless senses. On that note, she handed it to Derek who accepted it with concern marking his whole face.

"Can you just sniff it real quick? People keep poisoning my coffee and if I'd had your nose, I wouldn't keep drinking it."

Eyebrows up again — they really were getting a workout tonight — Derek smelled the content. Then took a sip, leaving a thin trail of foam on his upper lip, before handing it back to her. "It's clean."

"Thank God."

Desperate for a caffeine fix, she tried to take small sips and really savor it. Even went as far as closing her eyes and doing the slow breathing exercises Jimmy had taught her to be more present in the now. It was everything a double oat milk mocha cappuccino, extra foam, should be, and more. Well worth the twenty bucks extra in tips, in her opinion. It might have been her imagination, but it certainly felt like the hot liquid spread from her tongue to her muscles, helping them relax for the first time in ages. Maybe that prompted the tiny smile she sent Derek now and the heartfelt: "Thank you."

He sat leaned back on the other side of the kitchen island, arms crossed over his chest, and just nodded slowly. "Thank you for trusting me with it."

Not sure what to say to that — Derek had never come close to poisoning her as far as she knew — she just watched him clear the table while she sipped her coffee. He looked really well, she realized. Guess that new Alpha spark agreed with him. Guess he hadn't minded her mom dying. She closed her eyes, trying to calm the internal war going on in her head. That had been an unfair thought and she tried to drown it by studying him further. His skin that was back to a sunkissed golden tan and his eyes that remained bright and green as always. Unlike her, he'd changed clothes since the distillery, and of course, changed shirts again after she drooled on him. Joe grimaced at the thought that put an abrupt halt to her daydreaming.

Eventually, Derek finished cleaning the kitchen and Joe finished drinking her coffee. She kicked her legs from the tall barstool she sat on, trying to identify if that familiar tug of sleep had returned, and stared out the window. The moon, half covered by clouds, still looked full even though she knew it to be waning.

"How are you feeling?"

"Fine."

"Okay."

Derek finished wiping his hands on a dish towel, set it aside, and then placed his palms on the kitchen island to brace himself. Strike one, Joe thought, something was up with him. He glanced to the side and sighed as if resigning himself to face the music. Strike two, some sort of ball was about to drop.

"We need to talk."

There it was. Strike three. With zero connection between her brain and mouth, she blurted: "Are you breaking up with me?"

Derek's face went through a series of conflicting emotions before he eventually settled on confusion. "What?"

"Saying we need to talk is a classic break-up prelude."

"Are we— are we even in the position where we can break up right now?"

"I don't know, you were the one saying we had to talk," Joe babbled, gesturing at herself, and hoped he couldn't see how her heart had jumped up her throat. Maybe caffeine hadn't been such a good idea. "And you've been really super nice and not sarcastic at all since I woke up and that's super suspicious on its own and I've been trying to figure out why and now it's obvious it was to soften the blow because you want to break up."

"I don't—" Derek shook his head, shaking away the small flash of annoyance with it. "I've just tried to be nice to you."

"Why?"

"Because you're hurt, Joe."

"Well, it's weird!"

"That you're hurt?"

"That you're nice! I mean, obviously, you're not usually mean, but you've been super gentle and respectful and patient and telling me things that I want to know and that's… that's not you."

"You want me to be impatient and sarcastic?"

"A little, yeah! Because what you've got going on now just feels infantilizing. It doesn't feel like you, but it does feel like you're trying to prepare me for something unpleasant."

Derek huffed and straightened up to glare at the ceiling as if that would hold any answers for him. "One predictable conversation, is that really too much to ask for?" His eyes squeezed shut before he opened them to look at her again. "Okay. I'm sorry. Okay? I had a lot of time to think while you slept. About where things have gone wrong and what I could have done differently."

His voice grew stronger to prevent her from immediately replying.

"And I decided that when you woke up, I would do all the things I wish I'd done when you first came back. All the things I should have done. Telling you all the things I should have told you."

"You don't need to coddle me."

"I'm not. Joe, I know you don't need anyone to take care of you, you have proved that over and over again that you can take of yourself. I'm doing these things because I care about you. There's a difference." A small humorless laugh escaped him. "And yes, I've tried to prepare you for something unpleasant. This."

Joe opened her mouth to say something, but Derek apparently had taken her impatience jab to heart.

"And no, I'm not breaking up with you. It's very much the opposite." Another harsh breath expelled from his mouth as he shook his head in disbelief. "You really think I spent crucial minutes during a life-or-death situation to profess my love for you because I want to break up immediately after?"

His jaw tightened, probably because Joe's mouth had dropped open at his hard tone, and his gaze flickered to the side in uncertainty.

"You said you wanted sarcasm."

"Yeah, I mean," Joe blinked, "I did and that was great. Uh, but just to be clear—"

"The love part was not sarcasm."

"Okay, good. Good to know."

"But we still need to talk. If we want to make this work, we need to talk. Really talk."

If. It rang in Joe's ears worse than her own heartbeat. If this was going to work. A break-up was not completely off the table. Then again, he'd made his stance pretty clear, so maybe the if depended on her now.

"Okay, we can talk." Joe studied her fingers where they twisted around each other in her lap and made up her mind. "But only if you promise we're talking as equals," she stressed the word and saw Derek knit his brows together, "and that means no apologies."

He scoffed. "That's not how it works."

"Why not?"

"Joe."

"Okay, but then can I go first? Can I tell you how incredibly sorry I am for everything I've done to you and everyone else?"

"You haven't done anything you need to apologize for, Joe, not to me or anyone else."

"I tried to kill you, Derek!"

"No, you didn't." Derek didn't even sound disappointed, just resigned and factual. "You tried to make me fight back."

"Which is worse, you get that right? I tried to make you kill me. And if that's not bad enough, I blamed you for what happened to Cora. Your sister. And I was so wrapped up in my own shit that I didn't ask you or talk to you. About what happened or to tell you what was going on with me. And we can sit here and argue about mitigating circumstances, that I was brainwashed and hallucinating and you were feeling guilty and then controlled by an evil druid and we can go back and forth for why we've been hurting each other, or we can agree on no apologies and be done with it."

"I don't want your apology, Joe."

"And I don't want yours. So can we just call it even?" Joe did her best to keep eye contact, to sound resolute. "I mean, I think we're both feeling so guilty for each other that it basically cancels out. Tell me I'm wrong."

And he couldn't, because Derek did not lie. Instead, he stared at her from under his dark brows, his arms tense where they lay over his chest. Despite her proclamation, the apologies still clawed at her throat, fighting their way out. Sorry for lying to you, sorry for pushing you away, sorry for shooting you, sorry for not trusting you, sorry for this, sorry for that — and Joe knew that if she got that ball rolling, they'd need a lot more than thirty-six hours.

"Joe, I've done nothing but hurt you—"

"And I hurt you back!" she cut in before that darkness creeping into his voice could go any further. "So we're even. Equals, right? Do you need to hear that I forgive you? Because I can tell you that, but I can't be angry with you anymore, Derek, I can't let you use that anger to punish yourself for something that wasn't your fault. We can talk about everything that's happened and how it makes us feel and whatever kind of therapy sthick we can think of, but no apologies. Please."

"That's too easy," Derek finally said, repeating her words from a previous life, albeit not unkindly.

"Can't we decide to make it easy?"

Not sure what possessed her, not sure if she could blame fatigue or the sudden onslaught of empty carbs, but Joe still leaned forward on the kitchen island and reached out her hand.

Then here are my weapons, my empty hands and feet. Except it was not a weapon, it was just her hand facing palm up. An invitation. An olive branch. Something, anyway, and she tried to ignore the tell-tale hard thump in her chest from her accelerated heartbeat. She wondered if he'd been equally as nervous the times he'd offered her his hand. She wondered if he would rebuke her offer, just like she had those first times.

He sure as hell took his time to decide, just like she had. His chest rose about an inch from another deep breath, his eyes locked on her face and not even glancing down, before he accepted her gesture. Derek laid his hand in hers and it felt like holding onto a burning piece of coal, so hot to the touch it melted away even more of the tension in her body. And when Derek swapped the order, enveloping her hand in his larger one, she feared she might melt off the chair and run down into the cracks on the floor and disappear completely.

It had been too long since she last felt the intense spark from the pad of his thumb running over her hand. Too long since she could just focus on his touch and nothing else, every other thought lost in his calming scent.

"You sure you want to do this?" Derek's voice came so low she struggled to hear it. "That you want this?"

"This?" Joe asked, again mimicking a conversation from long ago. She needed to hear him say it. Desperately and all-consumingly, she needed to hear him say it. Spell it out for her plainly, so not even her treacherous brain could twist the meaning into something else.

"You and me." Derek didn't even glance up as Joe's heart threatened to stop. "Us." Now he did look up and she almost wished he hadn't. "And everything that comes with it."

You and me. Us. And everything that came with it.

"I want to do this," Joe confirmed in a hushed tone, knowing he would hear her even if she whispered. "You and me. Us. And the rest. The pack."

His thumb froze mid-swipe on her hand as if his heart had stopped now. It took everything she had to let him have a moment, to not let her mouth run away from her, to tell him everything she had learned and now understood about his world. If they got this right, there'd be time.

"Our pack," she said instead and was rewarded with indescribable attention from his side. "That we will take care of together, as equals."

Derek remained so still she almost thought he was shaking, vibrating even, with something she couldn't place. Something that made her own body respond in turn, filling with what might have been… hope?

"But we need to be together about this. About everything. Not just together, but unified. It has to be me and you against the world, not us against each other." It took a lot to keep her voice steady. "Because I hate when it's us against each other. It's worse than when Erica went missing. It's not like I'm missing a limb, it's like—"

"Like you're missing a lung? Or your heart? Like someone is constantly standing on your chest, making it hard to breathe and impossible to move? Yeah, I know."

"Yeah." It hurt to breathe now as well as if his words had triggered a self-fulfilling prophecy. "Do you want this, Derek?"

His answer came inhumanely fast. "Yes. So much that it terrifies me."

No need to elaborate. He had lost everything not once, but twice in his life. Of course, he was terrified. Every part of her yearned to reassure him, to promise him everything, but she would be lying if she pretended she wasn't terrified too.

"Then let's make this work," she said instead. "We just have to figure out how. Maybe establish some ground rules. Like, not shooting each other for an instance? Or, uh, no ordering each other around?"

"No secrets," Derek murmured as he glared at their hands, making Joe suspect he was trying to anchor in anger. "Not from each other."

"And no running away when things get hard," Joe added, thinking mostly of herself. "Or pulling away. No room for miscommunication."

"Communication is the key to any successful relationship, after all," he said now and straightened up to give her a half-smile. "Erica's magazines."

"Explains where Aunt Mel got it from. But it's not wrong. And I mean, we're not infallible, either of us, we're going to fuck up at some point, we're going to piss each other off, disappoint each other, which is fine and normal, as long as we just—"

"—just communicate with each other," Derek finished her train of thought and Joe nodded. "We're going for brutal honesty?"

"It's less about the brutal and more about the honesty. Openness, maybe. Candor? We don't need to label it, let's just… talk about things."

"You don't always make that easy." A hint of teasing in his voice, but something undeniably honest too.

"And you do?" Joe shot back, eyebrow still raised to showcase her skepticism. "I don't have your senses, Derek. I can't read you like you can me. I have to depend on your words and you're not always free-handed with those."

"I know. And I suppose I should depend more on your words and less on your signals at times. Sometimes your body and mind aren't in agreement and based on what I know now, I think there's a good chance you're able to mask your scent somehow. It would at least explain why it's so confusing at times."

"Dude, I've never even tried to mask my scent."

"I think it just comes naturally. And I'll teach you to control it if you want," Derek said quickly, his eyes roaming her face while his thumb still stroked the sensitive skin near her wrist. "I swear, Joe, I'll teach you everything you want."

Everything. She didn't have a chance against everything.

"Howling?" Joe suggested, half-teasing and half-serious.

Derek let out a short snort, but nodded, albeit reluctantly. "As long as you keep letting me feel that," he nodded towards her and she realized she was biting her lip, "I'll teach you everything I know."

Everything.

She did like the sound of everything. Unwittingly, she bit her lip again but caught herself and hung her head low to conceal the rapid flow of blood to her face.

"Maybe you can teach me to control my voice in general. I still can't believe I roared at you guys when I got to the distillery." She cringed in post-fight embarrassment and waited for Derek to crack a joke about it. When it never came, she dared to peek up at him and found him in deep thought. "What?"

"From a werewolf's point of view," he said slowly, clearly choosing his words with care, "it was easily one of the hottest things I've ever seen."

"Shut up."

"Just going for candor here." Derek sounded so sincere that she ducked her head again as if that would redirect the hotness from her cheeks to somewhere else, anywhere else. Maybe her energy affected him because Derek shifted on the stool without letting go of her hand. In fact, his other hand joined in and now encapsulated hers completely. Everything about his posture revealed that he was steeling himself for something and Joe found herself holding her breath in shared anticipation. "I want to ask you something. Or, it's not really a question, it's just— I thought that maybe— I just need—"

The broken statements were not like him at all and Joe tried to brace herself for the impact. "What?"

Derek sighed and swallowed hard.

"You didn't look at me." The words burst from his lips at uncharacteristic speed, like he had to get them out before they disappeared entirely. "Earlier."

Her brows furrowed, not following.

"When I changed my shirt. You looked away."

It took her a few tries before it clicked and now her tongue tripped over itself in an effort to explain, to get the words out as fast as possible because the vulnerability in his voice made her want to scream.

"Not beca— that was— I mean, I—" She squeezed her eyes shut, not to hold back tears, but to get her thoughts in a semblance of order. "I just didn't really feel it was the time or place to start drooling again. I don't care what you think, I know I've never been able to mask my scent about that."

A volcano of questions erupted in her that she struggled to hold back. Had he done it on purpose? Why? To test her somehow? Or just because he needed the validation? Joe mentally flipped through her old psych notes, trying to pair this with the existing literature, and coming up blank because the real world was so messy nothing added up.

"It was not because I didn't want to look at you," she finally said, hoping that was an appropriate answer. Just the fact that Derek brought it up meant something and she would not be able to live with him having doubts. Not now and not ever. Not him. "Or couldn't look at you. It was only because you're so hot you can make me forget how we just came out of a pretty intense life-or-death situation and I dunno, I just figured that wasn't what you needed to get from me right now. And, to be fair, I was already feeling kind of gross."

He nodded slowly, an indication that he'd heard her, but did not respond. More excuses pressed at Joe's lips, but she held back, hoping to leave some room for him to get his thoughts in order.

"You don't need to coddle me," he finally said, the edge in his voice just sharp enough to reveal that he wanted to mean it as a joke, but didn't.

"Sorry, my instincts kind of say I do." Hearing the hypocrisy and seeing his raised eyebrow, Joe shrugged. "Fine. Next time your shirt comes off, I'll drool to my heart's content." She kicked her feet on the tall barstool. "But can I ask you a question?"

His answer came immediately, almost relieved. "Yes."

"When did you stop shaving your chest?"

Maybe he had expected a topic change as he let go of her hand, crossed his arms over said chest, and glared out the window. "I'm rethinking this whole candor part."

Guilt gnawed at her organs in a heartbeat, already missing the warmth from his touch. "You don't have to answer—"

"No, it's fine. Right around the time you said you liked how I stopped shaving my face. Both of which I've been doing since I was fifteen, to blend in or something. But, as I've come to realize lately, I'm not in high school anymore. My turn. Why did you cut your hair?"

"Because I hated how I looked the same when I wasn't." She tried to laugh, but it came out a little too shaky and breathless to be real. "It's pretty textbook to want to alter your appearance after life-changing events, apparently. I tend to go for my hair. You should've seen the buzzcut I got in juvie."

Derek nodded. "Less permanent than a tattoo, at least."

He obviously referred to the triskelion on his back, probably something he had done after the Hale house fire. After Kate Argent killed his entire family. Joe blinked away the dark thoughts — she did not want to think about her right now.

"How does a werewolf even get a tattoo? Did you get it during a lunar eclipse?"

"No, but I guess that would've been an option if I'd thought of it. But no, I had to get it done multiple times in one sitting, wearing down the skin over time. Even our healing gives up if something is repeated enough times."

"That sounds incredibly painful."

"Temporary pain for a permanent mark."

"Right. At least that explains why the Alphas alternated which bone to break." Cursing her own running mouth when Derek's jaw tightened, Joe scrambled to get back to the more comfortable conversation. "Is that how your hands are calloused?"

Joe reached for his hand again and he didn't hesitate this time, opening his palm to let her run her thumb over the rough parts. He had workman's hands, and she could imagine him spending thousands of hours with a wrench or some other kind of tool when working as a mechanic. Or maybe they came from the workouts, the knurling of a weightlifting barbell rubbing away his skin bit by bit.

"Yeah," Derek said without further explanation but didn't shy away from her touch either. "Later I learned another way to get tattoos to stick, the one I showed Scott."

Joe wrinkled her nose. Why would he show Scott?"

"Which you don't know about," Derek continued in a slow tone. "I know I said no secrets, but does that include other people's secrets?"

"What do you mean oth— Scott has a tattoo? A real tattoo? A permanent one? Where? No, wait, if I haven't seen it, I don't think I want to know where. He's seventeen years old, who on God's green earth would tattoo a seventeen-year-old?"

"Hey, don't shoot the messenger."

"Too late for that, don't ya think?" Joe snapped before the tension had time to build. Revisiting that particular memory would not benefit either of them right now. Besides, the familiar sense of fatigue had started to wiggle its fingers at her, probably helped by his touch. "Don't worry, all out of bullets."

"We'll get you more bullets."

"You hate guns."

"Not as much as I hate the thought of you unarmed. I know," his hands tightened over hers again, probably to still her protests, "you can fight. In fact, some parts of me are still bruised from knowing you can fight. But we're supposed to be equals and my claws give me an edge you don't have. And like you said, nine-millimeter bullets trump nine-millimeter claws."

Joe blinked in an effort to keep the strain from sliding them shut. "What do you mean you're still bruised? It's been thirty-six hours and," she suffocated a yawn, "we heal faster when we're together."

"Might have been talking about my ego. Come on, I think it's time you get back to bed."

"Right," Joe said and did not make a single motion to let go of his hand or to move from her seat.

"You're not fully recovered, Joe. You need more sleep to catch up."

"I know."

It was not that she was delusional or had spent so long in insomnia that she didn't recognize the cues. The fuzziness of her thoughts, the heaviness of her eyelids, the yawns trying to escape every few seconds. It was just that annoying hangover from trauma that made her adrenaline spike from just thinking of going to the bedroom alone. Of closing her eyes and shutting off her senses, however human they might be, and be completely vulnerable in case of an attack. It didn't matter that the rational side of her knew the apartment was safe, that Derek would be just outside her room, or that there wasn't any indication of an attack anytime soon. The rational side of her had no chance against the looming post-trauma response filling her head.

But she did owe it to Derek to at least try. Get a grip, Delgado. She trudged down to her bedroom, gulping to swallow the hard pit in her throat, and stood in the doorway. The bedsheets lay bunched up from when she had wrestled out of them earlier, Derek's half-read book sitting on the nightstand. His side of the bed would smell like him. At least she hoped so.

"Where do you want me?" She blinked at Derek's words. He stood right behind her, probably having picked up on her rising degree of panic, and followed her. "How close?"

"If you could just drape yourself over me like a blanket with your full body weight, that might do the trick."

"Right," he said, somehow not even sounding surprised or weirded out by her request. He met her questioning eyes and shrugged. "It's a werewolf thing. Come on."

A split second she worried he would actually heed her request, but instead, he got onto the bed and leaned against the headboard. It left him roughly in the same position he'd been in when she woke up. And now he raised his arm, an obvious invitation that left Joe standing at the foot of the bed trying to comprehend.

"Don't overthink it." The smooth tone of his order filled the already fuzzy corners of Joe's brain. "Come here."

Overthinking was Joe's default state, but she somehow managed to shuffle onto the bed without looking too much like an idiot. It helped that his scent seemed to beckon for her, growing in intensity the closer she got to him and reaching its peak as she laid her cheek onto the green t-shirt covering his chest. Her senses worked overtime trying to catch everything — the musky and natural scent of him that was all Derek, the intense heat radiating from his skin to hers, separated by a flimsy layer of cloth, the strong thudding of his heartbeat inside of him that vibrated against her face — everything.

Three out of five senses, the majority can't be wrong. This was real. It would have been four, but her eyes had slid shut when Derek's fingertips started to brush the naked skin on her neck, tickling the wispy strands of dry hair in her nape.

"I might drool on you again," Joe murmured with her lips rubbing against the organic cotton of his t-shirt.

"I'm fine with that."

To emphasize his words, he pulled her even closer to him. Her head on his chest and the entire front of her body pressed up against him, halfway laying over him like a blanket instead of vice versa. Her leg moved on its own, bringing her thigh over his to nestle her calf between his knees. Instincts. Entangling them into a unified entity. Strongest together.

"Stop thinking," Derek said from above her, having correctly sensed her pulling the brakes on sleep again. His fingertips went in slow circles on her neck, whispering against her throat and jawline. "We'll talk more when you wake up."

"Do you know about limbo?"

Joe couldn't help herself and felt more than heard the annoyed grumble in Derek's throat. The disappointed sigh made her heart flutter when she was pretty sure his intention had been the opposite.

"Yes," came the answer after it became clear Joe was not going to sleep without it. "The transition from old to new Alpha. That's how we first found out our mom was dead. Laura went into limbo at the high school."

"Shit, I'm sorry." Joe wasn't sure what she was most sorry about, for his loss or for bringing it up again.

"It is what it is. You met Kali then?"

"I did. It was kind of like a desert, but not at the same time. It was weird."

"Laura met Mom in a forest. From what I remember, it has something to do with the lineage," Derek sounded as tired as Joe felt, "where the Alpha spark first originated. Ours come from the Celtic nations, yours probably from a desert."

"Is that the same reason our eyes are different?"

"Mhm."

"Huh. Uhm, speaking of, have you ever heard something about Alphas being able to tell the future?"

"Only that the lines of past, present, and future are less relevant in limbo. Why, what did she say?"

"That we're gonna have four kids," Joe blurted without being able to stop herself. Had she not been lying flush against him, she might not have caught how his body stiffened. Might not have heard the slight hitch of his breath, might not have felt how his heart seemed to beat a bit harder. Joe decided to avoid the second part of Kali's statement, it seemed superfluous now.

Derek's muscles gradually loosened again and he murmured: "Only four?"

"Only four?" Joe snapped and sat up to glare at him, only to be met with a glimmer in his eyes that revealed he was messing with her. "You're real cocky for someone who's gonna take at least half the pain during labor."

With a huff, she laid back down, allowing Derek to drape his arm back over her and resume the caresses on her neck.

"I'll take all of it." Derek's voice didn't reveal much either way and Joe stared straight ahead at the flat expanse of his stomach. His hand stopped briefly on her neck as he asked: "Do you want kids, Joe?"

Well, the tables had turned to say the least. Their previous conversation rang in her mind, about openness and candor and not running away when things got hard, so she tried her best to ignore the initial urge to feign sleep to make him forget about the question.

"I don't know. Maybe. I shouldn't, right? I'm not exactly the poster child of a healthy parent-child dynamic."

"I didn't ask if you should have kids, I asked if you wanted to."

"Not right now, maybe?"

Derek sounded amused. "Obviously."

"Besides, we already have four kids and they're exhausting. Isaac, Erica, Boyd, and Cora."

"I don't think Isaac is ours anymore."

"You sure? Maybe we just have to work out a joint custody agreement with Scott?"

"I'm sure." The darkness in Derek's voice made Joe snuggle even further into him. "I pushed him away as hard as I could. I had to. He was the obvious target for the Alphas. We'd spent the whole summer together, working together, bonding. I even taught him how to drive, which is why I got that piece of shit Cruiser now instead of the Camaro in case he was a slow learner."

"You don't think he'll come around?"

"Honestly, I hope he doesn't. For his sake. And Scott's, I guess."

Joe nodded in agreement, rubbing her cheek against his warm chest. Just one Beta would protect Scott from any potential challengers. Would help to keep him safe.

"This is nice," she said after a while, on the cusp of sleep, but not quite there yet. "We should have all our talks like this."

Derek's free hand closed over hers where it lay idle on his left pectoral muscle. "Deal."

For once, Joe didn't crash into unconsciousness. For once, she didn't slip into darkness at the hands of exhaustion or a well-aimed punch. For once, she drifted under the waves, lulled to sleep by the steady heartbeats under her that went in tune with her own. For once, Joe fell asleep, feeling safe and cared for.

---

The next time she woke up, Derek was still asleep. They had shifted a bit in their slumber; Derek no longer slumped against the wall, having slid down to rest his head on her pillow; Joe still sprawled over him, but with her nose resting in the crook of his neck. Most likely instincts had made her seek out the honeypot of scent that hit her nostrils with every inhale, the smooth tones in stark contrast with the scratch of his beard on her temple.

Careful not to disturb him, she inched herself upward to look at his face. His sleeping face was such a rare treat she couldn't let the chance pass by. Such a rare treat it almost felt sacrilegious to stare. Almost.

Derek was asleep, eyes closed and the usual furrow between his brows smoothed out. He hadn't woken at her shifting, still sleeping, lips slightly parted. A soft snore with every exhale and Joe took her time. Studying all his features. Thick stubble on his cheeks, going down his neck. Dark eyebrows completely relaxed, eyes barely moving behind closed lids.

Like in the dreams she had in the vault, she brought her hand out, unable to resist touching him. Except now she knew it wouldn't end here. Touching him wouldn't drag her back to reality, because this was real. So real she almost withdrew her hand. Almost. Softly, slowly, gently, she placed her palm on his cheek, just feeling the beard under her fingertips, like thick black fur—

She froze as Derek put his hand over hers to keep it in place. Everything in her system shut down as he turned his head to kiss the inside of her wrist. Soft, chaste, but sending sparks through every nerve ending in her body.

It had been worth it, Joe thought as Derek opened his eyes slowly to look at her. Every single second of the last months was worth another one of Derek's light-as-a-butterfly kisses on the inside of her wrist. Every single second was worth the chance of Derek opening his eyes from sleeping to look at her. At her.

Already so content, Joe's heart threatened to stop when Derek let go of her wrist to place his palm on her cheek, mirroring her position. Unable to move or blink or breathe, she watched Derek's eyes trail over her face along with his fingers, mapping out every freckle and contour from her cheek to the bridge of her nose.

Everything was worth waking up like this.

Even with the wet stain on his t-shirt from where she'd drooled on him, again. They noticed at the same time and Joe closed her eyes, heart still beating too fast to have time for embarrassment. "I'll get you a new shirt."

Derek just shook his head, his eyes heavy-lidded and relaxed. He didn't move his hand and kept caressing her face.

"I also need to pee," Joe admitted and her stomach somersaulted at the way Derek's mouth dragged into a closed half-smile. "Don't listen."

"I won't," Derek murmured and let her get out of bed, apparently having no inclination to do the same. His eyes closed and he nestled further into the pillows, almost enough to make Joe return to bed. Almost.

When she did return, with an empty bladder and a fresh t-shirt, Derek was unfortunately up as well. So much for her plans of just snuggling back into bed next to him. The knowing way his eyes glittered as he looked at her didn't help either, but he accepted the t-shirt and Joe forced herself to keep looking at him as he slipped out of the green one.

'Forced' was probably a too strong word, because it wasn't exactly a harrowing experience to watch his strong muscles work in order to put on yet another one of Jimmy's scent-free shirts. This one was blue, but Derek looked every bit as gorgeous in any color. It did have a deeper neckline, letting just a hint of his chest hair peek out at the top, which might have been the reason she chose it. Joe bit her lip as if that would prevent her imagination from running away of how it would feel to run her fingers through the dark curls again. She wondered how far down they went, if the trail of hair down his stomach never actually ended anywhere, and how it would feel against her skin.

Derek coughed and Joe blinked back to reality, aware that he was now watching her with a slightly raised eyebrow. Almost as if he wanted to ask 'Is it that bad?' like he'd done at the hospital several months ago, then referring to his scent.

Not letting the blush get the best of her, Joe cleared her throat dramatically. "I did warn you."

"Right." He cleared his throat now, as if trying to reset himself, and held up his phone. "I talked to Rob. They're gonna be here in a couple of minutes. He, Melissa, and Scott. I've told Jimmy to hold off with the others for now."

"Right," Joe echoed and stared at her closet, wondering if she should change into something more appropriate. What was the dress code for a family reunion? Business casual, probably. "Time to face the music."

"The music being your family coming to check up on you because they are worried?"

"Yeah, that one."

"No one's blaming you for anything, Joe."

"They should," Joe muttered and rubbed her scalp under her now completely dry hair. Her curls felt more defined than in months, evidence of Derek's handiwork.

"No, they shouldn't." Derek reached for her hand to place her in front of him. "And they don't. They're only here because they love you. Same as me."

Love.

Whatever answer Joe wanted to give disappeared because Derek's hand snaked up to the back of her neck and pulled her towards him; just enough force to give her time to resist. As if she wanted to. As if she wanted anything else in the whole world and with that in mind, she closed the gap and kissed him. A real kiss. An honest kiss. A kiss that was not born from desperation or had the fate of the world resting on its shoulders. A kiss that was just that; a kiss.

A good kiss, to be fair. Derek's grip on her neck did not relent as much as it strengthened, making her curve her back to press her chest into his and bringing her hands up to rest on his upper arms. Every beat of her heart pulsed into her lips where they met his, everything moving in perfect tandem, in unity.

Somehow, the distance between them decreased further. Derek opened her mouth with his, the new heat of his tongue claiming space next to hers, and she was not sure who let out the subsequent growl. Maybe both of them. His other hand grabbed for her waist and Joe dug her fingers into the thick part of his upper arms, only dimly aware of how the muscles tightened at her touch. Everything buzzed inside of her, from her naked toes on the floor to the tip of her nose crushed into his, demanding more of him, more of them. His teeth raked across her bottom lip and this time it was definitely Joe who moaned and pushed onto her toes to get even closer. Closer and closer and she knew she could never get close enough.

She wanted to feel all of him at the same time and pushed harder at him everywhere she could. There was no space left, no opening left to close, only their souls now blending into each other in newfound intensity. Joe nipped at his bottom lip, her teeth trembling from the effort of not applying too much pressure, and a rush of molten lava coiled into somewhere below her belly button. His pleasure, she dimly realized, but all thoughts blanked when he crushed his lips onto hers again, claiming her entire being as his and his alone. And by God, she was his.

The buzzer from the door broke through the fog of Joe's brain, but even that didn't immediately break the kiss. It slowed down from neck-breaking speed — where it had been less kissing and more making out as if they were two teenagers discovering the activity for the first time — into small, concentrated movements that filled Joe's heart to the brim with everything. Just… everything.

Their lips parted at the second buzz, but that was all. Joe's chest rose sky-high with every inhale, matching the expansion of Derek's frame, and their breaths fanned over each other, cooling their burning wet lips. So close, she knew she didn't imagine it when Derek shuddered. His fingertips tapped on her neck like he had to make a real effort to loosen his grip, and Joe realized she had to do the same to let go of his arms.

A third buzz and Derek pulled back, breathless and beautiful with glistening swollen lips that did not immediately go down because they came from an Alpha. Joe imagined she looked the same, down to the drops of sweat gathering at his hairline and the clear flush in his cheeks. It became clear as day that the kiss might've gotten away from him, but Joe was not about to file any complaints.

"Uhm," Derek's bright eyes were open in something between amusement and embarrassment, "what I wanted to say was that," he drew a shivering breath, "I love you and I'm here for you."

Staring up at him, aware of his every breath and movement, Joe struggled to think of an answer that wasn't 'Right back at ya!' or the even worse alternative of 'Ditto!'. In fact, she struggled to think about anything at all other than the delicious burn around her lips, courtesy of Derek's beard.

"I love you too," she managed to string together in a raw voice. "And… can I be there for you too, Derek? Please?"

Derek opened his mouth but closed it again to settle in a straight line.

"Just, I don't know how all the time," Joe continued, taking it as a good sign that his hands still remained on both her neck and waist. "But if you told me how and let me, I… I want to. I really want to."

The buzzer rang for the fourth time, taking advantage of the silence stretching between Joe and Derek where they still remained unbelievably close to each other.

"Don't give me space." The strong muscles on Derek's neck flexed as he swallowed hard. Like it took a lot of effort to get the words right. Or even out. "Even if I pull away and give the impression that I want space, that's not what I need. Not from you."

"You need me to drape myself across you like a blanket with my full body weight?"

Derek rewarded her with another amused and almost grateful smile. "Something like that. Now come on, we kept them waiting long enough. Melissa is trying to convince Scott to climb up the fire escape."

"Don't see the harm in that, to be honest. Should I change?" Joe asked, looking down at herself, in the sloppy ensemble of a tie-dye shirt and oversized sweatpants. "Since I'm expecting company and all?"

The look Derek gave her would keep her heart warm for a long time. "Absolutely not. You look great."