I'm here, just travelling for work and in a very different time zone.

Guest: of course what those women did to him is no excuse! But desperate men do desperate things…

14

Try as they might, they couldn't come up with any answer better than wait, be watchful and hope the police would find Burns sooner rather than later. And, Gillian declared after a while, probably stop by her place to get some more clothes and personal items. There was no need to elaborate further; if they had felt more comfortable with her staying at Cal's before, with Burns now literally on the run from the law, it was imperative to maintain a high level of caution.

Reynolds left first, on to try to find out more about Burns' sentimental misadventures despite knowing that one, it would have been rather difficult and two, there probably wasn't much else that would be helpful to them. They had thought that by knowing what had happened to him before he resurfaced they might have been able to understand his spiral, and in a way that had worked out as predicted. On the other hand, they had also realised that the information wasn't as precious as they had hoped: the fact remained that Burns was at large, and the information Reynolds had found did not include any direction to a possible hideout.

Still, Cal and Gillian took a little longer to leave the office as they wanted to jot down some notes about what the agent had shared and make sure everything was locked up properly before leaving. The daylight was slowly fading, a sign of the upcoming winter season, but there was the upside of a red painted sky and Gillian decided to lose herself in it while Cal drove. They spoke during the drive, mostly Cal trying to convince her to pack something from her 'big girl' drawer while she was at it, and he giggled to himself when she followed the reproachful slap on his arm with a teasing smile.

The flirty playfulness was still there when they arrived at her place, but Cal didn't forget to look around carefully as they left the car and make sure to keep an eye out as Gillian used her key to open the door. From a tactical point of view, the access to her apartment was both a nightmare and a dream with regards to surveillance: the walk from the street to the door was a bit long but easy to keep an eye on from the entrance; it was well lit, which usually made people feel safe but could also enable ill-intentioned visitors; it was clear of obstacles that could delay a safe arrival to the door but was also sided by thick bushes were someone could hide if really needed.

Thankfully, none of that mattered much when it was two people and not a single woman walking the distance, especially when one of them was practically walking with his head up in the air like a hound ready to catch the smaller whiff of danger. Cal was ready for anything, including dealing with Gillian's possible remarks about his inability to relax, but as they went into her bedroom and she fished out of the closet the biggest suitcase he had ever seen he started to feel like he'd should start worrying about where to put some of his own stuff back at his house.

Don't mind if I do! He mumbled to himself with a little smirk, especially when he noticed that she was starting to pack some of her heavier clothes, a sign that she was preparing to stay with him for quite a while. He shouldn't have been happy about it knowing the reason for the heavy packing, but he had been looking forward to spending Christmas as roommates long before that whole mess started and hey, wasn't it good for him to learn how to look at the positives every now and then?

Still, when Gillian finished with the suitcase and asked him if he could kindly bring that to the car before preparing another empty bag to fill with more stuff, Cal grumbled and rolled his eyes. Huffing and puffing, mumbling something about having to buy a new dresser or closet as he passed by her, Cal left the room and dragged the piece of luggage to his car.

She was shamelessly enjoying every last bit of it, no questions asked.

One of the many, many good things about being in a relationship with Cal was that now she had learned how to tease him in a way that would satisfy both of them. She knew how far to push, even in a dire situation such as the one they were in, in a way they would both enjoy and without reaching the limit. She had remembered about the huge suitcase on the way there and had not resisted the temptation to show it off, knowing Cal would be equally frustrated and pleased in his own way. One thing he didn't know, or was not entirely counting on, was that she was indeed planning to get some special items from a certain drawer, along with others from an even more special box of which even Cal ignored the existence.

Smiling to herself, and picturing the two of them thoroughly enjoying the intriguing objects with a little flush on her cheeks, Gillian started to look around for something far less entertaining but equally important. She hadn't been at her place in days and more than once she had needed an old notebook from her college days, a beat up pad with yellow pages and curled up corners where she used to register some of the rarest and more complicated syndromes someone in her profession could encounter. More than once that greatest hit of psychological oddities had come in handy with their cases and she cherished it so much that she didn't feel like bringing it to the office. She appreciated when their employees went above and beyond to learn and dive deep into what they did, but she was professionally jealous of that little book and was not willing to share. After all, she had justified herself more than once, nobody in the staff was trained as she was so it would have been too out of reach for them anyway. Cal knew about her treasure, she had told him about even before they became an item when they were stuck on a difficult case, and he had let her know that he completely understood: knowledge was power, and after all it wasn't that much different from him opening his office library to the public while keeping some of the rarest volumes and research at home where nobody could access them.

Gillian hadn't thought about taking the notebook with her when she had started staying at Cal's because of the current situation, mostly because she had not thought it would last longer than a couple of days, but at that moment it came to her mind and she started to look around for it.

"Cal?" She called out from the bedroom when she heard him coming back in. "Cal, do you see my blue notebook somewhere? I think it was in the living room the last time but I'm not sure." More steps but no answers. "Cal?"

The round L she always put at the end of his name was still rolling on her tongue when she walked into the living room, finding it empty despite the noises she was sure she had just heard. She felt bad at first, maybe she had indeed loaded the suitcase too much and overestimated Cal's strength, so she smiled to herself and started toward the door to go outside and give him a hand.

And that was when he saw him, them, standing close to the door, just a few steps inside her apartment.

Burns was holding Cal firmly with one arm around his neck, tight and strong, and as if the little drop of blood coming down from Cal's nose and mouth wasn't enough cause for alarm the gun pointed at his temple certainly sealed the deal.

Flashbacks were inevitable, back to that day of a couple of years before when a desperate man had glued the muzzle of a firearm to Cal's neck for hours. As scared as she had been then however, it only took Gillian one look at Burns widened eyes and crazed face to understand the present situation was a thousand times worse. To start, Matheson had been looking for help back then, although in all the wrong ways, while she wasn't entirely sure what Burns wanted: then, of course, the main emotion driving the man accused of killing his wife had been fear, but it was only rage the one she could see on her former lover's features. Most importantly, that day Matheson had needed Cal alive and Burns didn't.

"It's alright love, I'm alright."

Cal was the first one to speak, an unusual yet effective approach: he didn't want to give Burns any other emotional advantage in a confrontation that promised to be complicated, and he really needed Gillian to hear him out as far as he had the chance and hear the calm in his voice.

Whether such calm was going to last, it remained to be seen. For the time being, the strongest emotion Cal had to fight back was shame: he had been fooled, with all his observing and scouting and trying to think about possible dangers he had still let Burns get to him, literally. He had gone out to put the suitcase in the car, checked his way and made sure the door closed behind him even if it was a matter of minutes, and yet he had not seen the big angry guy coming at him until it had been too late. Unlike the last time they had squared off, Burns was well sober and his size and skills gave him an advantage when the former DEA had come out of nowhere, grabbing Cal just as he was about to step inside and immediately landing a rapid series of blows to the back of his head.

The surprise had gotten to him as sudden as the hits, and for a few seconds he had only been able to cover his head and try to muster up some kind of protection. In a moment of clarity, his brain had screamed at him that Gillian was still inside and he had tried to take his ass-kicking away from the door, but Burns had pushed him inside. They had scuffled for a bit, and Cal had quickly realised it wasn't even a real fight, not yet: Burns went after his face to put a firm hand on his mouth and tried to block him in one spot, while he was trying to vocalise something and possibly knock over something that would break loudly and hopefully alert Gillian that something was wrong. Sadly, Burns seemed to be reading his mind and had eventually overpowered him long enough to pull out the gun and hint that he was ready to blow his brains out by firmly pushing it on his temple.

So yeah, shame was the main motivation behind his attempt to take control of the situation, combined with the need to take Gillian's mind off of the fact that her request to take the suitcase away was somehow to blame.

"Cal-"

"Me, Gillian!" Burns cut her off, tightening the grip around Cal's neck as if on a reflex. "You should be talking to me right now, not him."

That didn't bode well, and Gillian immediately understood that she had made a mistake. Cal had the right idea, try to smooth things over and don't let their 'guest' take charge… It wasn't probably going to last but he was onto something, yet she couldn't easily get over the rehash of an image she had struggled to cope with for a long time. But Burns' impulsive reaction also gave her a little hint, a crazy one at that, on how to manage the situation.

"You're not the one with a gun to his head," she replied then, her voice oozing a good dose of contempt that he was maybe too enraged to notice but that didn't get past Cal. "You're the one in change, but you're not the one with a gun to his head."

It was a dangerous game, give him an inch and take back a foot, but for the time being it seemed the best option.

"Why are you doing this to me, Gillian?" The former DEA hissed back at her, breathing heavily on Cal's skin as he spoke. "I love you, don't you understand that?"

"I know you do Dave, but I told you I don't feel the same about you anymore-"

"But you did!" He yelled loudly and Cal could feel the strength of the grip of the man's elbow around his neck going up a notch, like a python slowly squeezing the life out of a harmless prey. "You used to, and I know deep down you still care about me."

"I know you've been through a lot, and I know you didn't have anyone to help you with it." She was trying something a little more soothing, mostly because she hoped it would make him relax the hold on Cal and he was starting to turn a little too red in the face for her likings. "But you have to listen to me Dave, this," she put her hands slowly, palms down and moving in slow circular movements as if to grasp the situation, "this is not going to help."

"What will?" This time there was no rage in his voice, on the contrary there were more sensitive emotions coming for the surface. "Tell me what I need to do."

"Let him go." It was a bit of a Hail Mary but she had to try. "Let Cal go, and you and I can talk."

Don't do it, love. Cal tried to flash his appeal to her with a very clear expression and a small shake of his head. I'm not leaving you with him.

"Talk about what? How you choose him over me? How you whore yourself out to him the moment I was out of the picture?"

"Why do you even care?" Cal couldn't resist, he was all for letting Gillian take the lead and he trusted her but it was a natural instinct for him to step in the moment Burns started to badmouth her. He'd take a gun to the head and bullet for her if it came down to it, so he was not going to let something like that slide. "You said it yourself, she hurts people. She already hurt you, why would you want any more of that?"

"Shut up!" Burns roared back at him, swiftly hitting him on the temple with the butt of the gun before resuming the controlling position. "You have no idea what you're talking about."

"Right you are, mate. Hey, no!" Cal held his up to Gillian, signalling her to stop when she motioned to take a step forward towards them. They exchanged a quick yet dense look, Gillian's eyes begging him not to get killed and Cal imploring her to trust him as much as he was trusting her. "I have no clue, she never hurt me. But why would you wanna be with her if that's how she makes you feel?"

"Because I am strong enough, I can take it!"

"Are you now? Same guy who can't take no for an answer?"

Cal knew he was going to pay for it but he felt that it was a necessary blow, and frankly he had been meaning to address that for a while. Still, when Burns hit him square on his kidney with the gun in yet another quick and skillful move he did realise he might have stepped a little too far. Only this time Burns was a little less quick in bringing back the chokehold and adrenaline kicked in, with Cal suddenly trying to wiggle out of it the best he could. What followed were a few seconds of chaos, with the two men oddly wrestling around and Gillian calling out Cal's name begging him to be careful. By the end of it however, not much had changed: they were back in the original position, only now they were a little closer to the open door and Burns had a small bloody cut on his cheek.

"Dave, please!" Gillian begged, she had promised herself not to do it but she saw how his face morphed into the sadly familiar expression of someone who was about to reach his boiling point and she couldn't let that happen. "Don't hurt him, please. If you want me to-"

"We're not doing that Gill, don't even think about it," Cal cut her off, dead serious even though he was the one in immediate danger. "You hear me? You said it yourself, we're not gonna let this weasel win."

"You talk a big game for someone in your position, Lightman." Burns laughed at him, wholeheartedly, and in doing so he missed the look between the two lovers. "That's what you always do, talk and talk and never listen. She's willing to come with me, she knows I'm best for her."

"C'mon now, you're a smart man Burnsy." Cal chuckled, a little too maniacally for Gillian's taste but she had to admit it seemed to be effective. "She's only talking to you because she wants to save me, don't you get it? She's trying to get you to let me go, and once you do she's going to drop your ass all over again."

"I won't let her go."

"But she'll never love you, not again."

"Shut up."

"And it's not because you left, or what you do or even because of all this mess you've created." Cal pushed on, surprising himself as much as the other two with his own relentlessness. "It's because you're a whiny little man with no spine, isn't it?"

That was…unexpected was the first word popping into Gillian's mind, but as the surprise came to her face something else went on in her mind: diabolical was more the word she was looking for, but also so derangedly brilliant. And before she knew it, she was giving Cal the smallest of nod or approval.

"You're not the man you used to be, Dave." She spoke softly, calmly, adding just enough of complacency to her voice to soften the blow while also striking mercilessly. "You're not the man I fell in love with anymore."

"I can be Gillian, I want to be that man again if you give me a chance-"

"Bloody hell mate! Where's your dignity?" Cal held back the fake laughter but laid heavily on the sarcasm. "That's your problem, you've become a moaning spineless thing. Is that why they left you?" He felt it, the bigger man's body tensing around him as his words struck a chord and, as crazy as it was, Cal relished in it. "One of them at least, am I right? I mean, the other just plain played you and didn't even see it coming. You think someone who gets dumped like that over and over again is enough for someone like her?"

"Shut up!"

It was roughly the third time Burns yelled that, and the third time he managed to strike Cal in the end without letting go of the gun, only this time he really took things up a notch with the choke hold and moved the gun down to Cal's side, pointing right at his stomach where they all knew a bullet could cause immediate and irreparable damage.

"You can't even take this from me, how are you going to deal with her leaving you again-"

"I said shut up! You- Stop!" In the blink of an eye his attention was on Gillian, who had taken a couple of small steps towards them. He pointed the gun at her all of a sudden, but Cal couldn't see that as a window of opportunity: if anything it was the opposite, he didn't care much about the danger for himself but a deadly weapon pointed at her was not something he was willing to take a chance on. "Gillian, I don't want to hurt you, I swear. But I can't let him be with you. He's not right for you, don't you see that?"

A lot of things flashed through Gillian's mind at that moment, thoughts and images and fears and hopes and a number of possible ways in which that situation might unfold, and despite the fact that almost none of them projected a positive outcome something flashed inside her: she wasn't going to let him win over them.

"I love him, Dave," she said then, steady and even with a sincere smile on her face, then she looked straight at Cal and her smile became even bigger. "I love you, Cal."

Her words triggered a lot of things, in all of them. It wasn't the first time she had said those words to him, not by a long shot, but it was the first time she was hit by how deeply, unconditionally and savagely she felt them; Cal was, despite everything, over the moon, seeing how truthful she was and how determined to make sure he could see all of it; but Burns had the biggest reaction of them all, with his whole body shaking as the intimate moment between the two lovers slapped him in the face with a violence he was not ready for.

So he did it, what he had been itching to do since he had learned that Cal was indeed the man that had replaced him, what he had thought about every time he had caught glimpses of them together, watched them make love and go everywhere without leaving each other's side after sending the police after him like a common criminal, all the way to when he had followed them from the office to there thinking about what he would do if he could only lay his hands on him.

He cocked the hammer of the gun and pushed it deeply into Cal's flesh, holding the trigger steady and ready to go with it, no matter what.

"We're gonna go now," he said then, frighteningly calm, with his eyes locked on Gillian. "Cal and I. But before we go, you're gonna tell him something."

"Dave, don't-"

"You're gonna tell him that everything will be alright. And then we're going to leave."

And then I'm going to kill him: that was what he meant, no question about it, and Gillian could not let that happen.

"Dave, listen to me please."

"I listened to you Gillian, but you're not returning the favour." Still calm on the surface, although Cal was getting dizzy for the lack of oxygen given how tight he was holding around his neck. "So now you'll do what I say. You're gonna tell him you love him, again, and you're gonna tell him everything will be fine." He paused for a second, showing off the gun and making sure she could see how serious he was. "Now."

Gillian swallowed a dry gulp, too scared to be able to think straight. Burns didn't need to be explicit, it was clear what he had in mind: take Cal away, kill him, drop him somewhere and leaving her alone without the chance to really say goodbye to him and with the never-ending fear of him still being out there somewhere, ready to come back and continue haunting her for the rest of her life.

"I- I can't," she mumbled in a broken voice, trembling and fighting back tears as she looked at Cal. "Cal, I can't-

Of course she couldn't, she was strong but Burns' request went beyond what was humanly possible. Cal had no doubt about it, mostly because he knew that if he had been in her shoes he'd never be able to come to terms with having to follow those sadistic instructions.

"Now!"

"I love you Cal, I love you." The words escaped her, tasting bitter in her mouth as she gave in knowing there was no point in it. "It's gonna be ok. Everything will be fine."

And there it was, the evil grin coming up to Burns' face as he got what he wanted, looking down at her as if he had just scored the ultimate win.

"That's a mean thing to do Gillian, lying to the man you love," he cackled sarcastically. "Especially when he knows you are."

If given the choice between saving himself and releasing Gillian from the emotional burden Burns was trying to put on her, Cal would have had no doubt. But he wasn't in her shoes, and short of trying his physical luck with a man who had already proved he could easily overpower him there wasn't much he could do aside from helping Gillian through the painful process.

Unless…

"Don't tell me you love me, Gillian. I don't need that, I know you do." He smiled, as sweetly and naturally as he could as the realisation hit him. There was no talking Burns out of it, he was a man on the edge, they all were: might as well just give him a push. "Will you marry me, Gill?"

The series of emotions on her face was quick and mostly random, anything between surprise and shock and relief, joy and even a touch of something he could only name as 'WTF did you just say to me'. But eventually the one he was looking for came to the surface and his heart leapt as he braced himself for what was about to come.

"Yes," Gillian said with a smile wet with tears. "I'll marry you, Cal."

"No!" Burns exploded, grabbing hold of Cal's neck and squeezing tight. "I won't let you have this!'

Cal didn't care about the yelling and manhandling, not anymore: all he cared about was that the woman he loved had just agreed to become his wife, and as corny and cliche as it was in that moment they only had eyes for each other. That was until Burns grabbed him again, elbowed him right on his nose and finally threw him on the ground with the gun firmly pointed at him just before the shot rang loud.

Gillian closed her eyes, not by choice but by instinct, scared by the noise and deadly flash of light and trying to prepare herself for what she would see once she'd reopened them. Cal lying on the ground, likely dead or mortally injured in a pool of blood with Burns standing over him with the gun still fuming in his hand and the crazed look of a man that had gone too far. She saw that in her mind, she heard the scream of pain following the shot and could already see herself being dragged away by a triumphant Burns without even the possibility to mourn the man she loved. For a moment, Gillian naively thought that if she kept her eyes closed forever then she'd never have to face what had just happened, that in her mind Cal was still alive and well and forever will be.

And she was still thinking that when she started to hear noises and voices, a lot of voices, at least one of them familiar enough to force her to open her eyes.