Unprotected, 7
Title: Unprotected, 7/9
Pairing, Characters: House/Cuddy established. The DDX team. Wilson.
Warning: Explicit content in some chapters. It is always safe to assume some angst.
Summary: This one asks the question, what would the sharkverse House and Cuddy relationship be, without sex?
Disclaimer: House MD and all characters and settings therefrom are not my property. This is a work of fanfiction and I am not profiting from it in any way.
A/N: Thanks to all my readers for the comments on this story and the expressions of concern. I am sorry that I have not been responding to them. Its not that I don’t love and appreciate the dickens out of you all, it’s just that it’s taking everything I have got, energy-wise, to write and post. Slowly but surely I am making my way back, though, and I’m more grateful than I can tell you for your patience and encouragement.
Other than the word FEAR and the 4 circles forming the Venn diagram, the diagnostics monitor screen projection was blank.
Fizzou, his hair loose around his shoulders, wearing a green cabled scarf and a tight black t-shirt, sat at the small desk, talking to Chase.
“I'm not gonna say anything to her about it,” he said. His dark eyes were fixed in a permanent slant of distrust, but his voice was soft, and thick with the slowest, smoothest Southern drawl. “It’s her pet, you know? But having it around creeps me the hell out. I can feel it watching me, and it like, inhibits me.” His broad shoulders curled.
“Sorry I can’t help you with that,” Chase said flatly.
House was alone in his office, reading a magazine. He gave Cuddy a wary partial smile.
“Doctor House, meet our new department head, Doctor Walker.” Cuddy made the introduction, and braced herself.
He ignored Walker and smirked an accusation toward Cuddy. “This is a medical fixup.”
“Yes,” she replied sarcastically, “because every hire I make is about you.”
“Just the ones who are dating Wilson or specialize in pain management,” House said curtly. He narrowed his eyes at Larry. “Please tell me you’re only in one of those categories.”
Larry, blessedly, was unfazed. “I’ve sworn off men.”
“Bully for you. I’ve sworn off being bored by quacks. So, go away. Can’t you see I have a patient?” He gestured toward the almost empty screen in the conference room and went back to his reading.
Cuddy glanced at the empty overlapping circles on the board and shot an apologetic expression toward Larry, who was looking at the other magazines spread out on House’s desk: Mountaineering, Ultralight Backpacking, Whitewater, Climbing, National Geographic Adventure.
“What I see, is a complete absence of physical symptoms,” Cuddy said. “There is nothing wrong with the man.”
“There sure doesn’t seem to be, from here,” Larry remarked, ogling the cover photo and headline on Outdoors Magazine: Adventurer of the Year, Daniel Sawvey.
House’s eyes crinkled. “Your swearing off needs work.” He turned to Cuddy. “Mine doesn’t.”
“Considering that the last time I even mentioned his pain medication it turned into a horrible fight, the whole thing actually went better than I expected.“
Cuddy frowned. “And then my hair turned blue, and the world blew up.”
Wilson startled. “Mmm - what?”
She rolled her eyes. “You haven’t been listening to a word I’ve said.” Not nearly as irritated as she sounded, she craned her neck in the direction of Wilson’s thoughtful stare. Two tables back, Kate Stephens was deep in conversation with her former colleagues.
“Oh, come on,” she challenged the other radiologists. “You have to admit, it was funny.”
“One of those lunatics from diagnostics brings an obese rat into the hospital, it gets out of its cage and eats through the panel, demolishing half the imaging lab, and that amuses you?” Katherine Clevington shook her head over at Kathleen Honeycutt. “You’ve gone over to the dark side.”
“No, but when sparks shot out of the panel and Foreman got zapped, and his tie got singed, and the patient’s chart caught fire, and then the alarm sounded and all the lights went out, and Chase and Taub just stood there watching Foreman smack his chest and stomp on the flames, and House said, ‘This, kids, is why we can’t have nice things’ ? Now, that was funny. “
“I guess ya had to be there,” Caitlin Douglass admitted generously.
“Sorry.” Wilson looked away from the Kates. “What do women - normal women -- talk about when they’re together?’
Cuddy was perturbed to find herself wondering if the rat, Florecita, was all right. (Jesus, she even knew the damned thing’s name; what was happening to her?) She made a note to have a long conversation with House and Townsend.
“You’re asking me?” she snorted. “Wilson, you’re dating a normal woman. Possibly, the only one still on staff in this hospital.”
He looked helplessly miserable at that, so she added, “I don’t know. Probably the same things men talk about with their friends. What do you talk about with House?”
“I very much doubt,” he said drily, “that any woman has ever devoted an entire Tuesday evening to the eternal question, ‘which superhero should be added to the Avengers’?”
“One with Ironman’s wit and Captain America’s ass,” she responded instantly. Wilson looked a bit stunned, and she shrugged. “What?”
“Nothing,” he said awkwardly.
“How are the dinner party plans going?” Cuddy inquired, keeping to herself her opinion of Wilson’s grand idea. It seemed beyond patronizing to her to celebrate Kristen’s career change to event planner, by planning an event for her.
“I’ll put the grocery order in today. Spinach mini-quiches and stuffed mushrooms, beef burgundy, some baby root vegetables, a caramel apple tart. I'm going for simple, but elegant."
“Simple but elegant works,” she agreed politely. For all Cuddy knew, Kristen’s friends would be impressed and Kristen would be touched and pleased by Wilson’s efforts. The man could cook a mean beef burgundy.
“So, what’s going on with Rachel’s school?” Wilson changed the subject to the one thing that was more vexing than Cuddy’s questionable normality or his own inexplicable relationship management.
“House told you,” she surmised glumly.
“He said that the school administration is making some suggestions about Rachel being ‘not a good fit’ there.”
“Did he also remind you that that’s exactly what his first residency advisor said about him, right before dismissing him from the program?” Cuddy flexed her hand. “I may have even used that line myself on him, when I was firing him once. Never mind. I’m looking at other options. Don’t tell House, but Summerfield has openings in Rachel’s grade. I went for a visit this morning.”
“Why don’t you want House to know that?”
“Because he’ll mock it mercilessly.” Cuddy gave up on trying to eat. “Hell, if I weren’t so desperate, I’d mock it mercilessly, myself.”
The school brochures described Summerfield as an “intentional educational community, partnering and integrating with diverse families for the purposes of creating and claiming a peaceful, self-actualized future through culture by nurturing whole child development.” Translation: Hippy-Dippy Woo Central. The second grade was actually called the Rainbow Room, and when Cuddy asked about the second grade curriculum, the Rainbow Room’s teacher had delivered, in a soft, breathy voice that made Cuddy long for a pump-action shotgun, a long, vague and peripatetic sermon, the gist of which was that Rachel would learn conflict resolution and verbal skills - one could only hope these included the ability to answer a direct question -- by hearing Eastern Hemisphere folklore.
When she asked about test scores and homework policies, Cuddy had been treated to a blank yet scornful look and a tour of the school’s - admittedly, very impressive - art and music classrooms.
“I won’t tell him,” Wilson promised, but Cuddy smiled disbelievingly, giving him tacit permission to be the first to hear House’s lavish application of ridicule.
Kate Stephens recounted something about Taub’s claim to being a “clutch hitter.” Chase had evidently made a derisive and very insightful innuendo about Foreman and golf, to which Shaeffer had added something twangy and cutting about “bass fishing.” The consensus of the Kates (the Katesensus?) was that this was all hilarious. It probably was, in context.
“Weird and annoying as Summerfield is, it may be exactly what Rachel needs,” Cuddy confessed. “If that’s the case, I’ll just have to deal with it.” She was dismayed to recognize a resigned tone in her voice that reminded her of her mother. Her mind reeled briefly at the foggy prospect of a future son-in-law.
“I know exactly what you mean,” Wilson sighed.
“Oh, shut up.”
House had looked at the scans, read the history, and ordered the tests. He’d put his own two eyeballs on every sample. He’d entertained every dumbass idea that every member of his team had come up with. He’d even talked to the patient.
And the only thing he could find wrong with the patient, was that the patient believed, with a bedrock certainty, that there was something wrong with him.
“I’m afraid,” he’d said simply. “Every time in my career, every single expedition where I’ve been afraid, there’s been a reason, a damned good one. So if I'm scared to go on any expedition, it has to be for a damned good reason, and it has to be about me.”
House believed him. The guy was said, by his sponsors, videographers, journalists, and all his fellow overgrown boy scouts, to have some kind of sixth sense. On several occasions he’d accurately predicted sudden and drastic weather changes. He was purportedly an expert in “reading” rapids and terrain, and his navigation skills were described with something like awe.
Okay, so he was a talented observer of sensory inputs that were indiscernible to others, and House had to believe that he’d also correctly interpret subtle signals from his own physiology.
Dan Sawvey survived by having confidence in his instincts, and those instincts were telling him that he was sick. When no fewer than nine doctors at four hospitals had been unable to confirm his intuitions, he’d contracted House - dared him, actually - to find out how sick and with what.
“The thing about death,” Thirteen said, appearing suddenly on the piano bench behind House, “is that it speaks in very short sentences. Two, three words, max.”
“Oh, crap,” House moaned. “I was wondering when you’d show up.” He’d fallen asleep on the couch again, and now he was going to wake up in the morning with another crick in his neck.
“You’ll appreciate that,” Thirteen said, reading his thoughts. “The discomfort will distract you. Oddly enough, from thinking about … distractions.” She pointed at his cell phone, next to the patient file on the coffee table. “If you really have no intention of consulting with this Doctor Walker - and do, please congratulate Cuddy for me on finding a doctor for you with such an ironic name -- why are you keeping that pain journal?”
“Were you this much of a bitch when you weren't dying?”
“Your last haunt was Amber, and now you’re dreaming me; what does that tell you about your preferences?” She ambled over and picked up his phone, scrolling through his notes. “Very thorough,” she said approvingly. “Time, to the minute, intensity, and whatever other distracting activity you’re engaged in. And you’re managing to keep the descriptions brief, so you don’t have your attention linger on the pain for any longer than necessary as you record it. Smart. What’s ‘j’ shorthand for? “
“Jangling. S is for stabbing, P is for piercing, PK for pokers, there’s c for clamping..”
“B for burning?”
“Bear, chewing on my leg.”
“I don’t see any dosages listed.” She sat down and crossed her legs, right over left, at the knee. On her right wrist, when she tossed the phone back to him, dangled five silver bracelets. “No oxy, vicodin, percoset … or methadone.”
“Psychosis and cognitive impairment,” he pointed out.
“If you loved her, you might be willing to take a little cognitive impairment, in exchange for a higher quality of life with her, for her sake. With where you’re starting, it’s not like it would turn you into an idiot, or even make you average. Taking methadone could be a noble, romantic sacrifice, like in … “ Her eyes panned the darkened room, landed at the shelf of DVDs next to the television, and then sparked with amusement. “… The Little Mermaid? Do you seriously live here now?”
“I am a guy with a flowered couch, a library of Disney movies, and a crockpot.”
“And an addictive personality, chronic pain, and no tolerance for opiates. You aren’t giving her many options, you know.”
“It’s not my fault the medicine hasn’t advanced in two hundred years. Morphine and its derivatives are still the gold standard for pain control; nothing I can do about that.”
Thirteen smiled knowingly. “I wasn’t talking about Walker.”
When he limped into the bedroom, massaging his neck and still trying to clear his mind of the Thirteen dream, Cuddy’s bedside light was on. A book lay flopped open on the floor beside her:You Can’t Make Me (But I Can Be Persuaded): Strategies for Bringing Out the Best in Your Strong-willed Child.
House shook his head and pulled his phone out of his pajama pants pocket. He entered in a letter and the time and, after a pause, typed looking at Lisa.
This was not one of the nights that her lips and jaw would be kiss-bruised, or the movements of her legs would indicate a faint soreness. She was nestled into a pile of pillows, the sheet wrapped taut around the round of her tummy and the droop of her breasts, and with her lids closed he could just make out the tiny lines spreading from the corners of her eyes like gossamer spider webs. House captured a strand of her hair and pinched it between his fingers, half-expecting the lone thread of silver to feel colder or more brittle to his touch than the feathery brown of her curls. For such a lovely creature, it was kind of amazing how much of her beauty came from the sensual, graceful way she held herself, from the snap of her eyes, the sparkle of her smile. Awake, she was all vivacious, dazzling energy and tenacity and wit; asleep, she was simply a very pretty middle-aged woman.
He reached across her body to turn off the light. She clasped his hand and pulled it around her as she rolled over, bossy even in her sleep.
With resignation and an unfamiliar sense of what he supposed could be called peace, he curled himself against her, closed his eyes, and consigned the puzzles to his subconscious.
Part 8
Pairing, Characters: House/Cuddy established. The DDX team. Wilson.
Warning: Explicit content in some chapters. It is always safe to assume some angst.
Summary: This one asks the question, what would the sharkverse House and Cuddy relationship be, without sex?
Disclaimer: House MD and all characters and settings therefrom are not my property. This is a work of fanfiction and I am not profiting from it in any way.
A/N: Thanks to all my readers for the comments on this story and the expressions of concern. I am sorry that I have not been responding to them. Its not that I don’t love and appreciate the dickens out of you all, it’s just that it’s taking everything I have got, energy-wise, to write and post. Slowly but surely I am making my way back, though, and I’m more grateful than I can tell you for your patience and encouragement.
Other than the word FEAR and the 4 circles forming the Venn diagram, the diagnostics monitor screen projection was blank.
Fizzou, his hair loose around his shoulders, wearing a green cabled scarf and a tight black t-shirt, sat at the small desk, talking to Chase.
“I'm not gonna say anything to her about it,” he said. His dark eyes were fixed in a permanent slant of distrust, but his voice was soft, and thick with the slowest, smoothest Southern drawl. “It’s her pet, you know? But having it around creeps me the hell out. I can feel it watching me, and it like, inhibits me.” His broad shoulders curled.
“Sorry I can’t help you with that,” Chase said flatly.
House was alone in his office, reading a magazine. He gave Cuddy a wary partial smile.
“Doctor House, meet our new department head, Doctor Walker.” Cuddy made the introduction, and braced herself.
He ignored Walker and smirked an accusation toward Cuddy. “This is a medical fixup.”
“Yes,” she replied sarcastically, “because every hire I make is about you.”
“Just the ones who are dating Wilson or specialize in pain management,” House said curtly. He narrowed his eyes at Larry. “Please tell me you’re only in one of those categories.”
Larry, blessedly, was unfazed. “I’ve sworn off men.”
“Bully for you. I’ve sworn off being bored by quacks. So, go away. Can’t you see I have a patient?” He gestured toward the almost empty screen in the conference room and went back to his reading.
Cuddy glanced at the empty overlapping circles on the board and shot an apologetic expression toward Larry, who was looking at the other magazines spread out on House’s desk: Mountaineering, Ultralight Backpacking, Whitewater, Climbing, National Geographic Adventure.
“What I see, is a complete absence of physical symptoms,” Cuddy said. “There is nothing wrong with the man.”
“There sure doesn’t seem to be, from here,” Larry remarked, ogling the cover photo and headline on Outdoors Magazine: Adventurer of the Year, Daniel Sawvey.
House’s eyes crinkled. “Your swearing off needs work.” He turned to Cuddy. “Mine doesn’t.”
“Considering that the last time I even mentioned his pain medication it turned into a horrible fight, the whole thing actually went better than I expected.“
Cuddy frowned. “And then my hair turned blue, and the world blew up.”
Wilson startled. “Mmm - what?”
She rolled her eyes. “You haven’t been listening to a word I’ve said.” Not nearly as irritated as she sounded, she craned her neck in the direction of Wilson’s thoughtful stare. Two tables back, Kate Stephens was deep in conversation with her former colleagues.
“Oh, come on,” she challenged the other radiologists. “You have to admit, it was funny.”
“One of those lunatics from diagnostics brings an obese rat into the hospital, it gets out of its cage and eats through the panel, demolishing half the imaging lab, and that amuses you?” Katherine Clevington shook her head over at Kathleen Honeycutt. “You’ve gone over to the dark side.”
“No, but when sparks shot out of the panel and Foreman got zapped, and his tie got singed, and the patient’s chart caught fire, and then the alarm sounded and all the lights went out, and Chase and Taub just stood there watching Foreman smack his chest and stomp on the flames, and House said, ‘This, kids, is why we can’t have nice things’ ? Now, that was funny. “
“I guess ya had to be there,” Caitlin Douglass admitted generously.
“Sorry.” Wilson looked away from the Kates. “What do women - normal women -- talk about when they’re together?’
Cuddy was perturbed to find herself wondering if the rat, Florecita, was all right. (Jesus, she even knew the damned thing’s name; what was happening to her?) She made a note to have a long conversation with House and Townsend.
“You’re asking me?” she snorted. “Wilson, you’re dating a normal woman. Possibly, the only one still on staff in this hospital.”
He looked helplessly miserable at that, so she added, “I don’t know. Probably the same things men talk about with their friends. What do you talk about with House?”
“I very much doubt,” he said drily, “that any woman has ever devoted an entire Tuesday evening to the eternal question, ‘which superhero should be added to the Avengers’?”
“One with Ironman’s wit and Captain America’s ass,” she responded instantly. Wilson looked a bit stunned, and she shrugged. “What?”
“Nothing,” he said awkwardly.
“How are the dinner party plans going?” Cuddy inquired, keeping to herself her opinion of Wilson’s grand idea. It seemed beyond patronizing to her to celebrate Kristen’s career change to event planner, by planning an event for her.
“I’ll put the grocery order in today. Spinach mini-quiches and stuffed mushrooms, beef burgundy, some baby root vegetables, a caramel apple tart. I'm going for simple, but elegant."
“Simple but elegant works,” she agreed politely. For all Cuddy knew, Kristen’s friends would be impressed and Kristen would be touched and pleased by Wilson’s efforts. The man could cook a mean beef burgundy.
“So, what’s going on with Rachel’s school?” Wilson changed the subject to the one thing that was more vexing than Cuddy’s questionable normality or his own inexplicable relationship management.
“House told you,” she surmised glumly.
“He said that the school administration is making some suggestions about Rachel being ‘not a good fit’ there.”
“Did he also remind you that that’s exactly what his first residency advisor said about him, right before dismissing him from the program?” Cuddy flexed her hand. “I may have even used that line myself on him, when I was firing him once. Never mind. I’m looking at other options. Don’t tell House, but Summerfield has openings in Rachel’s grade. I went for a visit this morning.”
“Why don’t you want House to know that?”
“Because he’ll mock it mercilessly.” Cuddy gave up on trying to eat. “Hell, if I weren’t so desperate, I’d mock it mercilessly, myself.”
The school brochures described Summerfield as an “intentional educational community, partnering and integrating with diverse families for the purposes of creating and claiming a peaceful, self-actualized future through culture by nurturing whole child development.” Translation: Hippy-Dippy Woo Central. The second grade was actually called the Rainbow Room, and when Cuddy asked about the second grade curriculum, the Rainbow Room’s teacher had delivered, in a soft, breathy voice that made Cuddy long for a pump-action shotgun, a long, vague and peripatetic sermon, the gist of which was that Rachel would learn conflict resolution and verbal skills - one could only hope these included the ability to answer a direct question -- by hearing Eastern Hemisphere folklore.
When she asked about test scores and homework policies, Cuddy had been treated to a blank yet scornful look and a tour of the school’s - admittedly, very impressive - art and music classrooms.
“I won’t tell him,” Wilson promised, but Cuddy smiled disbelievingly, giving him tacit permission to be the first to hear House’s lavish application of ridicule.
Kate Stephens recounted something about Taub’s claim to being a “clutch hitter.” Chase had evidently made a derisive and very insightful innuendo about Foreman and golf, to which Shaeffer had added something twangy and cutting about “bass fishing.” The consensus of the Kates (the Katesensus?) was that this was all hilarious. It probably was, in context.
“Weird and annoying as Summerfield is, it may be exactly what Rachel needs,” Cuddy confessed. “If that’s the case, I’ll just have to deal with it.” She was dismayed to recognize a resigned tone in her voice that reminded her of her mother. Her mind reeled briefly at the foggy prospect of a future son-in-law.
“I know exactly what you mean,” Wilson sighed.
“Oh, shut up.”
House had looked at the scans, read the history, and ordered the tests. He’d put his own two eyeballs on every sample. He’d entertained every dumbass idea that every member of his team had come up with. He’d even talked to the patient.
And the only thing he could find wrong with the patient, was that the patient believed, with a bedrock certainty, that there was something wrong with him.
“I’m afraid,” he’d said simply. “Every time in my career, every single expedition where I’ve been afraid, there’s been a reason, a damned good one. So if I'm scared to go on any expedition, it has to be for a damned good reason, and it has to be about me.”
House believed him. The guy was said, by his sponsors, videographers, journalists, and all his fellow overgrown boy scouts, to have some kind of sixth sense. On several occasions he’d accurately predicted sudden and drastic weather changes. He was purportedly an expert in “reading” rapids and terrain, and his navigation skills were described with something like awe.
Okay, so he was a talented observer of sensory inputs that were indiscernible to others, and House had to believe that he’d also correctly interpret subtle signals from his own physiology.
Dan Sawvey survived by having confidence in his instincts, and those instincts were telling him that he was sick. When no fewer than nine doctors at four hospitals had been unable to confirm his intuitions, he’d contracted House - dared him, actually - to find out how sick and with what.
“The thing about death,” Thirteen said, appearing suddenly on the piano bench behind House, “is that it speaks in very short sentences. Two, three words, max.”
“Oh, crap,” House moaned. “I was wondering when you’d show up.” He’d fallen asleep on the couch again, and now he was going to wake up in the morning with another crick in his neck.
“You’ll appreciate that,” Thirteen said, reading his thoughts. “The discomfort will distract you. Oddly enough, from thinking about … distractions.” She pointed at his cell phone, next to the patient file on the coffee table. “If you really have no intention of consulting with this Doctor Walker - and do, please congratulate Cuddy for me on finding a doctor for you with such an ironic name -- why are you keeping that pain journal?”
“Were you this much of a bitch when you weren't dying?”
“Your last haunt was Amber, and now you’re dreaming me; what does that tell you about your preferences?” She ambled over and picked up his phone, scrolling through his notes. “Very thorough,” she said approvingly. “Time, to the minute, intensity, and whatever other distracting activity you’re engaged in. And you’re managing to keep the descriptions brief, so you don’t have your attention linger on the pain for any longer than necessary as you record it. Smart. What’s ‘j’ shorthand for? “
“Jangling. S is for stabbing, P is for piercing, PK for pokers, there’s c for clamping..”
“B for burning?”
“Bear, chewing on my leg.”
“I don’t see any dosages listed.” She sat down and crossed her legs, right over left, at the knee. On her right wrist, when she tossed the phone back to him, dangled five silver bracelets. “No oxy, vicodin, percoset … or methadone.”
“Psychosis and cognitive impairment,” he pointed out.
“If you loved her, you might be willing to take a little cognitive impairment, in exchange for a higher quality of life with her, for her sake. With where you’re starting, it’s not like it would turn you into an idiot, or even make you average. Taking methadone could be a noble, romantic sacrifice, like in … “ Her eyes panned the darkened room, landed at the shelf of DVDs next to the television, and then sparked with amusement. “… The Little Mermaid? Do you seriously live here now?”
“I am a guy with a flowered couch, a library of Disney movies, and a crockpot.”
“And an addictive personality, chronic pain, and no tolerance for opiates. You aren’t giving her many options, you know.”
“It’s not my fault the medicine hasn’t advanced in two hundred years. Morphine and its derivatives are still the gold standard for pain control; nothing I can do about that.”
Thirteen smiled knowingly. “I wasn’t talking about Walker.”
When he limped into the bedroom, massaging his neck and still trying to clear his mind of the Thirteen dream, Cuddy’s bedside light was on. A book lay flopped open on the floor beside her:You Can’t Make Me (But I Can Be Persuaded): Strategies for Bringing Out the Best in Your Strong-willed Child.
House shook his head and pulled his phone out of his pajama pants pocket. He entered in a letter and the time and, after a pause, typed looking at Lisa.
This was not one of the nights that her lips and jaw would be kiss-bruised, or the movements of her legs would indicate a faint soreness. She was nestled into a pile of pillows, the sheet wrapped taut around the round of her tummy and the droop of her breasts, and with her lids closed he could just make out the tiny lines spreading from the corners of her eyes like gossamer spider webs. House captured a strand of her hair and pinched it between his fingers, half-expecting the lone thread of silver to feel colder or more brittle to his touch than the feathery brown of her curls. For such a lovely creature, it was kind of amazing how much of her beauty came from the sensual, graceful way she held herself, from the snap of her eyes, the sparkle of her smile. Awake, she was all vivacious, dazzling energy and tenacity and wit; asleep, she was simply a very pretty middle-aged woman.
He reached across her body to turn off the light. She clasped his hand and pulled it around her as she rolled over, bossy even in her sleep.
With resignation and an unfamiliar sense of what he supposed could be called peace, he curled himself against her, closed his eyes, and consigned the puzzles to his subconscious.
Part 8