Complicated

Chapter Fifty Six: Moment

Is getting harder every night
To take the punches left and right
Just to know that you're here by my side
Here are my terms have some faith in me
And I'll let you be who you need to be

David Cook – Life On The Moon

The baby was pissed off, Grace could tell by the fact she had spent the last ten minutes vomiting her guts up in the ladies bathroom of the Crime Lab. It was six in the morning, Don had been taken just over twelve hours ago and now she had just developed morning sickness.

Grace didn't blame the baby for revolting against her at this point, she had hardly been fair to it over the past few hours. Her stress levels had been sky-rocketing, her diet had been littered with coffee and candy bars, she was not being kind at the moment. She thought that the baby may have given her a little lee way considering she'd been so invested in the search for it's daddy but the irate collection of cells inside her was unforgiving. It was telling her to slow down and take a breath but Grace was struggling. She couldn't lose Don or this baby, she simply could not.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." she murmured, her hand rubbing across her unsettled stomach.

"You need to slow down." Adam told her, his fingers raking through her hair and holding it back as another wave of nausea overtook her. "I know it's hard right now but this is the baby's way of telling you you need to start taking care of yourself."

"My husband is missing, how the hell am I supposed to 'slow down'?" she snapped, pressing the back of her hand to her mouth.

"Gracie, you have to stop this. You need to look after yourself and take care of this baby. You can't just let everything fall apart. Don needs something to come home to and if he finds out that you've been neglecting that baby, we'll never hear the end of it." Adam informed her.

Grace withdrew from the toilet closing the lid.

"I think I'm done." she told him rubbing her hand over her face.

Adam released her hair so it fell lankly around her shoulders. His hands were gentle and caring as he helped her to her feet. He watched as she slipped out of the stall and moved to the sink before turning on the cold water tap and rinsing out her mouth before splashing some of the water on her face. Adam passed her a paper towel, Grace used it to dry her face before turning towards him.

"Your right." she sighed. "I'm not doing my job as a mom."

"I think you can be forgiven for that but you need to start thinking of this baby even though all this other crazy stuff is happening." Adam told her. "That's what Don would want."

"I feel it you know?" she said quietly, her thumb toying with the St Michael's sovereign around her throat. "I know he's hurting so God damned badly, I can feel it right deep down inside my chest and there isn't a damn thing I can do about it. It's the only thing that's keeping me going because it means he's still alive."

There were no words that Adam could say to dispel the fear that resided between the both of them. There was an immense sadness in his bones and he would do anything to take away the despair in Grace's eyes right now. It had been a long time since he'd seen her so lost and hopeless. It wasn't fair, Grace didn't deserve this. Life just kept kicking her while she was down. It hurt him to see her so frightened.

His arms wrapped around her body impulsively. She sank into his embrace like someone who was drowning. Her hands were holding onto him, clutching at his T-shirt clasping him close. Her panic was overwhelming, he could feel it in her body as she began to tremble against his solid form. She was trying the best she could to hold everything together but sometimes Adam understood better than most it was simply too much. His lips brushed across her hair line as his scarred palm caressed the soft delicate skin of her cheek. He kissed her closed eyelids, her cheeks and eventually he came to those pert pink lips.

"Adam don't..." she whispered as his lips lingered just above hers.

Her words were like an electric shock pulsating through his system as his azure eyes snapped open. Grace was withdrawing already as Adam took an abrupt step back, his hand over his mouth in horror.

"God Grace what the hell was I doing?" he asked her mortified. "Your pregnant and your husband is missing, I don't even have an excuse, I don't even like you..."

Grace grasped at his hand, gently shushing him as Adam wrenched himself away from her attempts to calm him. This was bad, this was awful. He raked his hands through his wavy, untamed hair in agitation. He couldn't believe he had let himself get caught up like that. In the years he had known her, he had never reacted that way.

The truth was he had no romantic designs upon Grace, he never had. He understood the attraction for other men but he himself was never subject to her charms and he had never wanted to be. Too many emotions had been entangling up in the air and he had responded to her desperation, got caught up in it. All he had wanted to do was take away that terror and now he had screwed things up between the two of them.

"We didn't do anything. Our lips never met." Grace told him firmly. "We got caught up in a moment and that's ok, it happens. You were comforting me and our signals got crossed. It's fine."

Adam peered at her from between his fingers in disbelief. She was offering him a lifeline here. Her empathy and understanding of the situation reminded him why the two of them were friends in the first place. She had always had an uncanny ability to read him, just like he could always see underneath that mask she wore.

"Look if I had any doubt in my mind that Don was my soul mate I wouldn't have married him and I have never had a romantic feeling for you at all. I care about you deeply but just not in that way and I know it's the same way for you. You didn't want to kiss me because your attracted to me you just wanted to take away everything that I'm feeling right now and that's not your fault, it's what friends do." Grace explained, showing him the facts as she saw them.

She had hit the nail straight on the head and now the issue between them was resolving as he lay his own cards out on the table.

"I love you Grace but I don't want to be with you." he confirmed, shaking his head. "Your the closest friend I've got and I wanted you to know I'm here no matter what happens. I didn't mean to go that far I was just trying to make you feel better."

"Thank you." Grace said genuinely, massaging her stomach lightly. "For holding my hair back and for being here for me and the baby. I need someone to remind me I'm not invincible sometimes."

"Just because you have a Wonderwoman apron doesn't make it true." Adam pointed out, his lips twitching with the beginnings of a smile as the usual dynamic between them slipped into place once again.