Hey guys! If you've been checking in with my other stuff you realise I have an issue with updating (or lack thereof). I just want to apologise for dragging this out so long, and I'm happy to say this is the final chapter!

That being said, it is me just partially being lazy. I was originally going to split this into a final two, but I was on a role with the second part and figured I should just finish it. I want to add as a disclaimer at this point that I profusely hope this isn't an anticlimax or let-down ending. As i've said before, I sincerely suck at writing action scenes, so I apologise in advance for the fairly open ended resolution to this story in terms of the police-aspect to this plot. (Sounds dumb even as I'm typing this but I will genuinely try to better myself as I continue to write.) Anyway I want to thank everyone who stuck with me in this story, for both nagging and encouraging me to finish (it really is the only way i get anything done!) You all rock!

Three minutes passed. And nothing. Not a word or update was given to the Intelligence Unit.

Erin was pressed against Hank, trying desperately to get comfort at a time where comfort was near enough impossible. Tears threatened to fall but Erin forced them away; she forced herself to be strong.

It was getting darker with each passing second, a bright moon illuminating the sight. Maybe it wasn't that dark, but that's just how Erin saw it.

She tried to maintain composure, but it was getting harder and harder.

"The bomb squad know what they're doing." Antonio had whispered to her. Maybe they did, but Jay didn't. He'd had little to no training in defusing bombs; what he was engaging in was a suicide mission.

More uniform police filed in, an array of police cars and ambulance vans clogging up the streets. At some point Kim joined the unit, running straight to Ruzek. Lindsay watched with a heavy heart as they fell into each others arm, feeling something hitch inside of her when Adam put an arm around Burgess in a strong hold that kept her close.

"You should go and get checked out," Voight commented quietly, any harshness to his voice completely gone.

"I'm not going anywhere." Erin said. Her voice was unwavering and Hank didn't push it.

Another five minutes passed, although it felt like fifty, and anything left in Erin was dwindling. Her sunken lids quivered as she looked desperately at the building, praying to God there was a such thing as a happy ending.

Her tongue darted out to her bottom lip as she dropped her head, feeling the brimming of tears as she bit back any sound.

She thought back to her lasts, realising she could maybe the last time she saw Jay Halstead to the list. She felt sick at the thought.

People rallied around her but she took nothing in. Instead she held a lazy, exhausted gaze at her feet, trying absolutely everything to hold herself together.

"It's him!"

Erin didn't know who said it, whether it be Ruzek, Dawson or Atwater or maybe even Voight, unlikely as it was. She didn't care who said it, either.

All she did was lift her head, feeling something tense inside of her at the sight of Jay. Her legs were in pain, but in a single second all pain was gone. She wasn't running, it was more like flying. Flying home.

She jumped the barriers, ignoring the distant cries telling her she needed to stay back. Everything was background noise. Lindsay's legs took her faster than ever before, with everything inside of her crying out for Jay Halstead.

He broke out into a run at the sight of her, too. They reached each other within seconds, smacking their racing bodies together with such force it hurt. Neither cared to let go though. They clung to each other, Erin's head buried deep in Jay's neck while her arms wrapped round. A feeling of unexplainable safety swept over her body as his hands locked round her back. She was shaking, her eyes were brimming. She held his solid frame, all the while a chanting in her head never ceasing:

He's safe. He's safe. He's safe.

He smelled of smoke and dust. And she never wanted to let go.

She could feel his shaky breathing in her ear. "Voight's looking."

"I don't care."

She felt him grasp tighten, as though scared she was going to slip free. The wind was bitterly cold around them, but in a way it was like they were sheltered from the world everyone else lived in. Lindsay could hear distant chatter, but it was hazy. Foggy, almost. She could only hear Jay's breathing in her ear and his heart hammering against his chest, pressed right to hers.

"I thought I'd lost you." She whispered, something inside of her breaking with the words.

"I'm not going anywhere."

Erin had never been more glad to hear anything in her life.

Kelly looked pale when he showed up, immediately holding her tight. She'd just finished with her check-up, and everything appeared relatively okay, although Erin made a point to not show her wrists around - The rope burns had left quite the marks.

She had a deep blue blanket wrapped around her shoulders, and Severide was desperately rubbing up and down her arms to generate heat.

Lindsay tried to keep composed, smiling at the right points and holding him back when he pulled her into him, but it was getting tiring. The day had taken a real toll on her.

He was saying something to her but she struggled to grab onto any words. Her eyes were drifting. She looked past him and to the back of the ambulance a couple of yards away.

Halstead was sitting in the back while a paramedic was shining a light into his eyes, checking his pupil response. He'd had a gash on his eyebrow stitched up and the small wound on his leg from the shard of glass had been cleaned up.

It was almost magnetic, the way he'd looked up like he knew she was waiting to meet his eyes. He looked withdrawn an empty, yet she felt a warmth from his eyes.

She quickly looked away and up at Kelly, who by the looks of it had stopped talking a while ago.

"What is it?" He asked, hitching his eyebrow slightly.

She gulped and looked at him. "We need to talk."

Somewhere in the chaos, they got swept away from each other. Jay was getting patted on the back and fist bumped left, right and centre. He tried telling them that he hadn't done anything; the bomb squad saved the city today, not him. Apart from taking out a few guys still in the building, guarding the explosive, his role was virtually non-existent.

As he stood next to Dawson, he thought back to his moments in there. The wires jumped in front of him, begging to be cut. He wasn't a specialist and had no clue how to even start rendering the device safe. He felt sweat coat his forehead, his hands shaking as he knelt before the explosive. A gulp in his throat amplified throughout his entire body. There was a pain in his leg from the glass and he just hoped infection wasn't likely. And then he thought of Erin, praying more than anything else that she was outside of the building.

"Jay?" Someone was talking to him, but his mind was elsewhere.

"Huh?"

Ruzek came into focus, smiling at him. "Drink? Pretty sure everyone's buying for you tonight, buddy."

Halstead smiled weakly and even briefly considered it. But his leg was hurting, and his throat was lined with dust, and his whole body ached. What he needed was sleep. And maybe a scotch at home.

Erin didn't want to break up with her boyfriend after a day like that. The look of genuine fear on his face told her that they weren't just a petty fling; he really cared for her. And she cared for him too. But there was someone else there, and he knew it as well.

They didn't say who, because that would've been too real. Instead they parted amicably, hugging for what would be the last time and holding on a fraction of a second longer. It was goodbye. And as Erin watched him stride down the street, eventually fading into the night, she knew there was somewhere she needed to be.

After rifling through the crowd, Lindsay hunted down Adam who said Jay had gone home. Apparently his co-workers offered to come by, but Halstead claimed he wanted a quiet night alone. Yet even knowing that, Erin didn't waver for a second.

The drive to her partner's was quiet and painful, as though everything was finally being put into perspective. The walk up his building stairwell seemed longer than the drive, anticipation building in her veins until she found his door and rapped it three times.

When the door opened, she was back in that room. Glass littered around them and Jay's face lit up in the dark. She shook the memory from her mind and forced a weak smile. A weak smile he reciprocated.

"Hey." He said, hoarse.

"Hey." For a few seconds it was just the two of them stood in silence. "Can I come in?"

This time his smile wasn't weak at all. Jay stepped aside and watched as Erin made her way inside. She hugged her jacket close to her, somehow still unable to get warm. As he padded into the kitchen, she followed. Beers at his place was somehow sort of a tradition. Although not tonight; tonight, she wanted to be sober.

She was about to tell him not to grab her a drink, but she got sucked into him somehow.

He'd changed clothes; although only into a different shade t-shirt with a darker pair of jeans. His eyes were sunken heavy into his face, and he looked like she felt. Exhausted.

"Beer?" He asked, not waiting for an answer before opening the fridge door and whisking two bottles from the top shelf.

She opened her mouth to say no, but felt at a loss of words at the sight. His shirt rode up as he reached, just a little at the back, baring the tiniest strip of skin. But that was enough.

His flesh was battered, bruising in purple splotches that twisted something deep inside of Erin.

"Oh my god."

She breathed the words out, her shoulders weighing down and her heartbeat slowing. She found her way next to him, her eyes wide into his.

"Let me see." She whispered.

His head shook slightly and he took a step back, dropping his beer to the counter. "I'm fine. Really."

She met his gaze and got lost in the blue of his eyes. A dark, broken blue that cracked in the dim light of his apartment.

"Take off your shirt." There was no room for compromise in her voice. Although still a near whisper, there was a steeliness that she knew he couldn't ignore.

He looked at her for a second longer. He took in her pleading eyes and her determined look. He let out a defeated breath and swiped his shirt from the back of his neck in one swift motion, turning his back to his partner.

Erin took an unconscious step backwards. His back was a canvas, once milky and smooth, now tainted with beatings of purple and green, smearing in a painful collision. Her fingertips were gliding against the skin of his back, eliciting a shiver from him as she traced the bruises. The bruising of skin that she inflicted with her careless words.

"I'm so sorry..."

Jay turned around at her voice, his head shaking and his eyes hard.

"This isn't your fault. I've had worse. I told you, I'm fine."

She looked again at his body, her icy fingertips finding their way carelessly to his tensed abdominal muscles. The discolouring of skin there had only just developed, too. She lost a breath thinking about what the fully formed bruises would look like in the morning.

He was brushing her off, and she didn't believe a word he was saying. After his words left his throat, he left his partner in the kitchen, stalking to the couch in the hopes of minimising the intensity of their conversation. He tugged his shirt back on his body as he went.

Lindsay swallowed the lump at the back of her throat and wondered when the tears in her eyes had formed. She told herself it was the roller coaster events of the day, just her hormones kicking in after an emotional wreckage. She blinked them away and followed him, taking a seat alongside her partner as she struggled to find words to say.

They sat in silence, Jay's bruised body being the only thing on her mind.

"Are you okay?" He asked after an eternity.

She let out a dark, hollow laughter that broke through the endless silence between them. Because only Jay Halstead could get pounded like a steak and wonder if she was okay.

"I'm not the one who's black and blue."

He dropped his head, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck.

"I was so scared today." She whispered into the space between them. Her eyes squeezed shut and she felt her lip quiver. "I was so scared."

She saw flashes of the events. Her eyes squeezed tighter. She was gritting her teeth now.

She felt him lean forward, felt his forehead press lightly against hers.

"I'm okay. We're okay."

Erin felt their breathing sync. She felt his chest fall and rise to the timing of hers. She felt all of him breathing in her space.

Rain pattered outside, smacking off the windows messily and unevenly.

Pressed so close to her partner, Erin was aching. She ached for his warm feel, his real touch. Even sitting right next to him, she could feel him slipping away. She could feel him running down that corridor, running to death.

As she pushed the memories from her mind, she moved again closer, their foreheads sliding as she struggled to control her breathing. She wanted him. And she hated herself for waiting so long to admit the simple fact.

She wanted him.

Their noses glided against one another. Their lips were so close.

Jay's breathing became shallow. She could feel the thudding of his heart. The rain poured.

And then, somewhere in the midst of shallow breathing and thudding hearts, Erin was finally getting the contact she was craving.

He kissed her softly, their lips in a touch so light that she felt goosebumps erupt over her entire body. It was a kiss that triumphed every other kiss she'd ever experienced. A kiss she felt everywhere.

Lindsay's fingertips trailed up his torso to the curve of his collarbone, sliding to the base of his neck where fingers extended.

After what felt like a lifetime, she felt him pull away, leaving their faces inches from each other. Jay's eyes were held shut, regaining his breathing.

Erin licked her lips and let her fingers find their way to his jaw. Her thumb glided across the corner of his mouth. She needed all the indication she could get that this was real.

This time, she kissed him. With more urgency and longing, she already felt her lips burning up as she moved faster against him.

A few seconds later, Halstead was tugging her leather jacket from her shoulders, slipping it backwards and from her frame. It was tossed carelessly behind her, but she was too wrapped up in the taste of her partner to wonder where.

Her tongue slipped in his mouth. He was an amazing kisser. She'd never admit it to him, but he was.

At some point she felt his hand on her thigh, driving her wild. His other hand landed in the waves of her hair, twisted around his fingers tugging at her neck.

The breath was stolen from Erin's lungs and she was suddenly inexplicably content. With her warm mouth against Jay's, she felt safer than she had in a long time.

Their bubble popped shortly, with a buzzing erupting from the back pocket of Lindsay's jeans.

With a groan she separated them, licking her swollen lips, looking down at Jay's as she retrieved the ringing device. With a dizzy mind and pounding heart, Erin put the phone to her ear without even checking who it was. She was too absorbed with the taste lacing her tongue.

"Yeah." She stated boldly once accepting the call, feeling Halstead's hand sliding further up her thigh. "Oh, Voight."

Jay stopped in his tracks, an unconscious sigh of discontent slipping from his lips. Against his inner desire, he pulled back slightly. The mood had gone.

"No, I'm fine. I just had somewhere to be."

Erin ran a hand through her tousled hair and shut her eyes temporarily.

"I can't right now." She spoke into the phone, her eyes lifting to the gaze of her partner. "I'm at Jay's. I'm busy, I'll see you tomorrow."

Jay could hear a voice on the other end, speaking even as Erin hit the 'end call' button. It seemed pretty surreal to him.

As she dropped the phone on the table with certainty, Jay kept his eyes on the device. It buzzed again within seconds, and Jay felt wonder at the way Erin turned her phone off without a second thought.

He was still looking at the table, even as Erin slid off her boots, the zipping bouncing from the walls.

She took a second to breathe, to decide this is what she wanted. There was no hesitation. As she looked into his bright, innocently blue eyes, she realised there was everything in them.

There were seconds where, if she closed her eyes for a second too long, she was back in that room. And she was thick with adrenaline. And she was struck with the realisation that nothing lasts forever.

Erin's hands went to the corners of her shirt, grabbing the hem and tugging it up and over her head. She noted she'd never been this undressed in front of Halstead before. She shivered in just the bra covering her chest and upper body.

Her eyes went to Jay, and she observed the way he was looking at her. Wide eyes and a nervous glaze to his countenance. It looked as though he'd never seen anyone in just their bra before. It was always his looks that managed to melt her. But this look was different - it was unfamiliar. It was hopeful and dizzy and nerve stricken. It was something they'd both waited for. And now, with broken bodies and battered minds, it was happening.

Erin held onto the material of her shirt for a second longer before dropping it next to her on the couch. Jay's eyes followed the motion. She then took initiative, slid onto his lap while her fingers grazed the skin of his neck.

They were both breathing heavy. Anticipation filled her veins.

"Erin..." He spoke warily, fully aware of the fact if they were to go beyond this point, it would kill him to stop.

She silenced his worry with a hard kiss, tugging at his hair and nipping at his lips. Seconds passed and he let his gentle touch find her bare sides.

He finally found his courage. Deciding to move them to his bedroom, Halstead lifted the two of them from the couch. Erin tightened her legs around him, holding on.

They stumbled their way through the dark, laughing into each other's mouths.

Jay finally got them to his room with clumsy certainty, sliding the two of them through the small entrance of his half opened door. It was a softer light, and as Jay pushed them both onto the bed, Erin noted how even the rain seemed to quiet for the two of them.

Her head found the pillow, and Jay hovering over her added a layer of warmth. Their lips collided again, swiftly and softly. His hands were more secure now, more comfortable. Gripping her waist as though he'd been doing it forever.

They stayed like that for a few more moments, and after a numbness in her lips was starting to set in, he pulled away. Kisses were pecked on her jaw, sliding down the her collarbone. Erin hissed in a breath.

He went further, past the thin lace of her bra down her toned abdomen. Sloppy kisses left her breathless. He reached the bottom of her stomach, the top of her jeans, and Erin was starting to feel dizzy. He popped the button open in a second, before travelling back up her body and kissing her lips again, hard.

Her body was practically humming with anticipation.

She moaned. Pulling his shirt again from his frame, she began tracing every bruise with shaky fingertips. His muscled skin was hard against her touch, yet seemed to soften the longer she held him. He kissed her neck, something he never thought he'd do to Erin Lindsay.

The stubble against her neck elicited a shiver from Erin. He kissed with feverous intensity.

Jay then moved upwards, his nose grazing past her ear. Letting out a steady breath, he felt her shiver again, gripping his bicep.

His nose slid along the redness of her cheek. The gun slap. He prayed it wouldn't bruise, planted a soft kiss against her skin. As though that could prevent anything. But the gesture melted her nonetheless, because it was something she'd never experienced. It was a tenderness she'd never felt.

Erin brought her hands to his neck. Her new favourite place. As she brought his face back slightly, he took in the redness of her wrists.

He took one in his hand, looking helplessly at the raw skin rubbed away by coarse rope. It was a reminder of her resilience, her strength. Not just of that day, but her entire life.

He rubbed his thumb across the broken skin and watched as Erin's eyes fluttered. She paused for a second, then noted it was her turn to explore.

She grazed the deep scar on his lower neck, he'd tell her later it was from a stupid accident from his childhood. She felt the rough skin of his gunshot wound, he'd tell her afterward it didn't hurt anymore. Small cuts coated his body, scars, reminders of the job. Her light touch traced them all.

In that moment her need deepened. Physically, emotionally, every other sense in the universe, she wanted him.

She reached for his jeans, tugging on the button lustfully before he went tense at the touch. She stopped, meeting his gaze. His jaw was hard again, his eyes deep in hers.

"Are you drunk?" The words caught in his throat.

She knew he already had his answer. She hadn't touched a drop in what felt like forever, there wasn't a trace on her lips or in her system. But watching the hesitation in his eyes, she knew he was afraid. Scared she'd forget the small touches between them once the haze alcohol was lifted. But Erin was adamant, she wasn't forgetting a thing.

So for his peace of mind (and her own), she shook her head.

And then as a simple precaution, she asked him the same question.

"You?"

Before he shook his head, she already knew. No beer, whisky, scotch... Anything on his lips. Entirely sober.

His eyes looked like hope and lust. He wasn't running down that corridor to his death anymore; he was running to her. He was running home.

And as a small smile found his lips, she kissed him again. And again, and again, and again. She kissed him with an aching body, with the acknowledgement that the trauma of the day wasn't going away any time soon. She kissed him for all the times she hadn't. She kissed him because it made her heart sing and her scars heal. She kissed him knowing things wouldn't be the same. And she kissed him because she was okay with that.

Thank you and good night!