Oscar knew what he had with Callie, was special.

Every spare moment they could find, they spent together. Though the change to his work and a new commission which came in for hers hadn't made it easy. As far as Oscar was concerned, it was worth the lost sleep. She was his first thought in the morning, his last at night and it felt like he was carrying her around with him when they were apart. 

The only shadow on what she referred to as their bubble of happiness was cast by his guilt. 

He had to tell her.

It was getting harder and harder, literally, when it came to his anatomy, not to have sex with her. He kept insisting they take things slow, wanted to do everything within his power to make her as crazy for him as he was for her. But she was determined to speed things up, made it feel like there was a clock ticking in the background and they had to enjoy every moment before their time ran out.

"I want to tell Callie what we've been doing," he informed the nerdketeers.

"You don't need our permission," Harry said.

No, he didn't. But he wasn't seeking permission or approval, he was reaffirming the vow he made to them never to do anything related to their work without talking to them first. The decision to keep it under wraps was his, he'd pushed them into it, and it had already cost one of them more than he would have asked anyone to pay.

When he glanced up from his keyboard, Jasper shrugged. "You know the risks."

"I have to tell her."

"Then do it." Jasper pushed his glasses onto the bridge of his nose and continued typing. "I just hope it goes better for you than it did for me."

Oscar grimaced.

"That's not a dig. I mean it, I really do," Jasper continued, earnestly. "I've never seen you as happy as you've been these last couple of weeks. And despite the sappy smile you've worn lately, you're focused and settled. She's good for you."

Yes, she was, and it made him wonder how different things would have been if they got together earlier. Would it have altered the decisions he made? He doubted he would accept sympathy from her in the days which followed the revelation of his monumental naivete, but if she got to him before he insisted on secrecy...

The irony was, while he still feared how she would react when he revealed what he'd done, their time together increased his confidence. That she'd chosen to be with him not only filled him with pride, it made him stronger.

"Tell her," Harry said. "It's Callie. She'll get it."

Oscar hoped he was right.

"When you gonna break the news?"

"Tomorrow," Oscar replied.

Harry patted him on the back on his way past. "Good luck. Get past this and you two should be golden."

The following day, after he'd liberated his old Mazda from stacked parking and they headed to Jersey for his mother's birthday lunch, Oscar rehearsed what he wanted to tell her in his mind one last time. He had to choose the right words, make her realize the choices he made had nothing to do with how much he trusted her and everything to do with the need to prove he could learn from his mistakes.

"You okay?" Callie asked.

Oscar shot her a smile and squeezed the tangled fingers resting on his thigh. "Fine. You?"

She'd been quiet, too. 

"A little nervous," she confessed. "I'm worried they're gonna take one look at us and know."

Both their mothers would be there. They'd been like sisters since the day Callie and Oscar met, been through a lot of ups and downs together, and there was no way Callie's mom would miss the celebration when both their kids were coming home.

"We talked about this," Oscar reminded her. "If you want to tell them, we will." He would cheerfully shout it from rooftops if the decision was left to him. "If you don't, you'll have to keep your hands off me while we're there and vice-versa."

Callie chewed her lower lip. "They'll be a runaway train when they know," she muttered. "They'll have us married off with a half-dozen kids before we've had sex."

"I'm pretty sure kids couldn't get here without it."

"If the subject comes up, you can explain that to them," she retorted petulantly, slipping her hand from his to lay it on her lap. "It's not like I haven't been trying every trick in the book to get you into bed."

Another reason he had to tell her. 

While he was losing the battle to stay out of her bed, she'd started to doubt her ability to get him into it. It took a while to notice when she made such a concerted effort to distract him, but he could see hints of dark sky on the horizon. 

Her frustration with his resistance was mounting, would erode her self-confidence if he let it. Eventually, it would lead to an argument and having spent years protecting her from the full force of his anger, the last thing Oscar wanted was to unleash it on her in the middle of an argument that could have been avoided.

His fingers flexed around the steering wheel, briefly turning his knuckles white. "Tell me what you want to do and we'll do it."

"I've told you numerous times what I want to do. In graphic detail. I'm starting to think you've taken a vow of celibacy."

"I haven't taken a vow of celibacy."

"Then why aren't we going at it like rabbits?"

"That's romantic," he said sarcastically.

"Oscar, I'm romanced out. We've had candlelit dinners, moonlit walks by the river and you've sent enough flowers to make my apartment look like a florists. Every time I see you, you're bringing me one of my favorite things." She turned towards him. "And lovely as all that has been, if we're gonna be asked a thousand and one questions about our relationship, it would be really nice to know what's going on in your head. I'm starting to feel like a sex addict in need of a fix."

Oscar frowned at the traffic on the road in front of them. "Would it be better if I jumped on you at the end of our first date, fucked you senseless and let things get weird between us?"

"It didn't get weird after you kissed me," she argued. "It wasn't weird when we went on a date and had phone sex. We both said what was happening felt right. But now it feels like you're holding back. If it doesn't feel right to you anymore..."

"It does."

"Then what is it? If you're into something kinky and are scared to tell me what you need, don't be. We can talk about it and so long as it's not anything too kinky, I'm open to trying –"

Oscar ground his teeth together. "I'm not."

Up for a little experimentation, sure, but if she thought he would ever do something she wasn't comfortable with...

"If it's a medical thing or there's a body issue reason you wouldn't send me an underwear selfie..."

Okay. That was it. He'd heard enough. Prying a set of fingers from the steering wheel, he turned his palm towards her and barked, "Give me your hand."

"I'm just saying –"

"Hand." When she placed it in his, he set it on his cock. "Does it feel like I have a medical problem?"

He heard a sharp intake of breath and then her fingers moved, gently exploring the length and width of his erection.

"No," she said in a lower, thicker voice. "It definitely doesn't. Wow. You're kinda big down there. Is that all for me?"

Yes, it damn well was. And what she was doing made it painful. 

Unable to withstand another second of torture without causing a pile up on the highway, Oscar removed her hand and put it back on her lap. "Can we drop the subject now?"

"How long have you been like that?"

"Callie." He hung on to his last thread of patience like it was a branch sticking out of a cliff face. "Controlling a hard on when you're around is like playing fucking Whac-A-Mole. Every time I think I've got rid of it –"

There was a burst of laughter from the passenger seat. 

"Sorry." She tried to control her mirth and failed miserably. "But, seriously, Whac-A-Mole, as in the arcade game?" She choked, "Only you could come up with that description."

Oscar felt the tension roll off his shoulders. 

Pulling off the highway while her laughter gave way to silent chuckling, he found a place to park and turned towards her. As she shot him an adorably mischievous smile, he reached out and brushed soft tendrils of hair off her cheeks. Then he leaned in, kissed her, rested his forehead against hers and looked deep in her beautiful brown eyes.

"Don't, for a single second, doubt how much I want you," he said roughly. "You hear me?"

"I hear you," she whispered back.

"When we make love, I want to rock your world and erase everyone else we've ever been with from our minds." He nudged the tip of his nose against hers, traced his fingertips over the delicate line of her jaw and felt the reciprocal whisper of her cool fingers on his forearms.

It was the silent language of lovers, one they were still learning but felt as old as time itself, as if the words had been there since the beginning, waiting to be heard.

"I want to get this right, Cal. I want you more than I've ever wanted anyone. Tell me, you believe me."

A range of emotions clouded her eyes, but before he could sort through them, she placed a soft kiss on the corner of his mouth and said, "I do."

The vow created a tightness in his chest which made it difficult to breathe.

"Thank you," she added. "I needed to hear that."

"I should have said it earlier."

Callie smiled. "You'd think I'd know what was going on in that big ole head of yours, by now."

Not true. How could she when he kept so many secrets?

"This is still new, for both of us. We'll figure it out." He leaned back, angled his head, and looked at her from the corner of his eye. "But we're good, right?"

"We're good." She moved her hands to his chest, smoothed the material of his shirt under her palms and pouted. "I just want it to be you and me for a little while longer. No outside interference. Is that too much to ask?"

"No. We just gotta stay strong, project a united front. No caving, no matter how hard they push."

"Can you remember a time when that worked for us?" Callie inquired. "I can't. And I've been trying really hard."

That's what she'd been doing on the way there, wracking her brain for the memory of a time they managed to pull the wool over their mothers' eyes? 

If he'd known, he could have saved her the trouble. There wasn't one. Even if they thought they got away with something, it inevitably turned out their mothers knew all along.

But telling her that probably wouldn't help.

"On the bright side, it's not like we haven't done the meet the parents' thing before," he reassured her. "Your mom loves me. My mom loves you."

There were no worries on that score. And it wasn't like they hadn't been treated as a couple before. 

One of the stand-out moments was when Oscar's dad died, a time he couldn't have got through without her. While she was a constant, comforting presence at his side - the only person who knew there weren't any words to ease his pain - all his aunts, uncles and cousins were convinced she was his girlfriend. They both denied it so many times that, in the end, she donned a sticky label which stated she was 'Oscar's best friend'. 

She'd been everywhere. Serving food, refilling coffee cups, making sure everyone had what they needed while running interference for him. She'd been a bright, shining light in what felt like never-ending darkness. And he'd loved her for that.

"I know," she replied. "And I know I shouldn't be nervous. But I am. I can't help it. It's just there."

"Why?"

"I guess..." She frowned and lowered her gaze to his shirt. "Well, I guess it's partly cos I know none of the girls you brought home were ever considered good enough for you."

"All two of them." Oscar smiled indulgently. "And that was back in college." He hooked his forefinger under her chin and tilted it up to encourage her to look in his eyes. "This is different. It's you."

"Yes, but on the flip-side, just cos we've known each other all our lives doesn't mean this will work out. I don't want them to get their hopes up, either."

The focus it took to keep up with her thought process while she jumped from one extreme to another wasn't anything new. But his reaction to the suggestion it wouldn't work out between them was so visceral, it stunned him into silence. 

A punch of possessiveness hit him, followed by a sharp jab of frustration. 

Okay, fine, so she obviously hadn't thought as far ahead as him. He could deal with that. But didn't she have any faith in him? Didn't she believe in what they had? 

If she didn't have those things before he told her the truth...

"I know what you're thinking," she said.

Oscar doubted the living hell out of that.

"You think I'm over-reacting..."

Nope, currently that would be him. Right that moment, he wanted to take her somewhere private and take her, hard and fast, over and over, until he was indelibly imprinted on her soul the same way she was on his. 

Something dark and dangerous stirred within him as the thought entered his head. The second it did, he shut it down with an iron-fist will it had taken more than a decade to master.

"One step at a time, right?" She smiled softly. "That's what you're gonna say next, isn't it?"

It should be. 

He nodded firmly. "It is."

He had to continue guarding the castle, particularly when it came to the darker side of his persona. That Oscar was the real threat to what they had and if the Oscar sitting beside her had anything to do with it, Callie would never meet him.

"We'll get through this," he said with conviction.

Callie drew in a fortifying breath. "Okay."

"You ready?"

"No. But we've come this far." She managed a feeble smile. "It's your mom's birthday. We have to go."

"We do," he agreed.

"Okay, then. It's settled."

"We're not telling them."

"No. But if they figure it out..."

"We won't deny it."

"Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of we move to another country and change our identities."

The ghost of a smile crossed his face. She was over-reacting a little.

"It won't be that bad."

"Remember you said that." She scrunched up her nose and leaned in for another kiss. "Now drive before I change my mind and ask you to head for Canada."

Oscar put the car in gear and eased them back into traffic. 

He considered postponing the talk he needed to have with her. Dealing with their mothers was probably enough of a challenge for one day. But it was best to get it over and done with so they could work their way through it. 

Until they did, it would keep getting in the way.