He didn't speak for a full minute. He wasn't going back on what he said, he was going to tell her everything, Sophia believed that. But she knew that this was just as difficult for him as it was for her.

"You know the first part," he began, and Sophia flinched imperceptibly. "I got home that day and found you waiting for me." He swallowed hard. "I knew something was wrong, the moment I saw you. All the time you were talking, I was just desperate to hear you tell me the truth, but you never did."

"You knew I was lying."

He gave a wry smile. "Like I told you then, I didn't believe you." He shook his head. "I had no idea if I was making the right decision. Now, I'm even less convinced I was, letting you go. But, as I also said then, I know you better than anyone. And if you were determined to leave, and determined not to tell me what was really going on," he shrugged, "there was nothing I could do. I would never," he paused, the words physically difficult for him to get out, "I would never make you do anything. Not like that."

Sophia closed her eyes, her heart aching for him, aching to be allowed to love him again. "I know."

"But once the door closed behind you, it took everything in me not to come after you. Beg you to come back. And I would have done it, down on my knees and everything."

"It might have worked."

Dean grimaced. "I think a lot about that," he admitted. "If I had gone after and begged, if I hadn't gone into work that day, if I had just pushed a little harder when something was clearly wrong..."

"Dean, don't." Sophia had started crying again. She was starting to get tired of always turning into a waterworks display. "I've been down the 'what if' road, and just, don't."

He stared at her, almost looking like he wanted to argue, but then just nodded. "I couldn't bring myself to do anything, I was just numb. It wasn't until I went back to work for my next shift that I told anyone about what happened. I didn't really have a choice. I wandered in looking more like a zombie than an actual human being.

"Alicia pulled it out of me first, and, well, long story short, Scott put me on two weeks leave."

Sophia gaped at him, guilt twisting in her stomach. "He made you take time off?" So not only had he lost her, but he had lost his job as well.

But Dean just gave a small shrug. "I was too miserable to be upset over it," he admitted, his eyes flashing to her face at the confession. "And it was needed. I would have been a liability out on calls."

"So what did you do?"

"I was going to go straight to my mom," Dean said. "But Raina got to me first."

Sophia flinched. "She blamed you, didn't she?"

"At first, yeah." He gave a rough bark of laughter. "She came banging on the door, demanding to see you, demanding to know what happened, demanding to know what I did...but then I actually opened the door and she saw what a wreck I was, and well, she knew something was up.

"We compared notes, trying to figure out any piece of the puzzle that we could, but you didn't leave us with much. I was heading to my mom's, but Raina said that if she didn't hear from you in another day, she was going to file a police report."

"Pretty sure the F.B.I. would have just killed that."

"Looks like that's exactly what they did," he said. "She filed it, but they just kept coming back with annoyingly vague answers, basically stating that there wasn't any evidence that suggested you were in any danger. But I wasn't with her when she did that, I was at my mom's."

Sophia swallowed hard at that. "Does Sandy hate me?"

Dean thought carefully about his words before answering. "No," he finally said. "No, she doesn't hate you. She didn't give away much of how she was feeling, really, too busy trying to make sure I didn't completely fall apart. And she was definitely worried, given your abrupt exit. But I think she was angry, too."

"Fair enough."

"Was, Sophia. I told her the basics of what happened. Now she's just very, very concerned."

Sophia didn't quite believe him, but she didn't argue.

"Honestly, after that, there's not much else to tell. Eventually, I got enough sense back in my head so I was able to function, went back to work, tried to carry on with my life. But I couldn't move on, no matter how much people told me that I should try to. I just, I couldn't shake that something was seriously wrong. Everyone, well everyone except my mom and Raina, told me that I was just imagining things, trying to make sense of the breakup."

He chucked slightly. "Hell, I got some random dead-end call from New York and was ready to drop everything and come here, so convinced it was you. Scott talked sense into me over that one."

Sophia slapped her hand over her mouth to stifle her sob, but that only made her reaction more obvious. Dean peered at her. "Was, was that...?"

Slowly, Sophia nodded her head.

Dean got up, unable to sit still for a moment longer. "So, if I had only followed that instinct and come here..." His voice trailed off.

"Dean, there are over a million and a half people in Manhattan alone," Sophia said gently. "You never would have found me."

"Why did you call?" He didn't seem to want to argue with her, either.

"I was hurting." He was being honest, Sophia owed it to him to do the same. "I wanted to hear your voice, although that ended up hurting even more."

"Everyone told me I was crazy," Dean said, shaking his head and sitting back down, "that there was no way I could know it was you just from your breath. But—"

"But you know me better than anyone," Sophia finished for him.

"And then it was just radio silence until last month," Dean said. "I tried to move on, actually live a life and not be miserable the whole time. Carson tried to set me up once, but, well, let's just say it didn't go well. I couldn't shake the feeling that something was actually wrong, but there was nothing I could do. So I just focused on being single for a while, as cheesy as that sounds.

"I had just gotten to work when Agent McKenzie called me. I couldn't believe what she was telling me, but, I have to admit, Graham being in the center of all of this wasn't the craziest explanation. And she told me to come and hung up, I didn't even have time to ask questions.

"The firehouse was divided over whether I should go or not. Some thought it was some elaborate prank, others thought there was too much detail in Agent McKenzie's story for it to be fake. But I was determined to go, and Alicia was on my side, so eventually, Scott just gave me the time off and said that he would reach out to some police contacts to see if they could verify that Agent McKenzie was F.B.I.

"Alicia drove me. I picked up a few things from home, got to LAX, boarded the first flight I could, and here I am."

He frowned, an almost grief-stricken look coming over his expression. "I thought I felt the worst I could feel when I got to the hospital and they wouldn't let me see you. But then they let me in, and, God, Sophia," his voice ran thick, his jaw clenching, "a part of me died seeing you like that. I couldn't bear the thought of losing you, not again, not permanently. It was almost too much, but I couldn't leave. I got through it because, well, because I had to. And I didn't know what your thoughts were when it came to me, when it came to us, so I vowed that I would be there for you, no pressure to make decisions, no dredging up the past."

"That's why you didn't tell me any of this?"

"I felt like I had missed something back in L.A. Like I could have stopped any of this from happening. I felt like I had failed."

"No. Never, Dean, just, no."

Silence fell between them. It was a lot to digest, and Sophia was only feeling the surface of all the guilt she would eventually have to deal with over all the pain she put Dean through. But that would have to wait. "You must have questions for me," she finally said.

He hesitated. "Yes," he said. "But they can wait."

"They don't have to."

Another moment of hesitation. "Just, why, why didn't you tell me when shit started hitting the fan? Before you knew it was Graham?"

Sophia digested the question. It was a fair one. "As aggravating as it is, in some ways, I don't know," she admitted. "But, in other ways, I think I knew deep down that it was Graham, and that's what stopped me."

"But why?"

"So much of our relationship had already been defined by him." Sophia angrily wiped her eyes. "I didn't want to bring all of that back up, especially since we hadn't had to deal with any of that for a long time. I was keeping myself in denial, and telling you would have broken that.

"But I also knew that if it was Graham, he was coming for me. And I didn't want you getting hurt because of him."

"You don't think I should have had a say in that?"

"You probably should have," Sophia agreed. "But the bottom line, Dean, was that he was coming after me. Whether or not you knew, he was coming for me. And if you knew, and the Feds confirmed this, and you got in his way, he would kill you. And I refused to let that happen."

"But—"

"But it's your life and you should have had a say and I get that, but I refused to let you die," Sophia said fiercely, her gaze hard and unrelenting. "I refused to put you in danger. And given that you're sitting here, in front of me? I would do it again. And you can't judge me, because you would have done the exact same thing if the situation was reversed."

He didn't deny it. He just sat there, staring at her, processing. "Well," he finally said, "I have to be honest and say that I'm very much not okay with that. But, you're not wrong." He let out a sigh. "It might take us some time to come to the same page on that, but I certainly don't think it's impossible."

Sophia leaned back, hardly daring herself to hope. "So, even through all of that, you still want to be with me?" she asked, her voice hoarse.

Another round of silent staring, Dean's eyes piercing into her. Then he got up and kneeled on the floor next to her. He grabbed her hand and placed her palm flat on his chest, directly above his heart.

"I'm yours, Sophia," he said simply. "I told you before, I'm always going to be yours. Will this be easy? No. This has been heartbreaking for both of us. But we're stronger than this. We can get through this, and I'm willing to put in the work if you are."

Sophia could barely breathe. She could feel Dean's steady heartbeat thumping beneath his clothes. A steady march that came from a heart that he had willingly given her. That he was still willing to give to her even after all she put it through.

"That's my choice, Sophia," Dean said softly. "But it's up to you to decide what to do with it."

Sophia's fingers curled into the fabric. "I've never once stopped loving you," she said in half a whisper. "I would spend every waking moment I have left on this earth working together with you to make things right. I decided a long time ago to trust you with my heart, Dean, to trust you with everything. It's not a decision I have ever regretted, and it's certainly not one I'm going to change now."

Dean stared up at her, his eyes wide and bright. "Soph, can I kiss you now?" he whispered.

"Of course, you can."

And then his lips were on hers and for a split second, it felt like nothing had changed. Everything had, but the way his mouth felt on hers, his lips moving gently across her skin, was everything she remembered.

Sophia gasped for air, overwhelmed by a tidal wave of emotions and sensations that flooded over her. It was as if she was taking in her first full breath of oxygen since she got to New York. Dean's hand supported the back of her neck, his other gently wrapped around her waist. Her face was wet from tears; his was too.

She kissed him again, growing greedier by the second. He felt like home. He was home. It didn't matter that they were in some fancy hotel room on the other side of the country.

She was with him, so she was home.