Women Prefer Their Own Beds

Disclaimer: I do not own it. C'mon, I'm a Tate shipper. Don't you think if I owned it they'd be together already? Yeah.

A/N: I want to finish this so Fluffy my plot eagle, will leave me alone. This is the last chapter, ok? Have fun with the fluff!

Chapter 2

"Hey, Kate, want to grab lunch?" Abby had emerged from her lab and was seated on the edge of Kate's desk.

Kate, who had been looking for a way to get out of the office all morning, smiled widely. "Yeah. Let's get out of here!"

They headed out. Gibbs noticed Tony staring blankly at his computer screen and came to stand behind him. "What is your problem, DiNozzo?"

"Whatever do you mean?" Tony's voice was flat, monotone. Gibbs glared at him as he turned to look up at his boss.

"You're not being a smartass."

"I thought that was a good thing."

"You know exactly what I mean, DiNozzo." Gibbs turned on his heel and headed out to find lunch. He called back over his shoulder, "Deal with it. I don't want to have to penalize you for pissing off Agent Todd."

Tony leaned back in his chair to think. He had been rather rude to Kate. She'd been trying to be helpful. It was just… he was a ladies man. She teased him about it, the world saw him that way. He couldn't go to KATE for relationship advice. Because at some point he'd blurt out that he was in love with her and that would be a problem. Yes, he decided, he really did love her. With that startling revelation, his chair promptly fell over backwards.

"Hey, Kate."

"Yeah?" Kate swiveled to look at Gibbs.

"What did you find out about the armed robbery/homicide thing?"

"Well, it seems that Captain Reynolds actually did surprise a burglar in his home."

McGee cut in. "But he was the one doing the breaking and entering."

Tony glared at him. "Wrong, Probie. He saw someone in his house when he knew there wasn't supposed to be anyone there, and so he climbed in through a window with his gun at the ready. Unfortunately, whoever it was killed him and made off with his stereo and about three hundred in cash."

When Gibbs left, the other special agents started putting on their coats and heading out. Tony reached out a hand to stop Kate.

"Hey, Kate?"

Kate sighed inwardly. Pasting a smile on her face, she turned to face her coworker. "Yes?"

"You said if I wanted to talk…" Tony didn't know how to finish the sentence. It was killing him to say this much, and he was hoping she'd jump in. He managed a half smile as her face lit up.

"Sure! Umm… where?" Kate's smile was huge. Tony was opening up? To her? It was a miracle.

"Would you mind coming to my apartment with me? I have to walk my dog." By this time they were standing in the elevator. When Kate nodded, he added, "We can talk while we walk, if you want."

Kate smiled, nodded again, then tilted her head to one side. "I didn't know you had a dog."

"Yeah, Shi Tsu. Brown, kinda scruffy looking. She's a sweetheart, though." Kate grinned. This was the Tony she loved.

"Shit."

"What?" Tony looked at her, startled out of his proud parent speech.

"Nothing, nothing. She sounds wonderful." Kate couldn't believe that she'd allowed herself to fall in love with Tony. She was not going to fall into the trap again. No dating coworkers. She'd promised herself. Oh, who was she fooling. She was in love with the man, and there was nothing she could do about it.

An hour later, they were wandering through a park somewhere, Tony's dog running around at the end of her leash. Kate was waiting for Tony to start the conversation, and Tony was trying to work out a way of talking about the problem without saying he was in love with her. Cause he was pretty sure she didn't love him back, and he didn't want to make a fool out of himself… again.

"So, Kate, I really am sorry for being such a jerk. It's a little embarrassing to have your boss and coworker see you naked, with your gun pointed at an iguana. And then, Agent Cassidy pretended to warm up to me, and it was normal. Completely normal for me. Flirting, dating, etc. When she said that she'd been playing, it hurt."

"But Tony, you do that all the time." Kate was making an honest attempt to understand her partner. She was just having a little trouble, that's all.

Tony stopped, ignoring the small yip of his dog as the leash pulled tight. "No, I don't do that. I flirt, yes. I try to seduce, even. But I don't do it when I don't mean it. If I flirt with someone, I flirt because I find them attractive. I don't then turn around and embarrass them in front of their boss, and I don't say that I was kidding. That's like sleeping with someone and then saying you weren't attracted to them, sorry, mistake."

Kate nodded slowly. "I think I get it. It's not that she rejected you, it's that she faked interest first and then rejected you in front of your Gibbs."

Tony nodded, and then before he could stop himself, added, "And you."

"What?"

"She did it in front of you."

"What difference does that make?" They'd resumed walking now, and Kate looked at Tony with a slightly puzzled expression.

"Look, as stupid as this sounds, I don't do women friends. You're like, an anomaly. I don't quite know how to act around you, so I do the flirting player thing. So…"

"So when that image is broken down, you feel uncomfortable. Awww, that's cute, Tony. And sensitive. Something I wouldn't have expected from you." She ruffled his hair affectionately. "So, tell me more about this dog. What's her name?"

Tony blushed bright red. "Kate."

Kate paused. "You named your dog after me?"

Tony blushed even harder, something Kate hadn't thought possible. "Why?"

He muttered something Kate couldn't hear.

"What? Speak up, Tony. I promise not to laugh."

He sighed, stopped walking, and turned to her. "Because I honest to god like you, ok?"

"Of course you do. You're my friend. We work together." Kate's brain wasn't working well.

"Not like that. I mean like, as in, love." He clapped a hand over his mouth, shocked at what he'd just said. In his mind, he was kicking himself for saying it. 'Stupid, she'll feel weird now, and she'll request a transfer or something, and then you won't ever get to even see her or talk to her or smell her hair… where did that come from?'

Kate, meanwhile, was trying to process what he'd blurted out. 'Love? He's in love with me? Oh, my god. Well, that certainly explains the dog… and the flirting… and the weirdness… ack! Now he probably thinks I don't like him back!' "Hey, Tony?"

"Yeah?" He couldn't bring himself to look her in the eye.

She reached out and grabbed his chin, bringing his eyes up to hers. "I like you too."

And then neither of them thought about the dog any more, because they were kissing, and neither of them had any reasoning capacity left.

A/N: Sorry for the abrupt ending, I had a bit of trouble with it. If you have ideas about how it SHOULD end, EMAIL them to me. Don't put them in a review, EMAIL them. If I see one I like, I might write it. If you like the ending, let me know, though. Those you can review. Thanks!