Horatio noticed his mother's car in the driveway of the house she was renting off her half-sister. He didn't like the fact that she was home so early from work. It could only mean one thing; time for them to pack up and move again.

"Ray, I want you to go to Mrs. Johnson's," he told his little brother.

"He's back, isn't he?" Ray asked with fear in his voice.

"I don't know, Ray," Horatio admitted. "But, mom being home this early isn't a good sign."

"I don't want to move again, Horatio," Ray said. "I like it here. I've got friends and all. I wish he would leave us alone."

"Me too, Ray," Horatio replied. "Me too."

w

Michael Caine towered over his wife.

"You thought I wouldn't find you this time, didn't you?" he growled as he backed her toward the wall.

Rosalind Caine didn't answer. She knew from painful experience not to speak until her husband was finished speaking.

"Answer me, bitch!"

Rosalind merely nodded. She steeled herself for the slap she knew that would be coming, but it didn't. That was when she realized that he was going to toy with her.

"Thought Angelina would protect you?"

"Yes," Rosalind breathed.

"Angelina only helps herself," Michael Caine purred.

Rosalind closed her eyes and silently prayed to God to end her misery and keep her boys safe.

w

Horatio cautiously opened the front door to the house. He slipped his hand into his right coat pocket and gripped the gun that resided there.

If his father was back to disrupt their lives, then Horatio vowed that today would be the last time. He didn't want to use the gun. It wasn't the solution to his family's problem, but he knew how to and that was all that mattered to him.

His youthful ears picked up the unmistakable sound of a raised voice and he knew without a doubt that his father had found them again.

Horatio tried to send his brother to Mrs. Johnson again, but he refused to leave. "I'm not going to leave you and Mom to deal with that asshole," he told Horatio in a hoarse whisper.

Horatio wanted to admonish him for his language, but there would hopefully be a better time and place.

"I told you last time, you fucking whore," growled a deep male voice. "If you left me again, I would hunt you down and kill you!"

Horatio stopped in his tracks and Raymond bumped into him. Both watched in stunned silence as their father shook their mother as if she were some old rag doll.

Thud.

Raymond's backpack had fallen from his boney shoulder. It caused Michael Caine to look in their direction. He let go of his wife and she fell to the floor like a sack of potatoes. Her head hit the corner of the coffee table.

Crack.

The sound was deafening in the nearly silent room.

Horatio felt Raymond brush pass him and attack their father with a growl of youthful anger. He watched in sickening fascination as their father backhand the pre-teen. Raymond landed against the wall and slid down it to form a whimpering pile of awkward limbs.

The father went after Raymond only to be stopped by the sound of a gun being cocked. He swung to face Horatio.

He laughed.

Horatio pointed the gun at his father silently praying that his hands wouldn't shake as fear coursed through his gangly frame. He had stood up to Michael Caine many times only to be beaten bloody for his trouble.

"You think that peashooter makes you a real man?" his father taunted him.

"Do you think beating the hell out of innocent people makes you one?" Horatio countered. A wave of calmness washed over him as the adrenaline finally kicked in. "Go away. You've taken enough from this family."

"Think you got the balls to shoot me in cold blood, boy?" Michael Caine stood his ground. He would out wait his oldest son and then he would teach him a lesson he would never forget.

Horatio licked his lips. He pulled the trigger.

Bang.

The sound deafened Horatio. He watched in mute horror as his father clutched his chest and fell to his knees. His father pulled his hand away and stared at it in shocked surprise.

Blood.

Blood spurted from the hole in his father's chest. He collapsed onto the floor his mouth opening and closing as he tried to get air into his lungs.

Several bloody gasps later and Michael Caine was dead. Blood still spilled from his chest as his heart frantically tried to keep doing its job.

Horatio dropped the gun. He went and checked on his mother, but he knew that she was dead. As she had fallen, her temple had struck the corner of the coffee table.

Next, he went and checked on Raymond. He carefully cradled him in his lap as he waited for the police to arrive. They lived in a neighborhood where the neighbors looked after one another and a gun shot would certainly be reported.

"It's just us now, Ray," he told Raymond. "You and me against the world. Just you and me."

With an uncharacteristic oath, Horatio tossed the case file he had been trying to read on his desk. He leaned back in his chair and closed his tired eyes.

His mind drifted back to the appointment he had had earlier in the day.

*Flashback*

Horatio, it's time you faced up to the fact that you need glasses.

I just need an assistant to read all the damn paperwork, Mick.

How old are you?

46

Our eyesight starts going down hill at 40.

And your point is?

Quit being vain.

He had laughed at that. Only Rhonda called him that and usually in teasing.

I don't like wearing glasses and never have. Call it a phobia.

What are those in your hand?

That's different.

How?

They just are.

Mick had sighed, but in the end he had gotten his way.

*End of Flashback*

"Horatio?" Rhonda inquired from the doorway.

"Hmm?" He didn't bother to open his eyes.

"Dr. MacKenzie dropped a package off for you," she explained. She slipped into the office quietly closing the door behind her.

"Oh joy," he muttered. He opened his eyes and caught sight of Rhonda holding something that looked suspiciously like an eyeglasses' case.

"That's my phrase," she reminded him. She set the case in the middle of his desk where he couldn't fail to notice it. She had taken a peek inside and thought the glasses would make him appear distinguished, but refrain from saying so.

"Have I told you lately what a bad influence you are?" he countered. He look everywhere but at the case. To him, wearing glasses to read or to do fine work around the lab was paramount to giving in; to admitting that he was getting old.

"No," she murmured. She watched his internal struggle all too aware of what having reading glasses meant to him. She had faced the same dilemma several years before, and now her reading glasses were only a minor irritant. "So are you gonna try 'em out?"

"Maybe later," he hedged. He wouldn't wear them around anyone. He didn't want to appear vulnerable or weak, so Mick had been right to accuse him of being vain. "I think I have had enough of work for one day. Care to join me for dinner?"

Rhonda smiled. "I just got the sudden hankering for tiramisu."

Horatio snicker in derision. "And you call me predictable."

"I never said you were predictable, Lieutenant," she teased as she turned toward the door. She opened it and looked back over her shoulder. "Just easy to read."

Horatio winced. He picked up the case and was about to slip it in his middle desk drawer when what Rhonda said next stopped him.

"Have I ever told you that I find guys who wear glasses incredibly sexy?"

"No," he whispered.

"Why don't ya bring those along and find out," she suggested. She strolled out the door and Horatio slipped the case in his inside jacket pocket before following her.

Horatio Caine was enjoying a rare Saturday afternoon off from work. The criminal element of Miami was catching its collective breath in the oppressive summer heat.

Horatio relished the break. In fact, if he were truthful with himself, he needed the break. He had been working almost non-stop for over a month and it was putting a strain on his relationship with Rhonda.

He was relaxing on his balcony sprawled on a chaise lounge. He was half-asleep listening to Rhonda move around in the kitchen as she did up the lunch dishes.

Domestic bliss was something he knew not to take for granted in his self-appointed role as Miami's protector, so he was enjoying this brief interlude in his otherwise hectic life.

Rhonda paused at the doorway to the balcony and studied Horatio. A slight off-shore breeze ruffled his reddish-gold hair as he slept. It could have been a scene straight from the cover of The Saturday Evening Post during Norman Rockwell's hey day.

She smiled. It wasn't often that she saw Horatio so relaxed. This gave her an idea.

Rhonda knew Horatio wasn't one for having his picture taken, but this was one moment in time that may never come again and she wanted to save it for posterity's sake. She went into the study and retrieved her digital camera.

She stepped out onto the balcony. She quickly snapped a few shots so as not to wake him up. Horatio was too much of a light sleeper for his own good.

She turned to go back inside, but paused when she heard him get up. She silently sighed annoyed that she could rarely get anything past him. She let him pull her into a light embrace.

"What are you going to call it?" he softly inquired. He studied the image Rhonda had captured surprised that he didn't dislike it. He always felt that he wasn't photogenic and avoided having his picture taken at all costs.

"Gato en el sol," Rhonda whispered.

"You think of me as a cat?"

"You do purr when we make love."

"I do?"

Rhonda pulled away from him, but held onto one hand. "How about I show you?" she suggested as she pulled him toward the bedroom.

Horatio studied Rhonda as she stood on the threshold of his condo. He had to bite his lip to keep from laughing at the sight she presented all rumpled and sticky.

"Go ahead," she said in tired resignation.

"Excuse me?"

"I know you are dying to laugh," she explained. "So, go ahead. Get it out of your system."

Horatio smiled and surmised, "You lost the coin toss, didn't you?"

Rhonda nodded.

l

To take his mind off of Rhonda "borrowing" his shower, since she practically tossed him out of the bathroom, Horatio wandered into the kitchen and searched the cabinets for a snack. He found the package of unopened Double Stuff Oreo cookies Rhonda had stashed away the week before.

Seeing them gave him an evil idea.

l

Horatio was quietly munching on an Oreo when Rhonda walked into the kitchen. Her damp hair was pulled up into a ponytail and Horatio smiled at the prospect of nibbling on her neck instead of the cookie in his hand.

Rhonda spotted the package of cookies and decided that she could have some fun at Horatio's expense. She thought it was amusing how food had become an integral part of their relationship. She grabbed a glass from the dish drain and poured herself a glass of milk.

"Do you feel human again?" Horatio asked with a wry grin. He watched her pull out a chair and draped herself in it as if she were boneless. Her physical flexibility always amazed him.

"Somewhat," Rhonda replied with a wry grin of her own. "Speed is going to pay for letting me fall face first into that dumpster." She blew a strand of her hair off her forehead before taking a large sip from her glass. "Nice of you to have saved me some, mister."

Horatio shrugged. He dunked the cookie he had been holding into his glass of milk and then took a bite out of it. "Possession is nine-tenths of the law," he quipped before finishing off the cookie and snagging another one. "And you have a mustache."

"Not anymore," she remarked as she licked the top of her lip clean.

"Tease."

"And your point is?"

"Just a casual observation."

"I see."

Horatio smiled and snagged another cookie from the package.

Rhonda watched him eat a couple more while she formulated her plan to try and get one over him. "You're doing it wrong," she informed him.

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are."

"I don't believe so."

"Yes, you most certainly are."

"What makes you an expert?" Horatio inquired.

"Three siblings, a houseful of cousins and a handful of nieces and nephews," Rhonda retorted, stating her qualifications.

"All right,' Horatio conceded, catching on to what Rhonda was plotting. "Show me how you do it." He handed her a cookie and gave her his undivided attention.

Rhonda took the cookie making certain that her fingers didn't brush Horatio's or she would be lost. When he was touching her, she had a terrible time concentrating on the littlest of things let alone setting a trap.

She opened the cookie and slowly licked the crème filling from each half. She put the cookie back together again before leaning forward and dunking it in Horatio's glass of milk. She finished it off in two bites. She licked the crumbs off her lips and smirked at him.

Horatio smirked back. "Your way certainly has merit," he remarked as he pulled another cookie from the package. He held it out. "Show me again?"

Rhonda gawked at him in mute surprise.

Horatio chuckled.

"You dirty old man," she breathed.

"You started it," he pointed out.

Rhonda shook her head and started to chuckle. He had once again managed to beat her at her own game.

"What?" Horatio asked, uncertain that he wanted to know Rhonda's answer.

Rhonda pulled herself out of her chair and made herself at home in his lap. She slipped her hands into his hair and pulled his head down. Before she kissed him she whispered, "I didn't start it, but I'll certainly finish it."