Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

No one knew that they were together.

Not only that they were together, but they were married. Honest to God, stood up in front of God and the law and pledged to only love one another for all eternity, exchanged rings married.

No one, save for two people. Zara and Barry were the only ones on the island that knew about Claire and Owen and only really because it would have been impossible to keep either one of them in the dark about it. Both Zara and Barry often had to track their bosses down, and Claire made the executive decision early on that it could only help to have some allies.

They were it, though. Other than those two, they decided it was best to keep things quiet. Claire didn’t need anyone accusing her of playing favorites, and Owen didn’t need for people to think he got special treatment for sleeping with the boss.

It was harder on Owen to keep it quiet than Claire. She had thicker skin than he did, was able to brush off people’s criticisms of her, and most of the time the truly nasty things weren’t said to her face anyway. But they said things to Owen, thinking that the raptor trainer would complain along with them when they bitched about Ms. Dearing.

He did not.

It didn’t take long for word to circle around not to complain about Claire in Owen’s earshot. But it was dismissed as Owen having a crush on her and not in any way reciprocated, based mostly on the chilly way Claire interacted with him in public. It seemed like Claire absolutely hated him.

Of course, the staff didn’t see the smirk on Owen’s face when Claire greeted him coldly, the glint in her eye. They didn’t know that hearing Claire say, “Mr. Grady” in her most business-like tone was a huge turn on for Owen. That when they got home, he would pin her against the wall, crashing his lips against hers.

“Say my name again, Mrs. Grady,” he’d growl, and Claire would giggle, leaving a trail of kisses up his neck.

“Mr. Grady,” it would be said like a prayer, and Owen would scoop her up and carry her back to the bedroom, kicking the door shut behind him.

The staff didn’t know any of this, so they pitied him instead. Poor bastard. Head over heels for a woman who despised him. Everyone had known about their first, failed date, but no one knew about Owen showing up on her doorstep a few hours later, apologizing and asking for a do over.

“A mulligan,” he shrugged, giving her a hopeful smile. Claire had relented, and the second date had been just as good as the first one had been bad.

They were married seven months later by a justice of the peace in Madison, Wisconsin where her sister and nephews lived. Owen came with Claire on a business trip to London, which doubled as a honeymoon, and no one was the wiser. She wore her wedding band on a thin chain around her neck, and Owen kept his in his wallet when they weren’t in the privacy of their home.

Owen was sure it would stun their colleagues if they ever knew the truth. And he also knew they couldn’t keep a lid on it forever. At some point he was going to end up ripping someone’s head off over an off color comment about his wife, and the cat would be out of the bag.

And he had feeling it might be Vic Hoskins who would push him there. Hoskins, who on top of being just a general pain in the ass, had taken lately to making comments about Claire. Mostly on the days that she visited the raptor paddock, and finally Owen, as much as he loved seeing her during the day, had suggested that maybe Zara be the one to come out to check on things and pick up reports.

“Why?” Claire asked, as she set out dishes on the table for dinner. She turned to her husband, hands on her hips, and he had sighed.

“I don’t like Hoskins around you,” he admitted. And he didn’t. It was more than just the things that Hoskins would say about her, it was the way he looked at her. Predatory.

“I can take care of myself,” Claire started to argue, but she got a good look at his face and it was her turn to sigh, moving to him and sliding her hands around his waist. “But okay, if that will make your life easier, I’ll send Zara out next time.” He dropped a kiss into her hair.

“Thank you,” he said softly, wrapping his arms around her and trying to push Vic Hoskins out of his mind.

And it helped, tremendously, to have Zara come out instead of Claire. Owen no longer felt on the edge of physically harming Hoskins at all times. But he did miss seeing her occasionally during the day, particularly considering the long hours she was pulling at the office.

“It’s this new asset,” she told him after crawling into bed well after midnight. She had gotten home and been nearly too tired to undress, instead tugging off her pantyhose and letting her suit jacket and skirt pool on the floor, stepping out of her heels and sliding under the covers and up to Owen’s side. “Now the safety engineers are saying the paddock isn’t big enough and the walls need reinforced, and how much money is that going to cost? We’re already bleeding money on this as is.”

Owen knew how stressed Claire was. He didn’t know much about the new asset, it being classified, but he knew enough to know that it was trouble. On top of all of her work stuff, Claire’s sister Karen had called and tearfully asked Claire and Owen to take their nephews for a few days while Karen’s soon to be ex-husband moved out. Claire had agreed, immediately, but the timing was awful.

Owen hated that Claire was running herself ragged, and wished he could help shoulder her burden a little more. At the very least he could keep her away from Hoskins, but it felt like a drop in the bucket compared to what she had on her plate.

He hoped, though, after the new attraction was ready things would ease up for her. They had been talking about taking a second honeymoon over Christmas for their three year anniversary. A real honeymoon this time, not just him tagging along, and he knew that there was no way that would happen unless Claire was able to get the new animal sorted out.

They just had to get through the next week. Get through the boys coming and the new attraction opening.

Piece of cake.

Chapter Text

Owen knew his wife inside and out. And as soon as she answered the phone, he knew that she was on the verge of tears.

“What's wrong?” He asked immediately.

“Today,” she answered. “I have a huge favor to ask, but I now I have an added meeting to my agenda and...”

“I'll pick up the boys,” Owen cut in, knowing that was where she was going.

“I hate that I can't,” he could practically see Claire rubbing at her forehead in frustration. “And just so you're aware, you've been roped into helping out with this new asset. Simon wants you to come out and take a look at the enclosure and give your opinion on what needs to be done.”

“I'll pick up the boys, and then drop them off at the hotel and come out there,” Owen promised.

“I can ask Zara,” Claire started.

“I can do it, plus they're old enough to be on their own for a couple of hours while you and I check out the paddock,” Owen used his most soothing voice to calm her down, and when she answered, her voice softer, he knew he had succeeded.

“Thank you. I'll see you in a couple of hours,” Claire replied. “Love you.”

“Love you too,” he hung up the phone just as he heard the crunch of tires on gravel.

Hoskins.

As if he didn't have enough to deal with today. Hoskins was getting increasingly more insistent that the raptors be ready for whatever sick scheme he and InGen had cooked up, and Owen was getting increasingly more worried he wasn't going to be able to stop it.

He and Claire had talked at great lengths about what she could do in her capacity to try to convince Masrani to step in, but her hands were pretty much tied. InGen could do basically whatever they wanted, and Masrani could disapprove, but he couldn't actually stop them. Not to mention that Owen hated when she had to deal with Hoskins, and, more importantly, Claire hated when she had to deal with Hoskins. His wife had enough on her plate, Owen certainly didn't want to pile more on there. Particularly because her efforts felt futile.

Owen was doing the best he could to keep Hoskins away from his girls, all his girls.

And he had a sinking feeling he was fighting a losing battle.

Claire was sometimes taken aback by just how well she and Owen had kept their marriage a secret. She had to bite back a snort when Masrani asked her if she knew who Owen Grady was.

Yeah , she wanted to say. You could say I know him.

Instead she had confirmed she did know him, as her fingers unconsciously reached up and ran over the cool silver of the wedding ring tucked under her blouse.

She pulled up to the paddock of the new asset to find her husband's bike resting against the wall, and him leaning beside it. Just seeing him lifted a little bit off her shoulders, made her breathe a little easier, and she turned off the car and climbed out.

“The boys get in okay?” She greeted as she walked over. Owen nodded.

“They were going to see the mosasaurus feeding and maybe check out the t-rex, and then I told them we'd be ready to meet back up with them,” he confirmed. “They loved the hotel.” Claire had gotten two adjoining rooms so that she and Owen could stay in the room next to Gray and Zach. The bungalow was far too small for all four of them to share for any length of time.

“Good,” Claire gave a nod, and then glanced around to see if there was anyone around. She knew where all the cameras were, and all of their blind spots, which was an incredibly useful piece of information. She tugged on Owen's vest and pulled him into a corner, reaching up to brush a kiss to his lips.

She was fairly strict with her rules on affection in the workplace. The last thing she wanted was the cat to be out of the bag because someone accidentally walked in on Owen pinning her against a wall or a desk, but she was having a day and she decided to screw her rules.

“Not that I mind the greeting, of course, but you doing okay?” Owen asked, leaning his forehead against hers and twisting a piece of her hair around his finger. She didn't answer, just nodded, and then gave him one last kiss and pulled away.

“It's just been a long day, in a series of long days,” she shrugged. “So, come on, I didn't pull you all the way out here for a kiss.”

“If you had, I wouldn't complain about that,” he grinned at her. “I want to go on record with that.” She rolled her eyes lightly, and lead him to the paddock. “So this is where you've been spending all your time lately.” He knew more than he was supposed to know about this project, Claire deciding that they had spousal privilege, and that being able to talk to him about it was more important than keeping it confidential, but he still didn't have all the details.

And as she filled him in, he was beginning to see why she looked like the weight of the world was on her shoulders lately, why she had kept the few things about the project from him that she had.

They had gone and made a new dinosaur. He had already made his opinion to her on the matter known, that he thought it was a terrible idea, so this time he swallowed his smart ass comments, following her up the stairs.

“Unfortunately,” Claire muttered. “I know how you feel about this, but we needed to do something, numbers are low and the Indominus Rex makes us relevant again.”

Owen stopped short, with a laugh, “Indominus Rex? Hon, you never told me what you named it.”

"We needed something scary and easy to pronounce. You should hear a four year old try to say 'Archaeornithomimus',” Claire shot back. Owen reached up and lightly ran his fingers along his waist before they reached the door.

“You should hear you try to say it,” he teased. Claire huffed, but he could see the smile tugging at the corner of her lips, and then she opened the door and she was all business.

Owen had known that this, this new genetically modified dinosaur, was a bad idea, but it had seemed like less of a bad idea when Claire would tell him about it at night curled up in bed, his arms wrapped around her as they were cocooned in their little bungalow.

But here? Standing in front of an empty paddock and feeling his wife's panic starting to mount as she desperately tried to figure out how it could have escaped? This felt like a bad idea on a monumental scale.

“They can track it,” Claire said desperately. “I'll go to Control, and we'll track it.” She started to move towards the door, and Owen stopped her.

“No,” his voice was firm. “I don't want you out there on your own with this thing on the loose.” Visions of her car on the side of the road, smashed and Claire gone flashed before him and made him dizzy. “Call from here, I'll go check it out.” She nodded, and reached over and gave his hand a squeeze before stepping out to make her call. He grabbed the guard and made their way into the empty paddock, his fingers grazing against the claw marks in the wall.

The radio cracked to life and Vivian's broken words made his whole body go cold.

“It's still in there!” He felt the ground shake and he had only one thought.

Claire .

Chapter Text

The ground shook beneath Claire’s feet, and she ran to the glass, dropping the phone that she had been holding tightly to her ear. She could see Owen running, the Indominus only a step behind, and her heart leapt into her throat.

It didn’t occur to her at first to be afraid for herself, she was too terrified for Owen to think about her own safety, and it was only when the entire viewing platform shook again as the Indominus crashed through the half closed door that she realized she was a sitting duck.

She had lost sight of Owen as soon as he ran out of the paddock (please be okay, please be okay), and she glanced around the small, empty room and realized with a sinking feeling that she had nowhere to hide. She threw herself to the floor, making herself as small as possible as she crawled toward the security desk.

Every shake of the ground made Claire tremble, and the thought of something happening to her husband made her breath catch in her throat. If he was gone, what would she do? How would she get out of bed every day?

No, no. He was okay. He had to be.

She wasn’t sure how long she was there, huddled under the desk, her knees pulled to her chest, when she heard Owen shouting her name in a panicked, terrified voice.

“Claire!” It took a lot of effort to get her shaking limbs to unfurl, her muscles tight with tension, but she managed to climb to unsteady legs as she ripped open the door and saw Owen rushing up the metal stairs to the viewing area. Claire launched herself at him and he managed to catch her just before they both tumbled back down the stairs, his hand coming to cradle the back of her head as she buried her face in his chest.

“I thought…” she started, breathlessly, “I thought…”

She thought he was dead, and it was only when she knew for sure that he wasn’t that she realized how certain she had been that she would never see him again.

"Hey, I’m okay, I’ve got you,” his voice was soothing, as he carded his fingers through her hair. He stank of gasoline and sweat, but she had never been so grateful to see him in her life. He pulled back, cupping her face between his hands. “Are you okay?” Claire gave a jerky nod, her fingers gripping his vest. She took a couple of deep breaths, trying to calm herself back down, and she could see Owen looking her over, making sure that she was actually unharmed, his gaze piercing.

“We have to get to Control, we have to…” Claire began, and Owen pressed his forehead against hers.

“We will,” he assured her. “But if you need a minute, we can take a minute.”

“We don’t have a minute,” Claire could hear the borderline hysteria in her own voice, and she took another deep breath. Owen’s arms wrapped more tightly around her.

“Here’s our second problem,” his voice came near her ear. “I think it smashed your car. Guess we’ll have to take my bike.” And despite everything that was happening at the moment, Claire found herself rolling her eyes, and following him down the stairs to where his bike was standing, miraculously untouched.

"Figures,” she muttered as she climbed on behind him, her arms around his waist, and she held on tightly as he sped off towards the Park.

His wife was a force to be reckoned with, and when they tore into Control, gone was scared Claire, replaced by an in charge and totally together Claire.

He could see that she was overwhelmed, but she was holding it together the best she could. Owen, on the other hand, was becoming more and more infuriated when he realized that they were going after this thing with non-lethals, that they weren’t going to evacuate the park immediately.

“We’d never reopen,” Claire said in a small voice, and he wasn’t sure if he wanted to hold her in his arms and reassure her that everything would be okay, that he wouldn’t let anything happen to her, or if he wanted to throttle her.

A little of both, if he was being honest.

He stormed out of the room, down to the main floor of the Innovation Center, fuming and attempting to calm himself down when he heard her voice cry out for him again. He spun around, the anger draining out of him.

“The boys,” she said breathlessly, and Owen froze, having forgotten that Claire’s nephews, his nephews were in the park somewhere. With this thing on the loose.

And Claire didn’t need to say anything else, as Owen grabbed her hand and tugged her outside.

She filled him in on what she knew as he sped towards the Valley, and he glanced over to see her biting her lip, a nervous habit that normally he found adorable.

“We’ll find them,” Owen told her, reaching across the car to grab her hand.

“What were they thinking?” Claire muttered, dialing Zach’s number again. “Why didn’t they come back when they were asked?”

“Because they’re Dearings?” Owen suggested, which got him a shove in the shoulder and a hint of a smile from his wife. Up ahead of him, as he sped through the fields, he could see the outline of something large and unmoving. He slowed down as they approached, and his heart sank. He threw the car in park, and turned to his wife. “Stay here.”

As he approached the dying animal, he heard the car door open and shut and he squashed a sigh. So much for listening to him. Because she’s a Dearing, he thought as her soft footfalls came up behind him. Had he really expected her to stay put because he asked? When had she ever?

She gave a choked gasp as she came closer, dropping to her knees on the other side of the dinosaur’s head, her hand hesitantly coming up to touch it.

Owen was sure he couldn’t love Claire any more than he already did, but he fell in love a little deeper when her devastated eyes came up to meet his. He climbed to his feet and glanced out over the horizon.

“She’s killing for sport,” he murmured, and Claire ran her hand along his back and tucked herself into his side. He turned his head and pressed a kiss into her temple. “I think you should take the car and go back where it’s safe.”

“Like hell I’m going to do that,” Claire answered instantly, her voice firm.

“Claire,” he began, and she shook her head.

“I will not leave you and the boys out here while I go cower in fear back at the Park,” she insisted. “Forget it.”

It had been worth a shot, he figured, brushing one last kiss to her forehead and heading towards the car. Owen wanted her to go back, wanted to know that she was safe, but there was another part of him that was happy she had refused. A part of him wanted her by his side, not only because he could then see with his own eyes that she was okay, but because he was a better version of himself when she was around. He was braver, smarter, better when Claire was next to him.

And if they were going to figure out a way to contain this thing, they were going to need all the help they could get.

Chapter Text

“No,” Owen could hear the grief in Claire’s voice as she sank to her knees and reached for the broken phone. It hadn’t taken long for them to track down the broken sphere, tracing the path the boys must have taken through the woods. Claire was out of the car in a shot, her heels sinking into the mud as she stumbled towards the wreckage.

“They made it out,” he was quick to reassure her, a hand coming down to squeeze her shoulder. “Look. Footprints. They made it out. We’ll find them.” Claire looked back at him, her eyes watery with tears, and he helped her back up to her feet, wrapping his arms around her.

“If anything happens to them,” she began, and he shushed her, tucking a kiss into her hair.

“We’ll find them,” he repeated. “Come on, let’s go.” He took her hand in his and led her out of the woods and towards the sound of rushing water, following the set of footprints until they stopped.

“They jumped,” Claire said breathlessly, pulling away from her husband.

“Brave kids,” Owen replied, glancing around and hoping that wherever the Indominus had gone after their nephews had escaped, it was far away from both the boys and them.

“Zach! Gray!” Claire shouted over the roar of the falls. Owen grabbed at her hand and shushed her, and his wife swung around to face him, her eyes flashing in anger. “Don’t you shush me. I am not one of your damn animals.” Claire was, Owen could recognize, holding on by a single thread, and he would have to tread carefully.

“I’m sorry, hon, but you have to stop shouting. The boys are alive, but we will not be if you continue shouting like that,” he tried to make his voice as gentle and even as possible, and he could see Claire swallow hard and give the tiniest of all nods. “Listen, you take the car back and I’ll see if I can track their footprints.”

“I thought I had made it very clear that I was coming with you,” Claire huffed.

“Sweetheart, you’ll last ten seconds out there, even less in those ridiculous shoes,” Owen tried to reason with her, and her eyes narrowed at the low blow to her shoes. “Those ridiculously hot shoes,” he corrected with a small smile, and she responded by untucking her shirt and rolling up her sleeves. “I don’t know what that means.”

“It means I’m ready, let’s go,” Claire insisted.

“Claire, please,” Owen tried again. “Please go back where it’s safe.”

“I can’t,” she told him, placing both hands on his arms and giving them a squeeze. “I can’t. I can’t go back and wonder what’s happened to you and the boys, I can’t. You would never leave me alone out here, and I can’t believe you really think I would.” He pulled her to him, pressing a desperate and fierce kiss to her lips.

“If you’re coming,” he started.

“I am,” she cut in.

“Then you need to listen to me, because you need to be okay, do you understand me? You being anything but okay and unharmed is not an option,” his voice was serious and Claire nodded, rising on her toes to kiss him again.

“Same goes for you,” she said.

“It’s just like taking a walk through the woods,” Owen said with a feigned nonchalance, shouldering his rifle and reaching for Claire’s hand. “65 million years ago.”

To be honest, the boys might be doing better than they were at the moment. It was Claire and  Claire was huddled behind a Jeep, her grip tight on Owen’s arm and her eyes squeezed shut, as they felt the Indominus’s warm and rancid breath on the back of their necks.

Owen gestured to run, and she was on her feet in a heartbeat, running as fast as she could as the Indominus crashed behind them. Owen reached out his hand to her, and she grabbed it without slowing down, tugging him with her.

She picked up the handset to give Lowery the coordinates of the Indominus, hoping that they were going to go after it with lethal weapons this time. Owen had been right (not that she wanted to tell him that and listen to him gloat), they were foolish to think that they could contain this thing.

It was not welcome news that Masrani had decided to fly the helicopter himself to go after the Indominus. Claire had been in the helicopter with him, and knew firsthand what a terrible pilot he was. She and Owen could do nothing but watch in horror as the helicopter crashed into the Aviary.

“Oh God,” Claire breathed out, mesmerized by the sight of black smoke pouring through the hole in the glass. A hole that now had dimorphodons pouring through, and it was only Owen pushing her that made her move her feet.

“Get down!” He yelled once they were back in the trees, throwing her to the ground and throwing his body on top of hers to shield her. The blood was pounding in Claire’s ears, and she had no idea how long they laid there, Owen’s hands keeping her firmly down, until he finally let out a shaky sigh.

“I think we’re in the clear,” he muttered, climbing to his feet and reaching a hand down. “You okay?” Her knees were skinned, her pantyhose ripped, but that was far better than the alternative, so she nodded, grateful that he was there, grateful that as the world fell apart around her, she still had Owen, strong and capable and, despite his brush with death that morning, so very much alive. “We need to move.”

Things had gone from bad to incredibly worse, and Claire didn’t have the luxury of time to think about the fact that Simon was dead, that the Park was almost certainly ruined, her career along with it. Not when she was running through the jungle, her husband’s grip on her hand just shy of painful, as the sounds of screeching echoed through the air.

It was chaos.

That was the best way Owen could describe Main Street. It was just pure chaos, and he so badly wanted to grab his wife and hunker down somewhere he knew she would be safe. But Claire, being Claire, was singularly focused on finding the boys, and had scrambled up to get a better view, making her a better target. Owen was trying his best to keep her safe, but he was knocked to the ground with a force that took the wind out of him.

He was struggling until suddenly he wasn’t, and he glanced up to see Claire smirking at him, reaching a hand down to pull him to his feet. He didn’t think, he just gathered her in his arms and pressed a kiss to her lips, deepening it just as she gasped.

“Zach! Gray!” She spun on her heels and raced towards them, throwing her arms around Gray and then Zach. “Where were you? Why didn't you come back?"

“Uncle Owen!” Gray launched himself at Owen when he spotted him, and Owen pulled the kid to him, ruffling his hair.

“We should get somewhere safe,” Owen said to Claire over Gray's head. Now that they had found the boys, Owen's only concern was getting his family somewhere safe. He would worry about the Park, about his raptors once Claire and the boys were on a boat somewhere very far from here. He knew he was going to have push back from Claire, but he wasn't going to take no for an answer this time.

The crowds were pushing in from all sides and Owen wordlessly gestured to a parked SUV, and Claire quickened her pace as the crowds surged towards them. The boys clambered into the back and Owen threw it into reverse just as the doors broke open and a massive amount of people came rushing towards them.

But for the moment, they were together, and they were safe, and that was all Owen could ask for. He reached over and squeezed Claire's thigh as he waited for everyone to clear a path that he could drive through.

“Everything's going to be fine,” he told her, glancing back at the boys and giving them a small, reassuring smile, and he was thankful that his wife was kind enough not to call him out on his lie.

Chapter Text

If they made it out of this alive, Owen was going to kill his wife.

His heart stopped when he saw her running, flare held high in her hand, a goddamn t-rex hot on her trail. It was an incredibly brave, selfless, and stupid thing to do.

It was something he would do, and he couldn’t help but think he might be rubbing off on her a little bit.

He’d be proud of that later. But at the moment, all he could think of was Claire, Claire trying to outrun a tyrannosaurus rex in the same shoes he had ridiculed her for earlier (he was going to hear about that, he was sure. The amount of money Claire spent on shoes was a well-worn argument between the two of them. This was all the proof she needed to be vindicated, and good God did Owen hate when his wife was right. But he was willing to let her lord it over him, because that would mean they were safe, she was safe).

He saw her throw the flare and then throw herself, flatten her body out on the ground inches away from danger, and he could only breathe again when she had scrambled to her feet, screaming at Owen and the boys to run.

Run they did, making their way to Claire, Owen grabbing her hand so forcefully that he was half afraid he would hurt her. There was no time to check to make sure everyone was okay, not with the battle raging before them, and it wasn’t until it was all over, until the Indominus was dead, until the other deadly predators (including Blue, which hurt, and Owen could feel Claire’s sympathetic gaze when he nodded at Blue to dismiss her) had rumbled away that Owen was able to finally assess his wife and nephews injuries and begin to retroactively about their safety.

Claire threw her arms around him, and he held her to him so tightly that he lifted her feet off the ground.

“You okay?” He asked softly, placing her gently back on the ground and brushing the hair off of her face. She nodded, and then spun around, pulling Gray and Zach to her. Owen wanted to run his hands over her body, make one hundred percent sure that she wasn’t hurt anywhere, but they were still standing in the rubble of Main Street, and his first priority was to get them to where the evacuation was happening and get them all the hell off the island.

“We should go,” he said, and Claire nodded, reaching for his hand and letting him lead her and the boys down towards the docks. She didn’t look back as they went, and he was proud of her for that, leaning over and pressing a kiss to her temple.

The boys were moving slowly, the adrenaline finally receding, and Owen felt himself becoming more sluggish as they went.

“We’re almost there,” Claire told the boys, reaching over to squeeze Zach’s arm. “I don’t know about you guys, but I want the world’s longest, hottest shower.”

“I want to sleep for days,” Owen chimed in. And he did. He wanted to climb into bed with his wife, wrap his arms around, and not move.

“I’m really hungry,” Claire added. “Like all of a sudden. Really hungry.” She slung her free arm around Gray’s shoulders. “I could eat a whole pizza by myself, I think.”

“Really?” Gray peered up at her, and Owen could see the hint of a smile on Gray’s face. He understood what his wife was doing, trying to be as reassuring as possible in the wake of what Gray and Zack just experienced. Trying to be as normal as possible, which was a hard sell all things considered. But still, he knew that she was trying, and he loved her for it.

"Maybe even two,” she added, and Zach snorted in disbelief, shaking his head at her. Owen let himself smile slightly.

Maybe they’d be okay after all.

Owen had left Claire and the boys when they arrived at the hangar, kissing her on the forehead softly and telling her he was going to see if he could lend a hand in any way.

She had debated getting up to join him, she felt like she should, but her feet ached and she was so bone deep tired that she found she just couldn’t make herself get up. She sat with Gray’s head in her lap, Zach slumped beside her, instead, mindlessly running a hand through Gray’s tangled hair.

She heard Karen’s gasp before she saw her, and Claire pushed the boys to stand, watching as they ran to their parents. Karen let go of Zach to pull Claire in for a hug.

“Where’s Owen?” Karen asked in a voice that told Claire that she was half afraid of what the answer might be. “Is he okay?”

“He’s okay,” Claire nodded, tugging the blanket on her shoulders more tightly around her. “He went to see if he could help.”

"Are you okay?” Karen asked seriously, her eyes raking up and down Claire’s body. Claire swallowed hard, but gave a slight nod. No, she wasn’t okay. She wasn’t anywhere near okay. But she was alive. And so were her husband and her nephews, and that had to be enough.

She was most likely unemployed. She was going to have to deal with the fall out from this disaster, including wrongful death settlements and probably a pile of lawsuits, but she was too tired and sore to think about that at the moment.

She was so exhausted that she was swaying on her feet, but she managed to see Karen and Scott and the boys off, bundling them in a cab and pulling the few strings she had left to get them on the first flight out. And then she went looking for Owen, needing to be near him, needing his solid presence to ground her.

“What do we do now?” Claire asked, as Owen slipped an arm around her and pressed a kiss to her temple.

"You two are together?” Lowery’s voice rang out before Owen could answer, startling Claire. If it had been twenty four hours prior, Claire would have jumped away from Owen, stammering out some excuse, but things being what they were, she just sighed instead, leaning into her husband a little more.

"Hello, Lowery,” Owen answered. “Glad to see you made it out okay.”

“How long have you two been together?” Lowery asked in a disbelieving voice. “Is this some kind of romance because of near death experiences and shared trauma?”

“No,” Claire shook her head, reaching up and pulling the long chain from around her neck, letting go of Owen long enough to undo the clasp and sliding the ring onto her finger.

“You’re married? I thought you hated him,” Lowery exclaimed. “I thought you hated her.”

"Far from it,” Owen grinned, squeezing Claire to him. “But while I have you here, Lowery, let’s talk about the fact that you opened a paddock door to let a t-rex out with my wife standing there.” He gave Lowery his fiercest glare, and Lowery visibly paled.

“She asked me to do it!” Lowery sputtered.

"Thank you for that,” Claire cut in, pinching Owen’s waist. “In all seriousness, thank you.” Lowery flushed, rocking back on his heels and nodding.

“I’m still trying to wrap my mind around the fact that you two are married,” he scratched at his head. “In the long list of unbelievable things that have happened today, that’s got to be near the top.” He shook his head. They heard him muttering to himself as he wandered away. “Married. Of all things.” Claire turned in Owen’s arms and reached up to kiss him.

“Guess our secret’s out,” she murmured against his lips.

“Guess it is,” he replied, finding that he really didn’t care all that much. Things that seemed to matter a lot seemed to matter a whole lot less in the wake of everything that had happened. “You ready to get out of here?” Claire hummed an agreement, letting most of her body weight lean on Owen as they walked out of the hangar. “And you know what we do from here on in? We stick together, just like we always have.”