"I will be," Christopher said. "I promise."
"I love you," Justine finished.
"I love you too," Christopher said, replying automatically, and hung up. He caught Paige's questioning look. "My wife, Justine."
"Ah," Paige said, before turning away to look at her computer again. "Congratulations."
She looked... slightly embarrassed for a moment or two, her cheeks reddening, like she didn't know what to say. Christopher wasn't sure what to make of that. He hadn’t mentioned his wife to this point, but why would he? It wasn’t as if there was anything between him and Paige.
"Look," Christopher said. "It's getting late. I don't think we're going to catch Riker today."
He caught Paige's wince at that. She obviously still thought that this was her fault, rather than just the way cases went. But then, she didn’t know that Christopher struck out more often than he didn't. The important thing was to keep going.
“Come on,” he said. “I’ll give you a ride home.”
“That…,” for a moment, he thought that she might reject the offer. “That would be good, thanks.”
He would give her a ride home, then go back to Justine. He just had to hope that Paige would turn up some good leads for him by tomorrow.