AN: It's admittedly been a LONG time since I've written anything, but I really love these two. After the finale, I couldn't resist writing a follow-up. I started this over the summer and planned to have it out long before the next season started, but you know what they say about the best laid plans... So it doesn't really align with what actually happened in the premiere, but that's why we have fiction world, right?
He'd gone home in a daze. Honestly, he had no idea how he'd gotten from the warehouse to his place, had no recollection of the ambulance or the hospital stay or the countless visitors – except for Kensi. Kensi he remembered, storming into the warehouse with her jaw clenched and sheer hatred in her eyes at the scene before her. She'd clenched, regretfully having to make the right decision and take out the most immediate threat first – the man calling the shots who now had a handgun pointed at her. She shot him first and, not missing a beat, sent another slug through the guy who'd just begun to press a drill into her partner's molar.
He remembered her in the hospital, touching her hand to his arm and then rolling her eyes when she found out the drill had made minimal contact. An emergency filling later and he was good to go.
Deeks wished he could blame the blinding pain in his back molar or the pain meds for making him loopy, but he really couldn't. How could he, when the only thing running through his mind, even after everything he'd gone through, was the recently added memory of the feel of Kensi's surprisingly soft skin beneath his fingers, her lips against his?
It wasn't for a case this time, and he hadn't been caught off guard – well, except for by himself maybe. She'd kissed him while they were under cover last year, and while the boundaries between them as partners had been breaking, he'd still been completely and utterly dumbfounded and motionless when she'd pressed her mouth to his.
It had happened so fast that it hadn't registered – the feel of her, the emotions. Before he could realize what was happening it was over, and he was stumbling over the realization that Kensi had kissed him. Kensi, his partner and friend. His very, very attractive and slightly charming and adorable partner and friend, if he was being honest with himself.
But this time it had been all him. And while he wasn't sure what had taken over him and unraveled the control he'd so carefully spun, it had happened almost in slow motion this time. It had built up as she went on and on in an uncharacteristic yet all too typical when it came to them way about how terrible he was at communicating. He'd just been so frustrated that he couldn't find clever words to spit out – well, looking back now, maybe she did have a point. But in lieu of words, courage and drive and feelings took over. He'd followed her when she'd stormed off, had slid his hands beneath her chin, tilted her face up to meet his, and pressed his lips to hers.
Well, he'd sure shown her. He cracked a smile at that in the sanctity of his living room. Of course the first time he kissed Kensi would be to prove her wrong and get back at her.
Tucking his arms behind his head and leaning back into the couch cushions, he gave up on the pain medicine-induced sleep he'd been contemplating and fixed his eyes on the ceiling. He just couldn't push it from his mind – the way she'd let him take control and tilt her head back, the soft, confused, searching look in her eyes when he'd pulled away.
The sharp knock at his front door was a welcome interruption from his overactive mind, but once he'd made it to the front door and pulled it open, he realized his train of thought hadn't been derailed at all. Kensi stood in front of him, looking just as good in casual light denim jeans and a white tank with a blue button-up pulled over it, but definitely not soft – or confused really.
In fact, he realized as his Kensi warning bells went off, she looked a little angry. Her arms were crossed and her jaw was tight and her eyes had that dangerous glint to them.
"Hey, feeling better?" she asked.
"Yeah, I-"
"Good," she cut him off, taking full advantage of the door he was holding open for her and striding on into his hallway. He closed the door behind them, skeptically following her.
Before he could even wrap his mind around the fact that she was walking all too comfortably on into his home and admire the sight of it, she'd spun quickly around on a heel, making him stop suddenly in place.
"What the hell were you thinking?"
Yeah, she was pissed.
Deeks narrowed his eyes inquisitively as she put her hands on his hips.
"When I got captured and tied to a chair, or when they drilled my teeth?" he asked sarcastically. "You're going to have to be more specific. But, for the record, I didn't really have control over either of those, so…"
"One tooth," Kensi corrected. "God. One tooth." She threw her hands up in frustration. "And that is not what I'm talking about."
"Then what?" He tilted his head, the sharp look in her eyes cutting through their bullshit and banter for once. And instead of swallowing down the thick lump in his throat that formed sometimes when he looked at her or thought of her, or averting his eyes when they got caught up in a moment that was too much, this time he was confronting it head on.
Kensi press her lips together, her anger faltering just slightly and leaving her with little courage to replace it.
"You had no right," she began, having to close her eyes and take a steadying breath, "to kiss me."
"Kensi," he started, seeing the war in her eyes.
"No." She put her hand up to stop him. "You're my partner," she said with every bit of resolve she had – and still, he could hear and feel her trying to convince herself of that, too.
"Kens," he said again, this time softer. And in a simple, almost innocent gesture to calm her, he wrapped his hand around her wrist.
As his fingers smoothed over the warm skin above her pulse point, he could feel her heart racing beneath. For a moment, she focused on the place where his skin met hers, watching his thumb glide over her wrist as if he didn't know what to do now that the momentum between them had changed so quickly.
"You said I had poor communication skills." He tried to get the words out, mouth twitching slightly to the side as he watched her watch their hands. "So, I communicated…"
And just as quickly as things had settled, he'd lit the fuse again. She rolled her eyes, pulling her arm from his grasp.
"That was kissing, not communicating." She turned, shaking her head as she began to walk away from him – but curiously, he thought, further into his house.
"It counts."
His words stopped her and she spun back around. "It so does not," she insisted, gesturing wildly again. "I asked you to say something you actually mean."
"And instead I did something I actually meant." He nodded for emphasis, knowing she'd read between his very indirect words before a bit of the playfulness returned. He couldn't resist… "It counts."
She tiled her head up in a half-grunt, half-growl of frustration, losing control of her patience and resolve. Before he could even comprehend what was happening, she'd grabbed a fistful of his shirt and pulled him close until their lips crashed together. Her fingers tightened around the fabric of his t-shirt, twisting and pulling until he emerged from the shock enough to fully kiss her back.
His hands migrated to her sides almost disbelievingly, holding onto her as if she were a figment of a dream that might just slip away when he held on too tightly. But instead she pressed herself against him, releasing her grip on his shirt to lay her hand over his arm. She cupped the back of his sculpted upper arm, urging his arms further around her.
Finally sinking into it, he obliged, wrapping his arms fully around her waist until his hands pressed into the dip in her back he'd found his eyes drifting to so many times before. And as he tilted up slightly, catching her lower lip between his, his palms pressed her body even closer against his.
He could feel the curve of her hip against his, the heat of her skin beneath his palms, and as he turned his head just slightly as their lips slid apart only to join again, he about lost all rational thought as her mouth opened for his. Nearly four years of pent-up tension had culminated in this, and as her lips pressed and slid against his in perfect rhythm and her hands urged him closer, he had to admit that it was well worth the wait.
But when his fingers gradually crept beneath the layers of fabric to graze her skin and make her heart pound even faster, she had to tear her lips from his with a muttered, "Deeks…"
He immediately pulled his hands away and raised them as if to show his compliance, forcing her to crack a smile. At the loss of his touch, though, she immediately regretted her interruption and sighed heavily.
"Sorry, I-" she started, but the moment she met his eyes – nervous, anticipating, bright blue and utterly adorable – she lost her words. Laying a hand over his abdomen and pressing up onto the tips of her toes, she captured his lips with hers – gentler this time, basking in the way he responded and let his fingers skirt up her back, tangling into her hair.
As she pulled back just slightly this time, he studied the way she pressed her lips together and narrowed her eyes a little as she gave him a look. It was the same playfully annoyed, swallowed pride kind of look she always gave him when he'd gotten one over on her. By the time he could question her with his eyes, she was shaking her head and rolling her now restless lips.
"Yeah, totally counts," she finally agreed, a smile lighting up her features.
"Right?" His brows rose, and the cocky, confident Deeks she was used to returned so quickly she almost regretted admitting it. "I knew it."
Kensi rolled her eyes, now using the hand that had been affectionately placed on his chest to push him away. And with that, he was sure that things had returned to normal between them. Almost.