Based on Isabo's Shirt, by Kirsten Beyer, in Distant Shores
Copyright: Paramount/Kirsten Beyer
Chapter 1
"Would you care to dance?"
She didn't hesitate to stand and take his hand, still bathing in the glow of the warmth she felt towards him after having opened his gift to her.
Her hand in his was nothing particularly new. She was accustomed to touching him fleetingly relatively often, patting his arm or prodding his chest playfully to drive home a witty retort, so this started for her as a natural extension of their every day contact. As his other hand circled her waist and rested in the small of her back, she felt the heat of his skin through her dress – certainly more noticeable through this thinner fabric than when he placed his hand there when they were in uniform.
He had beautiful hands. She'd noticed that years ago. Strong, long and relatively slender fingers for a man his height, and broad palms in keeping with his broad frame. Beautiful hands that could perform manual labour with force when needed, or could equally well move with grace and dexterity across sensitive input pads and control panels.
'Why has it taken you five years to bring me to Venice?' she asked playfully, as she relaxed into his arms, registering in the back of her mind how good she was feeling this evening, and how lovely it was in this holographic Venice.
He didn't reply immediately to her question. He often took his time to reply, or just responded with a look or a smile or a nod of the head. A 'man of few words' would have seemed positively chatty compared to Chakotay sometimes. He could even be a little sombre and moody on occasion, and she was no stranger to dealing with him on those days. This, however, wasn't one of those days, so Kathryn waited for some sort of response.
As her question hung in the air, he looked directly into her eyes and held her gaze for a few seconds. She had felt confident she could read him pretty well for several years now, so what she thought she could see in his direct gaze left her feeling slightly off-balance.
She wondered where that intensity had suddenly come from. The response in kind, the playful banter she was expecting, still didn't come. An answer of sorts finally came when the hand on the small of her back pulled her closer to him into an embrace, gently bringing her body flush against his. As he began to dip his head towards hers, her body registered what was happening, even if her brain was still lagging behind.
One direct gaze from him and the closing of the few centimetres that had separated them, and this sociable dance shared by two friends and colleagues seamlessly transformed into something quite else.