Author's Note: I'm not entirely sure what this is, lol. I started writing it after the third or fourth episode and went through a fun couple of months being Jossed and attempting to retcon the darned thing, before finally deciding to place it pretty solidly post-1x07, pre-everything else. This is by far the smuttiest thing I've ever written and I'm a little, I don't know... weirded out by that? Go easy on me. XP
She should have guessed it was too good to be true that Tom was completely innocent. Too easy. Every loose end stuffed in a box and tied up in a neat little bow, with the label 'IT WAS REDDINGTON' tacked on. Of course it couldn't be true. The only thing neat about Raymond Reddington was his clothing. Everything else was a tangled mess of contradictions and secrets not even the US government was capable of untangling. He was a mystery wrapped in an enigma wrapped in designer shades and a six-button vest.
When Liz found herself at Red's door after he sent her the Angel Station file, she'd been numb. Tonight, she was anything but numb, and yet here she was.
She couldn't explain what drew her to Red in particular, other than the fact that he was quickly becoming the only port in the storm that was her life. Whether that was by design or happenstance, she didn't know. She wasn't sure she wanted to anymore. If she knew, she was afraid she'd feel even more adrift than she already did.
That was a terrifying thought.
Dembe answered the door for her, of course. He hesitated to let her in, which probably had something to do with how she reacted after the Gina Zanetakos fiasco. He clearly wasn't in the mood for another falling-out between her and Red. She didn't blame him. A falling-out between her and Red usually came with a body count attached. "Come on. I need to talk to him."
"Lizzy." Liz peered past Dembe's shoulder to see Red standing in the entryway. "What a pleasant surprise." His tone made it obvious it was far from a surprise. Hell, at this rate, it was becoming a tradition. "Dembe, I can handle it from here." Dembe eyed Liz warily, but nodded to Red and left. Liz suppressed a flinch when she heard the lock slide shut behind her.
Red leaned against the console table in full-on relaxed Reddington mode, arms crossed nonchalantly, vest unbuttoned, shirt undone far enough she could see his chest hair… He wasn't even wearing shoes, and she would have bet good money he slept with them on for ease of escape.
"Can I get you anything? Cup of tea, glass of wine, something stronger?" He was feeling her out, she could tell. The first time she turned to him like this, she needed a distraction while she screwed up the courage to confront Tom about the murder. The second time, that day in the park when he held her hand, what she needed more than anything was something to ground her and make her feel if only for a moment that she wasn't completely alone. Each and every time since they started working together, Red knew what she needed better than she had and played the role to perfection without even being asked. This time… This time she needed something more than to pretend for a few minutes that nothing had changed.
This time she was furious, and she had no outlet for her anger. He was all she had left. She needed him and she hated herself for it. The irony pained her.
"Why? Why did you have to choose me?" She cringed at how broken she sounded. That wasn't at all what she wanted. He opened his mouth to answer, but she waved him off; she didn't think she could deal with more obfuscations to unravel. "I know, it's because I'm special, because of my father, because of whatever cryptic half-truth best serves your purposes this week. I'm sorry, Red, but it's just not good enough. Not anymore."
"Well, I'm sorry, Lizzy, but it's going to have to be. If I showed my hand all at once, I'd outlive my usefulness very quickly, you know that. I'm risking twenty years of work—"
"You're risking my life."
"No. Never that. I have no interest in hurting you. You're safe with me."
"This doesn't feel safe. I haven't felt safe in a long time."
His brows drew together in sympathy and, worse, understanding. "What is it you want, Lizzy?" Suddenly, she was shoulder to shoulder with him in the park again, his voice low and full of real emotion as he assured her she could trust him.
"I want a time machine. I want to go back to what my life was like before I knew you. My life is in ruins because of you."
"Your life is in ruins because of your husband," he said. "Without me, sure, you'd be basking in the glow of quiet domesticity, profiling run-of-the-mill bad guys by day, in bed by 11 PM every weeknight so your dear, sweet, treacherous husband could get up early to teach a room full of fourth graders long division, the most exciting hour of your week spent watching Cutthroat Kitchen on Sunday nights. But your life would've still come apart at the seams eventually and it wouldn't at all have been my fault. Really, you should be thanking me. I saved you a lot of heartache." He shook his head, pityingly. "You could be raising a child with that man right now, Lizzy."
The sound of the slap echoed in the small entryway. If not for the blood trickling from his split lip, Red would have seemed completely unfazed by the blow. Without breaking eye contact, he reached into his pocket, withdrew a handkerchief, and pressed it to his lip.
"I'm surprised you're still wearing those."
She wrenched the rings from her finger and whipped them at his chest; he caught them as they fell with his free hand without so much as a flinch. She growled in frustration and stalked past him, pacing. "Will you stop being so goddamn self-possessed?"
"What would you have me do? Scream? Cry? I'm not about to shed any tears over Tom Keen. He was never good enough for you."
"Who are you to judge who's good enough for me?"
"I am an excellent judge of character."
"You're an asshole."
"That, too."
She stared at him and he stared back, calm, unblinking, a still counterpoint to the nervous energy coursing through her. He folded his handkerchief over on itself and reapplied it to his lip.
"I shouldn't've come here," she said suddenly, moving for the door. He caught her hand as she pushed past him.
"Lizzy…" His gaze burned her, the intensity of it discomfiting in its intimacy; she had to turn away. "Since I can't give you what you want, is there anything you need? Anything at all to help you through this? If it's within my power to give it to you, I will. I owe you that, at least." His thumb rubbed gently at the juncture between her palm and wrist; the edges of her scar tingled.
Liz bit back a frustrated scream. His compassion had a tendency to rear its not-so-ugly head at the most inopportune times. Right now, his compassion was the last thing she wanted. She wanted to punish him. For what, exactly, she didn't know. For insisting they were the same and seeking to ensure it, maybe. For confusing her. For looking at her the way he looked at her. For the hot and cold rush that ran through her whenever they touched.
Without the added inch his shoes usually gave him, he seemed oddly small—short, even. He was far from physically imposing in general, but she knew better than most that looks were most definitely deceiving where he was concerned. Which made what she did next reckless in the extreme, more reckless even than stabbing him had been.
She spared half a thought as to why Dembe hadn't come back in with all the commotion and then launched herself at Red, catching him off-guard and off-balance. Her rings pinged against the furniture as they went down, rolling quickly out of sight. The landing dazed them both, temporarily. It seemed for a while that she recovered more quickly, but she soon realized that he was simply making no real effort to do anything more than half-heartedly defend himself against her attacks.
"Fight back, you bastard!"
"I told you," he said, fending off another blow. "I have no interest in hurting you."
"You've hurt me every other possible way. Why not this?"
His face darkened. In an instant, he had her on her back, his weight distributed strategically to immobilize her without injury. "If what you need is to take some of your anger and frustration out on me—even though it should probably be directed elsewhere—again, I'm happy to oblige. But believe me when I tell you I mean you no harm."
He loosened his hold on her to prove his point. She stared up into his self-satisfied face and something inside her snapped. With a growl, she pulled herself up into range with a hand on the back of his neck and kissed him. Hard.
His entire body tensed. He'd braced himself for a punch or a head butt, not a kiss. She took advantage of that millisecond of shock and flipped them over again. Their teeth clashed painfully as his back hit the ground. When she pulled away, she had the lingering taste of blood in her mouth. Thankfully, it seemed like it was mostly his.
He'd lost track of his handkerchief during their tussle, so he prodded at his injured lip with his fingers. It was bruised now as well as bloodied. "Brava, Lizzy. I wasn't sure you had it in you." He was entirely too fascinated by the blood on his fingers as far as she was concerned, so she grabbed him roughly by the wrist and pinned his arm to the floor next to his shoulder. She glanced over to find his other hand mirroring the one she already had pinned. She narrowed her eyes at him; his only response was a raised eyebrow. Leaning further forward, she pinned that one down as well.
Red pushed against her hold, testing it. For reasons she couldn't fathom, he looked pleased. Straining up at the neck, he leaned in as close as he could to whisper in her ear. "Now that you have me in such a… compromising position… what do you plan to do with me?"
She didn't enjoy the jolt his whispered question sent through her body, or rather she did enjoy it and that made her wary. She had one of the world's most notorious criminals prone on the floor of his own hotel room and all she could think about were the delicious tingles his voice sent down her spine. She shoved herself back into a sitting position, sacrificing her hold on his wrists to put some distance between their faces. It had the unfortunate side effect of eliciting a sound from him she might have mistaken for a grunt of pain if she didn't have ample evidence it was… rather the opposite. She would have blushed if she weren't already flushed from head to toe.
She settled more of her weight onto him and the groan that rumbled through his chest couldn't have been misconstrued even if she wanted to. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. As much as he cut a fine figure in his impeccable three piece suits and hats, seeing him like this—disheveled, pupils dilated, blood smeared across his chin, and a flush creeping down his neck—made her heart pound. A frisson of power shot through her as she realized he still had his arms bent up near his head as though she'd actually restrained them.
Locking eyes with him, she rocked her hips against him deliberately and bit back a groan of her own. There was a challenge in his eyes, silently urging her to do it again. She couldn't help but oblige.
She settled into a rhythm, digging her fingers into his shirt for purchase as she ground against him. She must have pulled at some of his chest hair, because he bucked up into her and his hands flew down to her hips; they didn't grip or guide her, just rested there, a warm, grounding presence.
His eyes slid shut and he arched his neck; the angry pink of the scar she'd given him drew her attention like a magnet. She leaned forward and latched her mouth onto it with a moan, tracing the edges of the scar with her tongue. He bucked against her then, once, twice, three times in quick succession, the new angle sending shockwaves of pleasure through her. Her teeth sunk into his neck reflexively as she ground down against him and all of a sudden, he went boneless, chest heaving as he came down from his peak. He huffed out a breathless chuckle as she pulled back and smiled a slow, languid smile, his eyes heavy-lidded and warm.
"You certainly have unconventional methods of punishment, Lizzy," he said, while tracing lazy patterns on her thighs with his thumbs. "Not that I'm complaining this time. I'd be more than happy to reciprocate if you haven't,"—she looked away, blushing even redder than she ever thought possible—"Ah. I had a feeling that wasn't a problem. I'd be happy to reciprocate anyway."
"I should go."
"You probably should." She made to climb off him, but he tightened his grip on her hips for the first time. "But you could stay." He looked up at her, the cautious hope in his eyes making him look oddly young.
What did she have to lose by staying, really? If Cooper and Ressler had lingering suspicions she and Red were in cahoots from the beginning, it would fan those flames a bit, but she'd proven her usefulness by now as much as Red had. If it got her tarred with the same 'necessary evil' brush as Red, so be it. If it truly hindered her career later, she wasn't so sure she cared much anymore. If a wanted criminal could demand to work with her and she could be served up on a silver platter as easily as she had been, well… It didn't exactly give her any confidence her employer wouldn't use her in other ways, too.
She would either be famous for her association with Reddington or infamous, but it certainly wouldn't be decided by one lonely night. She nodded hesitantly. He smiled and hauled himself up to kiss her properly.