There's Only One Way Out
Challenge: Jellie Smut Challenge
Prompt: Body Bag
Author: Jayne Casey (aka Epic_LoVer)
Characters/Pairings: Jellie (John Casey/Ellie Bartowski), some Charah (Chuck/Sarah), mentions of some others.
Disclaimer: Just playing in this sandbox, I don't own the playground…
Rating: M for More than you want your kids watching, I'm sure.
A/N:Self-beta'd. Please excuse mistakes I might have missed.
Colonel Casey pounded on the door for what had to be the umpteenth time, still receiving no answer on the opposite side. It was a chilly Saturday evening and he was trying to spend some quality time with Ellie. They rarely ever had a day off considering Chuck seemed to flash on every tiny thing he laid his eyes on and now they were stranded outside of the large cabin that they were sharing with Sarah and Chuck for the weekend.
So much for a leisurely walk…
Chuck had Sarah arching her back off the bed, her head digging back into her pillow in pleasure at the fingers that danced in swirls across her stomach. She moaned and threaded her fingers through the dark brown curls of his hair and his lips attached themselves to the side of her sensitive neck.
Both of their groans filled the room as they moved together, the friction of their bodies setting each other on fire. Suddenly, Sarah froze, her body completely stiff.
Chuck noticed immediately. "Sarah? What-"
"Did you hear something?"
They paused and both listened intently.
"No, I don't hear anything. Must be the wind," he concluded.
Sarah wasn't so sure, but as soon as Chuck started moving again, all of her thoughts flew out the window; paranoid and coherent alike.
"That's the last time we leave the cabin without grabbing keys first," he grunted, stepping back from the door. "I'm going to break this door down if they don't open up!"
Ellie moved behind him and placed a soft hand over his red, hardened fist. "John, threatening them won't get the door open any quicker."
"Wanna bet?" he muttered.
She smiled at him. "They're probably asleep."
He snorted loudly at the idea.
"Okay, maybe they're just… You know, it's a really big, insulated cabin. They probably can't hear us."
"They'd be able to hear us if I hadn't been talked out of leaving my cell at home."
"This trip is about getting away from the hassles and interruptions of everyday life; no cell phones, no laptops, no pagers…"
"No way to call for help in case of an emergency…" he pointed out.
"No forms of communication other than face-to-face. Besides, if it's a medical emergency, we've got first aid kits in the cabin and the car. Plus, you always have me," she grinned seductively, running a finger down his chest where his t-shirt was slightly visible through his lightweight jacket.
His frustration with the Intersect and his co-worker had ebbed away as he felt the imaginary line she traced send tingling sensations south of his belt line. "I'd like to have you right now," he growled, playfully.
Ellie felt his words caress her body, sending shivers down her spine. Every lust-filled sentence that came from John Casey was like poetry and it aroused each one of her senses.
"But there's still that little issue of not being able to get past the locked door and you won't let me break it down."
Ellie sighed as the truth of the situation brought her back down from her sexual high. She wanted to get inside just as much as he did. Glancing around the yard, she noticed it was actually very beautiful with all the fall leaves turning colors. Very beautiful and very romantic.
"You know what? Let's camp out," she suggested.
Casey narrowed his eyes. "Camp out? Are you serious?" It wasn't that he couldn't handle that, but they had paid half of the rental fee for the place and he had every intention of enjoying what he paid for.
"Sure. Why not? It's beautiful, it's fairly warm and we have the sleeping bags in the car."
He nodded. "Affirmative, but if you'll recall, the car is locked as well."
This brought a disappointed look to her youthful face. He frown always seem to make her look older than she really was and Casey hated to see her unhappy.
"Although, the trunk may still not be latched."
A glimmer of hope returned to her eyes. "Well, let's hope there's something we can use. I haven't cleaned it out in awhile, but I think there's some blankets in there."
They walked down the front steps to the porch and over to the car where Ellie indeed had forgotten to shut the trunk. "Well, thank goodness for small favors."
Lifting the lid, she found the first aid kit, a couple of wool blankets, an emergency blanket, a flashlight and another small box.
Casey picked up the box and stared at the lettering on the front. He held it up and looked at her, waiting for an explanation. When she didn't notice him waiting, he cleared his throat. "Something you want to tell me?"
She did a double take on the box and chuckled. "What do you want to know?"
"How about we start with the most obvious question; why do you have cadaver bags in your trunk?"
She sighed with a sad, tight smile. "In case I come across an accident scene. I've been in traffic jams that last for hours and sometimes, ambulances can't get there in time. When someone "passes" in the middle of one of those, it's usually hot and in the middle of a thousand people. If I come across them and can't help them in time, a little privacy and respect is the least that I can give them."
He nodded, accepting this as part of her caring nature. "So, anything we can use?"
She took another glance at her inventory, letting her eyes pause on the box he still held. "Actually…"
He followed her line of sight and caught onto what she was thinking.
"Ellie…I know that look," he warned.
"We could use one of the extra large bags…"
"No way."
"…with the wool blankets…"
"Negative."
"…and…"
"Not a chance."
"Why not?" she half whined, hands on her hips. "We don't really have much of a choice here."
"It's the same reason I don't run around playing in caskets."
"Because of the mortuary's 'You break it, you buy it' policy?"
Casey stared back at her; astonished those words had come from her mouth. It wasn't something he ever thought he'd hear from her.
She half-grimaced, half-smiled. "Sorry. My best friend, Missy, is a mortician with a very dry sense of humor."
He grunted. "She always joke about death?"
Ellie thought on this. "No, but when you make a living around it, sometimes you have to make light of it to keep from breaking down over it."
Casey could understand this theory to an extent, but being in the military, you see a lot of it and when a body bag usually shows up, it's not for sleeping in. "So, you want to fashion together some makeshift sleeping bags?"
"Just one," she replied, nonchalantly as possible.
"Ah, but where will you sleep?" he chuckled, teasing her.
Of course, this backfired when she shot him a dangerously wanton look and replied "with you."
Casey gave one of his more lighthearted grunts of approval and set to work, helping Ellie with thoughts of very primitive, sexy acts running through his head.
Ellie watched her husband with a knowing smirk as he grabbed a wool blanket and shook it out to line the bottom of the black bag she had laid out and unzipped. Pushing the fabric down into the plastic, she glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. "Why does the thought of sleeping in a body bag bother you?"
He growled, "Funny how quick you are to forget that night."
"Ah, yes, your bachelor party," she sighed with a tight, disproving frown. "How could I forget?"
He glared at her. "First of all, it was not my stag party; it was a pitiful excuse for a gathering, thrown in my honor, which I would like to remind you, was not approved by me. Secondly if it had been, half of those people wouldn't have been invited and we would've gone to the gun range."
She smiled. Her man wanted guns over girls and that was why she loved him.
"Furthermore, if it had been in my control, I would not have woken up in such a state."
"Welcome, ladies of the night and gentlemen. I am Lester Patel and the man standing surprisingly sober and coherently beside me is Jeff Barnes and together, we are Jeffster!"
No one claped and you could practically hear the proverbial crickets chirping.
Casey turned and glared at Chuck who threw his arms up in surrender. "I didn't invite them, I swear! I told them no, over and over again."
Casey growled, his narrowed eyes piercing the two idiots on stage. "Looks like they decided to crash anyway; I'm calling security."
"No, no, no!" Chuck said, frantically waving his arms. "Just…just wait a minute. Give 'em a chance, big guy."
"They had their chance to stay alive and by showing up, they've decided to forfeit that chance."
"Casey, come on. You know all about second chances. That's the main reason we're here tonight, right?"
Another growl escaped him, hating himself for agreeing with the nerd, but he was right. Ellie had given him a second chance to explain his actions over keeping his military work and Chuck's involvement a secret, and in return, he looked past her swinging a frying pan into his face.
Reluctantly, he let them continue.
"Tonight, we're all here to welcome one of our very own into the world of manhood…"
"Manhood?" he seethed, through clenched teeth.
Chuck's mouth gaped open like a fish out of water. "I, uh, I don't know…"
"…our friend, our brother, the big dog; John Casey. The alpha male has found a female to his liking to enslave in matrimony…"
"Enslave? I'm not enslaving my fiancée…" he groused, his blood pressure rising at Lester's insinuations.
"…for the purpose of comfort, emotional support...and procreation."
"That's it! I'm grabbing my gun," he turned and stalked off, leaving Chuck staring in disbelief at the stage.
After speechless renditions of Montly Crue's "Girls, Girls, Girls" and Poison's "Talk Dirty To Me", Jeff and Lester took a short break and jumped off the stage to check with Chuck on the general consensus of their performance.
"So," Lester smirked, "what do you think?"
After thinking of many different things he could say to Lester, he asked the question that had Casey wondering earlier also. "'We welcome one of our own into the world of manhood?' Care to, uh, elaborate on that, buddy?"
"It's from our bar mitzvah speech," Jeff chimed in. "We didn't have time to write one for a bachelor party on such short notice so we tweaked it to work."
"I think it worked perfectly, Jeffrey. It flowed with the theme." He smiled at Chuck. "We're planning on doing something from the King as an encore."
"Oh," Chuck looked relieved. "You do Elvis?"
"Elvis? Please! We're doing Sir-Mix-A-Lot's 'Baby Got Back'."
"Right..." Chuck drawled out. Any objections he had left him as his eyes blurred past the two of them and Casey came into focus with something hidden in his right hand. Yep, it was a gun.
Panicking, he dug his new tranq gloves out of his pocket and threw them on.
"Wow! Those are some nice gloves, man," Jeff slurred, already having had too many beers while he was playing onstage. "Are they real fake leather?"
Chuck smiled tightly and cupped the side of their faces. "Oh, you guys!"
"Jeffrey!" Lester admonished, "What did I tell you about-"
Casey approached them just in time to see Jeff and Lester collapse into a moronic heap on the floor. "Good going, Bartowski. Now we'll never know what he told Barnes."
Chuck looked confused. "Did you really want to know?"
"No, of course not," Casey sighed. "But I still really wanted to shoot them."
"Sorry about that. Hey, did you realize that you're holding your actual gun and not your tranq? I think you grabbed the wrong one by mistake."
Casey looked down at his firearm and back up at Chuck. "No, I didn't."
He turned to walk off, but Chuck grabbed his arm. "Seriously, Casey, you were going to shoot them, shoot them? I know they can be annoying, but…"
He was pretty sure that Chuck's rambling would someday actually cause him to fall asleep, but he didn't realize that it would make him so drowsy so fast. Or maybe it was the amount of scotches he had. He glanced down at his arm to see Chuck still tightly gripping his upper arm.
"How effective are those gloves of yours?"
Chuck glanced at his hands in horror. "Oh! Uh, pretty effective…"
Casey swayed a bit on his feet. "Effective enough to work through layers of fabric?"
"Um..." Chuck hesitated before Casey's eyes rolled back into his head and he passed out on top of the two musicians. "…evidently."
Ellie chuckled at her husbands annoyed face.
"Oh, yeah, laugh it up, but when I came to, It was far from humorous."
Kneeling down, she pulled back the top blanket and shimmied between the covers. It was warm and it would definitely suffice for them for the time being. She looked to him to join her, but was surprised to see him still weary of the idea. "It's just a bag, sweetie. It's not like it's a curse or anything to lay in one."
"How many people do you know alive that have been in one?"
None, she agreed silently. Well, he had her there. "Was it really that traumatizing for you? I mean, I'm the one that suffered."
His eyes widened. "You?"
"Yes me! Of course, you wouldn't know, you weren't there. Well, you were, but you weren't. Consciously, anyway…"
"Okay, Morgan, Sarah," Chuck paused, looking at two members of Casey's SWAT team, "guys...we need to get Casey into the house before Ellie comes home. If we can get him into the bedroom," he paused again with a shudder at the word, "then it'll look like he's asleep. She's scheduled to work a double shift tonight, but she could be home anytime so be on the lookout."
Nodding, Sarah scanned the perimeter of the dimly lit courtyard before they all shuffled their feet, carrying the heavily weighted down black body bag swiftly past the fountain. Chuck ran ahead to unlock the door and have it open for them. Quietly, they moved into the apartment and closed the door before turning on the light. After reminding Morgan not to touch anything, knowing how much of Casey's gadgets looked fascinating to the untrained-spy, Chuck disarmed the front door alarm before it could go off.
"The bedroom's upstairs, fellas; first door on the right."
Tightening their grip on the attached nylon handles, they lifted the bag higher and ascended the stairs.
"Chuck, explain to me again why this," Sarah motioned to the dead weighted bag, "is even necessary?"
He raised a brow. "Do you remember how Devon's bachelor party went?"
Sarah nodded. They didn't mention Devon if they could help it. Ellie had long decided that she couldn't take anymore his deception; not to mention the fact that he made it pretty obvious by being officially the World's Worst Liar…ever. Although, his "I-had-to-decapitate-a-cat-bear-attack" story was slightly amusing, it was just another lie to top the mountain of tall tales that had been piling up for a while now. Agent Forest had shattered Devon's credibility, but as innocent as he was, it was pretty set clearly in stone for Ellie.
"Okay, but this is hardly like that situation. There were strippers, but once he growled at them once, no one's gone near him all night," she said, not understanding the problem.
"Right, but remember the bear story?"
"Yeah," She frowned in thought. "What about it?"
"Do you remember the "truth" after the story?"
Sarah recalled the story he told her after wards about him and Devon standing in the courtyard, while Ellie listened to his story, but then she flat out told him that she didn't believe him and then Chuck said…
"Oh…OH!" Sarah said, recalling with widened eyes.
"Yeah," Chuck agreed.
"The 'Casey was drunk and arrested' spiel?" she grinned a little at the audacity of the notion.
"Correction, thanks to Devon: 'arrested, drunk, and exposing himself after he peed his pants.'" He chuckled. " Anyway, after hearing that, Ellie doesn't like him drinking in public."
"But he had to have told her it was a lie, right?"
Chuck looked helplessly at her.
"Right?" she pressed. When he still didn't answer her, she stared at him in disbelief. "Are you telling me all this time, she gave him a chance after she found out that he was a 'perverted drunk'?"
"I don't know," Chuck shrugged, his hand on the doorknob to the bedroom, turning it, "I never asked-"
A scream interrupted Chuck as he opened the door, startling everyone and alerting the men (Morgan included) who had dropped their handles on the bag. Both servicemen now had their guns drawn, ready for action.
Ellie stood in the bedroom doorway in a soft pink silk and lace chemise and slightly ruffled bed hair. "Chuck, what are you doing here?" She glanced around and noticed some of her fiance's military buddies. "Steve…Mike…"
"Ma'am," they replied, nodding to her.
While she ignored the fact that Morgan stood in the back of the crowd, hesitantly waving to her, her eyes fell on the obvious full body bag at all of their feet. Without warning, her mind raced. Her family and some of John's military brothers were standing in her house with an occupied body bag…and John was nowhere to be found. That could only mean…
Her hands were magnetized to her face, covering up half of the horrified look that took residence there. Her eyes filled with tears. "Oh my…no!"
Everyone stood there, momentarily too stunned by Ellie's reaction to stop her heart from breaking in front of their eyes. What shocked them more was that despite her pain, her emotions had just done a complete one-eighty and the look on her face was now one of extreme displeasure, possibly hatred.
"Who was it?" he voice came out sharply, with a slight hint of shakiness to it.
Chuck broke out of his revere and shook his head. "Who was what?"
"Was it a terrorist?"
"A terrorist?" he asked, making sure he heard her clearly. "I-I don't under-?"
"Who killed my fiancé Chuck?"
"Killed…fiancé?" Ellie was asking who killed her fiancé and he was still so stunned he hadn't realized that he hadn't explained to her that he wasn't dead. Oh, crap…
"John, Chuck!" Ellie had broken out in full-fledged tears by this point and fell to her knees."Who killed my fiancé, my husband-to-be, my John?"
Sarah nudged Chuck into saying something instead of stammering like he'd been doing for the past minute and a half. "No one!"
"Chuck, it's okay; just tell me. I can take it. You don't have to protect me from this."
"No, no, no, no, no," he said quickly as his brain restarted, working double-time. He knelt on the floor next to his sister and pulled her into a hug. "Oh, God, Ellie, I'm so sorry. Casey's not…John, he's…he's not dead."
She sniffled back her tears and looked straight into her brother's eyes. "He's not?"
"No, I swear to you, he's not dead. Unconscious, maybe…"
Her eyes lit up. "He is? Really?"
"Really, really. Watch this," Morgan replied as he kicked the side of the bag. As he expected, a low, muffled moan escaped from the confines of the bag. "See?"
"Then what's with the bag?" she asked. Wait, the bag…body bags are airtight to prevent the smell of decay and fluids from escaping…John! "Quick! Open the bag!"
Sarah scrambled for the zipper on her side and pulled it down the side, splitting it into two and revealing the left side of Casey's perspirated, semi-conscious body. Ellie unzipped the other half and pulled it back to let the cool air blanket her fiancé.
She glanced up at Mike and Steve. "Would you please help me move him to the bed?"
"Yes, ma'am," they both replied, lifting the bottom of the bag and moving to the side of the bed before transferring him from the hot nylon to cool, comforting sheets.
"Thank you," she said, wiping the tears from her face. "Now, I'd appreciate it if you could give me a minute and meet me downstairs in the living room." Nodding they all started filing out the door except for Morgan.
"El, I just want you to know that I am here for you. Anything you need, you just ask and I'll be on it. I can get you anything you could possibly-"
"Morgan...go home."
His cheery demeanor dropped instantly into disappointment and he turned towards the door as he spoke. "Go home, right. I can do that. I'll just, uh, head out my Morgan door."
"Morgan…"
"Yeah?" he asked, reluctantly turning back to her.
Ellie walked over to Morgan and enveloped him into a hug. "Thank you."
Relishing in what he understood had to be a very emotional moment for Ellie, he nodded and hugged her back. "No problem."
As Ellie tried to pull away, she found Morgan's grip not loosening and rolled her eyes. "Morgan…"
"Right," he said, releasing her, "leaving." He grabbed the door to close it and said, "If you need anything just call. Anytime. Anything at all…I mean anything..."
"Go home, Morgan."
"Grimes," Casey grunted, reliving the thought of him hugging his wife. "I'm going to lock that little troll into a dungeon he'll never forget!"
Ellie smiled and wagged a finger at him. "He might like that. Remember, you're talking about an adolescent adult who grew up with my baby brother playing Dungeons and Dragons."
He stared down at her, still snuggled up in the bag, remembering how he'd felt being zipped up in it; feverish and claustrophobic. He imagined that hell would feel quite similar. "That was really traumatic for you, wasn't it?"
"Losing you?" she asked with every serious bone in her body.
"Yeah," he confirmed. "It sounds like you had a bit of a breakdown."
She frowned. "You don't know the half of it. I'm not the type of person to just break down. I'm usually a very strong person."
He nodded in agreement. "Very headstrong and stubborn."
"But the thought of losing you, John, I don't know what I'd do without you, now that you've come into my life." She shook her head and but her lip, feeling sorrowful tears prick at her eyes.
He sighed and stared at the bag before reluctantly pulling back the cover and sliding down into it and throwing an arm around his wife. "You'd carry on without me."
"How can you say that?" she demanded, appalled at his nonchalance.
"Because as difficult as it is to voice it, it's still a fact. The sun will rise and set, the world will still turn, your brother will still be a bit of a nerd..."
Ellie slapped him playfully, despite the seriousness of the conversation, causing him to chuckle.
"See that abuse? You'd be just fine on your own." The humor fell from his face and was now masked with a mixture of love, admiration and seriousness. "You already did one helluva job with Chuck. I have faith in you, El."
"Thank you," she said, staring into his eyes. "But I don't ever want to lose you, John Casey. Ever."
He glanced down at the ring on his hand. "I can't give you any guarantees, Ellie, you know that."
"Then promise me," she commanded, tightening her grip on him and bringing her face closer to his, "promise me you'll try."
"I'll try," replied the colonel, deeply inhaling her scent, feeling the warmth of her breath softly gracing his lips. "I promise."
The fierceness that was held in her gaze was now pouring from her lips in a deep, emotion-driven kiss that was sure to leave bruising.
Casey's hand cupped the side of her face, his fingers running through her hair as his lips fought hers in a battle for control. U Using his body's leverage, he held her close and rolled on top of her.
"I swear to you, Eleanor Faye Casey," he pledged between soft, sweet kisses to her neck, just below her ear, "that I will use every last fiber of my being to come back to you, no matter what."
The meaning of his words and the passion underlining them sent chills down Ellie's spine, before breaking off into webs of pleasure that shot straight to her core. The tiny mewls of ecstasy dislodging from her lips had him harder than he could ever remember and he ground his pelvis into hers to thank her for it.
"John," she breathed, "I need you...here...right now."
A ripping zipper could be heard through the sound of heavy panting. Casey wrapped his hand around his hardened cock, plunged deeply into Ellie who was soaking wet and sighed as the rest of the world fell away. Simultaneous moans were exchanged at the contact and were swallowed by each other in a silencing kiss.
He was in heaven, there was no doubt about it. He was reminded with each little sound she made when he bottomed out with every thrust. It was just him and his beautiful wife, wrapped around each other in the throws of passion and nothing else mattered.
There they were: outside, vulnerably where anyone could see them, making love in a vessel normally used for transporting the deceased. As disturbing as it should have seemed, it seemed more taboo than disgusting, which only served to turn up the heat in the fire they had already ignited.
The heat from the bag mixed with the trapped heat of their bodies and Ellie and John were sure they were going to spontaneously combust. Drive after drive, he their hands roamed over each other in exploration, rediscovering what they knew would send the other over the edge into a euphoric paradise.
Ellie felt her release bearing down on her. Her arousal was heightened with each internal rub of friction in a place where only John Casey was King.
He felt her beginning to contract around him and her movements were getting more frantic, signaling her impending climax. Thankfully, he was already close to release himself. Expertly, he slid his hand down between their sweating bodies and hovered over where they were joined.
"I love you, Ellie," he proclaimed, applying pressure to her sweet spot.
"I lo-" Ellie's words died in her throat at the explosive orgasm that washed over her. Her body arched stiffly from the ground and froze with sensation.
Casey gasped and grunted as he felt her clench onto him like a vice. Each involuntary contraction was another turn of the vice's handle, squeezing him and milking him for all he could muster and then some. He used all of the last of his energy shooting into her throbbing body as he came.
At the sensation of him spilling into her, another jolt of passion swam through her and threw her into a second mind-blowing orgasm.
Casey's exhausted body collapsed lightly on top of her before he rolled off to the side to avoid hurting her with his weight. Getting his breath back, he threw his arm back around Ellie's waist and drew her close, pushing the damp hair back out of her face.
She smiled lazily at him. "I love you, too, John."
"I know," he said, his smile mirroring her own.
"Please, don't ever leave me. I lost my mom and my dad, I don't wanna lose you too."
"I'm not going anywhere, sweetheart," he assured her, running a loving thumb across her cheek. "We're married."
She smiled sadly. "Marriage isn't always an eternal bond."
"Ours is."
She smiled at the determination behind his look when he said those words. "Yeah. it is."
"An oath is an oath. And I take mine very seriously."
"Are you sure?" she asked playfully, "because once you're in, there's no going back."
"I'm positive."
"And you can never leave me."
"Ellie, I'll always come back to you." Casey kissed her passionately. "There's only one way out of this and it's in a box."
"Actually, it's a bag."
"You know what?" he asked, looking around them. "Now that I've conquered my doubts about this thing, I'm not so sure I want out."
"Well I do," she laughed. "I feel like we're a couple of steamed vegetables in here."
He laughed at her choice of words. "Agreed."
She unzipped the bag a bit more to let some cool air in and sighed. "So, you like the bag now, huh?"
He smirked at her mischievous grin. "Let's just say that a body bag will never look the same to me."
Her grin widened. Mission Accomplished.