Summary: Some things are perfect in their imperfection.
A/N: Something short and sweet that I'm not entirely sure about. That is, I'm not sure if I'd want this to happen if the show were still alive, but my mind insisted! :) Oh, and other lemon-and-lime flavoured beverages are available! :D
Rating: T. Fairly harmless.
Disclaimer: Lie to Me is not mine.
The lights of the cars passing by were intermittent blurs amidst the driving rain, while the polished chrome and red leather of the diner were lit by hard arrows of unnatural light that almost made the restaurant a beacon in the darkness. It was painfully quiet in that dead space between late night and early morning.
They were eating in a comfortable silence, both lost in thought after a long day chasing the truth with her softness and his sledgehammer. It was depressingly empty, the diner's owner was running a cloth around clean glasses in impatient and erratic circles while the 24-hour news was low and unimportant in the background.
Shifting slightly on her stool, she thought about the dull setting for a long moment. It was the exact opposite of romantic, worlds away from anything in one of the many novels she'd read. The lighting was harsh, the weather outside was oppressive and uncomfortable, and it had only been minutes since she'd prised an offending gherkin from a thick glob of processed cheese atop her burger. Oh, and, of course, she'd delicately sucked the salt on her fries from the whites of her fingertips, but judging from the deep black orbs flooding out over his irises, perhaps that innocent action had provoked something desirous. In spite of those negative thoughts colliding in her brain like the hailstones that started banging on the pavement, she bit her thumb and then shook the nerves away.
"I was thinking," she whispered, the gentle reverie evident in her tone as she leaned a little closer to him, taking a tentative sip through the wide straw in her Sprite.
"Oh, yeah? Sounds dangerous," he replied, infinitely distracted by the way the line of plastic darted between her lips, how everything seemed so ridiculously sensuous and enticing, even as another sheet of rain battered into the wide pane of glass in front of them.
"I was thinking… I tried to kiss you when I was drunk… and you, you wanted to do something when you were high, so… maybe we should get some vodka for these drinks?" Certainty and uncertainty seemed to tango in her words, everything staccato and then solid.
"I'm all out of Sprite, darlin'," he replied, wondering where her sudden reminiscence and bravado had come from as he swirled the last few sad bubbles around the bottom of the glass, considering whether he should tear his eyes away from the wonderful picture of willing and wanting that he had suddenly found beside him. After all, it had to be a hallucination, right?
In contrast, her mind went through the gears like a Ferrari, and before he could utter even the merest hint of a protest, her lips were icy citrus on his, while the last fine grains on her fingertips were like sandpaper on his stubble. The salt, sweet and sharp merged into a kiss that was full of contradictions and surprise. A contented sigh unfurled between them as she pulled away before quickly returning for more, the casual dip of her tongue prompting him to cast all doubt aside as his hand drifted from the patent leather of her boot to the warm skin of her thigh like liquid silk.
A sharp, instant clatter broke through the rising haze of their passion as the owner dropped one of the glasses he had been wiping. Taking in the sudden changes before him in surprise, the vessel had slipped from his fingers and shattered into tiny pieces on the hard floor. Caught between a chuckle and a grimace, he dropped the cloth on the bar in defeat and made his remark loudly, despite the emptiness.
"Hey! Lovebirds! There's a hotel across the road!"
By the time the hotel room door had shut with an affirmative click, the power had gone out, quenching all the light and giving way to the low, insistent rumble of thunder. Hair curled and damp from the water, she traced raindrops over his tattoos without wondering if his shivers were pure desire or punctuated with the cold. As the electric blue lightning serrated the dark ink in the room, he never cursed the absence of daylight to see every inch of her, thinking that those fleeting merges of colour were just like the hunger in her eyes.
When one of the lamps on the beside table flickered into action, spreading a surprisingly soothing glow in an instant, they were still relying on senses other than sight as she listened to his heart slow to a gentle pulse while he ran his fingertips over her hip, committing every curve to memory.
Thinking back to her earlier musings, she knew that the moment was light years away from the hard truth of their fantasies or the printed fiction of her romance novels. It had been a night cluttered with imperfection – the unromantic diner, the contradictory kiss, the shards of broken glass, the blanket of black pulled over the heat of their colliding skin. A shrug soon chased away those thoughts into oblivion, the warm press of his lips against her temple rendering them insignificant.
"You alright, love?"
Their eyes met in the light for the first time since the diner, but her wide, satisfied smile and one solitary word gave him her answer well before the rising red of dawn.
"Perfect."