Promise

Reese promised to walk Zoe home at the end of Lady Killer. But it's another promise from him that she really wants.

While Joss does not appear in this story, she figures prominently in it, so I have categorized this as a Careese tale.

XXX

"Sure you don't want to call your driver, Zoe?" Reese asked as they walked away from the bar.

"No…it's a nice night and I could use the fresh air," the fixer said. She took his arm and began telling him about the client she was meeting with tomorrow.

Zoe was smart, savvy, beautiful, and until recently Reese thought, detached. During a long cold winter, while Stanton's virus worked its will with the Machine, leaving both it and Reese sluggish and erratic, her smoky voice, cool hands and lean, sinewy body had worked together to bring him a few short moments of blessed oblivion.

While the Machine couldn't be depended to call Harold, Reese knew that Zoe would always call him.

But winter was long gone, the Machine had begun dispensing numbers regularly again, Shaw had joined the team in her own way, and Reese had slowly started to emerge, not just from the trials of the last few months, but from other things, things he had held close to his heart for a very long time.

Zoe's arch, sardonic patter should have been amusing, but as they walked along, Reese realized he wanted more than a conversation that ended with a quip or a shrug.

He wanted questions, challenges, debate. He wanted to laugh hysterically and to yell at the top of his lungs in fury. He wanted to grieve and to rejoice.

He wanted to sit down and talk with the one person in the world he knew could do that with.

He wanted Joss.

But after spending time with her in the safe house, after seeing her with Ian Murphy, after watching her walk away into the evening shadows tonight, Reese knew whatever it was they had had between them, would not come back easily, much less move forward.

He couldn't just hang around and ask if she was ok.

He had to earn it.

He just didn't know how.

"I didn't realize Jo –" Zoe's eyes flickered at him, "Carter had been demoted. Lionel mentioned it to me at the club."

Reese stopped walking, looked at her. His voice was soft, dangerously soft. "Does it matter?"

It was an unspoken rule between them. They didn't talk about Joss. They never talked about Joss.

Zoe tilted her head at him, regarded him solemnly. "No," she shrugged, "I guess it doesn't."

They walked in silence the rest of the way to her apartment.

As they stepped across the threshold of her place, Zoe turned to him, and for a moment, Reese saw an awareness, even a little melancholy in her eyes, but they were quickly replaced with the mocking amusement he was so familiar with. "I'd ask you to stay, but…"

"I know. You have an early day tomorrow."

They both smiled at the hollowness of that exchange. He had never asked, she had never offered.

Zoe dropped her purse on the floor, pulling him close. As she kissed him, Reese felt a sudden surge of – anger, regret, the pure need for physical relief - what, he didn't know. Spinning her around, he pushed her further into the apartment.

Reese bent Zoe over an end table, lifted her dress up and pulled her panties down. Freeing himself, he swiftly entered her from behind, the slapping of flesh upon flesh and the rocking of the table the only sounds in the room.

Eventually he heard Zoe sigh and stiffen, and then quiver around him. He followed her shortly after.

Disengaging, they righted their clothes. Zoe turned around, facing him. "I deserve better than that, John."

Reese nodded. "You're right. I'm sorry."

As he turned to leave, Zoe said suddenly, "Promise me, John, you'll tell me when…"

Reese stepped forward, taking her face in his hands. "I will."

He kissed her cheek and left.