tell me lies (i want to believe)
Summary: Bobbi always wondered. Drabble- Bobbi Morse, Lance Hunter. (She never believed in promises, but she believes in him.)
Warning: Drabble.
Set: Story-unrelated. Post S02Ep22, I believe.
Disclaimer: Standards apply.
His chest rises and falls in a steady movement that is hypnotizing.
Bobbi feels the bone-deep weariness, the sated exhaustion that comes after sex. Her entire body still hurts – she is bruised and blue, her finger tips ache in a way she doesn't want to focus on and she cannot put weight onto her knees. But she's not in the hospital wing anymore. This is her room, her bed, and after the last week is familiar and welcoming even in its simpleness. As familiar as the body below her. She can feel his heartbeat vibrate through her, all the way down and into her bones. His hands are carding through her hair in a steady rhythm. Shivers run down her spine whenever he runs his hands down her back.
Taking a bullet for me was stupid.
Walking into a trap when you know it's a trap is stupid.
You were the bait.
There are a million ways to say the words they never really said, and Lance Hunter knows all of them.
As if he senses her thoughts, his arms tighten around her. A deep breath escapes his lips in a huff of warm air that ghosts over her face. His heart beats so close to her, and it still is not close enough.
"I can't lose you." His whisper is almost swallowed by the sound of her breath. The raw emotion is evident in his voice, the desperation in it a mirror of her own feelings, and that it why it makes her angry.
"Don't talk like that," she snaps, ignoring both the grunt of pain as she straightens, her hand digging into his ribs momentarily, and the agony that shoots through her like a lance of fire. "Don't even think like that!"
He meets her angry glare, his gaze not the wounded puppy she would have expected him to adopt but clear and utter seriousness.
"Why should you be allowed to die for me, but I not for you?"
And of course he knows what she is talking about, the same way she knew what he meant from his four words only.
"Because…"
But every reason she once had has evaporated, crumbled to dust, and there is nothing that comes to her mind except for I cannot live without you. But it is the same he just said, isn't it, and why should she be allowed to claim something he isn't? Bobbi Morse knows she would give herself up for Lance Hunter in a heartbeat – knows since she willingly took a bullet to save him – but she doesn't even want to think of him taking one for her. And that's stupid.
Love is not logical, a voice whispers in her mind, and is that what it is, love?
And the question is moot, because hasn't she discussed all of this with herself in the eternity between Ward leaving the room and Lance entering it?
Lance looks up at her to where she is hovering above him. His eyes are dark and endless, and so full of things and she breaks apart, little by little.
"Fitz asked me something sometime."
Confused, Bobbi draws back, but something in his eyes stops her.
"He said my room was so bloody empty. A bed, a dresser, a desk – but nothing on them, barely anything inside. And he's right, isn't he? Even compared to Mac, who's the epitome of manliness, all hulking and taciturn and stuff, has more bloody personal stuff than I have. I told Fitz my ex-wife threw it all away. Poor kid, he was so embarrassed."
Now he's smiling again, but it isn't a happy smile. Just a small smile, a memory-smile, a ghost of the Hunter she first met.
"It's been months since then, and I still don't own more than a few spare clothes and weapons. You've seen it. And you know it wasn't always like that."
His eyes don't leave hers.
"And there's a reason for that, Bob. Do you know why I don't collect personal stuff anymore?"
Mute, she looks at him, willing him to stop and wanting him to continue at the same time.
"It's simple, you see." And now he lifts his hands again, touches her face. "I don't need things to make a home for me. Because you're my home."
His eyes are honest, open. Vulnerable. His body is riddled with scars, as is hers. His body and his gaze and his life are a testament to what they believe in, and so are hers. Hunter is strong. It's impossible that there are weaknesses in him, things that makes him human – but there are, and it's his faults that make her love him. That make her want to bury herself in his bones and his heart, all the while knowing it still isn't close enough.
And the thought terrifies her.
Bobbi leans down, slowly, feeling her skin slide over his and relishing in the way his eyes turn another shade of dark, how his body reacts to hers. She kisses him until he draws back, breathless, and then hovers over him, her hair falling down around her face and creating a space just for the two of them.
"Don't say things like that."
"You are beautiful," he says, instead, his eyes drinking in her sight.
"Stop it-"
"You are strong. You survived an insane man's torture. You can kill a man with two sticks, many men, in fact. You speak more languages than I have fingers on one hand. I don't care what they say, your looks can kill, seriously. You kick my ass on a regular basis, and I figure that's fine with me as long as it's you. You got away as a member of Hydra, which shouldn't sound as sexy as it does in my head right now. You are willing to die for what you believe in. And that's fine with me, too, as long as I get to bloody die with you."
There is nothing Bobbi can say that would match this sorta-confession of his, nothing she can think of. So she leans down to kiss him, again, and his body reacts predictably. Maybe, she thinks, dizzily, maybe he will forget this conversation if she just distracts him long enough. Maybe he won't remember on the next day: the magnitude of the things he said, the consequences this will have for them.
Maybe she won't remember, either. But every single one of her heartbeats seems to whisper his name.
He feels her panic, maybe, or she somehow gave herself away. He breaks the bruising kiss, gently cradling her face, and looks at her, and Bobbi wants to cry at the tenderness in his gaze and in every single touch.
"It's alright, love. Everything will be fine."
She kisses him until he gasps for breath, his need blatantly obvious. It is the only answer she can think of that won't break them.
(At least not yet.)