It wasn't the last bottle. He'd grabbed it from the three had left, now carefully wrapped on the Farragut, that had survived the crash of the Enterprise-D. Beverly uncorked it with a laser scalpel, a neat trick that reminded him of much younger days. She poured fragrant red wine, a Mourvèdre blend Robert had been experimenting with a few years ago, into the metal cup from the emergency kit. Knowing it was one of his brother's last experiments cut into the fresh wound his death had left in Jean-Luc's heart.
He hadn't told her yet. With the crash and the chaos that followed, finding the time to be himself had been a luxury he couldn't afford. Now the rescue ships had arrived, his crew was safe and they were going back to Earth to build a new Enterprise. Deanna had nearly begged him to take the time off for a picnic and once he'd seen how exhausted Beverly was, he had to agree with his counselor. Time off was something both of them took so little of and today, they needed it.
Accepting the metal cup Beverly handed over, he felt her fingers brush his and that familiar twinge ran through him. They were still, even always, friends, but today it bothered him that they were still stagnant. What he'd seen in the Nexus wasn't something he could ignore. He could smell the warm earth in his memory, just as surely as if he'd been there a few hours ago.
"You have that look again," Beverly said, swirling the wine in her cup. Her long fingers were wrapped neatly around the dull metal, and the sun over Veridian III, the star he'd saved, caught in her red hair. She was beautiful, peaceful now that her work was done, and she was smiling at him. She had circles under her eyes and she hadn't in his... What was he calling it? A vision? A dream? No, it was something deeper and that unsettled him.
"I'm sorry," Jean-Luc replied sheepishly. He needed the correct words, words that would explain what had happened without revealing more than she was comfortable with. Beverly wasn't ready for their relationship to be like that. Not yet, not now when their home was shattered and everything was in disarray. He couldn't ask that of her.
"Dreaming of your new ship already?" she teased, shifting on the emergency blanket they'd taken for their picnic. Beverly set down her wine and picked up her emergency rations with a wink. "This one's barely in the ground you know."
Jean-Luc's chest was too tight. The sudden constriction filled his chest with heat and the drowning feeling of grief clawed at him again. Her eyes changed. Beverly's amusement faded and she saw through him.
"What happened?" she asked, reaching for his hands. He almost pulled back, he almost didn't trust himself to let her touch him, but her fingers crept around his and pressed into his palm. "Jean-Luc?"
"There was a fire," he began, barely hearing his own voice as he looked away from her eyes. Beverly knew him too well. "On Earth, my brother, my nephew--" The tightness in his chest crept up into his throat and shut it down.
Beverly's lips moved slowly but he couldn't hear her if she was speaking. The blanket rustled. The wind sang warm through the trees. Her hand touched his back, leaving a different kind of heat, a soft warmth that threatened to take the tightness away. Beverly's body made contact with his an instant after her hand. She wrapped her arms around him, holding him close before he had time to pull away. The feel of her surrounded him and he was back in the Nexus, safe with her.
He'd left the dry, the dust and the heat and been in his childhood home. He knew that road. The gravel crunched under his feet as he walked up towards the house. Everything was as it should be. The sun was shining overhead and he could hear laughter behind the hedge as he approached it. Jean-Luc knew better than to give away that he had heard, and he continued onward, pretending obliviousness. Whistling made the giggling louder, and he still pretended not to hear. Two more steps put him in harm's way and the ruffians emerged from the hedge, surrounding him in a loose semicircle.
"State your business," Abby chirped, arms crossed over her chest. She could be so much like her mother when she wanted to, even though her hair was darker, like his was. This new prank, highway robbers, was Alexander's fault. Worf's son had a vivid imagination and his holonovels were the favourite of the children. Of course, in France on holiday, they needed only their imaginations to build a world.
"I wish to see the lady of the house," Jean-Luc offered, raising his hands in surrender and trying to look as nervous as he could.
"Do you?" Paul added, eyeing him with a suspicion far beyond his seven years.
"Have you been 'vited?" Clara chimed in, moving closer to his side.
"Does he have a letter?" Daniel whispered seriously to his sister. "He's supposed to have a letter."
"Do you have a letter?" Abby and Paul asked in unison, lifting wooden swords with serious expressions on their small faces.
"Speak, peasant!" Abby finished, making Clara giggle up at him when he pretended to be afraid. The youngest at three, Clara could only pay attention to the rules of their games long enough to see her father laugh. As soon as he laughed, she'd run squealing with delight, as if that was the point the entire time.
"I have a letter," he promised, patting up and down his civilian clothes, as if the paper would magically appear.
"He doesn't have a letter," Daniel announced from the back, calling his father's bluff as he twirled his toy sword with a devious smile.
"I assure you," Jean-Luc tried to get himself out of it. "I had a letter. Signed by the lady herself..." He let the sentence fade as he scooped up Clara from near his feet and held her menacingly.
"Cheater!" Paul yelled, tossing his sword on the ground.
Abby was more determined to stay in character and held her blade up towards him. "Kill the thief, she means nothing to me!"
Daniel grinned that dangerous smile and nodded. "She did let herself get caught."
Clara giggled and then shrieked as he tickled her sides. Swooping her up onto his shoulders, he caught her legs tight and began to run. "I'll sell her on the black market!"
The children followed him, laughing ahead of his way until they arrived, panting and giggling, at the lawn just in front of the house. Daniel and Abby conspired to pull him down, and they collapsed in a wrestling mass of arms and legs until he was pinned to the grass, smiling up at his children as they held down his arms.
"You'll pay twice the ransom for this," Daniel promised.
Clara tugged his sleeve, pulling until he looked down to his baby sister. "We want randsom?"
"We do," Daniel clarified for her. "Tell him he'll pay for his insolence."
"You pay you in-so-lens!" Clara told him, shaking a fist. "You pay."
"Yes, you'll pay!" Abby agreed, glaring down at him. "Right, Paul?"
"Chocolate!" Paul cheered, forgetting to hold down his father's arm and getting to his feet. "Chocolate!"
Being dragged into the house, Jean-Luc swept Clara up and held her on his hip. She was too young to understand that the highway robbers weren't supposed to be friendly with the kidnapped, and she kissed his cheek. "We go mommy," she said cheerfully.
"Not mommy," Paul corrected, rolling his eyes and looking far older than he was. Even his curls didn't take away the maturity he was attempting. "The lady."
"Right!" Abby bounced a little, dragging her father by the hand. "Come on, ruffian."
Beverly was in the study, surrounded by padds of work. Her tea cup was cold, and a full glass of wine sat forgotten on the desk. Jean-Luc's father would have rolled his eyes a little at the padds, but Jean-Luc knew that it was hard for her to get away. Beverly's research was almost as important to her as her vacation. Just having time to work on her interests, to read and publish, was a blessing. She looked up when the group entered, eyes shining in amusement.
"Lady-" Abby started but paused and looked to Daniel for help.
"Honoured Lady," Daniel corrected her.
"Right," Abby agreed with a formal little bow. "We bring you this ruffian for ransom."
"Oh?" Beverly stared at her husband, faking a serious expression. "What has he done to merit ransom?"
"He's daddy," Clara piped up, as if it was a secret everyone was missing but her.
"Oh I see," Beverly said, leaning against the desk as she tried not to chuckle. "Is that your reasoning? This ruffian should be ransomed because he's your father?"
"If that means chocolate," Paul said, obviously calculating it in his head. "We want chocolate."
"And he's valuable enough for me to pay chocolate?" Beverly paced in front of the desk, thinking over what they'd said. "That's a very high price."
"We could just do away with him," Daniel teased his mother and lifted his toy sword towards Jean-Luc's chest. "If he's not worth anything."
Abby giggled wickedly, lifting her sword with her brother's. "Let's run him through..."
"No!" Beverly's cry of dismay was rather convincing.
Clara wrapped her arms around her father's neck and looked entirely sympathetic. Her huge blue eyes were full of concern. "'s okay mommy. Daddy okay."
Paul's heart was the hardest. "One bar each," he suggested, tapping his foot on the floor.
"Two total," Beverly countered, shaking her head in amusement. "You're splitting them." She dug the chocolate out from the desk and Jean-Luc wondered if she'd planned this all day. Clara wriggled down and Daniel divided the chocolate fairly amongst his siblings. They ran squealing in delight back outside, and Jean-Luc wondered if René would face the same ransom when he returned from the Academy for the holiday later that afternoon.
Beverly waved him over, wrapping her arm around his waist. "I'm sorry you were attacked by vagabonds."
He laughed, kissing her cheek and sighing in complete contentment. "They're excellent vagabonds. Very tough to negotiate with."
She touched his lip, smiling back before she kissed him sweetly. "I think they get that from their father. I hear he's quite the ruffian."
He grabbed her glass of wine when the kiss ended, taking a sip before he handed it to her.
Beverly waved it back, frowning before she kissed him again. "Keep it, I don't think this blend and I are going to get along."
The life René would never have: falling in love, going to the Academy, taking his first assignment, all of that weighed on Jean-Luc as if the Enterprise had fallen from the stars onto his shoulders. Sitting in Beverly's arms, crying into her chest, some of the hopelessness began to fade. The unfairness of fate, the cruel nature of the universe, both of those dug at his heart and would for some time to come. He would not mourn the death of his family easily, nor could he replace them, but with Beverly, he stopped feeling alone.
She continued to hold him, something that went past the line they'd established between themselves. Today, she was more than his friend and everything he needed. Beverly's faith in him and the knowledge that he wasn't alone made it possible to keep breathing through his grief. With her cheek against his, he spoke of René and Robert without tears. Jean-Luc remembered to laugh, and how much he'd fought with his brother. He remembered their lives, not the wrenching loss he was consumed with.
He wasn't sure when he'd started talking about the Nexus. Jean-Luc didn't realise what he was saying until they were laughing over children that had never been born.
"Four," Beverly shook her head, lips touching her cup. "Really Jean-Luc," she teased. "Four children? That's three years of pregnancy."
His eyebrows shot up and he took a quick gulp of his wine. "You're beautiful pregnant." He'd meant it to be friendly, an offhand comment, but it was more.
Lowering her cup, she set it on the rock and touched his cheek again. "You only saw me a few times when I was pregnant with Wesley."
"Once was enough," he said too quickly.
Her hand dropped away from his face. Beverly pulled away, her knee rising between them. She rested her chin on it, her eyes landing on his face. "The Nexus represents the deepest desires of your heart. Pure joy, Guinan called it." She shook her head, digging her fingers through her hair as it tumbled down when she dropped her forehead to her knee.
"You couldn't do better than me and a band of children?" she asked lightly. No amount of levity took away the gravity of his admission. In all the universe, with all its wonder, what he wanted most was a family with her.
"I couldn't," he agreed, reaching for her this time. "Not in this universe or any other I've ever seen."
"Jean-Luc," she sighed, lifting her head slowly to kiss his hand before he cupped her cheek. "You're a terrible romantic."
"I'll work on it," he promised, leaning closer.
She smiled before she kissed him. Somewhere in the motion, somewhere between breaths and the press of her lips, something changed. The softness of friendship melted away, deepening into something far less tangible full of much greater promise. Her knee moved when he advanced. Jean-Luc put down his hand and Beverly's cup, still full of wine, bounced down the rock.
He started to apologise, but she covered his lips. "No, no," Beverly insisted. "I didn't like it."
Another kiss, even deeper, quelled his reply. Any surprise he might have registered, or regret that the wine was not to her liking, faded away. The sun beamed down on them both, full of warmth in the last moments of afternoon. Beverly's hands drew him in and he laid her back. Kissing grew desperate, full of need and heat. She grazed his bottom lip with her teeth, sighed into his mouth and pressed against him.
Jean-Luc was gone, wrapped into the memories of the Nexus and suffused with her. He ran his hand through her hair, feeling it slip cool through his fingers. She tugged off his uniform jacket, squeezing his bare arms with strong fingers. The air smelt of wine and warm stone but all he tasted was her. He hadn't been intending to seduce her. Being with her had been an emotional need, not a physical one, but when he kissed her, he realised he needed both.
Pulling her free of her own jacket, tugging the tank top loose from her waist, Jean-Luc paused. "Beverly, I..."
"Shhhh..." she insisted, nibbling his neck. "Jean-Luc, I want you."
There was no more discussion. Her trousers abandoned her hips and the smooth skin was bare for his hands. He pulled her close, driving their hips together until both of them were panting from need. Her hair tumbled between them, cascading red over her shoulders. He grabbed her breasts through her bra, squeezing them to her chest as her fingers wrapped around his dick through the opening of his trousers. The sudden shock of contact made him grunt in surprise.
Smiling wickedly, Beverly moved her hand up and down, taunting him with the dryness of her palm. He left her breasts, running a hand down her stomach and into the dampness between her legs. Dancing slick fingers over her clit made her moan, then hiss in frustration. Amusement that he could make her want him so and something far deeper within him rushed through his mind. Thrusting his fingers in, he felt her nod against his neck.
"Please," she panted, kissing his chest. They fumbled, jostling on the blanket for position, and the tangling of limbs ended with her on his lap. The first, wet thrust into her was ecstasy and he groaned. After that, the speed was hers. Surrender was usually hard for him, but Beverly already possessed him. Giving her his body was an easy feat when she had his heart. Arching up into her sent him deeper, and her tiny moans of pleasure came with little waves of tight, glorious contractions.
Ripping off her tank top, Beverly then snapped off her bra. He kissed, then sucked a breast before licking across to the other. Pale pink nipples hardened in response to his fingers, then the friction of his chest. Dragging off his own shirt, he thrust up into her desperately, his trousers still around his knees. Holding her against him, he set his heart as free as his body. Beverly hid nothing from him and he could drop his guard. The guilt and fear that kept him apart had no place with her. Letting his body drag his heart towards her, Jean-Luc let himself love.
Her moaning deepened, sinking lower in her chest. Her hips rolled over his, always gaining speed. Licking his fingers and reaching down for her clit, he circled it, then teased it between two fingers. Beverly gasped, losing the rhythm of her breath and sagging against his chest. He pushed her harder, still guiding her body, demanding she continue through the sensation. His own release loomed, taunting the back of his skull with fire. Beverly took him over, digging her hands into his shoulders as a final thrust left him softening inside her trembling body.
Regaining his breath with her slumped against him, Jean-Luc looked up at the darkening sky and watched the first stars begin to appear. Home was calling him, and with her all around him, it had never looked so bright. Hope sank into him, filling him with a more precious sensation than sex. Beverly shifted her head, snuggling close and smiling with a kind of peace he took to heart.
This time, he'd caught her. Beverly had taken one sip of her wine, then spat it back into her glass. She'd tried to be subtle, even hiding behind her hand, but he was certain he'd caught her. Jean-Luc finished his toast, smiling at her as everyone around him raised their glasses. It was a new Enterprise, a new beginning for a new crew. He'd seen Worf promoted and transferred to Deep Space 9, but the rest of his senior staff was staying. Will, Deanna, Geordi, Data and, most poignantly to him, Beverly, were all staying aboard.
The toast over, most of the staff headed for the food. Beverly hung back, either waiting for the queue to die down or for him to come tease her. She smiled at him, reaching for his hand with warmth in her eyes.
"I'm sorry," she offered towards her glass. "I did try it."
"It's a different grape," he offered, slightly perplexed but still amused by her genuine apology. "We're trying carignan this year, perhaps you'll like that better?" he hoped, handing her a napkin as she dried her lips.
Beverly shook her head, licking her lips and then drying them again. "Maybe I will. When will those be done? Towards the end of next year?"
"Marie should send some in the winter." Jean-Luc nodded, waving over one of the waiters as he looked out at the Enterprise, 1701-E, floating like a dream in the spacedock below them. He could see the window of his, their quarters. Moving in had taken most of the day, and Beverly had almost begged off the reception.
He took a glass of water and handed it to her. She sipped it greedily, then closed her eyes. Beverly sighed, sinking into the sofa by the window. Her unwanted glass of wine disappeared with the water and he sat down by her side.
"I hate moving," she muttered over the glass. "How did we get so many things in six months?"
Jean-Luc shook his head and took a sip of his wine. He loved the richness of the black currant notes in this year's vintage and he wondered how Beverly could find it so unpalatable. Everyone else seemed to be enjoying it. Putting that out of his mind, he smiled at her in defeat. "You'd think losing the last ship would mean we had less to move."
"But we're both terrible pack rats who had eight containers each," Beverly groaned, rubbing at knots in her neck. "And your artefacts, and my plants..."
"The books, our clothes..." he sighed with her, and set down his wine to take over the job of rubbing her neck.
"Thanks." Beverly's eyes closed again and she shifted to give him a better angle. Her head dropped and he widened his path out to her shoulders. Her muscles were tense, either from the move or the incredibly long shifts they'd all been pulling trying to get the ship ready to launch. Jean-Luc dug his thumbs in along her spine, then sank his fingers into the stiff muscles of her shoulders. Beverly only hissed once, then she relaxed into his touch.
"I wonder if our quarters will be big enough," she said, her tone softening as she relaxed.
"I'm sure the mess will improve with organisation," he replied, dropping his hands and watching as she turned to face him.
Beverly rested her chin on her hand, looking out the window and down towards their new home. Her eyes came back to him, sparkling with some secret amusement. "I'm moving in something else; I forgot to tell you. Will you forgive me?"
Jean-Luc tapped his wine glass thoughtfully, studying her bright blue eyes and teasing smile. "Will it still fit?"
"We have time to make room," she said evasively. Beverly leaned forward, moving her elbow from the back of the sofa and touching his arm. "Plenty of time to put everything in a place. Save us a bottle of the new wine. If it's done in the winter, it'll be just about perfect." She lingered close to him, nearly kissing him, too intimately for the venue, before she left him with a gentle brush of her lips against his cheek. "Back to the party," she insisted, dragging herself to her feet.
Jean-Luc watched her stand, returning her smile with a hint of curiosity. "Will we be celebrating?"
"Yes," she nodded, offering him her hand up as her smile blossomed. "We definitely will."