AN: Hello everyone! This is my second Sly Cooper fic. It's set after Sly 3 leading up to the clandestine balcony wink scene. Started years ago...but finally decided to finish it today. What perfect timing. This piece has a lot more dialogue than I'm used to writing, but hopefully it's still good. Patiently awaiting for someone to buy me Sly 4 O.O
This fanfic might be outdated now...R&R nonetheless! Very much appreciated.
The thing about an adulthood romance was that it required sophistication and class. What better way to have both than following the tradition of a formal dinner date.
The idea was Carmelita's. One night, while trying to pinpoint the next location of the infamous leader of the Japanese yakuza by the name of The Kuma, it had dawned upon her to ask. There was nothing wrong with a relationship between them now. They were both cops.
Sly was trying to think like a criminal as he stared at the map with an intense concentration. He had one of his eyebrows raised, his classic expression. Just as Carmelita turned around in her chair to get something, she noticed his intense gaze. She found it ironic that he now works on her side now. It had been almost half a year now. Interpol finds his expertise quite useful. It takes a thief to know a thief after all.
She felt this was the perfect opportunity to share her invitation. It had been mulling over in her mind for several days now, and she never found the right opportunity to ask. That is until now.
Carmelita turned around in her chair staring at him as if searching for some sort of signal. Sly caught her gaze and his face relaxed as he turned to her.
"You seem to have something on your mind." he said with both raised and yet concerned eyebrows.
"No, I was just thinking." Carmelita replied, as she was interrupted from her personal dilemma.
"Thought of something on the criminal?" How funny it was hearing the word come out of his mouth in that tone, she thought.
"Well...no. But, are you free this weekend? We do have it off after all?" Sly was rather taken aback by the sudden question, especially having seen her workaholic tendencies in the past twelve months.
"Tell me if I'm out the ball park or something, but is Chief Inspector Fox asking me out on a date?" He could see Carmelita a bit uncomfortable in the way she tried to hide her flustered expression by staring at him with squinting eyes.
"No," she shot back, "Carmelita is asking you out on a dinner date, at my apartment, 7:00 pm this Saturday. Now do you accept? Or do I have to tell her that you'll be busy?" still holding her no nonsense business squint. Sly took this opportunity to give her his poker face, however after a few seconds of playing the staring game, Sly laughed.
"You still haven't answered the question." Carmelita reminded, trying to keep her poker face. Sly smirked knowing that he was just given permission for a second to be unprofessional.
"Okay, I accept." he said with a self-satisfied look on his face leaning against his office chair.
"But first," she said, "back to work."
...
The date was to take place at Carmelita's apartment. She decided on the intimate setting of her flat as opposed to a restaurant because it would help with the transition into falling into a couple. It was 6:55 pm, minutes before the date, or when he was supposed to be there. She was mentally going through the things in her checklist while fiddling with the flowers on the dining table. She sighed in relief as she got everything done. The doorbell rang and she did a final head to toe check by the ornamental mirror before heading towards the door. If she was nervous, she didn't have time to show it. Quickly, she checked through the peephole to see a disproportioned looking Sly waiting quite patiently in the hallway. Taking a few breaths and do a final visual sweep across her apartment, she opened the door to greet a very handsomely dressed Sly. She saw him in a tuxedo while she was in her elegant black gown. She smiled at him, and he returned it. There was nostalgia in this.
"Come in Sly," she motioned and saying his name to let him know that this evening was just about them.
"Thanks," he answered while entering, "here's something I picked up for you." he said giving her a bouquet full of elegant yellow roses to her which he had been hiding behind his back. "They compliment your stunning beauty." he smiled a bit seductively. On most other occasions, Carmelita would have said, "shut up, criminal", or even humoured him with a "let's have a date when you're behind bars" joke, but at this moment, she simply smiled and complimented him:
"You look good yourself, handsome."
"Well, then let's not waste anymore time."
They started the evening with dinner. Sly made his seat on the round dining table as Carmelita brought the steaming food onto the table.
"I hope you like my cooking. Picked up a few recipes when I was in Barcelona af-" she stopped herself and concentrated on serving the food.
"Barcelona?" Sly said nonchalantly as he dug his spoon in the soup. "Were you there on vacation?"
"Well, yes. I needed to relax for at least a month after a...really exhausting mission... " Carmelita measured her words carefully trying to not reveal too much. She had gone to Barcelona to visit relatives for a much needed break after pulling off a literal shot-gun wedding in China. She really needed a break after the Cooper gang's latest plans in tricking her into helping them. Carmelita was out for a month and even vaguely aware that the band of thieves were somewhere in Pirate Bay. Not that she should complain...
"Wow, that explains a lot of things," Sly smirked. For an instant she felt like he knew more than he was letting on to before he changed "Like how great this stuff tastes!" She was elated at his compliment and managed to forget her nagging suspicion
"You are quite the charmer" she lightly snorted on her way to sip the class of wine
"But you knew that already" he winked.
The rest of the evening was spent eating delicious food and wine while talking about life in general. Carmelita had opened the doors leading to her balcony to let the cool Paris night air into the abode. The two of them lounged on the sofas near the balcony having a drink and chatting laughing with less inhibitions. The alcohol was getting to their heads.
"I never knew you liked his work? It appears we have very similar taste" she said drinking down the last sip of wine.
"Yeah, who knew?" he chuckled at some inside joke they had made that evening as he reached for the wine decanter to pour himself another glass.
"Oh, it's empty," Carmelita got up and took the container to the kitchen to refill. She paused once she was halfway there. "Actually, I have a special treat." she said smirking at him with a slightly mischievous look. "I think you'll enjoy it very much."
Sly smirked back with a raised eyebrow in anticipation. Waiting on the couch in for her to return, he decided to spend the time looking out of the balcony doors to get a view of the lit up Parisian night sky, over the row of flat blue roofs. He felt content and smiled at where he was. He was in here, with Carmelita on a dinner date. A year ago her wouldn't have imagined it. Sure there were things that he couldn't really talk to her about. He had planned to gradually make the reveal that he was slowly "remembering things" all of a sudden. Sly was happy and family legacy be damned but he was happy where he was.
There were also times where he missed his old pals. He had heard that Murray was in the racing profession and that Bentley was probably going off on an adventure with Penelope. The Thievius Raccoonus would be in his good hands. He had hoped that they well and knew that he was well too. That's when he noticed a tiny LED light flashing on one of the shadowed roofs. He instantly knew what that was from. Sly was about to get up to confirm his suspicions when Carmelita came back with her treat.
"Here it is." she declared holding up a very expensive bottle of Champagne. Sly's eyes opened slightly but he didn't say anything.
"What? Too much? " Sly laughed a little at what Carmelita was doing.
"I didn't think we'd be having something this special tonight" he commented as he sat back down. He was very amused at what Carmelita was doing: feeding him that bottle of champagne to him. He suspected that it was revenge for all those time he gave her the slip. Not that he minded this little "revenge".
Carmelita opened the bottle and poured it the drink into two elegant champagne glasses. Her smirk widened into a smile as she handed him his glass.
"Tell me what you think. I've been waiting to open this for a very long time." Sly accepted the glass and smiled back. He swallowed his pride and took a sip.
"This is amazing stuff." he was amazed at Carmelita's cheek. Carmelita grinned.
"Why don't we go outside?" she suggested as she got up, holding her champagne glass and elegantly walking towards the open balcony. Sly followed her linking his arm with with hers as they exposed themselves to the cool night air. They talked some more about life before he realized just how beautiful she was standing right beside him like this. He couldn't believe things had worked out the way it had.
...
"Carmelita," he said while breaking the quiet last few minutes they spent simply revealing in each other's proximity. She turned to look at him as if she knew he was going to say something important. He took her hand in his gloved ones and stared deep into her eyes. He wanted to say something along the lines of "I purposefully gave up my old life for you. Carmelita, I love you."
But instead it came out as:
"I'm happy where this is going. I'm glad I'm with you." With that, Carmelita's heart melted at the sheer sincerity of his confession.
"Sly..." Carmelita started, squeezing his hands lightly, "I'm glad I'm with you as well". Sly smiled at her words. He was happy here and although he gave up a lot for the sake of love he didn't regret it. Wanting to tell someone this, he turned towards the tiny light he had spotted on the adjacent roof a while back and winked at the shadow.
...
A few seconds later: "Did you just wink at the sky?"
AN: Hope you enjoyed it! Please tell me if there's any mistakes/things I could have done better etc... Forgive me if I've overlooked any grammar mistakes -_-;