Breathe Slow

"You'll worry you'll fall for him. All his assistants do…"

"Well, when I see his assistant, I'll tell her…"

"No. I do want to. Helen, Clare, Armin, Nathan…" Jake's voice fell softly into Alesha's ears, softer than she had ever heard it. "All of them had lives left to lead. What a waste."

Sighing, Alesha leant forward at her desk, catching his eye. "Jake, we won the case," she told him firmly, his dark eyes flicking up to hers, looking like some sort of avenging angel in all his dark-haired glory. "Move on".

"What? Like Frank Shane?" he asked coolly, and Alesha almost gasped at the level of human emotion in his eyes. After months of working together, she had still doubted if her partner was human. Not like James, who was so human, so passionate about doing what was right for the people he protected. But Jake was once again showing her how little she truly knew of him. Utilising her training, she allowed nothing to show on her face, as usual. "Sometimes winning just isn't enough."

She looked away, unable to hold his gaze, looking down at the mountain of paperwork and case files before her. A moment later, she heard a rustle of paper, and glanced up to see Jake once more reading through a case file, his brow furrowed, his black hair falling against his brow in a way which should have been illegal.

Shifting slightly in her chair, Alesha turned back to her work, her pen hovering over the papers as she scanned them.

But her mind was miles away. Her thoughts were bent on the brilliant but mysterious, sometimes irritating beyond belief, man sitting on the other side of the office, sifting through paperwork, the man who was so unyielding, yet sometimes could be so driven and powerful. Whenever he stood up to speak in court, Alesha found herself listening as if spellbound.

He captivated her as much as he aggravated her. Since joining the CPS, she had done little dating. Matt and her just hadn't taken off, and James…there had been something there but their work and his departure had always stood in the way. And now…

Enough! Her sensible half shouted mentally. He's entirely too sure of himself, he drives you mad and you know he's a consummate womaniser. And he's your partner; relationships in the workplace just make things difficult….

Maybe Jake could sense her thoughts as they centred on him, maybe he was just sitting uncomfortably, but he shifted in his chair, making Alesha glance up and she almost wanted to groan at the mischievous twinkle in his eye.

That little vulnerable moment had passed, and Jake Thorne was back in business.

"You know, you never did answer Phyllis's question, Alesha," he began, a small smirk playing on his full mouth. Alesha just rolled her eyes derisively, despite knowing what he was talking about.

"What question?" she asked.

"When she asked if you'd fallen for me. It may have been phrased as a statement, but there was a question hidden in there," he replied, a slow, cocksure grin stretching over his face.

"And I told her," Alesha replied repressively. Jake chuckled, and the sound sent shudders down her spine.

"No, you didn't. You said that if you saw my assistant, you would warn her not to fall for me. You didn't say you yourself hadn't," he replied smugly, making Alesha roll her eyes even if her heart was pounding.

"We're not in court now, Jake, and I'm not under oath," she retorted coldly, grabbing up a case file and her coat before standing. "I'm going to work from home, where I can have some peace and quiet."

"I see I touched a nerve," was his quiet, albeit arrogantly confident, reply as she spun around, glaring at him.

"Phyllis was right about one thing. You are driving me mad!" she snapped, before marching from their shared office with a frustrated growl.

Alesha was able to calm down once she made the lift. She inhaled deeply, and leant back against the wall of the lift, closing her eyes as the lift descended. It was late, and she and Jake had been the last at the office, apart from the cleaners.

Feeling a slight stiffness in her shoulder, she dropped her bag and rolled it, easing the muscles as the lift juddered to a halt and the doors opened.

It wasn't her stop, and it certainly wasn't a cleaner stepping in through the doors as Alesha looked up. It was Jake.

He looked dishevelled and slightly out of breath as he strode in towards her, pressing the button to shut the doors and dropping his own bag.

"Jake, what the hell-?" Alesha managed to gasp before she found herself shoved back against the wall of the lift, his arms caging her between them. This close, she inhaled the scent of him, cologne and some dark, woody smell which was just so Jake. It made her dizzy as she looked up into his eyes, stormy and entrancing as he almost glared down at her. His breath panted against her lips, and she shivered, unable to hold back when he was this close to her.

It's ok. Just breathe, nice and slow…her mind told her, expecting some form of panic to emerge at the fact she was pinned against a wall by a man. She knew it was psychologically likely, after Merrick, but it just wasn't happening.

All she felt was a dizzying sense of lust.

"You still haven't answered my question, Alesha," he growled, and the sound of it made her knees go weak. It was like chocolate and honey and silk, and every sinful thing on the planet, as Alesha shivered. But that didn't mean she would give in that easy.

"I don't have a clue what you're on about," she snapped, eying him angrily. He just grinned, and that smirk, so confident, so bloody arrogant, almost set her off again. How could one man simultaneously infuriate her and arouse her to the point of doing something stupid?

"I think you do," he replied huskily, and God did she want to melt at that voice. She closed her eyes, cursing her traitorous body for its reaction, her hands rising to grip the lapels of that damned coat of his.

That was another thing she both loved and hated about him. That coat which hugged his frankly hot body and made her have fantasies about stripping it from him. She seemed to have a thing about men in coats, since Matt's various calf-length ones always had her eying him appreciatively, and James had always looked perfectly kissable in his, especially when paired with those scarves of his. But none of them had driven her insane like Jake's had.

A bit like the coat's owner then.

Suddenly she felt his lips at her ear, and the slight arch of her spine was all he needed to know the truth.

It's ok. Just breathe slow…

"You should know better than to verbally fence with a barrister, Alesha," he whispered, and the smugness in that sentence angered as much the dark undertones made her pulse race. She opened her eyes with a snap and her mouth too, but the latter was suddenly rather busy.

Or occupied might be a better term.

Jake didn't kiss her sweetly or tenderly. He didn't kiss her gently, tentatively like in novels. He was no Mr Darcy but a Byronic rogue, a Mr Rochester.

The odd literary allusion was the last coherent thought to grace Alesha's mind before he wiped it clean.

He kissed her dirty and hot and demanding, exactly as she wanted him to, as much an argument as a plea for her to respond. She had no choice.

She framed his face and kissed him back, her hands sliding into his hair, ruffling the dark strands under her palms as he groaned into her mouth. The heat in their kiss was unmistakeable as he pushed her back into the lift walls, his body weighing heavily on hers. Both knew where it was leading.

Jake Thorne had a way with women. Alesha had seen it herself, seen the way he could bewitch a woman simply by looking at her and smiling, but the way he was kissing her now…it was raw, it was needy, like he was trying to drink her in.

Abruptly he broke from her lips, nuzzling down her neck as she gasped and arched, his hands pulling at her blouse until it gaped, and his hungry mouth took a fiery path down her body. She heard her name interspersed with words like 'brilliant' and 'beautiful', as she simply moaned and pressed her back into the wall.

"Jake…" she breathed, as he rose to his feet, his body tense with lust and power, and kissed her again, his hands dipping into her hair when the lift juddered to a halt, and he paused. Both of them were breathing raggedly, their eyes locked together and she wanted to move, desperately but couldn't, and a feminine voice intoned "Ground floor."

"As much as I've dreamt of having you over my desk," he managed to growl, making her shiver and cling onto him for dear life. "I'm taking you to bed."

No question, no option for discussion, just command in every syllable, imbued with a sexual energy she couldn't deny. She just nodded and let him lead her from the lift, following him through the atrium of the CPS and outside. Rather than hold her hand, she felt him close behind her, his heat blazing down her back even through her coat and clothes as she hailed a taxi.

As soon as they were inside, his mouth was on hers again, pushing all thought of talking out of her head, as she delightfully ruffled his dark hair, pulling a groan from him.

"Oi, none of that!" the driver's annoyed voice cut through the haze of their lust, as Alesha drew back with a pained moan to look at the weedy little man eying them balefully. Jake looked ready to kill, and as much as she found the look of menacing intent on his face both amusing and sexy, she would rather not be having to work out a case for defending the murder of a taxi driver.

She could think of a hundred better things they could be doing with their time.

"Jake," she breathed, touching his cheek as he relaxed imperceptibly and leant into the touch, looking down at her with that same menacing intent, one that screamed danger. It softened, losing its menacing edge but not the intent, and Alesha wanted to have him inside her right then and there.

Jake took a shuddering breath, one which pressed against her chest, eliciting a shiver from them both. Turning back to the irate taxi driver, he gave him his address before moving away from her, his fists clenched. Feeling more amused than insulted, Alesha did the same, acknowledging that the need driving them was too raw, too powerful, too new for them to touch one another without giving into it.

It was hell. Each moment, filled only with silence and the sound of the traffic outside the windows of the taxi, heightened the tension, any smart remark, any dry quip that might have passed between them pushed down between the lust building between them.

As soon as they reached the block of flats where Jake lived, Alesha got out, leaving him to pay while she walked up to his flat. Despite never having actually been there, she knew which floor he was on, and felt his eyes on her as she walked up the steps in front of him.

She paused before the lift, eying the dimly lit interior balefully before decisively heading for the stairs. As much as she enjoyed their encounter in the lift at work, the stairs would probably be quicker.

Especially as she wouldn't be tempted to push the 'stop' button.

Jake just shot her an amused look, knowing and just as aggravating as it always was, but Alesha just flounced past him, her hips swaying unconsciously.

He caught her arm, pushing her into the wall again, his voice against her ear, his arms either side of her shoulders, his body achingly close.

"You'd better get up those stairs quickly, Ms Phillips. The floor is looking quite attractive at the moment, or the wall," he muttered, and despite the mixture of shock and need which rippled through Alesha, she eyed him coolly.

"We will see, Mr Thorne," she replied, surprised by her own voice as it came out low and almost sexy. Seeing the look in Jake's eyes as he leant in to kiss her again, she ducked under his arm and almost jogged up the stairs, aware of the man following her, a barked laugh as much a reaction to her challenge as a release of some of the tension holding them.

They stopped before his door, Alesha surprised again to see Jake's hand trembling slightly as he unlocked it, letting her in first. Skin all but electrified by need now, Alesha dropped her bag, eyes wandering over the small, but well-appointed studio flat, the surfaces covered in legal papers and books, and few signs of personal touches. She glimpsed his bed through an archway as she paused in front of a low slung black leather sofa, and shivered just as his heat impacted against her spine.

His arms wrapped around her from behind, pulling her back against him hard, and she gasped in delight at the hardness against her lower back, his lips gliding along her neck as she tilted it to one side. She went to turn around in his arms but he refused to allow her, holding her tightly in his embrace.

"Jake?" she breathed questioningly, turning her head so she could watch him from the corner of her eye. He just exhaled shakily against her neck and she felt him smile, perhaps a tad grimly.

"You're so damn perfect," he growled against her ear. "You were made for me."

As if to reinforce that point, of how well they fit together physically, he rocked against her back, making her moan, drawing a sharp growl from him.

As always, Jake was direct and almost painfully inexorable.

Alesha could only gasp in shock as his fingers slid beneath the waistband of her skirt to slide into her heat, between her thighs, as she cried out when he played, teased then thrust one finger in deep.

"You…absolute…bastard!" she cried out, as pleasure rose beneath her skin, and her body ached, needing something more substantial than a finger to fill her. She turned her head and caught his lips in hers with a searing kiss, her hand dipping into the dark crinkles of hair at the nape of his neck, above his shirt collar. He'd removed his coat and jacket, and the smart linen pressed against her rustled with every rock of her body, and every movement of his. She bucked her hips backward, against him, and he broke off their kiss with a cry of pleasure.

Delighted in her power, Alesha slid her hands behind her, between their bodies, seeking out her prize. She soon found it, sliding her palms over it before grasping it tightly; retaliating for every ounce of almost painful, teasing pleasure he'd taken from her body.

"Bloody hell…Alesha!" he gasped, rocking into her hands, unwilling to take his hands from hers to stop her, before desperation made him act, seizing her wrists and spinning her to face him. "You evil little minx!"

"Eye for an eye, Jake," she replied backing up to the bed, taking him with her. Her voice was driving him mad, and he told her so.

Somehow she spun him around, pushing him back onto his bed and following, straddling his hips and confidently bucking against his them as he arched up to meet her.

"Now you know how I feel. You drive me completely and utterly insane!" she hissed, holding herself on her hands above him, the curtain of her black hair falling around their faces, shutting them off from the world. She avoided his lips, bruised, swollen, just begging to be kissed, and peeled back the collar of his shirt to pepper the vulnerable skin with her lips, punctuating each kiss with a word, like full stops after a sentence. "You…completely…annoying…infuriating…bastard…of…a…man!"

Teeth gritted and body now completely rock hard with need and lust, Jake reached down to her before she could uncover anymore of his chest. "Likewise, sweetheart," he growled before he kissed her, refusing to let go even when she rode her hips into him, sweet pleasure making them gasp as he sat up, wrapping his arms around her and holding her at last. Alesha could not resist holding him to her, hands buried in his hair as they kissed, almost like a mother holding a child to her. But Jake was no child, but one hell of a sneaky bastard as he proved when he turned and flung her on her back beneath him.

His hands pushed her skirt up as their lips rejoined frantically, so his hips could nestle in the cradle of hers, their hands already undoing the buttons of their shirts. Alesha succeeded first, running her hands delightedly over his well-toned musculature, marvelling at the contrast of her dark skin against his pale skin.

A moment of tenderness punctured the need driving them, as she rested her hand over his heart, catching his eye as he paused, then she flexed her nails into his skin, and they were truly lost this time.

He lunged for her mouth, taking his revenge as she moaned and writhed beneath him, heightening their passion for one another, his hands sculpting her body to his, running along the curve of her thigh, pulling it up so he rode against her harder. Their lips still joined, Alesha pulled non too gently on his hair to keep them, swallowing each groan in her greedy lust.

At last they threw the last of their clothes aside, naked skin meeting naked skin with an electric thrill, making Alesha almost cry out from the burning heat of his body. He raised his lips from hers, his eyes as burning as his body, before they latched onto her neck like a tiger hungrily feasting. She could only arch and moan under his ministrations as he worked down her body, taking great delight in torturing her breasts until they were hard peaks under his lips, then moving lower.

Knowing what he going to do, almost on fire and ready to explode, Alesha pulled him up, shaking her head. "No, Jake, need you now. Need you inside me now," she gasped, almost in tears by the state he had reduced her to.

"Shh," he soothed her with gentler caresses which were nonetheless possessive and needy, brushing his lips across hers. Instinctively, she tracked them, drinking in his moan as she kissed him, holding him to her. With surprising care, he lifted one firm thigh over his hip and thrust in, filling her and making her gasp against his lips. Eyes closed against the need to have her, to thrust again into her molten heat, Jake leant his forehead against hers, panting harshly against her lips. "You are incredible, Alesha Phillips."

The time for games would come later, but now Alesha just clutched his hips as he smoothly withdrew and then entered her once more, one hand transferring to his back, nails digging into the shoulder blade as their rhythm increased and their bodies melded perfectly, made for each other.

Jake's lips left hers to trail down her neck, before suckling fiercely on the spot where her pulse raced madly with each thrust, each buck of her own hips, the softness of the mattress beneath her cushioning his thrusts, only increasing the pleasure as he slid deeply within Alesha.

Alesha could only hold on tightly, the hold she had on his back, and the feel of his lips as they returned to hers, her only anchor to reality as the rest of it splintered under his skilful hands and body, turning that tension infusing her muscles to pleasure until she couldn't take anymore, crying out as she felt release sweep her, his own following soon after, as he held her tightly against him, hot breath panting softly against her lips.

Now, hair ruffled, eyes passion blank Alesha reflected that he didn't so much as look like an avenging angel than a fallen angel, before tiredness stole away thought and consciousness, slumping into Jake's arms, limbs entwined.

Alesha didn't know how long she slept before a strange sensation down her spine awoke her, dragging her from that peaceful haven of sleep. It felt like butterflies were hopping down the line of her spine, but with feet like heated irons, burning her skin.

"Jake," she breathed into the pillow, as the kissing stopped and warm arms came around her, tucking her back against him tightly. She turned her head just enough to catch his eye, smiling at him without a hint of irritation or worry on her young face. Her smile only grew as she remembered the events of the night, eliciting a warm flush across her body rather than the consternation and guilt she had thought they would. "God, you must have sprinted down the stairs to catch that lift!" she snorted, as he grinned unrepentantly, his fingers tracing down her arm and back up sensuously.

"Maybe, Ms Phillips," he replied teasingly.

"What time is it?" she asked, looking towards the alarm clock on his bedside table, squinting through the darkness. As she moved, he snatched her back again, his hot breath feathering her ear, as he nuzzled her soft hair.

"Nowhere near time for you or me to get up," he replied in a heated growl, capturing her lips before she could speak, driving conscious thought from her mind. She slid her hand into his hair, holding on as he drove her demented again. But before he could push her onto her back again, she twisted around and pushed him back, straddling his hips and leaning over him, their lips still joined. "I thought you liked me on top?"

"Maybe," she murmured quietly, gasping as his lips tenderly traced the line of her neck.

"Maybe," Jake muttered beneath her, shaking his dark head. "That word shows a distinct lack of verbal originality on your part, Ms Phillips. If you use it again, I may have to teach you a lesson…"

One eyebrow arching in mock-weariness, she just stared down at him, his head on the pillow, the white cotton stark against his dishevelled black hair. "You started it," she retorted, leaning down to kiss him again. He moaned against her mouth, before sitting upright against her, lips now trailing a heated exploration down her neck.

"You still haven't answered my question," he growled against her neck, as she drew back to meet his gaze. "Have you fallen for me, Ms Phillips?"

She paused, then a slow, sensual smile stretched her lips as she looked down at him. "Maybe, Mr Thorne. Maybe…"

Her laugh was cut off as he twisted her beneath him, his lips drinking in the sound, as they came together again, levity passed, raw need in its place.

Maybe, just maybe, she had fallen for him but only because he'd fallen for her too.

Please tell me what you think :) Much as I love Matt and James, Jake is just too sexy...