Title: The Story
Rating: PG-13(?)
Warnings: Sexual situations
Characters/Pairings: Julian/Suzanne, Sheridan
Word Count: 982
Summary (for chapter): a stormy night, fifteen years earlier.
Prologue
Lightning Strikes
Fifteen Years Earlier
Suzanne—brunette, busty, barely twenty years old—wasn't the most experienced lover Julian Crane had ever had in his thirty-plus years of existence (far from it), but she was one of the most eager. The current Miss Harmony's enthusiasm was going to be the death of him—literally—if she moved her greedy little hand an inch higher on his thigh. "Suzanne, pet," he protested half-heartedly as her fingers continued their creeping, "we're almost there. I can't…"
Toying with his leather belt, Suzanne giggled at his shiver when her lips brushed his ear lobe, and she would have continued her sweet torture if the car hadn't swerved dangerously, tossing her back against her seat and tumbling her dark hair into her playfully glittering eyes. "Oh, but you can."
Reading her predatory intent with a glance, Julian closed his eyes with a stifled moan, jerking them back open a second later when he felt her supple lips attach themselves to his neck. He uttered a silent prayer of gratitude that the lengthy driveway that traveled from the fringes of Harmony to the sprawling Crane estate was such a solitary road and there was no oncoming traffic to navigate around as the car veered to and fro in the rain-soaked night. The frantic whirring of the windshield wipers did little to improve the dreadful visibility, and while Julian loved his women just as much as his drink, he didn't relish the idea of dying for the sake of some action below the belt. With a regretful sigh, he gently pushed Suzanne back into her own seat, a chastising frown on his lips. "What's wrong? This was your idea."
Pouting, Suzanne crossed her arms across her ample chest, looking forlornly out the passenger window just in time to see a brilliant flash of lightning zigzag across the midnight sky. "Yeah, like this is so romantic: taking your mistress home to meet your wife."
"My wife," Julian spat the title with disdain, "is visiting her father."
"What about your kids?" Suzanne turned in her seat to regard him, her childish pout somewhat diminished.
"They're with their mother," Julian responded, glad his answer seemed to appease her and she looked less like his toddler daughter and more like the nubile young woman he'd seduced into his bed only months earlier.
"So your father-in-law used to be the governor," Suzanne remarked with interest. "You married the governor's daughter."
Julian simply arched a brow at her deduction, silently reminding himself it wasn't her brilliant brain that had enticed him in the first place, and concentrated on the blurry road in front of him.
"I remember thinking she looked like a princess in all her pictures. Your wedding looked so romantic."
Romantic? Hardly. His wedding to Ivy had been a farce, just like their marriage. Still, Suzanne had hit upon one truth Julian had never been able to deny. "My wife is beautiful." Feeling the heat of Suzanne's stare, he elaborated, "A beautiful, cold-hearted bitch." To his amazement, Suzanne seemed unfazed by his harsh words. When she simply giggled girlishly in response and scooted closer once more, all his previous protests were forgotten. His breath rasped tortuously from his dry throat when she worked the button of his slacks free with her talented fingers and his white knuckled hands gripped the steering wheel fiercely, the car careening down the road, the sparsely spaced trees lining its edges nothing but shadows intermittently illuminated by flashes of brilliant light.
"Do you want me to stop?"
Too far gone, Julian could only grit out, "Almost there."
Smirking at the double meaning of his words, Suzanne placed her mouth at his pulse point and teased, "I know."
The car's headlights cut a yellow, fragmented path in front of them through the downpour, and through heavy-lidded eyes Julian could see the imposing but completely dark structure the Cranes had called home for nearly a hundred years looming. And in front of the house…
"Hey!" Suzanne cried out, bracing herself against the dashboard of the car when Julian forcibly braked the car to a screeching stop, and all she could hear over the pounding of the rain on the car's roof was the shallow, stuttering stall of her lover's breath beside her. "Julian?" she grasped Julian's arm as he fumbled to open the door. "What the hell's going on here?" she cried over the din of the storm as she followed Julian's suit and got out of the car, the rain drenching her in an instant.
A child stood, still as a statue not two feet in front of the car, her hands held out in front of her, palm up, her golden curls plastered to her head and her flimsy white nightgown clinging to legs that were short and bare. The next flash of lightning showed that her blue eyes were unfocused and the pale skin of her hands and neck was dark.
Suzanne watched in bewilderment as Julian dropped to his knees in front of the child and grabbed her firmly by the shoulders.
"Sheridan! Sheridan, look at me," Julian urged, one hand leaving the thin, trembling shoulder to touch the small chin, the other coaxing her into the meager swath of light the car's twin headlights offered.
"Oh my God," Suzanne gasped, hand going to her mouth. "Oh my God." Turning from the surreal scene in front of her, she closed her eyes, stifling the scream that threatened to escape. The heavy rain pounded and pricked like needles at her skin, but she wasn't aware of it as she stumbled forward, violently losing the contents of her stomach as the seconds' old memory played and replayed before her eyes and a child's plaintive cries bubbled forth with growing hysteria.
"I didn't mean to do it. I didn't mean to do it! I DIDN'T MEAN TO DO IT!"
Another UA AU (lol). With very few exceptions, though, you'll recognize the characters (that, by the way, absolutely do not belong to me) and a few of the situations they find themselves in. Lots of pairings in this fic, folks, so there should be something for everyone.