Sand between her Toes; Sunlight in his Hair
A gift fic for amalgamads
When the twin suns overhead beat down beams of vibrant blue and yellow heat, Loki woke to find Jane gone. The warmth wavering up from the sand outside their beachside dugout made the world uncertain, shifting. He shook the sleep out of his eyes and stood, stretching as he looked around. Jane's towel and hat—a floppy dyed-straw monstrosity she'd insisted upon bringing from Midgard—were gone from the hook by the door.
She'd gone back to the shore, to the wet strip of sand washed by the waves and speckled with green foam. He could see her already; lying with her face hidden but the rest of her skin exposed to the sky. This particular planet orbiting the binary star system was uninhabited. It was one of Jane's favorite places in the whole of the Nine Realms.
Loki stood in the doorway of their little cool cave, steeling himself to go into the brilliant dual light. When she had asked to come back for their anniversary—he kept no count but she insisted it was their sixteenth year together—she had not understood his hesitation. Glaring sunlight and unremitting heat were not part of his favorite environment.
Still he brought her. And now he went to find her. She would be lying there, absolutely peaceful, the dip of her stomach rising with her gentle breathing, just below the smooth outline of her ribs. There would be sand between her toes.
()()()
She felt his footsteps sinking through the sand as he approached. But Jane was too comfortable to look up. The sand—white as snow, fine as talcum powder—had molded itself around her, cradling her hips and neck like a pillow. Her skin dripped with lazy beads of sweat; the dry heat bled her like a sauna. Yet every so often, a breeze would whip in from the ocean, bringing a rill of icy water over her toes.
Loki's shadow slid over her and the contrast in temperature was so great she shivered.
"You're blocking my light," she grumbled. "S'cold."
He chuckled, sitting at her side. "I noticed." His wide palm cupped the underside of one breast; Jane squealed when he thumbed her nipple.
"Cold!" she cried, and slapped his hand away.
"Really, Jane," he said, "It is hard to deny a husband the right to touch his wife…on their anniversary, too."
Jane poked up the brim of her flopping pink hat with one finger. "We've touched plenty," she corrected him primly, "And since you were exhausted from our touching, I came out to enjoy the sun. It's criminal how much you don't enjoy this beach."
"You enjoy it enough for the both of us," he said, "How did I come to choose a woman who is clearly half lizard?"
"Well, if you don't want to soak with me, there's always the ocean," Jane sat up and slid her hat back on her head, enjoying the tickle of the rough straw on her back. "Why don't you go cool off?"
"I suppose I might as well enjoy the water, since my wife clearly wants nothing to do with me," he said, standing. Jane gave the lie to his words by giving his ass an appreciative slap as he stood at the brink.
The smile he gave her was warmer than the sister suns above. It had taken years for her to coax it out of him, and even still she saw it far too rarely for her liking. But she could live with all that, because there, naked in the light, stood her beautiful husband. Skin pale and perfect, eyes shining and deep, and hair so dark that the sunlight itself only burnished it with a dim glow.
He turned away, and with one sinuous move, dived deep under the waves that lapped the shore.