A/N: My second Jibbs fic. This idea just would not leave me alone; it persisted and pleaded. It came into being while I listened to Josh Groban's 'Remember When It Rained' on a quite cloudy day. I also incoprorated that 'That'll be the day' line Jenny mentions in Hiatus, and the fact that Jethro was who hooked her on bourbon. The part that takes placein Paris is, clearly, a flashback.
'Wash away the thoughts inside, that keep my mind away from you.'
Gibbs gave the thick file in front of him a vicious glare. He swept the empty coffee cup next to him into the wastebasket to join the many others; rested his hand on the manila folder and looked up at the eerily lit and empty bullpen. His team had disappeared without his notice, possibly hours ago. It had started to rain steadily sometime in the night. He didn't know how late it was; he doubted anyone else was here.
He was wrong.
Movement in his peripheral vision drew his attention, and his focus was drawn to the catwalk, where Madame Director was stepping out of MTAC alone, her head bent slightly and her eyes glued to an open file in her hands. His eyes followed her brisk walk to her office, where she barely paused in opening the door and slamming it behind her, with considerable force. Unaware she had an audience. No doubt wrapped up in her obsessive hunt for The Frog.
What are you thinking about?
Paris.
Get your mind out of the bedroom, Jethro.
Gibbs rested his elbows on his desk and rolled his neck to the side, transferring his immovable glare to the rain-splattered window across the bullpen. He leaned his chin into his palm and squinted into the inky black that was the nightscape of Washington, D.C., thinking of a different city, a different rainstorm. A different Jenny.
The light curtain of the second story window fluttered and drew aside slightly, and he knew she knew he was on the street watching her.
After a moment, the curtain drew back even more and her pale face appeared, slightly amused, framed by the flickering lights that would have to be the candles behind her. He straightened away from the lamppost he had leaned against and lifted his hand, beckoning to her with a smirk.
Her eyebrow went up, he knew it from experience, and she shook her head. He leaned back against the lamppost and stuck his hands into the pockets of the heavy coat that was now soaked through. The curtain fell back into place and her shadow moved across it; he waited with a triumphant smirk in the dark, glancing up and down the deserted and wet streets of this questionable Paris neighborhood, where being out at night was the equivalent of standing in a back alley in Detroit.
Jenny stepped out of the rented apartment's foyer and onto the front porch, leaving the door cracked so the pale yellow light flooded the stoop, still protected from the torrent of rain by the overhead roof. She was accosted by the splattering and pounding sound of raindrops on the cobblestones.
The streetlights were only a bare glimmer, and she felt the goose bumps creep up her arms and legs, dressed as she was in a lace nightie that left little to the imagination.
"Jethro, what the hell are you doing?" she shouted, amusement overpowering the annoyance she tried to put in her question.
He looked at her from under the brim of his hat and gave her a patronizing smirk, his icy blue eyes driving her mad as usual.
"You said you wanted out of that 'god-forsaken hovel'." He responded slowly, quoting her words exactly. Jenny snorted, her eyebrow arching up.
"It's pouring rain, you idiot." She informed him, cupping her mouth with her hands to be heard over the sudden gust of wind that blew leaves down the path in front of the apartments.
His low, scoffing laugh reached her ears.
"Afraid to get a little wet, Shepard?" he taunted, holding a palm upwards to catch the icy water.
Jenny narrowed her eyes and glared at him, determined to wipe that smug smirk off his face. She stepped out from under the protection into the pouring rain, a slow and secretive smirk of her own jerking at her lips. Water splashed up her bare legs as she tip-toed down the stone stairs, the smell of clean rain tickling her nose.
She stepped down onto the sidewalk and bolted towards him, the pavement slick and treacherous beneath her bare feet. A high shriek escaped her lips as she lost her balance, and Jethro leapt deftly forward and caught her before she went down on the soused sidewalk; pulled her upwards and braced her against his sodden chest as she laughed.
She straightened, still leaning her lower body against him, and reached up to snatch his hat, promptly turning it over and dumping the collected water in the brim all over him. She shook her fast-dampening russet curls, spraying him again with water droplets, and captured his eyes with hers, challenge present in them.
The rain soaked her to the bone without a thought, plastering her thin lace nightgown to her pale skin, darkening her red hair to black wine. Jethro closed his hand around her bare and shivering forearm, turned her around and pinned her against the lamppost, his legs pressing against hers.
She reached up behind her with one arm and curved it around the lamppost, arching that tantalizing eyebrow even higher, her lips playing in a teasing smile.
Jethro dipped his head closer, his eyes darker and flickering; he moved his foot to step on the edge of his hat so it wouldn't be whisked away, curling his thigh against hers. His head tilted so his breath mingled with hers; he brought his mouth low to press against her shoulder beneath the wet curls of her hair, moving up to her neck, in the hollow below her ear.
The wind drowned her quiet gasp, her fingers curled against the collar of his jacket.
"Why…" he started questioningly, suspicious amusement dripping from his voice, his lips dangerously close to her ear, "…do you smell like bourbon, Jen?"
She made the mistake of giggling, and he pulled back to look at her, eyes wicked and triumphant again. He pulled her thigh closer to his, his mouth descending on hers only to stop at the last moment, his tongue tracing the contours of her lips.
Her slick fingers scraped against his neck beneath the coat; she moaned quietly, her head resting back against the pole, eyes closed. He smirked.
"Taste like it, too."
Her eyes flew open, bottle green orbs sparkling and curtained by heavy eyelashes in a sultry glance that pushed him to his limits. He pressed his hand into the flimsy material of her 'clothing', feeling warm skin beneath the soaked fabric. She parted her lips.
"Busted," she said, with the air of someone who hadn't been conquered at all, "You hooked me on that bittersweet swill you call alcohol."
He reveled in the less-than-humbled admission with a low laugh, dredging up her insults about his drink of choice in his head.
"That'll be the day," he scoffed.
Her arm uncoiled from the post and she draped it casually over his shoulder, letting her other drift from the collar of his coat inside, dangerously low to his waist. He was desperate to taste the bourbon on her again, to be enveloped in the smell of her.
Jethro found the place on her neck again, shifting his own hand lower to trace her inner thigh through the increasingly annoying lingerie. He felt her breath hitch as she shifted towards him, her head lift, her face turn, her lips press against his hair and his ear, touching skin as she spoke.
"Voulez-vous coucher avec moi, Jethro?"
The sound of his name alone in her throaty alto was enough to send him over the edge. He took her by the arm and very nearly bolted for the apartment. She shrieked, skittering and sliding in the puddles and holding desperately tight to his arm to avoid a nasty spill on the stone streets of Paris.
They reached the top step, the dark and dry shelter of the awning, and she stumbled against him, reaching for his hair, his neck, anything to bring his lips closer to his. He gathered lace fabric in his hand, wine red curls in the other; Jenny was wrapping a scantily clad leg impatiently around his, her lips forming his name against his mouth in an enticing moan…
"Jethro…"
"…Jethro?"
He shut the manila file and glanced up at her, his face a mask of stone, an eyebrow raised slightly in response to her question in the form of his name.
Jenny's own eyebrow arched in a painful reminder and her lips turned up in a smile as she reached down and took the file off of his desk, flicking through it deftly before she shut it and tucked it under her arm with her purse.
"Jen," he responded, a little hoarsely.
She seemed to be staring into his mind, trying to discern what he was thinking, what he meant by saying her name like that. She reached down and brushed her hand over his knuckles, her fingers dancing across his skin. She flipped off the desk light, leaving them in the dark except for the lights outside from the city.
"Go home, Jethro." She said softly, glancing out the window she'd found him looking towards when she came. She turned and left the bullpen, reaching to hold her coat close around her.
Gibbs leaned back in his chair, turning his head again to the window, realizing that the rain had stopped and the only thing left of it was a few stray drops on the glass.
*'voulez-vouse coucher avec moi' = 'Do you want to sleep with me'
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