A hoarse scream woke Maura. She bolted upright in bed, covers falling away from her bare shoulders.
"NOOOOOO!" The cry echoed around the dark motel room. The mattress lurched against the wall. Disoriented, Maura pushed her hair from her eyes and turned. Jane was thrashing in a subconscious panic, her frantic writhing trapping the sheets around her body. The tighter they pulled, the harder Jane fought.
"Jane! JANE!" Maura shouted. She reached for her friend's flailing arms, earning herself a hearty thump on the collarbone that drove the breath from her lungs. With some difficulty she managed to wrestle Jane's slender wrists to the bed and pinned her there. "JANE!"
In the gloom she saw Jane's eyes snap open, flashing wild with terror. Jane didn't register that the face looming above her was Maura's. She bucked violently, almost throwing Maura off, but Maura gritted her teeth grimly and used her full weight to hold her down.
"JANE! Wake up, it's me. It's Maura. It's okay. You're okay," she said.
Jane paused mid-twist and sank back to the pillow, panting heavily.
"Maur?" she whimpered, and Maura's heart broke to hear the fear and hurt in her friend's voice.
"Shh," she soothed, releasing Jane's wrists. "It's alright."
Jane began to sob. Maura shushed her again and sat up, drawing Jane against her like a child. Jane fell into her protective embrace, clutching at Maura's silk negligee, and began to weep openly. Maura wrapped her arms tightly around her friend and rested her cheek on top of Jane's mass of thick, dark hair.
"It's okay," she said, pressing a quick kiss to the curls. "I'm here. Shh. It's alright."
Jane's fists tightened. "Maur, it was him. It was Hoyt," she whispered.
"I know. Shh, I know." Maura didn't know. Jane was the only person she could lie to.
"I was … I was pinned to the ground. And he had you. He was hurting you," Jane continued. The hair on the back of Maura's neck stood up.
"Jane, you don't need -" she began.
"I saw the knife. I saw the blood. I wanted … I wanted to save you, but I couldn't … I couldn't," Jane howled, sobbing anew.
Maura didn't know what to do. She shushed and rocked Jane, gently detaching Jane's death-grip on her negligee and raising the hand to her lips, pressing them first to the skin on the back, then turning the hand to gently kiss the scar on the palm. Jane's crying ceased and she hiccuped, sitting up.
"Maur ..."
Maura couldn't tell Jane's expression in the half-light, but she sensed how close her face was. Maura's breathing came shallow and quick. She felt her chest flutter where Jane's tears had soaked through the silk.
"Jane," she murmured.
Jane raised the hand Maura had kissed and tentatively picked up one of the curls resting on Maura's bare shoulders. Slowly she twirled it around her finger. Maura waited, not believing what was happening. The room was suddenly boiling hot, a fact she knew to be meteorically impossible because the air con kept the temperature at a constant –
Jane's fingers brushed suddenly against the hollow at the base of Maura's throat. Maura swallowed and the fingers travelled against the ride of skin, lightly tracing a lazy trail to the jaw. Maura closed her eyes for an instant, every instinct screaming for her to turn away.
But she didn't. Instead she raised her own hand and tenderly brushed an unruly lock away from Jane's eyes. She let her palm come to rest against Jane's cheek and felt, rather than saw, her friend smile. Maura felt a smile grow on her face as well.
Later, neither would recall who moved first. Jane's hand slid around to grasp the back of Maura's neck and in the same breath Maura flew towards her. The distance between them closed in an instant. Their lips came together hesitantly at first, but as the passion built the kiss intensified. They drew together and Maura felt the firm press of Jane's breasts against hers. Fire licked across her skin. Her usually organised mind went haywire as her senses overloaded. The taste of Jane, the feel of her, the smell of her filled Maura until she felt as though she were drowning. Which she knew was entirely improbable due to the lack of a body of water, but it was the only way she could have described the sensation as a wave of Jane crashed over her.
Breathless, they pulled away, remaining an inch apart. Jane's breath was hot on Maura's lips, her hand still firmly grasping the nape of Maura's neck where the hairs now stood on end from an entirely different kind of chill. Maura discovered that her own hand rested on Jane's hip, but she had no recollection of putting it there.
"Maura, I -" Jane began, but Maura shushed her once again. Neither of them moved. They remained as close as possible. Maura found herself swaying. The heat rising off her friend's skin excited her, and she found herself imaging the rose-tinted blush that must be travelling across Jane's flesh.
Jane broke first. Maura felt Jane's lips brush her jaw, then slide down to the exposed skin of her throat. Maura buried her face in the crook where Jane's neck melded into her shoulder. Jane's skin smelt wonderful. Not of perfumes and expensive oils – just of her. The steeled muscle bunched and rolled beneath Maura's cheek as Jane shifted, rising up on her knees and lowering Maura gently to the mattress. The big, fluffy pillows enveloped Maura and made her feel very small, but then Jane was there, pressing her to the mattress, covering her with her body, feathering frenzied kisses down the doctor's chest.
Maura closed her eyes and revelled in the sensation as Jane's lips moved to her breast. Before she realised what was happening Jane's warm mouth closed around her left nipple. Maura gasped and arched her back, her hands jumping to cup Jane's ears and close with fistfuls of the thick, dark hair she so loved. Her silk negligee offered no protection from the sudden onslaught of Jane's teeth and tongue. After just a few seconds Maura was forced to push Jane away to catch her breath.
"What is it, Maur?" Jane rasped as Maura's breast heaved.
Maura just shook her head and sat up, crushing herself to Jane once more, taking Jane's next words with a hard kiss. They rolled to the side, hands running up and down each other, legs flailing until they entwined and tightened. Maura felt heat coiling in her loins and instinct began to move her hips. Jane moved her lips to Maura's throat once more as Maura's hand slid down the hard plane of Jane's stomach.
When her fingers hit the elastic of Jane's plain, practical underwear Maura paused. What was she doing? Her heart surged in fear. This wasn't right. Jane was her best friend. Best friends didn't do this. This was madness. It needed to stop before it went too far. But Maura was at the precipice and Jane's fingernails raking across the inside of her thigh sent her cascading over the edge.
Maura's hand completed its journey and cupped around the furnace that ached for her touch. The doctor's fingers began to tease her open, and when Maura slipped a finger inside the detective she captured the brunette's gutteral moan with her lips. Her caress roughened as her own fire built, the kiss turning to a bite. Maura pressed herself to Jane to hold her to the bed as her hand worked faster. Jane's fingernails raked gently up Maura's spine, catching slightly on the silk.
Panting, Maura sat up astride Jane and pulled the negligee over her head, discarding it with a flick of her wrist. In the gloom she could sense Jane looking up at her and, for an instant, the doctor paused. But it was too late to stop now. Jane's hands came up to close around Maura's breasts, and her mouth followed a split second later. Maura's head slumped backwards, mouth open, the cry of ecstasy trapped in her chest somewhere beneath Jane's teasing teeth and tongue. She tangled her fingers in Jane's long, thick hair and, when the pleasure grew too great, tugged Jane away.
They toppled backwards onto the plump pillows, Jane twisting to wrestle Maura beneath her. With a laugh Maura fought back but Jane pinned her and bent to bite gently down on Maura's earlobe. Maura's giggles dissolved into feverish gasps, and soon Jane had her squirming to get away lest she came then and there.
"You're too good at this," Maura breathed.
A throaty chuckle eased up with the pulse of Jane's wildly beating heart. "You think you're the only one with school stories?"
"I don't know what you're talking about," Maura grinned, eliciting another rasp from Jane that rumbled like the tumble of hot coals in the flames.
They giggled together for a second, defusing Maura's tension. She felt her shoulders roll as she relaxed and Jane responded to the movement by gripping her friend's thigh. The grip slid higher. Maura's laughter turned to a groan as Jane's fingers found her. Her legs softened wider beneath the press of Jane's lithe body and the merciless assailment of her hand.
Jane worked quickly. She knew Maura was close to the edge, and with the skill of an artist she kept her hovered there. Maura's moans blurred together with the come and go of Jane's lips against her neck, her breasts, her ears, her eyes, her jaw. Her world became mad and sticky with frenzied desire. Jane held her suspended between pleasure and pain, hanging her over the height with a gossamer thread. Maura whimpered. She ached for the thread to break, at the same time she wanted to hover there forever.
Then the firestorm broke. The wave crashed – throwing Maura carelessly against the rocks, dragging her back and forth, building and rolling. Maura was a doll in its jaws. She cast her arms around Jane and cried out, fingernails digging viciously into her friend's hard back. She heard nothing, saw nothing.
There was only Jane.