A/N: This is nothing but a bit of heavy flirting… Something vaguely similar to this was written ages ago, but I scrapped it until I rediscovered it and quickly re-did it. Not the greatest thing I've ever written, but it was fun to do anyway, so I hope you like it.
Review? It's common courtesy. Really, it's like you guys see a red light at the bottom of the fic and just stop…
Disclaimer: I am getting rich off this. Seriously - tons of money coming in. Hence why I live an apartment.
Testimony to Denial:
The gentle pattering of rain resounded quietly pass the arched limestone entrance of the small cavern, bouncing off great, large leafs and creating puddles throughout the jungle. An occasional large bird or howler monkey's call broke the serene tranquility of the moment, dusk having set it rather quickly along with the rain that accompanied it.
It seemed to Elizabeth that is was only a few minutes ago that Jack somehow had manage to persuade her to accompany him and a group of crew members onto an unexplored island they had anchored nearby, in hopes of discovering something interesting. Foolishly, Elizabeth's curiosity had gotten the best of her and she had complied with his request. Before they had gotten much searching done, the pair had accidentally managed to get themselves separated from the rest of the group, to their great displeasure and worriment. After no more then perhaps two hours of hacking their way through the thick foliage of the rain forest together, Mother Nature had decided the time to be perfect to unleash her wrath upon them, drenching the pair immediately with rain.
Heaving a heavy sigh, Elizabeth shivered slightly and turned away from the low entrance and saw Jack attempting with some frustration to light a fire, muttering strings of profanities under his breath. Pacing over, Elizabeth kneeled by him, watching with extreme amusement as his face contorted with annoyance and impatience each time a spark failed to be produced. Noticing her trembling jaw from the corner of his eye, Jack said quietly, sounding distracted, "You should change love. You might catch a fever."
Pushing her wet hair out of her face, Elizabeth threw a glance at him. "I haven't any clothes to change into."
A cocky grin that could only be described as Jack's formed on the man's face, and setting down the stones he had been fiddling with, he reached over and grabbed a traveling bag he had brought with them, in case something like this occurred. Undoing the leather clasp, he withdrew a dark red blanket and handed it to her.
"You could change out of your clothes and then wrap this around yourself." At the somewhat cold look she gave him, he added hopefully, "You'll stay warm and dry."
Elizabeth threw her eyes skywards. "Honestly Jack, I am none too worried of my present condition." However, she stood, took the rough fabric and draped it around herself, pulling it tight.
Jack's bottom lip pushed out into an irresistible (though Elizabeth managed to resist) pout, ostensibly not pleased with her decision. Elizabeth smirked, throwing a little more wood to the flame (figuratively – Jack still hadn't gotten a fire going) and eyed him wickedly.
"I'd never let your eyes dishonor me so, Captain, though I'm sure they manage to do that even when I am clothed," she murmured, figuring she could at least have some seemingly harmless fun tonight.
The corners of his lips twitched upwards, delight written all about his face. "My eyes have never dared to sully your honor in such a way, Captain Swann." Contradicting his statement though, his eyes traveled down the span of her body, making her cheeks tingle slightly. The dark orbs flicked back to her face, and then he turned from her, once again busying himself with his soon-to-be-fire.
Ever since she had begun sailing with him, Elizabeth had requested from Jack more then once to use her proper last name when addressing her by it. However, he was forever going against her wishes, ever so persistent by using her formal surname of Swann, though that was a rare occasion – he normally just called her love, dear, missy, pet, or Lizzie. For some reason, the latter of the names always made her bristle with an alien form of contentment.
Attempting to ring some more water from her dark and damp tresses, she twisted her hair until it resembled a tight rope. Jack had finally managed to get some small flame going and was now trying to make it kindle with the tiny pieces of wood he was feeding it.
When she sat down, Jack's eyes flickered down and up her appraisingly. "Perhaps now is one of those times when nothing is best."
Fixing him with an annoyed look, Elizabeth pulled the blanket closer. "Unfortunately for you Captain Sparrow; not tonight."
"Another night than, eh?"
"You're insufferable."
Jack's smirk fell. "That hurt darling," he said with mock sadness.
Elizabeth snorted.
"You're wet, but you look comfortable," she pointed out, steering the conversation away from topics that made her blush.
He grinned. "Contrary to popular belief; I'm rather cold at the moment." He leered at her, his grin widening. "Perhaps," he said, shifting slightly so he was leaning to her, "if one would so selflessly share her blanket with a cold weary traveler, he'd become comfortable."
Elizabeth tried to look appalled, though a strange feeling in her stomach ignited. She silenced the feeling quickly, and shook her head. "As said before, you're insufferable. There is another blanket in the bag, in case you have forgotten, Captain Sparrow."
"Just throwing out more pleasing suggestions love," Jack replied defensively, removing his hat and tilting it so the water ran out of it. Elizabeth watched the water dribble slowly onto the ground, turning a small portion of the dirt floor into mud.
"Tell me," she began, brushing a stray hair away, "how long until we reach the Fountain of Youth?"
Biting the side of his cheek, Jack sat pensively for a moment, his hands unfolding another blanket, draping it over his shoulders and sitting beside Elizabeth. "If we manage to hack our way through this jungle by tomorrow mid-day, I'd say in about a week. However, if we dawdle too long, the crew'll run out of supplies, and we'll have to take port at the nearest island."
She sat quite for a moment, and then frowned. "I wish we had made it back today; what of William-."
Jack interrupted her by waving a hand dismissively. "The lad'll be fine on the Pearl my dear Swann; no need to worry over such frivolous things."
"My son is not a 'frivolous thing', Jack," she said crossly, eyes narrowing.
A grin lingered on Jack's lips; there was nothing more interesting and striking than Elizabeth when she was angry. "I hate to contradict you love, but he is. Useless and always in the way is what that boy is. Much like the whelp."
She shoved a finger into his chest, her amber irises glinting fiercely in the warm firelight. "I do recall him helping you out of situations on more then one occasion, dear captain, or did you manage to forget the entire tavern incident where he got you out of a what would have been a fatal fight with that beast of a man? You do remember, don't you? The man who was about to break you," –she jabbed her finger harder into his chest to get her point across more- "into two pieces for trying to stealing his coin purse."
"Really?" Jack sounded surprised. "You should explain my dear swan, for I have no reco-."
"If William hadn't feigned being your son, you would have gotten broken in half," she interrupted. "You were lucky that that man didn't want to leave a boy fatherless when he wasn't even a man yet." Elizabeth withdrew her hand and it disappeared under her blanket as she gave Jack a pointed look.
"Oh. That." He gave her a guilty grin.
"Yes, that."
Jack twiddled a beard braid for a moment. "Well that puts everything into an entirely different perspective."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes, her arms reaching for their traveling bag. She dug into its contents, aware of Jack watching her intently, causing her to flush to her great annoyance. She threw a side-glance at him, and withdrew two small bottles (of rum, unsurprisingly), a few empty flasks that had been meant to recover fresh water, and a tiny burlap sack filled with hard-tack and dry, salted meat.
"Ta love," Jack said, taking a bottle of rum.
Putting away everything but the rum, Elizabeth uncorked her bottle with her pirate companion, tapping the body of it to his bottle.
"To getting lost," she muttered sardonically, taking a big gulp. Immediately after swallowing, she lurched forward, coughing and sputtering loudly while tears began to prick at her eyes from the burning sensation she felt – it must have 'gone down the wrong pipe' all to quickly.
A big hand pounded her on the back. "Easy love – you might end up coughing up your stomach itself, and I can guarantee that would not be a pretty site at all."
Under any other circumstances, she would have given him a withering glare, but her eyes were squeezed shut, her coughing beginning to settle down. She cleared her throat a few times.
"Damn drink," Elizabeth rasped, clearing her throat once more.
"It's not the drink's fault."
"Oh shut it."
"Someone is rather vexed tonight."
"I wonder why?" the young woman nearly shouted. "First, you force me on this little expedition of yours onto this stupid, bloody island, then we get separated from the rest of the search group, and you manage to get us lost. And on top of that, we are soaking wet, it's raining, and we are stuck it this stupid, bloody cave for the rest of the night."
A chuckle made her look at him. "And what is so funny?" she demanded.
"You love – you need to pull that… tree trunk size stick out of your bum," –he gestured with his head to said body part- "and get those pessimistic thoughts out of your head, because they're buzzing around in there quite loudly. Our current situation could be far worse."
She scoffed. "How could that be?"
"Well…" He considered her words. "There could be some sort of rather large jungle predator residing here in this cave with us, waiting for the opportune moment to strike and eat us. Or we could have had to of find shelter outside in the rain, or even worse, we could be rum-less!" Jack shivered. "A horrific thought to even mull over, dearie, if you ask me."
Some sort of sharp comment almost made it off Elizabeth's tongue, but she held back. Silence enveloped between them for a good while, the only sound coming from either of them being the swish of their drinks or a stifled yawn.
Elizabeth had been eyeing Jack's hair for a long time that day – she was knew that each trinket meant something, though she had never really gotten to inquiring as to what each one did mean. Reaching out, she fingered a large yellow bead that was woven into his locks, a rather bold move for a governor's daughter, but not for a pirate king.
"These all have stories behind them." It wasn't a question, but he nodded. "What's the tale behind this one?"
Jack looked at the bead in question as she held it out a bit for him to see. His eyes immediately brightened and his russet lips pulled upwards into a mischievous grin.
"Ah, lovely anecdote for this one. Lovely Spanish lass she was, though her husband was a rather fickle man… Not to mention he was a priest…" Elizabeth's eyes began to widen and she caught on immediately.
"You…" She flushed slightly, her gaze dropping for a moment. "Bedded a married woman? A woman who was the spouse of a cleric, a man of a church?"
"Generally that's what a member of the clergy is love, but yes, and she was quite the beautiful little thing. She had the most-."
Elizabeth shook her head.
"I'd rather not hear of how you got in such activities with a woman who was already married."
"You're right love," he agreed. "I'm sure you'd rather experience first-hand."
Pursing her lips, Elizabeth once again snuffed out a tiny flame that sparked in her stomach. "Of course, but most certainly not with you."
Jack chuckled, turning away from her, his eyes on the fire. "No sense to be lying love – 'tis a sin… I'm sure." He frowned slightly.
"I am not lying."
"All evidence to the contrary," he retorted.
Snorting, Elizabeth challenged, "What evidence is that?"
He turned his body to her and grinned. "I'm glad you asked."
She did not realize the wrong of her inquiry and the purpose of his answer until he reached a hand out, his thumb running over her lips slowly. Eyes widening, Elizabeth held back the urge to sigh or lean into his touch, straining to keep her look mocking as she continued to gaze into his eyes.
"Again Captain, what evidence?"
The woman should have known she was just goading him to go further, that she should have just swatted his hand away and bid him good-night, but a dark part of her was genuinely curious to see how far he would go… and how far she would allow him to go. It was all coming back to her, now, their conversation on the Black Pearl those so many years ago.
And when you do you will discover something… that you're a good man.
She had no doubt of him being a good man – she had piles of evidence that he was, but the real question was could she act like a good woman? It had been different back then, she had known so little, she was so naïve, but now…
Jack broke her thoughts when his thumb glided up her jawbone languorously to where it met her ear. It then began to travel down her neck, lingering on her pulse where his index finger slowly took over, tracing a long, meandering path down to her exposed collarbones. Elizabeth's eyes never left his, and she struggled to keep her lip from quivering, her eyelids from falling.
The pirate captain only made matters worse when his head leaned forward, his lips now brushing against the soft skin of her cheek. Elizabeth's breath hitched almost silently, but she knew Jack heard it. Her hand fell onto his shoulder, but if it was meant to stop him, she did not go through with her action – she just let it rest there, her eyes closing. His lips continued to ghost across her face, until they rested at the corner of her mouth. His rough hand splayed across the base of her neck lightly, his thumb making smooth movements back and forth against the back of her neck.
Oh god, he was going to kiss her… Longing burned deeply in Elizabeth, a fierce and hot flame that wished to get released through some type of outlet. She had felt this many times in the past years, but never had it been as loud as now. She was sure that if she allowed Jack to kissed her things could possibly get out of hand…
Elizabeth took both of her hands and wrapped them around his, pulling it away from her skin that betrayed loudly, and pressing it against his chest. Her eyes remained closed, but she knew he had moved away when the warmth of his skin left hers.
"Enough," she told him quietly, her voice shaking. Here eyelids lifted to reveal Jack back in his original position, smirking at her.
Glaring at him she turned towards the fire.
"You're too bold."
"And I was right."
"You shouldn't take advantage of a woman."
Jack snorted. "It's hardly taking advantage when she is bloody well asking for it."
"I was most certainly not."
"Keep telling yourself that darling."
A grow emitted from Elizabeth's mouth. Standing, she moved to the opposite side of the fire, lied down and stubbornly turned away from him.
"Good-night love." His voice was the epitome of cheerfulness.
Oh, she really wanted to hit him.
She lied there for a long time awake, nearly hugging the wall, forcing her breath to resume its usual even pace. That was the closest they had come towards one another physically since she kissed him back on the Black Pearl what seemed like an eternity ago. Elizabeth's body longed to be touched again, but the sensible woman that remained inside her denied her that right, obstinately making sure she did the right thing. It was a tiring battle, but she always managed to pull through.
Just before she was about to fall asleep, her thoughts drifting off, she heard a quiet chuckle.
"What evidence indeed…"