Title: Mocha (2/3)
Author: Mina Robins
Fandom: Sherlock
Pairing: Irene Adler/Kate (Maid)
Rating: G until the last chapter…
A/N: Please be kind and inform me of any spelling or grammatical errors.
…
~Past~
Oh god, she has never said my name like that before. Like melted chocolate, soft and uncommanding. So addicting that I want to lean in close and hear more. Instead I feel my legs backing me out of my own room and my hand closing the door in my wake. When I realized I had gone back down the stairs and situated myself next to the marble kitchen counters. I had wanted to scream in dumb frustration. Instead, I placed my forehead down on the cooling stone and mentally tried to blank out the last 5 minutes of my life. Miss. Adler had been on my bed, and I had walked out of the room like a wide eyed idiot.
The coming morning was extremely embarrassing. It felt like the awkward morning afters I vaguely recalled having while I was still in University. Except this time around I didn't even get laid this time.
Miss. Adler strolled into the room as if she hadn't been naked and on my bed last night. Just as I slide her favourite omelette onto her plate she pours herself a cup of mint tea from the steaming kettle I had left out for her.
"Kate," Her voice was all business. "You're not working today."
Alarmed, it's too late as I feel my fingers go slack around the pan handle. It dips, and in my haste to right the kitchenware I grasp onto the sizzling metal with my left hand and painfully drop the pan into the kitchen sink.
Miss. Adler is beside me in a flash, pulling my hand under a stream of cold water.
I hiss and try to draw my hand away but ceased my struggling when she glares at me warningly. She lessens the flow of the tap and uses her hand to cup the water first so it would only trickle onto the angry welts that were forming on my forefingers and thumb.
"Kate."
I glimpse sheepishly up at her while she stares directly into my eyes. "I want you to take today and this weekend off, a holiday if you will."
I blink at her. "I'm not getting fired?"
Miss. Adler smirks. "Don't be absurd." She lets the water run of my digits for a couple more minutes, then lifts them up to inspect the damage. She opens a cabinet beside our sink and takes out our fully stocked med-kit. She rummages through the square container and places a newly found tub of aloe vera jelly onto the table.
"Why am I getting this weekend off?"
If I didn't know Miss. Adler so well I wouldn't have noticed the small twitch of her eyebrows. But I've been staring and watching and needing her for almost half a year, if not more. The twitch might as well have been her frowning agitatedly and biting her lip. Was she apprehensive about something? She's only ever worried her lip when she thought she had miscalculated something of dire importance and only in my companionship, never in the audience of others.
She had stop hiding her emotions from me after Christmas of last year. When she had laughed, actually laughed for the first time in my presence after a particularly entertain scenario involving cinnamon sticks and eggnog. A story for another time.
It wasn't controlled or precise, just laughter that was contagious and continuous. She gave up the charade of coy smirks and graced me to full blown smiles from that night on.
It hurts me to see that we've reverted back into the need for passive expressions and secret feelings in our relationship. I remind myself that we only have a work relationship.
"The tickets take you to Paris." She blows on my burns then smoothly applies the jelly onto my reddening fingertips. I wait as she patiently cradles my hand in hers, once she's relatively sure the jelly has dried sufficient she wraps a thin layer of gauze over my wounded digits. I bite my tongue to supress a moan that was more guilty pleasure than pain. "The car will arrive in half an hour, be prepared by then."
I nod.
"Off you go." She releases my hand and returns to her seat and begins to gracefully consume her breakfast. I watch as she turned on her android tablet to run through today's appointments.
Something I should be doing. "Thank you, Miss. Adler."
I blink away at the tears that I'm sure has begun to rim my eyes. I clench my aching fingers and obediently return to my room to begin packing for Paris for whatever Miss. Adler wants me to do there.
When I return to my room I noticed my phone was vibrating. 12 text messages and 3 missed calls. It's only 9am in the morning… This was my personal phone, not the Blackberry designated for dealing with Miss. Adler's clientele.
As I start packing for my impromptive trip to France my phone rings the theme song to Dr. Who, signalling a call from my sister. "Jennifer, how many times have I've told you not to tamper with my phone's ringtones!"
"Geeze, settle down, I've explained it to you, I'm a doctor, hence I use the theme song to Dr. Who. it's all really clever," Jennifer replied. "And its Jenny, mum calls me Jennifer."
I sigh and begrudgingly continued packing my belongings, how long did Miss. Adler say it was to be. Today and the weekend? "What do you want, Jenny, I'm busy."
"Christ sis, Happy Birthday." The exasperated patience in her voice could only be mustered from years of practice as our family's oldest.
I almost drop my phone and swiftly walked to the night stand to pick up the ticket… May 18… It was my… birthday.
Miss. Adler had stated tickets with an 's' earlier… Oooh. This was my birthday present. I had gone back to my parents last May due to a family emergency and had come home to a diamond pendant waiting on my pillow, a necklace that still adorns my neck. A gift that far surpassed what was deemed suitable for an employer to gift an employee.
Miss. Adler remembered then and appears to have remembered now.
My phone vibrates in my hand as the theme song plays again. "Hello?"
"Katey, you weren't answering, is everything alright?"
"Yes, yes, actually yes." I shift through my paper waste basket hoping to see the second ticket and thus proof that Miss. Adler had actually wanted to join me during my birthday. That I hadn't just conjured her in her birthday suit to greet me last night. I find nothing, which I realized dimly would be the case. Miss. Adler had wanted to frown earlier because she thought she had gotten my birthday wrong. Which isn't a reactionary surprise after I practically ran from my own room the night before.
She must have thought that I didn't want to be with her in every which way a person can possible be with another. Knowing her, she wouldn't leave the second ticket behind. She was stubbornly prideful, she doesn't even react to my birthday the way people normally would. No cards or cakes, just charming jewelry and apparent tickets to Paris.
She did things her own way, showed her affections boldly and yet doesn't bother to acknowledge when I seemed to have rejected her. She just backs off and plays pretend for me, tries to make things easier for me. Of course she wouldn't try to reinforce her desires, the first time we met I was in tears and jobless because my employer had done such a thing. She was so ridiculously considerate sometimes. Can't she tell that the feelings are mutual? Stupid thought, I had left the room without a word and slept on the living room sofa, tormented with the idea of having to explain myself to her. How the very idea of her on my bed was ludicrous; a pure fantasy. How easily she causes me to revert to a bumbling, love stricken teenager.
If she has only lust for my body and wants nothing more, I wouldn't even mind, I just want her to have me completely. I've grown to adore everything that she was about, the secretive life that surrounds her. Miss. Adler has somehow managed to own my heart without even needing to lay a single lash against my body.
I love her.
The conclusion causes me to sit back onto my bed. "God, I love her."
"Katey, did you just say 'her'?"
"Jenny, I love her."
"Oh, god, please no, I just came out to da and mum a month ago, don't do the whole following my footsteps thing, are you copying me in some convoluted hero sibling worship?" The aghast fear in her voice manages to make the tone she was using sound less condescending. "Cause it's not funny, it really isn't, oh gawd, they're going to kill us, let's pray that Ryan doesn't pull a gay card or mum's going to go nuts!"
"What?" I almost drop the phone; I seemed to be fumbling around with everything today. "WHAT?!"
"Hah, right, didn't tell, you." Jenny pauses and I can almost feel her nervousness. "Didn't really want to tell the rents either, god, Katey we use to talk about everything."
"I know." I regret the gap that has grown between us, but she has the hospital and an apparent relationship and I ha... I had a goddess to tend to. "Look, can I call you back?"
"Seriously, we just came out to each other and you're hanging up on me." I can imagine Jenny's indulgent grin.
"I need to fix something I royally screwed up."
"Yes, of course, you always were so good at that, screwing up." My blonde headed sister joked.
"Jenny!"
The line ends with a quick click.
There's a knock on my door, I turn to see Clarence. Miss. Adler really did pull out all the stops. She called the limo for me… For us.
"Miss, we will have to head out now if you want to catch your plane, where's all the suitcases?"
I motioned at my half pack travel gear and shrug.
"Miss, you're normally so prepared." Clarence was the older brother I never wanted but got. He was surprisingly protective of Miss. Adler. It was strange to see someone that cares as much as I do. I sometimes wonder if he had the same feelings I harbour for our resident dominatrix.
"Did you say suitcases?" I inquired with a quirk of my eyebrow.
"Yes, of course, Miss. Adler told me that I needn't be on call this weekend."
That definitely means that there was an 's' at the end of the word ticket.
"Clarence, would you be so kind as to helping me pack?" I smile charmingly at him; I know that he used to help Miss. Adler do a lot of the tasks I've taken up so it wouldn't be a stretch for him to help me pack just this once.
Clarence scrunches up his handsome nose but nods good naturedly. "Yeah, no problem."
I kiss him on the cheek as a thank you and rush down the stairs.
Miss. Adler is still seated at the high chair, casually sipping her tea as she scrolls through files on her tablet. "You should be in the car." She notes.
"And you should be with me." It's surprisingly bold, I'm somehow managing to channel the work me. The one that forbids one Miss. Adler from cigarettes in bed, from succumbing to too many drug focused soirées. I was her efficient maid, the secretary who attempts to lower the number of dalliances she has with the insane. I wonder if she sees through the cool, brave mask I don when dealing with relentless and unsuitable customers.
But I wasn't dealing with a client.
I was dealing with the seductress herself.
Miss. Adler has spun around in the chair to face me. Her gaze cautious but optimistically curious.
I dropped onto my knees in front of her, placing a hand beseechingly on her knee. I hear her gasp from the small contact and wonder if I instill a fragment of lust that she constantly causes me to exude.
"Kate, be a dear and wait in the car for me."
…
~Present~
"Musing again?"
I glance up from my laptop and peek at the array of letters scattered on the living room coffee table and take a moment reshuffle them into a neat pile before answering. "Miss. Adler."
"I am not one that fancies musing," She tsk tsk and taps her finger against her cheek bones, "Definitely, not when an employee should be diligently arranging my meetings." Her face was passive and bored, the tone inflecting towards annoyance, but her eyes are sparking with mischief.
Her hand moves to grip my chin, she tilts up my face and stares down at me. If I still had a sliver of mock decency I would be ashamed that I was dripping wet already.
The couple I've been booking always chooses separate times of day. Neither seems to have a clue that the other has been procuring my lady's swift hand.
My lips are dry and as I stick my tongue out to lick them. I hear my mistress's hungry growl.
The phone rings.
