Well, I hope that if you are reading this, it means that you enjoyed the first chapter. Thanks to everyone for the story favorites and subscriptions. Also, to the one review, yes, I do plan on continuing this story. I might not be updating it as quickly as this chapter is going up, as I have another story I need to finish, but I will update.

The Flames of my Desire

"Will you stay with me tonight? I mean, after everything do you think you'll be able to sleep?"

All the seriousness in Jace's features left, replaced by a grin. "That depends. Are you going to start moaning my name again? If so, I doubt I'll get any sleep. In fact, I'll probably need to take a cold shower."

Clary bit her lip. Regardless of how horribly her dream ended, she still had the memory of Jace's hands on her skin, the way his body felt pressed up against hers. It was so vivid, so real. She wanted it to be real, wanted to be able to be with him without fear of getting hurt.

"Where have your thoughts taken you, Clary Fray?"

It was a normal occurrence for Clary to get lost in her thoughts. Reality had a tendency to melt away from her from time to time. "To my dream."

Jace sat back on the bed, his hand stretching out to fill the space between them, his eyes intent on hers. "I'll never let him touch you again." His words held a promise, all the hostility now gone.

"I wasn't thinking about Sebastian. I was thinking about you … in my dream." She hated that she needed to make the distinction between the two of them—the real Jace who could barely touch her and the dream Jace, not held back by the heavenly fire. An idea sparked in her mind. "Can you lie down?"

He eyed her suspiciously, but complied. Stretching out on the right side of the twin bed he crossed one leg over the other. All the while, his eyes never left hers.

Clary scooted toward him, kneeling on the bed. Her cheeks were flush and her hands shook at her sides. "I just thought … all this time, it's been you trying to control the fire, you worried about burning anyone you touched. But what if I touched you? Let me be the one in control." She couldn't help the waver in her voice. She hoped he didn't notice.

"Clary—" he started to protest.

"Just stay calm, Jace. Please, let me try."

She reached with both hands for the hem of his shirt, careful not to touch his skin. Compliantly, he pulled it over his head. He settled back down on the pillows with an exasperated sigh. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but the pants are staying on, just so we're clear."

She tried not to smile and nodded her head. Tentatively, she reached her fingers toward him and ran them along his chest, tracing the scar from the Angel's blade, still red and puckered. Then her hand trailed down across the silver-white scars that mapped his skin of his stomach, watching for the tell-tale red-gold glow. It didn't come. Jace let out a frustrated breath, but Clary wasn't going to hear his excuses. "Go to your happy place."

"That's just the problem. My 'happy place' involves you, and in it we're not platonically sharing a bed. Besides, my other 'happy place' isn't going to be able to take much more of this."

"Your other happy place?"

"The one in my pants."

"Jace," Clary hissed, "I've barely touched you. Close your eyes if it helps."

"Are you going to blindfold me?"

"Would it help if I did?"

"No."

"Can you stop joking around, please? This is hard enough as it is."

"Well, it's hard for me, too."

Clary turned abruptly away from him, her cheeks flushed. She giggled despite herself. "Do you know how hard it is to not look at your—your 'happy place'?"

She felt him sit up behind her in bed. "I think I'll take that cold shower now." His fingers brushed her hair from her back, tucking it over her left shoulder. She could feel his breath tickle the back of her neck. "Care to join me?"

She turned toward him as his fingers reached out to touch her rune of Angelic Power. She winced at first. The skin still burned. She searched his face, but he seemed serious. "Do you really think that's a good idea?"

"No, but I'm all out of good ideas. You and I in the shower, that's a bad idea. A very bad idea." Jace hooked a finger under the strap of her camisole and pulled it gently off her shoulder.

"Maybe the cold water could counteract the burn?" She hated how much her voice shook, how her heart hammered in her chest, betraying her.

His lips lightly grazed her shoulder blade. A dull shock passed along the surface of her skin. "Wishful thinking, Clary. Cold water is used to treat burns, but I doubt it will do anything to neutralize them."

"What if we leave our clothes on?"

Jace's eyebrow arched. "Are we having a wet T-shirt contest? Had I know I would have worn white."

"And you're assuming you'd win?"

"I think this would count as a win-win situation."

Clary rose abruptly from the bed, pulling her shoulder strap up before she lost her gumption. She padded across the carpeted floor and into the small bathroom, turning on the light and closing the door behind her. Opening the glass shower door, she turned on the water … and waited.

She counted the seconds that passed, hoping the task would calm her nerves. Ninety-three seconds later, the door opened. Jace's eyes flashed darkly when their eyes met.

"This is dangerous, Clary."

"Just consider it part of your training." She turned away from him and climbed into the shower. The ice-cold water did nothing to calm her nerves. Instead, it sucked all the breath out of her lungs. In seconds, she was shivering all over. Her teeth chattered as she considered reaching to turn on the hot water … just a little bit.

A hand reached in front of her, turning the knob. She turned to look at Jace, her teeth chattering, cold water now pouring over her left shoulder.

"Hypothermia isn't sexy, Clary," Jace said, closing the glass door behind them. He turned her around pulling her back to his chest, strong arms wrapping around her own clung desperately across her chest.

The heat from his skin immediately caused her to relax, her chattering and shaking subsided.

"I've never done this before," she confessed.

"Showered? I hadn't noticed a smell."

"No," She rolled her eyes, "showered with someone else."

"Thanks for crushing my girl's locker room fantasy." She turned to face him, her arms still firmly clasped across her own chest. Unlike Jace, who was shirtless right now, she had worn white.

The water was now the perfect temperature. Without thinking, she leaned her head back, letting the warm water wash over her hair.

Jace's eyes dilated as he watched Clary's head tilt back, exposing the long column of her neck while also causing her hips to press against him. A sudden surge of heat passed through him. His arms abruptly withdrew causing Clary to tumble backward, her hands flying out to her sides to steady herself.

Clary's eyes sprung open in surprise. "What did I do?"

Jace was shaking his head. He had backed up against the cold tile of the shower, putting as much space as possible between them. "I don't think I can do this." His eyes were hooded, taking in the sight of her. The thin cotton shirt clung to her skin. He could see the curve of her breasts and the darker shade of her nipples through the wet material. It was too much.

"The fire?"

He swallowed the lump in his throat. "I didn't see it, but I felt it coming on."

Clary looked back at him, a smile suddenly springing to her face. "But that's progress. You felt it and let me go before you burned me. You anticipated it."

"Yes, this time, but what about next time? I can't risk touching you."

The words flew out of her mouth without thinking. "Then don't. Just watch." Heat flooded her cheeks as soon as she said it, her stomach clenching in nervous knots.

"You are trying to torture me, aren't you?"

Clary turned her back to him. "Consider it part of your training." Adrenaline surged through her veins, just as it did when she fought. It emboldened her. She glanced at him over her shoulder as she reached for the hem of her shirt. Slowly, she lifted it, peeling it off like a second layer of skin.

Even over the noise of the water streaming down on top of her, she could hear his breathing hitch. She turned away as she lifted the shirt over her head and let it fall to the shower floor in a wet splat.

Clary froze, then. Fear gripped her. Her mind wandered back to her dream, where she felt no shame as Jace's gaze raked over the bare skin of her chest. But that was a dream. Yes, that was a dream, and this was real. This was the real Jace, who loved her and accepted her completely.

Slowly, she turned toward him, fighting to urge to pull her hair over her shoulders to hide herself. This time, her eyes searched his, looking for any sign of disappointment. What she saw was a flame, true and bright. It wasn't a trick of her eyes. It was really there, pulsing beneath the surface of his golden gaze.

"Clary," Jace whispered, his chest rising a falling rapidly, "you're killing me." And there was a pain in his eyes. Clary took a small step forward, closing the distance between them. That's when she saw it. The red flame licked its way from his chest outward. each tendon, vein, and bone illuminated under his skin.

Jace's eyes snapped shut, his hands clenched into fists. He worked to control his breathing, and as he did, the flames that flickered beneath his skin subsided.

"Jace—"

"I can't do this, Clary. I'm sorry." Anger tinged each note in his response.

Clary, crestfallen, turned away and shut the off water. She hastily wrung out her hair and cracked open the shower door to reach for a towel. With her back turned to him, she quickly dried her hair and wrapped the towel around her, stepping out of the shower. Clary didn't know what to say to him.

She let out all the air in her lungs once the bathroom door was firmly closed behind her, trying to stave off the sting of rejection. Shucking off the rest of her wet clothes, she tossed them in the hamper. She had just wrenched open the drawer to her dresser when the door opened behind her. Gripping her towel in hand she turned to face him.

He stood in the crack in the door, the light from the bathroom pouring in around him. His hair was a golden tousled mess and his wet pants clung to his skin. His eyes immediately softened when he saw the look on her face. "Clary…" he let out an exasperated sigh and retreated back into the bathroom, closing the door behind him. A few moments later, he reappeared with just a towel around his waist and approached her, stopping only a foot away.

"Clary, you have to know this isn't your fault. You know I want to touch you … more than anything. If I could stand there watching you take off your clothes in front of me without going up into flames, then you would know there was something seriously wrong with me. If I could look at the woman I love standing before me in all her glory and be so unaffected …" He ran a nervous hand through his hair. "Do you know how hard it is just to keep my thoughts in check knowing there's nothing beneath that towel?"

She believed him, every word of it. Still, it didn't change the fact that she wanted to scream that it wasn't fair like a petulant child. "If you'll turn around, I'll put some clothes on." Her eyes quickly passed over him. "You should probably put some clothes on too."

"Do you have a silk robe I can borrow? I've been told pink is my color."

She smiled despite herself. "No, but I do have a Wonder Woman pantie and cami set you could borrow."

"Only if it comes with a whip, otherwise I won't consider it." He looked at her seriously then. "There's two sides of me right now, warring against each other. One really wants that towel of yours to accidentally fall to the floor, while the other is praying for your sustained grip strength."

"Then turn around, flame boy." He did as instructed.

Clary pulled out a random pair of underwear and sleep shorts from the open drawer, setting them on top of the dresser. She was just about to open her shirt drawer when she had a thought.

"Jace?" she called over her shoulder.

"You can't possibly be done yet."

"No, I'm not. I was just wondering if I could wear your shirt. I mean, I know you need to go back to your room to change, and I didn't know if you'd be able to come—"

"Of course," he cut her off, "you didn't need to ask."

With her towel still clung tightly to her, she retrieved Jace's shirt from the floor and padded back to her dresser. There was an oval mirror that rested on top of the dresser, and she checked to make sure Jace's back was still turned before she put on her clothes.

She retrieved her towel from the floor and was about to go hang it in the bathroom, when a thought crossed her mind. She hurled her towel at Jace's head. "Oops."

He turned around to glare at her.

"Go get dressed. I'll see you at breakfast." When he didn't move, Clary grabbed her discarded towel from the floor and began to wind it in her hands, preparing to use it as a whip.

"Okay, okay, Wonder Woman. I'm going. I'll see you at breakfast." Clary chased him to the door, slumping against it when it shut behind him. Glancing at the clock on the wall, she saw it was three thirty in the morning.

She climbed off the floor and into her bed, willing herself to go to sleep.

Jace began making his way silently down the hallway when a door opened. "Shit," he cursed under his breath.

"You two do realize I share a wall with Clary's room, right? It's hard to sleep with all the moaning and screaming going on." Isabelle leaned in the doorway of her room.

"It's not like it sounds, Izzy."

"Sure it's not. That's why you're sneaking down the hall in just a towel at three in the morning. What I don't understand is how …" She threw her hands up. "You know what, never mind, I don't want to know."

"Well, Izzy, when a man and a woman love each other very much—"

"I said I didn't want to hear it, Jace. Go to bed."

So, I didn't really plan to write another steamy scene so soon, but it just came out. It might seem strange to jump back into bed, so to speak, after Clary just revealed her almost-rape to Jace, but I think this actually points to the fact that Clary still isn't processing what happened to her. She's still pushing it to the back of her mind.

The next chapter will have a confrontation with Isabelle (she's not just going to let things slide without an explanation) and I'll go a little more in depth as to why Clary is at the Institute and not back at Jocelyn and Luke's apartment.

I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter. Feel free to let me know what you think. I'd love to hear from you, good or bad.