A/N: Thanks so much for all your reviews & encouragement. It is kind of addictive, and inspired me to continue quickly, in response to another prompt at RTN. Here is the next part; I hope it is everything you hoped for!
FNF #8: Desperation, Denial, and Decisions
Prompt: At night in the dark when the sun goes down
Jason froze for a few seconds. What is she doing?! he thought, stunned. He began to pull back, but then he felt her grip tighten – signaling her desperation and her panic -- and he couldn't do it. So he took the only other route open to him – he relaxed into the kiss. And then he couldn't think at all.
He could only feel; his senses heightened and focused in on her – the softness of her lips against his; the sweet almond smell of her skin; the soft sound of her sigh as she opened her mouth to his questing tongue; the slight taste of the chili she must have eaten just before he arrived at the docks ...
Instinctively, he took control, deepening the kiss, sliding his hands around her waist and under her shirt to the skin of her back, almost moaning with pleasure as her hands left his jacket and slid up into his hair to pull him even closer…
"Elizabeth?" Dimly Jason heard a voice calling her name. "Elizabeth!" This time it was more insistent and suddenly she jerked back, tearing her lips from his and almost knocking herself off the bench as her eyes went wide. She didn't fall only because Jason tightened his hands around her waist. She looked away, turning such a deep red that had he not seen her skin in its usual creamy shade just moments ago, he'd have thought she was badly sunburned.
"Elizabeth, what are you doing?" Lucky sounded shocked and appalled and Jason watched, fascinated, as Elizabeth opened her mouth, then closed it, then repeated this sequence three more times as Lucky asked again, "what are you doing? With him? Elizabeth?"
After another short silence, Elizabeth finally closed her eyes and said very softly, "Lucky." That was it. Jason waited for her to say more, ducked his head to try to catch her eye, but she just sat there with her eyes closed, as though she wanted to be anywhere else. She just sat there, the way little Michael might play hide and seek – "hiding" by simply closing his own eyes because he thought if he couldn't see you, you couldn't see him. As he watched, the blood drained from her face, leaving it completely, starkly white.
Jason glanced at Lucky, who was watching Elizabeth with a look that said more clearly than words, this can't be real… this can't be happening ... Elizabeth, with Jason?!
After a silence that seemed an eternity, but was probably only a few short seconds, it became clear that Elizabeth was either unwilling or unable to say anything else, so Jason cleared his throat and, as calmly as he could manage, said, "Lucky, what's happening?"
Lucky finally tore his gaze from Elizabeth and looked at Jason. His hands were still at her waist, and hers had come to rest on his chest after her aborted attempt to pull away. Neither of them had made a further move to break these points of contact. Lucky opened his mouth to reply, then closed it when he realized there was nothing to say. He just shook his head once, as though to clear his senses, and turned and walked back the way he came. Jason watched him go, wondering if Lucky was actually trying to go back in time, to before he had seen the woman he apparently loved kissing another man.
Jason shook the thought away and looked back to Elizabeth. He tentatively said her name, and had to lean closer to hear her whispered response. "Is he gone?"
"Yeah, he's gone." She slowly opened her eyes and looked at him, so he smiled gently. "It's okay," he said, because she looked like she was about to bolt.
She groaned and buried her face in her hands, blushing deeply again. "Tell me that did not just happen," she said on a moan. "Tell me I did not just attack you and Lucky did not just see … oh, God, what did I just do?"
Jason was torn between concern, amusement, and lingering arousal. He said, "I would hardly call that an attack. Relax, breathe, everything is fine. You're okay."
She dropped her hands, met his eyes briefly before her gaze skittered away to a point over his left shoulder. "How can you say that?" she asked in a high-pitched squeak. "You were just sitting here minding your own business and I attacked you. Oh, God, you must think … oh, God, what am I doing? You must hate me. And poor Lucky… oh, God …" She looked ready to cry.
"Hey, hey, relax, it was just a kiss. No big deal. I don't think anything, and I certainly don't hate you. And I thought the whole point was for Lucky to see it."
"Oh, God, I'm so sorry," she said, as if she hadn't heard him. "I'll leave, I'll just go. You can just forget all about this … I'll see you later, I have to go."
And even as he started to object, saying, "Elizabeth, please …" she broke free of his grip and practically ran from his sight.
XXXXXXXXXX
An hour later, Jason still sat alone on the bench, staring out at the water as the sun set. Soon it would be dark, and he thought he should probably move. Sonny and Carly would be expecting him at the penthouse for dinner. He was probably already late, and Carly would worry. Still, he sat there long after the sun had finished its descent, long after the harbor lights had come on, long after the crescent moon had begun its trek across the sky.
He usually didn't spend much time dwelling on things, but he kept thinking about that kiss. About Elizabeth. He had known her by sight for ages; she was, after all, one of his sister's closest friends. He had always believed that there was nothing more to it than that. If anyone had asked, he'd have said she was certainly pretty, and she seemed nice enough, a good friend to his sister, but that was as far as it went. She was a nice girl, and nice girls weren't for the likes of him, so he just never thought about her at all.
That's what he would have said, and he'd have believed it was true, until today. Until that kiss. Suddenly, he realized he had been kidding himself, in denial of his feelings. That kiss changed everything. The only question remaining was what he would do about it.
She had panicked and run away, clearly embarrassed because she had kissed him, and because Lucky had seen them. If her reaction to discovering Lucky's feelings was any indication, she would probably try to avoid him as well, Jason mused.
She had started the kiss because of her inability to handle Lucky's feelings for her, as a way to avoid telling him that she didn't reciprocate. But that didn't change the fact that she had been enjoying the kiss as much as he had, before Lucky's interruption. He himself was a little embarrassed that he had forgotten their audience, had lost track of his surroundings as he lost himself in her. But although that could be dangerous for a man in his line of work, he couldn't bring himself to regret it.
She had opened the door on feelings he had been suppressing, and he was not one to ignore realities once he was aware of them. Decision made, he got up from the bench, pulling out his phone to call Sonny, to say he was on his way.
She could run all she wanted, but he wasn't going to let her hide from him the way she hid from Lucky. That kiss was the beginning, not the end, he promised himself.
No, he thought, with absolute certainty, this is not over. Not by a long shot.
