Author's Note: This chapter was getting out of control, so I had to go back through and find a breaking point, or else it would never have ended/been updated.
Then put your little hand in mine
There ain't no hill or mountain we can't climb
Merri Brody groaned and tried to reach for her phone on the nightstand to shut the alarm off, only to discover that she was being restrained. Then the reality of her situation came flooding back. She wasn't in her bed at home. She was in the back of the Tahoe, curled up with her fellow agent, catching a few hours of sleep before they had to slog back into the swamp to continue the search for the missing petty officer.
Maybe they'd found her... But Pride would've woken them up, told them to go home and get some real sleep, a big, pleased grin plastered on his face for finding the girl alive... or weary frown if it was just a body they recovered.
But as it was...
Babe, I got you babe
I got you babe
Ugh! She used to like the song, but after it daily signaling her need to crawl out of her cozy, cozy bed... it needed to end. It needed to end now. But-
She squirmed, realized that she and her bedfellow had shifted position, but she was still trapped even with her being on top of the man, because he had his hands, his entire forearms really, up the back of her shirt, holding her torso down flush to his body with her own arms stuck between them, curled against his chest. Christ, he would've had to have untucked her blouse, the sly bastard. Sly bastard with those incongruously large hands possessively splayed over her skin, one on her upper back, one on her lower, the tips of the fingers edging under the waistband of her pants. She'd noticed her partner's hands before, strong and a little large for a man of his stature, not freakishly so, but enough to make him seem a little puppy-like. She pretended she hadn't contemplated the old insinuation about the consistency in the size of a man's appendages.
"LaSalle," she whispered his name, not wanting to shout and have someone look into the disturbance to find her lying tangled up with her partner, on top of him. She squirmed again and he made a noise, somewhere between moan and growl, which she hoped meant he was waking up.
Her phone took a breath, and then began the damnable song all over again, determinedly executing the task she had set it.
"Wake up."
This time he stirred, but his hold on her only tightened as he reflexively tensed his muscles, groaning sleepily.
"Brody?"
"Yes. We're supposed to lead the next search party shift, to relieve Pride, remember?"
"Uh... yeah." His hands finally slipped out from beneath her blouse allowing her to push herself up using his chest to brace her arms, which made him groan again.
There was a little light filtering through the tinted windows from the floodlights surrounding the searchers' encampment, and she could see his dark eyes attempting to focus on her face. She leaned over him, reached for her phone, and turned the alarm off with a sigh of relief, collapsing on top of him again. His hands settled on her waist.
"Jus' five more minutes, please."
"Nope. Rise and shine, LaSalle."
"I do my shinin' anywhere but in a swamp," he said, whining pathetically into her neck as he hugged her like a toddler with a teddy bear. "This ain't natural."
"I thought you could party all night long," she teased, pushing herself up, realizing she was straddling his hips with a hot flush of embarrassment that only deepened when she felt a certain something pressing firm against her groin.
"Despite being called a search 'party', this ain't a party, by any stretch of the imagination." He was still holding onto her. Couldn't he tell that she could tell that he... She locked eyes with him. He didn't seem to care. He'd gotten so comfortable with her, that her knowing he was aroused didn't even seem to faze him. Well, if that's the way he wanted it...
"Really?" She said. "Because unless you've tucked your sidearm down your pants, you definitely seem interested in a certain sort of party."
He pursed his lips, looked away as he squirmed beneath her before he tugged at her waist, lifting her slightly so that she'd get off from him. Ha! She smiled to herself as she rolled onto her back for a moment, relishing the fact that she could still embarrass him when he seemed beyond having boundaries with her.
"Before ya go gettin' all sexual harassment-y on me..." he said as he found his jacket in a crumpled heap that had been jostled to the side and began straightening it out. "Ya do know that wasn't intentional... I was asleep."
"Oh, the old 'morning glory' excuse," she said with playful sarcasm.
He was already grinning as he recovered his phone and SIG. God, he was either too easy or too difficult to tease. Her frustration with the man's presumptuous intimacies was already dissipating. That damned smile of his. Even in the dim light, its effect was undeniable.
"It's a thing," he said, as she opened the hatchback and they slid out into the yet dark, extremely wee hours of the morning. She laughed as she shrugged into her jacket and zipped it up completely to her throat against the chilly air.
"Whatever you say, LaSalle." She patted his chest condescendingly before glancing around, spotting their boss and heading off to greet him. Somehow, just three hours of sleep on the hard bed of the SUV had her feeling quite refreshed.
Pride, on the other hand... Merri wasn't sure she'd ever seen the older man so run down. He always seemed filled with, if not boundless energy, a bottomless drive. And she supposed that tenacity was what was still keeping him standing. Although he seemed to be swaying a little on his feet. God, he must be tired.
"Mornin', Brody," Pride greeted her, his tone even more subdued than when LaSalle had made his pathetic puppy-eyed pleading for a place to sleep earlier that night.
"Not sure it qualifies as morning yet," She said. "But you definitely should take a break."
LaSalle came up beside her and they exchanged a concerned look. But he seemed to know the older agent a little better, for he didn't mention the worn-down state of him.
"Find anythin'?" LaSalle asked, diverting attention to the case. Merri herself was about to protest, to insist the debrief could happen later, that Pride should go lie down for awhile, but she supposed the man wouldn't do that, not until his junior agents were up to speed and prepared to take over for him, leading the search.
Pride shook his head. "Nope. Nothin' so far. And if we don't come up with anythin' soon... There's only two more areas left to be searched... it's not lookin' good for Rebecca Sisson."
"We'll handle this, King." LaSalle put a hand on his friend's shoulder, squeezed it gently. "Ya go 'n' get some rest."
"Alright, alright." Pride nodded his head in a way that more mirrored someone nodding off to sleep, and Merri wondered briefly if she and LaSalle would have to carry their boss to the SUV and tuck him in after he collapsed from exhaustion. But the stubborn man stayed standing. "Couple things you need to hear first. The deputy who's takin' over for this shift is a bit of a backwater ass. So Brody, you'll need to remain... imperturbable."
Merri raised an eyebrow at this. It was an odd instruction. Pride elucidated his suggestion.
"He doesn't care much for women employed-"
"In law enforcement?" Merri suggested.
"In a 'man's job'," LaSalle said at the same time, earning him a glare.
"What? Some people consider it men's work." She continued to glare at him, letting him dig himself deeper, putting him on the defensive. "I'm not one of 'em."
"But Deputy Morris is." Pride came to the rescue of his junior agent. "He's the type who prefers his women barefoot and pregnant. And at the moment, tempers are short. Everyone's run down."
"I can handle myself," Merri said.
"I know you can," Pride said with a grin. "I'm tryin' to save Morris a bit of hurt, though."
LaSalle laughed until he caught her glare once more, and sobered up. Well, as best he could when he found something amusing.
"What else we need ta know, King?" he asked.
"They're servin' up some grub over by the main tent. Grab some before it's gone. You'll need the fuel when you're slogging through the swamp for the next few hours."
Both LaSalle and Brody nodded, as she felt her stomach rumble its eagerness to comply with that instruction.
"Now I'm gonna go pass out for awhile. Good luck."