PART
The next morning she had another voicemail, but it wasn't from Walt.
"Hey, Vic. It's Eamonn. So, something really weird happened that I'm still not sure how to explain, except that you must have some kind of superpower. Walt called me. And he apologized. For his, and I quote, unprofessional behavior. And then he offered me a job. So actually it was three really weird things. I felt like I was in an episode of The Twilight Zone. Or maybe Punk'd. Are they even still making that show? Anyway, the evidence of the call's existence is in my phone, so it must've been real. I haven't decided about the job yet, but I wanted to say thanks. For whatever you said to him. Talk to you soon, I hope. Bye."
Vic stared at her phone in disbelief. Walt Longmire apologizing. Wasn't that one of the signs of the apocalypse? And what if Eamonn decided to take the job? She respected him as a cop and she liked him as a person and, yeah, he was kind of cute, but fuck. The potential for awkwardness was huge.
Really, it was all too much to cope with first thing in the morning, and dealing with male egos was very far down on her to-do list for the day. She was getting her life together and the first thing she needed to do was make breakfast.
Afterwards, she cleaned up the kitchen, which included taking out the many bags of garbage. On the way back inside she cleared out the stuffed mailbox and collected the small army of newspapers camped on her doorstep. The stack of mail joined its twin on the counter and the newspaper army went into the recycling. Assuming that any of her clothes not in a drawer or the closet were dirty, she gathered and sorted them into piles, then picked one at random and shoved it in the washing machine.
All in all things were going pretty well. Her next plan was to clean the possibly toxic bathroom. Vic figured she could then spend the afternoon going through the mail and still get at least three loads of washing done before the end of the day. So while her personal and work lives might have gone to shit, at least she'd have clean clothes and a tidy house to sit in when she was unemployed and alone.
Yay.
She was just heading upstairs to scrub at the gross gunk in her shower—soundtrack courtesy of Whitesnake—when she heard a knock at the door. Pausing at the bottom of the stairs, Vic took stock of herself. Her hair was in a messy braid with loose pieces falling out everywhere, she was still wearing the tank top and shorts she'd slept in, her socks didn't match, and she may or may not have remembered to put on deodorant. On the other hand, at least she was wearing a bra.
With a shrug, she turned around and headed to the door. Whoever it was had come to her house, not the other way around. If they didn't like what they saw, they could leave.
Vic pulled open the door and immediately wished she hadn't.
"Hey," said Walt from the other side of the screen.
"Hi."
He cleared his throat. "I, uh, is this a bad time?"
Yes! her mind yelled. It's a terrible time! I am basically in my underwear and I look disgusting and I was in no way prepared to even talk to you let alone see you today! Go the fuck away! But what her mouth said was, "No."
"Oh." He swallowed. "So, um, can I come in?"
"Uh, sure." She unlatched the screen door and pushed it open, letting Walt take it as she backed up to let him inside. Standing in the entryway he seemed even taller and broader than usual, like a giant in her little house. Vic looked around blankly for a few seconds as she tried to remember what came next in these situations. Her brain was still trying to catch up to the fact that he was even here. On any other day she would've offered him coffee, or maybe a beer. But right now she wasn't feeling the least bit hospitable and she had no desire to make this—whatever it was—easier for him. "Do you... want to sit down?" she said eventually.
"Okay."
She lead him over to the sofa underneath the big front window. Sean hadn't wanted to put it there when they'd first moved in but she'd insisted and he'd let her have her way. That was back when they were still trying to make each other happy. It seemed like a long time ago.
Walt took his hat off and set it on the coffee table. His hair was all flattened down but somehow messy, as if he'd been running his fingers through it beforehand. It made him look a little naked, oddly vulnerable. Vic's stomach churned. She busied herself with winding a loose thread on one of the cushions around her finger until he spoke.
"You haven't been answering your phone."
She shrugged. "I didn't feel like talking to anyone." In fact, she hadn't even looked at it since listening to Eamonn's message.
"Right." He seemed to take in her appearance, finally. "What happened to your knees?"
"Went running. Fell down." Apparently they'd switched conversational roles for this talk. He had the complete sentences while she was as close to monosyllabic as she could get. "No big deal."
Walt nodded. It was possibly the most stilted and inane discussion they'd ever had. "Uh," he began, then paused, and she knew she couldn't make it through another of his stumbling, halting speeches.
"Look, Walt, if you're here to fire me, just get it over with."
He looked more baffled than she'd ever seen him. "I'm not gonna fire you, Vic."
Her flash of relief was quickly followed by puzzlement. "Then why are you here?"
"I, uh, I came to see you." The words no kidding were on the tip of her tongue when he added, "To apologize."
Seeing him dance buck naked down Main Street couldn't have shocked her more. First Eamonn and now her? Maybe it really was the apocalypse. "Oh," she said, at a loss.
Walt set his hands down flat against his thighs and she noticed his bare left ring finger. When had he taken off his wedding ring? She couldn't remember. Was it when he'd started seeing Lizzie? Vic had taken hers off almost as soon as Sean packed up and left. But then her marriage had been a pretty flimsy thing to begin with. Walt's had been much stronger, had meant much more.
What she'd felt for Sean was such a paltry, weak emotion in comparison. It withered and died so easily, leaving behind only the sting of disappointment and a vague sadness at having failed yet again. The hurts he inflicted on her in his bitterness were as insignificant as paper cuts compared to the slow-bleed agony of Walt's abandonment.
And now here she was, trapped in this strange, strained situation with the man she was in love with, while the man who'd been in love with her had traveled to the other side of the world to get away. 'The Disaster' felt like a more appropriate nickname for her than 'The Terror' these days.
Sitting back, she drew her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them. The stretch made her knees sting but she felt less exposed to whatever was coming.
"Vic," Walt said as he shifted on the couch, angling himself to face her. She'd always loved that he could say her name like it was a whole sentence all by itself. Now it ached a little. "What you said the other day... you were right."
That made her look at him fully. "Which part?"
"Uh, well, all of it, really. I haven't been a good boss, or a good friend, or... much of anything for a while. I'm sorry for that. And I'm sorry I made you feel like you did something wrong. Because you didn't, Vic. You did a great job—you do a great job. I should've told you that. You deserve to hear that."
"Thank you," she whispered. It was as much sound as she could get from her throat.
"I don't know if you've talked to Eamonn..." He let the sentence dangle for a few seconds but Vic didn't pick it up. "Um, well, I offered him the job."
"Okay."
Walt nodded and rubbed his palms against his jeans a few times before he spoke again. "There's no official department policy against, uh, coworkers dating, so if you wanted to, um, with Eamonn, it... wouldn't be a problem."
Vic didn't know whether to crawl into a cupboard and hide or burst out laughing. She could only imagine the look on her face. "Are you... trying to set me up with Eamonn now?" Her voice sounded high and squeaky in her ears.
"No," Walt said with force. "No, that's not... I just thought, um, if... There's nothing that says you couldn't. If you wanted to."
"Okay," she said cautiously. "That's... good to know." Somehow the conversation had moved from the stupidly dull to the thoroughly surreal. Eamonn's comment about The Twilight Zone was making more and more sense.
"Okay," Walt echoed. "About that, uh, I want to say I'm sorry if it seemed like I was implying, in any way, that you were, um..."
He was floundering so hard that she finally took pity on him. "The Whore of Absaroka?"
"Yeah," he said, looking relieved. An instant later his expression turned horrified. "I mean no. I don't think that, Vic. I wouldn't... I mean you have the right, obviously, to do, um, to make whatever choices you want, and it's not, uh, my place to judge them."
This uniquely Walt style of flustered earnestness was making it impossible to hold on to the antagonism she wanted to be feeling. "Yeah, I think I got a little carried away with that one. Leaping to the worst possible insult is sort of my specialty." She offered him a rueful smile. "And while we're on the subject of apologies, I'm sorry for the way I acted. Especially since I accused you of not being professional while I was standing there being completely unprofessional myself. Not that I regret what I said. Well, not most of it," she corrected. "But it was the wrong way to say it. So... thanks for not firing me."
Walt leaned forward and shook his head. "You were honest and direct. I value those things in you, Vic. I would never punish you for being who you are."
Jesus, she thought. For a man who had so much trouble talking about feelings, he could pack a hell of a lot into a few sentences when he wanted to. Her heart fluttered a little, not so much at his words but the conviction behind them. Maybe it was a pathetic reaction but she knew him and she knew he'd never say something like that if he didn't absolutely mean it. Sitting there on her sofa, he was as willing to be open as she'd ever seen him. She wanted to discover how far they could go. "Why didn't you ever call me back?" she asked. "I left you so many messages."
"Twenty-seven," he said.
"What?"
"You left twenty-seven messages. I, uh, saved them."
"You saved them? Why?"
He looked down at his hands. "I liked hearing them. Liked hearing your voice."
"You could've heard my voice a lot more if you'd called me," she shot back.
"I know." When he looked up at her again his eyes seemed even more intense than usual. "I got caught up in my head. Thinking about... everything. Time just, uh, kind of slipped away from me I guess."
Vic studied him for a few moments, taking a leaf from Walt's own book. Thinking before she spoke, or at least trying to. So she was calm and steady when she said, "That's bullshit and you know it. You're a smart, perceptive man, Walt, but you can also be a real shit when you want to be. You hide yourself away because you're scared and you like to wallow around in your misery. And then when you're done and you decide to join the rest of us again, you get pissed because the world hasn't just been holding its breath, waiting for you to grace it with your presence."
Walt let out a long, slow breath but didn't break eye contact as she silently dared him to contradict her. When he said nothing, she kept going before she could change her mind.
"You shut out the people who care about you. Cady, Henry, me. It's cruel, Walt. You hurt people. Do you get that? You only want us around when it's convenient for you and that's so fucking selfish I can't believe nobody's ever called you on it." She unwound herself to sit with her legs folded underneath her. They were almost nose to nose now. "I know that I can't understand what it was like for you to lose your wife the way you did. But I do know how I've felt with you pushing me away and ignoring me these last few months. And I don't want to feel like that anymore, okay? You don't get to use your grief as an excuse anymore, Walt. I won't accept it."
Tears were gathering in her eyes and it was an effort to push the rest of the words out past the lump in her throat. But she needed to say them and she needed him to listen. "You have to be my friend all the time and not just when it suits you. If you can't do that then I need to know now. Because I am so fucking tired of being hurt and I'm not doing this with you anymore."
That was as much as she could manage. Swiping at her face with one hand, she flailed for a tissue with the other. There was a time when she would've been embarrassed that Walt was seeing her like this, but that was over. She blew her nose and crumpled the tissue in her lap with a long exhale. Glancing at Walt, she saw his hand twitch as if he'd stopped it in the act of reaching out.
"I'm sorry I hurt you, Vic," he said quietly when she met his eyes. "And I do want... I want to be your friend. I'm probably gonna screw it up sometimes but I do want that."
She sniffled and gave him a half smile. "Well, 'screw up' is my middle name, so we'll make a good team."
"Yeah." His smile in return was wry. "We do make a good team."
The relief of finally getting it all out and the release of crying combined to make her feel a little giddy. She laughed. "Yeah. We're pretty kickass."
Walt's smile turned softer and he studied her in the way he sometimes did, like he saw and knew all of her. No one else had ever looked at her that way. It stole her breath now as much as it always had. "Listen, Vic," he began, just as her phone rang in the kitchen. They both turned their heads toward the sound. "Uh, that might be the station," he said with a hint of apology. "I told Ruby I'd be coming here."
"You're such a pain in the ass," she said as she sprinted into the other room, her knees and calves protesting vigorously. Walt came in behind her as she checked the caller ID. It wasn't a number she recognized. "Nope, not the station."
"You don't want to answer it?" he asked as it continued to ring.
She declined the call and faced him. "That's why voicemail was invented."
"Right."
They stood looking at each other while silence stretched between them. The delicate connection of just a minute ago began to dissipate and Vic was suddenly afraid he would use the interruption as an excuse to leave. She wasn't ready for that to happen just yet. "Hey, do you want something to drink?" she asked. "Coffee or water or... I actually went grocery shopping yesterday so I even have juice that's not out of date."
For a second she thought he'd refuse, but he surprised her by saying, "Water's fine." He was quiet while she grabbed a couple of glasses from the cupboard and filled them, then he cleared his throat. "Uh, Henry mentioned you were at the Red Pony yesterday as well."
"Yeah, I was pretty much out of everything edible." She handed him a glass with an ironic flourish, and took a sip from her own before setting it down. There was no way she wanted to get into a discussion right now of what Henry had or hadn't said about their talk. "So, um, you started to say something before," she said with a gesture toward the living room.
"Oh, uh..." Walt drank half the water down in a few quick swallows and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. A hot little spark shot through her as she watched the movements of his throat. The kitchen seemed to grow warmer and Vic scrunched her toes against the cool tile under her feet, wishing she'd taken off her socks. Walt set his glass on the counter and tapped it twice with one finger. "I don't know how to say what I'm about to say, so I'm just gonna say it, okay?"
Her heart tripped into a faster rhythm. "Okay."
"A few months ago when, um... when Sean had me serve you the divorce papers, I told you I wanted you to stay. When I said that, I, uh, I didn't just mean with the department." She swallowed hard as he took a step closer. "The reason I wanted you to stay, Vic, was... It was personal."
There was air in the room but she couldn't seem to get it into her lungs. So much had passed between them since that moment in his office. She'd begun to doubt it had held any significance for him at all.
"So, uh, how do you feel about that?" He sounded nervous, as if he really wasn't sure of her answer.
"Why the hell do you think I'm still here, Walt?" she demanded.
He breathed a laugh, glancing down and then back up again. His mouth curved in a tiny smile that was reflected more brightly in his blue, blue eyes. "Well, I hoped, but..."
She took her own step closer to him and said, "Duh." Reaching out to where his hand rested on the counter, Vic touched the tips of her fingers to his. "After a while, though, I thought maybe it was just me," she told him in a quiet voice.
"No," Walt said just as quietly and covered her hand with his. "But after what happened with Branch... I thought I had to be more objective. Not let my personal feelings interfere. So I tried to ignore, uh, ignore how I felt."
"And you had to ignore me as well?" she asked, turning her hand under his so that their palms fit together. Though his skin was cool from the glass, prickles of heat danced up her arm.
"I didn't mean to, Vic." His fingertips whispered an apology over the sensitive skin at her wrist. "But I think maybe, um, maybe you were right. I did expect everything to hold still until I was ready."
"Ready for what?"
"Ready to live the rest of my life." His gaze was steady on hers as he drew a slow path across her palm to tangle their fingers together.
It felt so natural to be standing there in her kitchen with him, to be holding hands as though they did this all the time. And Vic so badly wanted to accept what his words and his touch seemed to be offering. But— "That's not how it felt when you came back to work."
"I know." He sighed and looked down at where their fingers intertwined. "That was, um... I saw you and, uh, Eamonn together and I thought..."
"You thought what?"
"That you'd given up on me," he admitted.
"Hurts, doesn't it?" she asked softly.
"Yeah." He met her eyes again. "Yep."
"Well, you were wrong," she told him. "Which you would've known if you'd talked to me instead of making an ass of yourself. Seriously, Walt, communication is a thing people do."
"I think I heard that somewhere," he said with a lopsided grin.
Vic rolled her eyes. "It's a thing you need to do."
"Might've heard that, too."
"Yeah, from me." She tugged on his hand to emphasize her point. "I meant what I said. I'm tired of being hurt."
The humor vanished from his face and he regarded her solemnly. "I know."
"Good," she said. Then, like the seasoned investigator she was, she homed in on the other salient point in his admission. "So," she drew the word out like an elastic band, "you were jealous because another boy likes me?"
"Vic," he said, wincing. And, holy crap, was he actually blushing? Laughter bubbled up out of her and she pressed her lips together, trying to hold it back. Walt slid his hand along her arm and pulled her in until they were standing toe to toe. "You think that's funny, huh?" he asked in a low, rumbling voice.
"Maybe a little," she said, grinning, although the urge to laugh was fading by the moment now that they stood so close together. Her gaze flickered down to his mouth and she licked her lip without thinking. When she looked up again, he seemed to be transfixed.
Her free hand came up to rest lightly against his chest. She could feel the motion of each breath he took under the slightly rough weave of his shirt. Walt's other hand curved around her hip and pulled gently as she swayed into him.
A distant part of her mind thought finally as their lips met. The touch of his mouth on hers sent a flurry of warmth spinning through her. It was an easy, undemanding kiss, not earth-shaking, but good. So good. Everything in her loosened and her head felt light enough to simply float away.
Their lips parted slowly, reluctantly, and it took Vic a few seconds to open her eyes. He was so close; they hovered just at the borders of each other. She felt immersed in breath and skin, rocked by an almost unbearable yearning to press herself against him everywhere, all at once. When they moved together again she shivered.
This time he opened his mouth a little, catching her bottom lip. It was as if a circuit had been completed, an electric current like a silent hum passing through them and spreading to fill every inch of her. Walt's hand slid higher, rucking up the back of her shirt and finding skin. A soft noise of pleasure rose in her throat as the contact lit her up like a flare in the dark. Vic pushed closer, restless, up on her toes and gripping his shirt for leverage.
His hand at her elbow moved to cup the back of her head, fingers twisting through the loose strands of her braid. Her newly freed arm swept down over his ass to pull him in tighter against her. Walt's mouth was hot and slick on hers, his body hard. She felt engulfed by him, her muscles softening like warm wax as she let herself sink. They separated only to gasp for air and then dove back into each other with lips and tongues and teeth, drowning together in a ferocious, heady sea of want. Vic forgot everything except the heat and urgency building between them. They were on the verge of inferno, ready to ignite.
Her phone rang.
They sprang apart, stumbling a little and breathing hard. Vic touched her fingers to her lips with a shaky hand and cleared her throat. Walt looked as flustered and dazed as she felt.
She fumbled to answer the call. "Hello?"
"Hey, Vic, it's Ferg. Is the Sheriff with you?"
"Just a sec." She held the phone out to Walt. "Ferg."
He took it and she turned around to stare blindly out the window, wrapping her arms around herself and trying to calm her breathing. And her everything else. Christ, she'd had sex that wasn't as hot as those few minutes of kissing. Now her body was practically vibrating with arousal, achy and unsatisfied all over, and Walt was about to go off to be the sheriff for who-knew-how-long. Why hadn't she switched her phone to silent? Or switched it off altogether?
Behind her, Walt's side of the conversation consisted of "Yeah," and "Where?" and "Okay," punctuated by stretches of silence during which she assumed Ferg was talking. When the call ended, she turned again and Walt passed the phone back to her.
"You've gotta go," she said.
"Yeah."
Vic nodded. That was the job and she knew it well. But usually she was the one leaving, not the one being left; usually she'd be going with Walt, not staying behind. She found she didn't like it from this side at all.
They stood there for a handful of seconds before Walt said, "So, I should..."
"Yeah."
In the living room she watched him put on his hat and settle it into place. How many times had she seen him do the exact same thing? The action always heralded departure but it had never seemed so significant before.
A leaden feeling descended on her as she opened the door and held it for him. The heightened emotion of the last hour had drained away and left her muddled and a little deflated. "I guess I'll see you tomorrow," she said.
Walt considered her, reaching out to brush his fingers over the back of her hand where it rested on the doorknob. Her body recognized his touch and responded with an eagerness she resented just then. "Vic," he said. His gaze roamed her face as if he was trying to memorize it. "I don't want to leave."
Her heart thudded hard once against her ribs and then settled back to its usual beat. "I don't want you to, either."
The tension in his face relaxed and he moved a little closer. His thumb traced a sweeping arc back and forth across her knuckles that sent awareness rippling along her nerves. "So, uh, you busy tonight?"
"No," she said, and it came out breathless.
He ducked his head and somehow managed to look up at her through his lashes. "Do you want to come over? Have dinner with me?"
Vic's stomach backflipped and she bit her lip, trying to rein in the helpless smile spreading across her face. "Okay."
"Okay," he said with a smile that mirrored hers.
"What time?"
"Uh, seven?"
He was looking at her mouth again.
She wanted to lick his jaw. Or his anything, really.
"You need to go," she managed.
"Uh huh," he said, making no move to do so.
Then he was leaning in and so was she. Their mouths met in the space between them, stand-ins for everywhere else their bodies wanted to touch. The kiss was brief but full of promise and it left her a little hazy. Judging by the not-quite-steady step back Walt took, it had the same effect on him.
"So I'll see you at seven," he said.
"Yep."
He nodded and pushed opened the screen door.
"Want me to bring anything?" she asked.
"Nope," he said, then paused and seemed to reconsider. "Uh, maybe some clothes for tomorrow. If you want." The slow, lazy smile he flashed her short-circuited her brain.
"Jesus," she whispered as everything in her went hot. Where the fuck had he been hiding that all this time?
"Bye, Vic," he said, closing the screen door and looking pleased with himself.
She watched in a floaty, tingly, squeezing her thighs together kind of daze as he walked to the Bronco. When he pulled away, she shut the door and leaned back against it with her eyes closed. A low-grade buzzing filled her head like some kind of emotional white noise. It was sheer overload from every strong, confusing, all-or-nothing feeling she'd lived with over the last few days.
Vic had learned a lot about herself since coming to Wyoming. She'd also learned a lot about love: what it was and what it wasn't; what it could and couldn't be. The lessons had mostly been painful, and some of them had left scars, but all of them had forced her to grow. She knew she was a better person than she'd been back then, and it was largely due to Walt. No one else had ever inspired her or pushed her or believed in her the way he did. She hadn't overhauled her life for him—she'd done that work for herself—but Walt had been the catalyst.
The morning she'd driven out to his place with a six-pack of Rainier and a wild hope in her heart, Vic had thought it was a beginning. But he'd been absent in more ways than one. Now, though, he was ready and right there with her. It all felt more possible than ever before.
Vic covered her face with her hands and allowed herself one very loud, very girly squeal of happiness. Then she raced up the stairs to find something to wear that would make Walt trip right over his tongue. He might have thrown down a gauntlet with that shameless invitation, but she planned to be the undisputed winner tonight.
[END]
A/N: i stole a line from 4x06 which you might not even notice. thanks and apologies to everyone whose comments i haven't responded to. as always, constructive criticism is very welcome.