A/N: Another leg on this odd journey that is Lucy & Wyatt's first real date. Thanks so much for reading along! Love to hear your comments & reviews. Should be at least two more chapters. And I promise, it will get steamier.
"I'll take the pork loin." "The goat cheese salad and a Merlot for me."
The waiter took the menus from their hands. The clink of glasses and clatter of silverware murmured around them. Wyatt smiled at Lucy across the table, and she responded with a lopsided grin. A silence fell between them, and Lucy looked out of the enormous window towards the city.
Wyatt kept looking at Lucy as she enjoyed the view, letting himself admire the elegant curve of her neck, imagining following it with his fingers, slipping off that dress. Later! But as the silence lengthened, he began feeling tense. There was nothing to do here. No one needed anything. Lucy was just...Lucy, not playing a role, not fighting against an enemy or an emotional hurdle. What were they together when things were calm?
Lucy looked back at him and seemed to take in that his mood had shifted. She fidgeted with her bag and didn't start up the conversation right away. Wyatt racked his brain and blurted out the first thing he could think of.
"Your hair looks nice like that. I've never seen you do that before."
Lucy put her hand up and felt the side-swept braids gingerly.
"Are they still up?"
Wyatt half shrugged with great trepidity. "It looks fine to me?"
Lucy poked gently at her hair. "To be honest, I've never worn my hair this way before. Jiya did it for me and I think she used half the bottle of hair gel to keep it this way. You just saved my bacon, too." He looked at her questioningly. "I literally made her spend hours on my hair and I don't think she would have forgiven me if you hadn't noticed it at some point."
He grinned, feeling relieved. It's just Lucy. Stop worrying. Then he said, "You know, I went kinda off the wall waiting today, too."
"You were nervous?"
"You would not believe." They shared grins. "What were you most worried about?" Wyatt asked.
Lucy put her chin in her hand, the light of the candle on the table reflecting in her eyes and in the window beside her. Wyatt couldn't resist any more, but put out his hand to touch her cheek. Her smile in response sent a thrill down his back. Cannot wait for tonight... he thought.
"Honestly, just now when that pause fell I had a terror that my worst fear was coming true. You remember that 'first date' I had with Noah?"
"The one where you were trying to see if you could fall in love with a total stranger?" Wyatt said sarcastically.
"Hey, he knew me!" Lucy shot back.
His voice became gentle and serious. "Doesn't change a thing. He knew some other version of you."
Lucy folded her hands and looked down at them. "I mean, it was me. I saw the pictures of us together, in love."
"Hey," Wyatt tilted her chin up with his finger so she looked at him. "That was some other world, some other life. Where you didn't know Amy, you didn't time travel and..." he trailed off, but she got his drift and smiled smugly at him.
"And I didn't know you."
He grinned sheepishly, "Yeah, you never met me. So Dr. Meathead ended up sweeping you off your feet. But you're not his Lucy..." he trailed off again, not sure he could keep going once again. Lucy reached out and squeezed his hand with her own.
"I'm your Lucy," she said, meeting his gaze, trying to put all the longing and hope she'd felt for months into that gaze.
Wyatt stared back, drinking in her look, trying to take in all that had happened in the past few days. It was what he had hoped for but it was hard to believe it was finally happening after all this time. The previous night he had woken in the wee hours, reaching for Lucy at his side in his now empty-seeming bed. Somehow after only sharing it with her for one night, the expanse seemed lonely without her. He realized that another silence had fallen over them, but this one spoke deeply and did not scare him any more.
He raised her hand to his lips and pressed a kiss to her fingers. The waiter came back with their drinks and he reluctantly let her go.
The street was teeming and lively when they left the hotel. A theater across the street had a crowd that spilled out into the street. Chuck walked with them, lollipop in his mouth. Wyatt started exchanging travel directions with him. Lucy's attention was caught by a familiar face. The woman whose children they had befriended was crossing the street, now clad in a long dark blue dress that twinkled with beaded patterns. As she met the crowd she became accosted by fans asking for autographs, calling out questions. Two nattily dressed young people met her and ushered her into the theater.
"Guys," Lucy pointed, "I think we just had a brush with greatness." The men looked up in time to see the film maker disappear into the crowd.
Wyatt crossed over to Lucy. "Well, maybe we should talk to her about making a movie about us."
She looked up at him with a mischievous glint in her eye. "Wyatt and the Time Jumpers? Rufus' Spacetime Roustabouts?"
"Clearly it would be called, Lucy and the Lucky Leapers."
Chuck pitched in, "No self-respecting corporate executive would let it be named anything like that. People like snappy one or two-word titles these days. Like Atomic Blonde, Logan or Get Out."
Lucy tilted her head looking for inspiration. Then she shivered, her uncovered shoulders catching the night air. Wyatt put his jacket around her and interlaced his fingers with hers on her forearms. "Lucy, we can head out now. Unless..."
"Yes?"
"We might take a walk first."
"And find some privacy?"
"It's possible."
"Lay on MacDuff."
"Mac what?"
"They didn't teach you Shakespeare in Texas?"
"Ah ha! I'll show you Shakespeare: 'Friends, Romans, countrymen...'" Wyatt offered his arm to Lucy and proceeded to deliver the speech from Julius Ceasar. "'He was my friend, faithful and just to me. But Brutus says he was ambitious...'" She stared wide-eyed at him.
"Wyatt! You never told me you had thespian aspirations!"
"No such luck, ma'am. But that was one of the plays we studied in high school. So perhaps show some more respect for the good educational system in Texas."
"But did they teach you about evolution?"
"The what now?" But his eyes were twinkling. Lucy shoved his shoulder. "Careful, Professor. Let's not take a tumble until we have something softer to land on."
They had reached a landing that overlooked a green space tucked between the tall buildings. Chuck hung back at this point, keeping an eye from the street level and giving them some space.
Stairs curled down around the hotel, leading to a park. Cool colored lights flickered between branches and leaves. Blue lights threaded through the railing led the way down. Tree ferns lining the walkway rustled slightly in a velvet evening wind. A group of stone mermaids at the center of a fountain glittered in shifting hues as though bedecked in rubies, emeralds, sapphires.
Lucy leaned against Wyatt savoring the slow pace of the evening. No need to race out to avoid being caught by suspicious authorities. No more than the usual concern for Rittenhouse flunkies waiting in the shadows. No need for Wyatt to even carry his usual firearm. Though, tightening her grip on his firm bicep, she felt secure in the knowledge of his ability to protect them from many threats even unarmed.
They came to the fountain. Despite the cool night air, Lucy could not resist the lure of the water. She slipped out of Wyatt's jacket and unfastened her shoes leaving them with her purse on the ground. Leaping up to the edge of the fountain, she held out her hands to the spray. Wyatt caught his breath. Having seen Lucy dump herself through windows, off horses and nearly run into airplanes, he braced himself for a splash. But though her balance wobbled, she steadied on her bare feet and he smiled to hear her laugh like a child.
The lights reflected off her skin, turning her hair red then azure. She reached out her hands and the pale skin of her flesh strobed with color. Wyatt caught his breath at the flash of her smile. Mine. Seriously. Mine?
She turned her back to the mermaids and he saw her shudder with cold again. Reaching out to take her hands he was about to help her jump down. He was happily anticipating putting his arms around her slight frame to warm her, when Lucy yelled, "Hey! That's mine. Drop it!"
Turning Wyatt saw a young woman crouching by Lucy's things at the fountain's. Her face was stricken with fear. Wyatt was dismayed by her expression. He glanced up to Chuck, and began searching for others who might be threatening her, or offering an ambush. He swore under his breath and his hands brushed uselessly against his side where his gun typically sat.
But while he debated a greater threat, Lucy took action for the immediate one. She leapt from the fountain and wrapped her arms around the woman as she stood and tried to race away. Wyatt watched stunned as they hit the ground together. He moved in to grasp the strange woman's wrists and allow Lucy to get up. He swore again and maneuvered the three of them to stand beside a massive fern tree, placing Lucy with her back to the tree itself.
"What were you doing?" Lucy said to the girl. Lucy hopped on her bare right foot, having grabbed her shoes on the way, she tried to re-attached the straps on her left foot. "You could have been killed!" The young woman had been looking down and away, ignoring Lucy's words at first. But on the world "killed" she pivoted and Lucy captured her attention.
"Killed?" The woman's face turned ashen, she looked at the still humorously ungainly Lucy and shook her head wondering. Then she took in the deep glare Wyatt was giving her and quailed under his gaze.
Lucy nodded, finally done with her left foot, now working on attaching the straps to the other. "Mr Delta Force here or tall dark and bodyguard up there could easily have made mincemeat out of you." Chuck was on his way down the stairs coming towards them with a grim look on his face and his hand on his gun, though it was holstered.
Wyatt said, "Hey, Lucy, it was you who took her down."
The young woman put her hands on her face. She crumpled, ending half kneeling between Wyatt and Lucy. "I am so hungry. I was turned out of my place two days ago and I don't have anywhere to go." Lucy and Wyatt exchanged concerned looks.
Chuck reached them, breathing slightly fast from his exertions. After taking in the situation, he took his hand off his gun. The young woman was crying. Lucy reached down and put her arm around her protectively.
"Chuck," Lucy said, "You got any lollipops left?"
After spending half an hour on calls to half-way houses and shelters for women, the group of them made their way back up to the hotel lobby.
"Please put this on Mason Industries' account," Wyatt told the hotel clerk.
"I can never pay you back for this!" their new friend Sarah said around the stick of a lollipop. She was alternately grateful and disbelieving.
"You don't have to. We can't find you a place to stay until tomorrow, but for tonight it's the least Mason can do. He owes us a favor or two," said Lucy.
Wyatt pretended to cough: *for saving the world for him,* cough.
The woman gave him a very strange look, and Lucy waved her hand. "Don't worry about it. Chuck, you said you knew the security staff here?" He nodded. "Sarah, we'll ask them to give you a ride tomorrow. And here—" Lucy pulled open her purse and took out a few bills. She grimaced at the low amount, and Wyatt pulled out his wallet to add to the count. Lucy gave him a grateful smile and turned to the young woman.
"I can't accept this." Sarah put out her hands to ward away the bills.
Lucy took Sarah's hands and put the bills in them. She looked her directly in the eyes. "Yes, you can. Because we have all been there. Where our survival depended on the kindness of strangers. This is just your turn to be helped."
Wyatt said, "I'd listen to her if I was you. She doesn't take no for an answer, believe me." He flashed his dimpled grin at the young woman. Sarah looked at him dazzled, then looked back from to Lucy, overwhelmed by the attention, with tears starting to form in her eyes. She shook her head wonderingly. "Okay. Thank you, both." And as Chuck stepped up she said,"All of you."
"I'll catch up with you two," Chuck said, "And see you safely to your room." He handed Sarah the key & waved a careless good bye to Wyatt and Lucy as they walked back toward the elevators.
"Can you believe..?" "What was that?"
Lucy and Wyatt had made it back to the hotel garage, finally. Sitting in Mason's fancy little car they held hands over the cherry burl inlaid stick-shift. They laughed softly together, until Lucy turned serious. "I wouldn't change anything that kept us from helping that girl, but we haven't ruined your surprise, have we?"
Wyatt pulled her hand to his lips, kissed it and glanced at the elegant black & white analog clock ticking soothingly away in the dash.
"Nope. We won't have as much time to enjoy it as I'd planned, but we haven't missed it yet." He tucked her hand against his chest, cradling it with both of his.
"Shouldn't we get going then?" She asked.
Wyatt sighed. "It's just hard to think about sharing you more tonight." She leaned in and he met her lips half-way.
They clung together, forgetting the time, the odd events of the evening, and pretty much anything except the feel of each other's skin. His arms came around her, hers rested on his chest. Lucy ran her fingers down his neck and melted at the sound of the soft groan he gave in response. She tugged at his already loosened tie, and undid the top button, softly caressing the triangle at the base of his throat. He broke his lips away from hers, pressing small kisses to her cheek and forehead as he pulled back.
He met her gaze. His pupils were dilated. She saw his pulse in his neck. He gulped to gather himself and said, "One last stop before home?"
She ran her finger along his lower lip and said, "One last stop."