She was cold, so very cold it didn't seem as if she would ever manage to get warm again. Her bones ached from the frigidness that surrounded her and she clamped her teeth together forcibly to keep them from chattering.
Snuggling deeper into the blankets didn't seem to help at all. Nothing helped. It shouldn't be this cold. On instinct, she reached her hand out, her fingers fumbling through the layers of blankets as they sought out his body heat.
Her fingers nudged against something and she immediately let her hand wrap around a solid, warm bicep. She moved closer to it, seeking out the heat radiating from the other side of the bed. Her leg found his and she draped hers over it as her entire body melted into his. One muscular arm snaked out and pulled her even further into him and she came willingly, desperate for the warmth that only he could make her feel.
Eyes still closed and mind still shrouded in sleep, she felt his hot breath brush against her face a mere moment before his lips were covering her. His arms wrapped around her, splaying over her back and following a trail along her spine. She ached herself into him, burying her breasts into his chest and ignoring the tickling of the course hair that dusted his torso. Something about that wasn't right, but she couldn't quite put her finger on what it was. Her mind was far to occupied with the sensations he was arousing in her to care.
But that was off as well. Normally, it took far more than a kiss from Richard to make her pulse thump so violently in her chest. Usually the feel of his hands on her skins wasn't enough to make the heat pool in her core like it was at the moment.
She couldn't remember the last time she had felt so needy, so wanton and overcome with passion.
The thought was barely complete in her mind when it was answered. Yes, she did remember. She remember exactly the last time she had wanted someone as bad as she did at the moment.
Chicago.
Her eyes snapped opened and she blinked rapidly, trying to remove the last visages of sleep from her muddled brain.
She had no idea why sleep was so elusive to her. She felt exhausted. Her body ached with the tension her muscles had endured throughout her long day. Sleep should be easy. Normally all she had to do was close her eyes and she tumbled right over the edge.
She wondered for a moment if it was possible that it was Cappie's sudden reappearance that was causing her restlessness.
Of course it is, stupid, she told herself. Talking to herself had become a habit in the last few months. She figured that if she was talking to herself, at least one person was paying attention to what she was saying.
She grabbed the fluffy blankets and pulled them over her head. God, that sounded self-pitying and pathetic even to her.
She wouldn't let that man reduce her to this ridiculous person. She couldn't. She was Casey Cartwright, damn it ! She was powerful and independent, confident and capable. There was nothing she couldn't do, nothing she couldn't handle. And she refused to let Richard London take that away from her.
He was trying. She could feel it. He worked at her confidence, had been for months, like a rat gnawing away at her self respect and assurance. He had been doing that for the last couple of years, actually. Making her doubt herself, making her feel as if her opinions and decisions weren't good enough. As if SHE wasn't good enough.
Well, she was good enough. She was plenty good enough.
And, she jumped up and grabbed her robe, she was going to prove it. Because, the only way she was going to sleep, she realized, was in Cappie's arms, where she wanted to be.
Tiptoeing as quietly as possible to keep from waking anyone else, she moved to the door right next to hers and tapped it lightly. When she got no answer, she tried the knob and it twisted in her hand.
Easing inside, she blinked, trying to adjust to the sudden darkness of the room.
When she could see again, she smiled at the sight before her.
He was sitting up, his bare back resting against the oak headboard. His hair was slightly mused as if he had been pulling his hands through it. It wasn't as long as it had been all those years ago, and for a moment she missed the bangs that once hung in his face, nearly covering his eye. She missed the way he used to watch her from under that veil of hair, all the while, pretending like he wasn't looking. He was always watching her when they were together. For some reason unknown to her, she fascinated him. She asked him about it once and he told her that he just had to keep looking at he, reminding himself that she was really there with him. At the time, she thought it was a line, one of the classic Cappie lines, meant to get her undressed as quickly as possible. But later, after they broke up and he still watched her every time they came into contact with each other, she wondered how much had been a line and how much had been the truth.
There were so many times when he would say something, or do something, so sweet, so enduring, so nakedly, emotionally raw. She had never really thought much about them at the time. He was Cappie, just being Cappie, the class clown, the stand up comedian. It was hard to take him seriously, to think of him seriously when he made it a point to keep everyone laughing.
That was his game. His trick was to keep the laughs coming so you wouldn't take the serious side of him too seriously. Unfortunately, his game back fired more often than not. No one ever took Cappie very seriously, even when he was baring his soul.
His blue eyes were watching her again, this time without the curtain of brown between them. It was just him, staring at her so intently she felt like fidgeting. His piercing gaze made her uncomfortable.
His mouth was set in a firm line, framed by the trim, well kept, reddish brown goatee that covered the lower part of his face. She still wasn't sure what to think of the facial hair. It made him look so different, so mature and grown up. It was hard to reconcile the man before her with the boy she once knew.
He didn't move, not an inch. His breath was even and steady. His fingers, resting on top of the blankets over his thighs, didn't so much as twitch.
She had no idea what to say to him. How to explain why she was sneaking into his room at two o'clock in the morning, especially after the rejection she had gotten only hours before.
She suddenly felt desperate, like she was throwing herself at him after he'd already said he wasn't interested.
Maybe she hadn't thought the whole plan all the way through. But there was no escaping it now, not without causing a scene or at least some tension between them.
If she left without a word, it would be like he was rejecting her all over again.
She opened her mouth, trying to think of something, anything to say. But nothing came out and she felt like an even bigger moron.
Then, still without breaking the silence in the room, he shifted and drew the blankets back, giving her an inviting look as he slid down into the bed.
She shrugged off her robe quickly and took his invitation, sinking in beside him and not knowing what to expect next.
He didn't reach for her. Didn't pull her into his warmth like she hoped, he just watched her. As if he were waiting for her to make a move before deciding his own.
Closing her eyes for a moment, she tried to get her thoughts together. She felt she needed to say something, explain the reason behind her sudden presence. But again, the words wouldn't come to her. She couldn't think clearly. Couldn't make sense of the jumble her brain was in.
" How did you know ?" She asked finally, her voice shaky and hesitant.
" How did I know what ?" His was steady and firm as it rumbled from his chest.
" That I was going to come in here. You looked like you were expecting me when I came in." She tried to explain.
" I knew," He whispered as he leaned in closer. " Because I've been laying here for hours wanting to do the same thing. Every time I close my eyes, all I can think about is Chicago and how much I've missed you."
Then he was kissing her, kissing her like he had all those years ago, reawakening in her all the feelings that she had locked away for so long she hardly remembered them any more. His tongue grazed the roof of her mouth and she sighed into him. He swallowed the sound as he left her lips and made of trail of fire over her jawline, pausing long enough to suck her earlobe until she groaned, then continuing on to her collarbone.
She was lost, immersed in her memories of the way he could always make her feel. The way she hadn't felt in five, long, barren years. Every nerve ending in her body suddenly came to life and she groaned as if they had taken over her voice in a yawn of renewal.
Her back arched as she tried to get as close to him as possible and she was, so close that not a breath of space separated them, still it wasn't enough. She wanted to be closer yet, to merge with him until she forgot anything else existed.
His lips and tongue and teeth were helping her do just that as they played over her skin, taking in every inch of her body, leaving no place unexploded as he re-familiarized himself with all of her.
The world faded and time slipped away, years and distance suddenly became meaningless as she let herself be carried away on the wave of emotions he was creating inside her.
She had come to him looking to prove something to herself. To remind herself she was still desirable, still wanted, but now she found herself taken away on a ride she hadn't meant to step onto.
As she clutched at his shoulders and begged him with her lips on his skin, skin that tasted so wonderfully delicious, she knew she had started something that neither of them was strong enough to fight against.
And now that it had begun there would be no containing it. It was exactly what he had been battling on the steps when he pulled away from her. He had found the strength once. But she knew now that neither of them could walk away any longer.
Her hand brushed his bare back, stoking up his spine and causing him to shiver into her. Their chests both rose and fell in heavy pants as they struggling to find air to sustain them.
It felt as if all the oxygen had been sucked from the room, the breathes that she drew in weren't enough and her lungs burned with need.
But the rest of her body burned with a different kind of need, a need that over road her lungs' desires, a need that over road everything else. Her fingernails scratched his flesh and he flinched slightly before arching back into it, as if seeking out the pain she accidentally caused him.
He threw his head back and groaned when she did it again, relishing in the sharpness of the feeling. She seized the opportunity and quickly latched onto to his throat, drawing noises from him that were so primal and raw her entire body hummed with the sound.
Their clothes were gone without either of them knowing how. A rip of material and a slash of cloth and there was nothing else between them.
Flesh scraped against flesh, sending new sensations to long dead nerves. They heaved against each other, the rough hair that covered his chest rasped against her nipples and the feel was so delicious she was drowning in it.
His hands locked over her wrists pinning them to the bed as he hovered over her, still tasting her, devouring her in a fire so hot she felt like she was burning from the inside.
She could feel him, throbbing insistently against her thigh and she shifted her hips, grinding into him and causing him to cry out in desperation.
Eyes locked together, gazes held tight by emotions neither of them had felt in far too long, he moved into her and they both gasped instantaneously. Like the entire Earth shattering around them, they settled, both too afraid to move, afraid to break the spell that had them enthralled.
Not Chicago, not Cyprus Rhodes, never had she felt anything akin to what she was feeling. The power that held her, pulled her into him, pulled him deeper into her, was stronger than anything she had ever encountered. It consumed her, scorched her, tore her apart with longing and desire.
She no longer felt numb, dead inside. All at once, the world came into focus and everything colorized and came to life.
She closed her eyes, breaking his hold on her hands and dug them into his hair as he began to sway within her. A gentle rocking motion that was so far from the urgent pulsing that drove her that she cried out and pushed her hips into his, spurring him into a harder, more frantic pace.
When it still wasn't enough, she shifted, pushing at his shoulder until he found himself under her. His hands moved to cover her breasts and he pinched her nipples, sending electricity through her whole being.
She began to rock, grinding into him with each downward motion.
Soon, his hands found her hips, steadying her and holding on with bruising intensity. Looking down, she found him with his head thrown back and his eyes closed, a look of utter concentration furrowing his brow as he tried to contain his desire, hold his emotions in check as long as possible.
But again, the desire was stronger than either of them and as she ground into him one last time, she grabbed his shoulders, falling forward as she pulled him into her climax.
The last thing she remembered before the world faded away was him biting into her shoulder to keep from screaming out loud.
She woke to the sound of the clock ticking, a constant, steady, ceaseless beat that lulled her. She shifted slowly as she realized that the clock by her bed was digital and didn't make a ticking sound as it kept time. Her leg brushed against a warm, coarsely covered limb and her eyes instantly snapped opened as her unfamiliar surroundings came into focus.
There was a hand running listlessly through her hair, the rise and fall of a chest under her head, the sound of a heart beating mimicking the noise of a clock.
She made to raise up, but the hand not in her hair held her steady, soothing her back into relaxation.
Then she inhaled deeply and stilled. The unmistakable aroma that she found chased all her uneasy away as the memories of the night flooded into her sluggish, sleep-muddled brain.
" Cappie," She whispered, his name falling from her lips on a sigh.
" Don't move." He answered. " Just stay a little longer."
She shifted slightly but only so that she could see his face. " I'm not going anywhere." She assured him.
His arm relaxed on her back and rested its weight lightly on her shoulder. His other hand still played through her hair, drawing the long, blond locks through his fingers. He had always been fixated on her hair. Something she had never understood, but right then, she relished in the comfort of the movement.
In college, they would lay, just as they were now, for hours, pretending that nothing else existed besides them. In his bed, in the wee hours before dawn, they could imagine that there was no Greek life tugging at them, no classwork pressing down on their shoulders, no life outside of the two of them.
" So what happens now ?" He asked, so quietly she would have missed it if she hadn't been draped over his chest as she was.
" I don't know." was her honest answer. " I hadn't really planned that far ahead."
He chuckled. The vibrations tingled through her exhausted body. " I must be rubbing off on you."
He shifted, turning slightly and pulling her into the croak of his arm with an ease that gave testament to the strength of his arms as they rippled against her skin.
She started to tell him that she wanted nothing more than for him to stay with her forever. She wanted to tell him to just hold her and never let her go again. But something in his face held her back and she remained silent, waiting on him to guide her with his own thoughts.
" I have no idea where to go from here." He told her, so solemnly that she felt tears prickly at the corners of her eyes. " But I have to be honest with you." He sighed as if steeling himself for something unpleasant. " I have never felt anything like that. Not even when we were together before. This was different somehow."
She let out a breath she hadn't even realized she was holding, as relief flooded into her. Her hand came up to cradle his face as she leaned forward and kissed him gently.
He took her hand and held it softly in his own, surrounding it completely. " I'm just not sure how I fit into your life now. If this was just a repeat of Chicago, a fond trip down memory lane, before we go about our own way again, tell me now."
She remembered that night in Chicago all too clearly. The intensity of the feelings he evoked in her as they renewed all the old emotions between them was almost enough to make her to walk away from everything she had built in D.C.. But waking to almost simultaneous ringing phones had jolted them both back to reality as Rebeca and Richard intruded on their respite, reminding them both of what they had to lose. The decision to go their own way, to walk away and never look back was mutual, though she always felt as if, had she given even the slightest hint at hesitation, he would have turned his back on everything and followed her anywhere.
" There is no one waiting on either of us now. Nothing holding us back from being together." He continued. " If we decided to walk away this time, we have no one to blame but ourselves."
She considered his words carefully. He was absolutely right on all counts. They had no holds on them now. She couldn't remember the last time they were both single at the same time. It had been so long ago. It seemed their entire life had somehow turned into them staring at each other as someone else held them. They were always passing ships in the night. A light, fluffy flirtation that never went any further or a soul wrecking, regret that completely consumed them. Not since Freshman year in college had they really tried to have a relationship. She wondered if it was even possible.
He must have mistaken her pause for hesitation because his eyes fell and he began to pull away from her.
But she grabbed his arm, stilling him before he could move further. " Wait." She whispered. " I'm not sure what I want anymore. I have been through so much. You've been through so much. It seems like we have the weight of the world in emotional baggage between us. But I want to try this."
" I'm not sure I can ' try', Casey." He answered.
" What does that mean ?"
" It means that I've never stopped loving you, never stopped thinking about you. You're like some kind of drug for me. I'm an addict." He tried to explain. " And right now, my focus should be on my daughter. Its too easy for me to get wrapped up in you and forget everything else."
He sighed and the desperate, finality of the sound made tears threaten again. " What are you saying ? Are you telling me that this was just a fond trip down memory lane for you ?" She asked, trying hard not to grab him to keep him beside her.
" No, it isn't that. This was so much more than that. I'm just not sure where my search for Emily is going to take me. But I can't give it up. I have to find her."
" Of course you do." She answered. " And I'm going to help you. We will find her, Cappie. I promise you, we will."
" You sound so certain. I wish I could believe it, too."
" I'll prove it to you. I'll make you believe it, too." She told him, pulling him back into her arms. "You'll see."
