A/N 1: I am wondering if reviewers and PMers got the replies I sent to the PMs and reviews of Chapter 6 and Chapter 7?
CHAPTER 8: REACHING OUT
Goren and Eames both managed to get out early that Friday, and an hour after Eames arrived home, he was downstairs buzzing her apartment. He almost brained her with her front door on his way in, and after a cursory greeting he immediately grabbed as much of her gear as he could hold before rushing downstairs with it. She threw on her coat, picked up what was left, and followed him, at a much slower pace. This was all happening much too fast.
"Hey Goren, what's the rush," she asked when she met him on the stairs, already coming up for seconds.
He shrugged and twitched evasively. "We've got a three hour drive at the least, and I'd like to get to the campground during daylight." He finally looked straight at her, and she knew he was seeing the real reason for her question. "Why?"
Eames knew she had to do some damage control. "Bobby, I'm not having second thoughts." He turned away and sighed, tramping back down the stairs.
"Yes, you are."
"No I'm not, I promise." She reached out and touched his shoulder, and he turned so quickly she almost lost her footing. He quickly reached out to steady her, grasping her waist firmly and confidently. For a long second they both froze, his hands warm on her waist and her hand feeling his strong shoulder muscles flex beneath it. They both held their breath, locked in the moment.
Almost even height standing two steps below her, he scrutinised her face for deception. She let her face relax, knowing that he tended to second-guess his reading of her. She allowed herself to show her doubts and insecurities, but also the hope and anticipation she was feeling.
"You're afraid. Of me?" The question betrayed his own insecurity, and she understood why he'd been hurrying.
"Of course not, Bobby." She held his gaze and willed him to read her correctly. "I want to do this. I would not have said yes if I didn't. I'm really looking forward to spending time alone with you." She emphasised her last words, and felt a blush creep up her face at her bluntness. "But you have to admit, it's – different."
"How so?" He hadn't let go of her, and he squeezed her waist reflexively as he asked the question. They weren't standing that close – anyone who passed would not have felt they were interrupting an intimate moment – but the deliberateness of their touches was inescapably clear to both of them.
Eames took a quick breath and tossed her hair. Bobby had described the gesture as being like a thoroughbred trying to gain her head, and she'd scowled and told him if he valued his life, he'd better not take that metaphor any further. Completely missing the thrust of her warning, he'd then given her a detailed explanation of how she was exactly like a thoroughbred: wilful, determined, smarter than she seemed, competitive, keenly aware of the rules of the game, and willing to leave it all on the track every time. He'd gotten as far as saying that their teamwork was what won the race, but she'd managed to stop him before he'd actually compared himself to a jockey, because she really, really couldn't have handled that. Not the notion that he 'held the reins' – he'd just finished telling her that, despite what most people thought about racehorses, it was a much more complicated relationship than that (which she really appreciated, actually) – no, it was the idea that he'd even obliquely thought of himself riding her.
That was early on in their partnership.
"Bobby…" She shook her head and looked down. "I just – I don't want to have this conversation right now, OK? It's too soon. We have two weeks, and I'm sure a lot of stuff is going to come out. Can't we just take it easy for this evening?" She looked hopefully back at him, begging him silently to let it go for now and let them get used to this at a relaxed pace. "Just – relax, OK? It'll help me relax." At that, he grinned, and she knew they were OK. He gave her waist a final squeeze, then he took her backpack full of clothes and canvas grocery bag out of her arms and looped them over his shoulders.
"OK," he whispered, then turned and headed down the stairs.
o.o.o.o.o
After they packed his car, he held the passenger door open for her. "I'm not driving?" She asked incredulously.
He grinned boyishly, and she felt ripples of affection and arousal thread through her anxiety. "Nope," he said, "My invitation, my chauffer service. You can drive us home if you like." She pursed her mouth in mock chagrin and took the map book he handed her.
o.o.o.o.o
She hadn't wanted to push it with him, but being idle in the passenger seat significantly added to the tension she was feeling. As his Mustang ate up the miles, she ran over in her mind all the things that had gone unsaid between them for a decade. Not that they didn't talk – quite the contrary actually. They spoke at length about almost everything that went on in their professional lives. How could they function as a team otherwise? Surely many of their rumours about their off-duty relationship arose from the looky-loos who observed them emerging furtively from stairwells and quiet corridors. What people no doubt assumed were assignations, were actually evidence of the hard work that made their complex schemes look effortless.
Yes, she was afraid. Not because she regretted anything about the upcoming journey, but because Bobby was right about her. She left it all on the track every time. She'd proven it countless times in their work, and in the next two weeks, she was going to prove it personally as well. Whatever there was to say, she was going to say it. Whatever there was to do – well, hopefully there would be no regrets there, from either of them. And maybe, just maybe, the reality would live up to her fantasies.
O.O.O.O.O
All the next Monday, Goren was quiet and pre-occupied. Several times, Eames was motivated to say something like, 'My, you're quiet, Goren,' and he would reply, 'Mmm,' and look up and smile reassuringly, and they'd carry on. At the end of the day, Goren straightened his desk, plopped his folder onto his blotter, and sat staring at it, fiddling with the zipper.
"Eames?" he said at his folder. Eames looked up and 'hmmm'd at him, and he leaned back and then forward, and rubbed his neck.
"Um… about – about holidays?" He looked up at her, then quickly back down again. "I actually do, um, I have plans. But I was thinking of going later in the summer."
Eames nodded quickly. "OK, well no problem – we don't have to take our vacations at the same time. Ross won't be happy, but I for one don't care." Her nervous, hunted look was back, and Goren almost chickened out.
"Actually, Eames, that's… um – about that." There was a long pause where Goren stared at her as if he were waiting for her to say something, while she looked expectantly, and not a little impatiently, at him.
"About what, Goren? I'm growing old over here."
Goren laughed nervously and closed his eyes, then opened them. "Actually," he said evenly, looking her straight in the eye, "I was thinking of going camping. And I wondered if you'd like to join me." He closed his eyes again and laughed nervously, then jumped up to go grab their coats.
"Me?" she said incredulously, gaping at him, "Go camping? With you?" She stood up so he could help her on with her coat. "Is Denise busy?" she snapped over her shoulder, then had the grace to look embarrassed.
Goren paused and looked at her speculatively. "I have no idea what Denise is doing, but I'm asking you because I'd like to go with you."
Eames shook her head ruefully. "I'm sorry, Bobby, it just took me by surprise. And I really never thought of myself as the type of girl you'd take camping."
"Type? Well if by type you mean my favourite person in the world, it's a very small set." Goren stood, very still and very close, looking down at her while he handed her her umbrella. He saw her breath catch in her throat, and she reached up reflexively to touch herself there.
Eames looked away for a moment, and the way her hair fell over her face made her look both vulnerable and coy. "I'll think about it," she said sincerely. "When do you need to know?"
"Whenever. I'm planning on booking the campground spot for late August, and return after Labour Day. If you can't go, I won't be inviting anybody else." They walked together to the elevator, and stood waiting by the doors.
"OK, that sounds like fun," she said softly, "I, uh – thanks for thinking of me. I'll let you know as soon as possible." Eames seemed suddenly flustered and shy, and marched at top speed towards her car when the elevator dropped them off at the parking lot. She forgot to even offer him a ride to the subway. Which was fine, because he needed to walk off some excess energy.
O.O.O.O.O
"Hey, how are you doing?" Alex whispered as she crawled into the tent and lay down next to Bobby. Earlier, without comment, she had put their two air mattresses next to each other and covered them with the sheets she'd brought, making a shared bed for them with their unzipped sleeping bags. "I am so sorry, Bobby. I heard from Nicky that – Chris –" she managed to squeak out his name, "Is leaving tomorrow afternoon, but if you want us to leave too, that's fine with me." Wordlessly, Bobby reached out his arms to her and she gratefully fell into them. He felt so good to her, she felt herself instantly relax, and she found it easy to forget the big mess they were in the middle of. Bobby was amazingly half-aroused, and she tilted her head up to kiss his jaw and throat.
"It's OK, s-sweetheart." He stammered a bit on the endearment – the first she had ever heard from his lips in any context – but the word warmed her heart. "Alex, this is probably the only time you're going to get to see Nathan for a while, right?" She shrugged and nodded. "So, I think we should stay." At her quizzical face, he whispered, "It's OK, really. We can sleep in the tent, spend the days with Nate, it'll be fun."
Alex couldn't help herself, she giggled. "Listen to you, planning fun! But I'm so sorry Bobby, really. This really isn't what we'd planned, is it?"
"No, it's so, so much better," he whispered as he rolled on top of her, exploring her bare skin with his mouth and hands.
o.o.o.o.o
This was extremely dangerous. Not only because of Liz, who was probably listening for a chance to catch them in flagrante delicto, and not only because of Nate, who had probably been coached by Liz to sneak out and 'chaperone' them. Not only because after dinner, he, Alex and Nate had gone down to the little dock in the quiet patch of the river and Bobby had taken turns tossing Nate, then Alex in her gorgeous bikini off the dock into the river over and over, then they'd pulled him in, and Nate and Alex had both wrapped their arms and legs around him like two monkeys, and they'd all laughed and laughed the whole way back to the cottage, and his heart was so full of love and joy that he almost couldn't stand it. And not because he was lying, in a bed (kind of), with Alex, who was wearing nothing but thin shorts and a tiny tank top and had sunk into his arms with a happy sigh and was now squirming and mewling under him.
No, it was dangerous because of the acute desire that was suffusing his mind and body, short-circuiting his common sense and interfering with his reasoning.
Not merely the desire to join physically with the woman to whom he'd long ago given all his love and loyalty; that craving, though magnified by circumstance and proximity, was manageable.
The problem was sexual competitiveness – the fear of being out-competed for a precious, even essential resource; an anthropological phenomenon his familiarity with which had been of use to him many times over at work, but which he had carefully avoided in his personal life. Until Alex. With almost a kind of nostalgia, Goren recalled the awful moment when he realised that she might have slept with that pissant Mulrooney, and before that, Detective Lyons – who had strutted around like Abel, cloaked in the courage of his (untested) convictions.
Because now, despite the fact that it was clear to him tonight that Alex had no interest in Christopher Botsford, CA, and despite the fact that the man had clearly been making every attempt not to seem like a romantic rival for the woman he seemed intimidated by only slightly less than he was intimidated by her partner, Bobby found himself consumed by a need – a hundred times worse than he'd ever felt – to claim her in that most basic of ways.
He wasn't made of stone! Bobby knew he was an honourable man, but he also knew that there was a part of him – and not a small part – that was willing to go to great lengths to keep what he had. Come on! The man whom she'd gone out on nine actual dates with (compared to the 0 she'd gone on with Goren), and with whom she'd considered spending her vacation, who'd come up here expecting to spend time with her, was sleeping a mere 50 feet away. And here she was, nibbling and sucking Bobby's throat and unconsciously tugging at his clothes, smelling and feeling so good and making the most captivating sounds. It didn't matter that he was leaving tomorrow. Bobby felt the almost overwhelming urge to have Alex tonight.
