A/N: So here's the update. As always I love to hear that you all still enjoy reading Tali. OCs are such a delicate art, your feedback really helps me make her better (I hope) lol. Also am very glad people are enjoying how their relationship is developing. Yes, there's angst, but there's also fluffyness and tension and hot sexy romance and that all comes with the territory. What also comes with the territory is the fact that this fic will undoubtedly get more and more AU as the season progresses. Bear with me. I'm going to keep writing them in tandem with the episodes, but probably be rewriting a few things here and there and...well we'll just see how it all works out. As always, I REALLY love reading your thoughts so Enjoy! -pj
Chapter Eleven – The Three Card Monte Job
Nate tossed an ice pack into Eliot's lap as he breezed into the living room and plopped down in one of the black leather chairs, popping the top on a beer and sliding one to sit in front of the hitter.
Eliot picked up ice pack and raised an eyebrow at him.
"What's this for?"
Nate sipped his beer, eyes never leaving the tv screens.
"For the giant knot on your head you've been trying to pretend isn't there." He laughed abruptly at the home video taken of a cat falling into a fish tank before adding, "you know you can't stay alone tonight, right?"
Eliot rolled his eyes, and then squeezed them shut. Bad idea.
"Dizzy?"
He looked over, but Nate still wasn't looking at him. He glared anyway.
"I'm not a child, Nate. I can take care of myself."
Nate nodded condescendingly, finishing off his beer and opening another.
"You've been tilting to the left all day," Parker appeared beside Eliot with a box of cereal. "Sophie said you nearly pulled her arm out of the socket a couple times at the police station."
"Well I wouldn'ta had that problem if somebody hadn't thrown a crowbar at my head," Eliot growled, turning his glare on Parker.
"He's got you there, mama," Hardison added absently from the kitchen table, eyes glued to his computer, still trying to run logistical algorithms to see if he could narrow down which bank was going to be hit the next day. Call him crazy, but he didn't trust Jimmy Ford to just read in his estranged son.
Parker gave them both an affronted look.
"I said I was sorry."
Eliot grumbled something unintelligible, giving her a look somewhere between a scowl and exasperation, and moved to stand, taking his ice pak with him.
"I'm goin' home, tell Sophie…" he paused and turned back to scan the room. "Where the hell is Sophie?"
oooOOOooo
Tali blew out a long breath and pulled her pack of cigarettes from her pocket as she headed for the door. Eliot hated these things, she knew, he always gave her a dark look when she lit up. Nevermind the fact that he'd bummed a light and a cig off her the night they met.
Damn sexy hypocrite.
She opened the door to go outside and was surprised to find someone standing in the hallway.
The woman had long, silky dark hair that framed her face elegantly, a sleek blue jacket and black skinny jeans that ended at knee-high suede boots that Tali didn't think she could even afford to look at.
She cleared her throat, feeling under dressed in her own apartment in nothing but cargo capris and a striped tank top.
The woman smiled congenially as soon as she saw her and in spite of herself Tali felt slightly more at ease.
"Oh, hello there, you must be Tali. I'm-"
"Sophie," she cut in, dropping her cigarettes back into her pocket and leaning against the doorframe, "right?"
"Y-yeah…how did you know?" Sophie asked, surprised. Her dark eyes widened slightly and she tilted her head, revealing shiny gold hoops in her ears.
Tali shrugged one shoulder and reached up to put the cigarette she'd extracted behind her ear.
"The only one of Eliot's team who didn't stalk me after our breakup…thing. What are you doing here? Eliot said you guys were on a job, he doesn't usually…" her eyebrows drew together. "Wait. He's alright, isn't he?"
Sophie hesitated, looking torn. Tali stood up away from the door, ready to bolt.
"What? Is he okay?"
"Well, not entirely, you see something happened earlier and-" Sophie stopped when suddenly Tali had disappeared from the door. Before she got a chance to lean forward and call out the woman appeared again, this time wearing shoes and holding her jacket.
"Take me to him."
oooOOOooo
Eliot tensed immediately when he heard the door to his apartment open, but relaxed again when he heard Sophie's voice.
"Eliot it's me."
He sat up slightly on the bed, indulging in resting against the pillows set up against his headboard when the room tilted. Through his open door he could see someone's shadow on the hallway wall approaching his room.
"Sophie I really don't-" he stopped himself when a curly haird figure draped in an oversized jean jacket entered.
His jean jacket.
"You're not Sophie."
"She just opened the door to let me in," Tali gave him a cockeyed grin, "sorry to disappoint."
Eliot relaxed his frown and stopped himself just before he shook his head, the throbbing behind his eyes intensifying just from the thought of it.
"You never disappoint."
Tali smiled, very nearly blushing at the honest comment, while pulling off his jacket and toeing off her shoes. She crawled across the blue bedspread to sit beside him.
"Sophie says you're not allowed to sleep for the next couple hours. She said you had an unfortunate encounter with a crowbar." Tali gently ghosted her hands through his hair to feel the injury, and hissed when she felt the nearly golf-ball sized lump under her fingers.
Eliot snorted, pulling just slightly away from her touch.
"I had an unfortunate encounter with Parker." He motioned at the ice pack laying forgotten on the night stand.
She furrowed her brow slightly, her hands moving away from the sensitive area on his head to touch his face, pushing his hair away from his eyes.
"Does she still have that duck?" She asked suddenly.
Eliot gave her a look and then laughed, which morphed into a groan when his headache increased.
"Don't do that," he said, and if it came out suspiciously close to a whine Tali had the decency not to mention it.
Smiling mischievously, raised up onto her knees and swung one leg over him, brushing her lips against his ear she whispered, "lo siento querido."
Tali grabbed the ice pack off the table and smiled when the foreign words instantly got the reaction out of him that she expected. She trailed kisses down his jaw gently and pressed the ice to the back of his head over the lump. She shifted her hips against his jean-clad ones and Eliot groaned again, causing Tali to pull away.
"That doesn't hurt your head, does it?" She asked, too innocently.
Eliot's eyes were closed when he responded, his hands braced firmly on her hips.
"Not the one that got hit with the crowbar," he responded, a willing participant in her game of innuendo.
Tali smiled and leaned back in, brushing her nose against his before dropping to kiss along his neck and collar bone, undoing the buttons of his shirt deftly with one hand.
"You said your head hurts when you laugh," she said, her accent so thick the 'y's came out sounding like slurred 'j's.
Eliot made a noise somewhere in the vicinity of 'uh-huh' as her kisses descended, peppering every bit of skin she revealed with each conquered button.
Eliot pried his eyes open when her hand tugged experimentally on the zipper of his jeans. Obviously she was taking Sophie's command not to allow him to sleep very seriously.
"How does it feel when I do this?"
oooOOOooo
Eliot walked along behind the rest of the team on the docks after watching Jimy Ford get on the boat, bound for the 'Old Country'.
Eliot thought it was too good a fate for the old man. But then, nobody had asked him.
Nate and Sophie ambled off toward his black sports car and Parker and Hardsion toward the hacker's red Ferrari.
Hardison turned back when he realized they'd lost their straggling fifth teammate.
"Yo Eliot, we're gonna go find someplace to eat, you comin?"
The other three turned upon hearing him and Eliot shook his head, moving toward his orange Challenger.
"Got plans."
It was the weekend after all.
His comment was met with a round of nods and Sophie calling back over her shoulder, "Tell Tali we say hello, Eliot!"
oooOOOooo
Eliot was waiting for her when she came out her front door a half hour later, a black duffel carrying a change of clothes slung over her shoulder and looking positively urbane in her black leggings, brown boots and grey top with the lace up back.
Her hair was pinned up with about a thousand bobby pins and Eliot itched to remove one-by-one so he could watch those curls tumble down around her face.
she tilted her head upon seeing him and her dark eye makeup shimmered in the reflection of the setting sun in the windows of the buildings around them.
"You look like James Dean," she said, sauntering over to him with an amused grin.
Eliot glanced down at himself. He'd gone home to change, now dressed in a relaxed pair of jeans, his boots and a black t-shirt and leather jacket.
He crossed her arms and ankles, leaning one hip against the side of his orange challenger.
"I'll take that as a compliment."
Tali nodded, dropping her bag at her feet, she placed her hands on her hips. "You should."
Eliot uncrossed his arms and reached out, opening the passenger side door to reveal the black on black leather interior and a six speed manual gear shift just begging to be pushed to its limit.
"Let's go for a ride."
Tali ran her eyes over the aggressive, masculine lines of the car and allowed herself a small smile upon seeing the black racing stripes on the orange paint. Her mama always said all little boys just wanted to be racecar drivers.
"Gotta work tonight. I was planning to stop at the gym on the way in." She shrugged, feigning disinterest as she picked at her nails. It was a lie, of course, no one dressed like this to go to the gym, but she didn't want Eliot thinking he could just say 'jump' and she'd kiss him breathless without a word of protest either.
Though she probably would.
Eliot saw straight through the façade and smirked. Pushing off the car, he closed the distance between them and reached out to tilt her chin up, pressing his lips over hers demandingly.
Tali blinked when he pulled away and smiled lazily at the sight of her red lipstick smeared across his mouth.
"Fine. I'll go," she whispered a bit out of breath, but stopped him when he started to tug her forward, producing a set of keys, "but I'm gonna drive."
Eliot frowned and patted down his now empty pockets.
"How did you-?"
Tali giggled and jerked away from him, running to the other side of the car and dropping into the drivers' seat.
"Well? What are you waiting for, Cowboy?"
She pressed her foot to the gas pedal, squealing happily at the low roar of the revving engine. Eliot rolled his eyes but smiled, scooping up her bag and tossing it behind the seats before climbing in himself.
"Are you sure you know how to drive this thing?" he asked, half amused, half worried.
Tali cut her eyes at him and raised an eyebrow.
"I think I can handle it."
The look in her eyes left Eliot fumbling for his seat belt and Tali laughed as she threw the car in gear and slammed her foot on the gas.
And Eliot swore he could smell rubber burning as they tore away from the curb.
TBC
lo siento querido - I'm sorry, love