"Where are we going?" Kaylee called to her Captain's retreating back as she scrambled to pack her repair kit. He wanted her, and her tools, in shuttle two. "We leave in ten minutes," he had said before stalking away down the corridor.

His voice carried back to her, although he did not slow his steps. "Picking up Inara. Shuttle broke down. She's out on the plains somewhere."

"Is she alright?"

"Alright enough to insult my shuttle."

In a few minutes they were airborne, flying away from where Serenity was docked on the outskirts of town. They had finished a job. Jayne was off in town, pursuing his usual entertainment; Wash and Zoe had hardly been able to contain their excitement at finding out they'd have the ship to themselves.

"I told her you were coming for her. She said to hurry." Wash had been close to giggling, had been much too excited to sit still. One of his gorram dinosaurs was nuzzling at the belly of, apparently, its prehistoric plastic wife.

"She didn't say that, you just want me off my boat so you can..." Mal shook his head. Likely they'd be on top of the ship itself ten minutes after Zoe made the return trip. "Just...put a towel down or something." He'd gone, double time, in search of Kaylee.

Kaylee was speaking with Inara over the comm link while Zoe flew. "What happened, sweetie?"

"Please don't be worried, I'm fine. I was on my way back to the ship when a few of the indicator lights flashed. I tried to make some corrections but found myself losing speed and altitude. I thought it most prudent to descend, and I had already done so when the forward engines lost power. The landing was a little bumpy, but no damage, I think. None of the diagnostics that I am familiar with showed anything out of the ordinary."

Kaylee mused over this information for a few moments. "You have fuel cells?"

"Plenty. I refueled before leaving my client's estate."

Kaylee's eyebrows raised at this. "Wow, guy must be plenty rich to afford his own fueling station."

Mal caught Inara's discreet smile, her only response to Kaylee's assessment.

"Tell her she's to stay put, we'll be there in about an hour."

"Tell the Captain that she can hear him perfectly well, and that as a favor to him she'll rein in her desire to traipse around the plains like a crazy person."

Kaylee snorted her amusement and sent a sidelong glance at the Captain. "Don't let his crabby ways fool ya, 'Nara, he likes playin' hero."

"Yes, I spend my days praying you'll break my shuttle so I can have the privilege of coming to your rescue and getting mocked for my trouble."

"I hardly broke your shuttle."

"Then why ain't it flyin?"

Kaylee broke in. "That's for me to find out, soon's we get there. I got some ideas..." She thought for a moment. "Can you send me those diagnostics you ran?"

"Certainly, mei mei."

They were at the shuttle sooner than anyone had expected, and Zoe lost no time in hopping out of the pilot's seat and opening the hatch to the outside. As soon as Zoe leaned out into the thin sunlight of the plains, Inara opened her door and waved, her purple gown rustling in the wind.

"Best get over there and start the heroing, sir." Zoe's hand was on the small of his back as she walked him to the door.

Mal paused at the hatch. "If we get anyone sniffin' around about certain contraband materials, you make sure to - "

"Still remember how to walk and talk at the same time, sir?" Her smile was mild, benign, but the pressure on his back increased noticeably.

"Pushy woman! You just want to get me gone so you can hurry back and -"

"Yes I do sir. Mite keen to get started on that, too." She met his eyes with her uniquely calm expression until he capitulated and started across the flat ground to Inara's shuttle.

Kaylee's greeting to Inara was effusive, but Mal saw she was eyeing the shuttle curiously even as she returned Inara's hug. "Them diagnostics you sent me don't add up anyway I can see. Got to let 'er talk to me face to face. Are you sure you're ok?" Kaylee asked, her eyes taking in Inara's bare arms and fancy dress.

"Yes, completely sure. You got here so quickly, I didn't have time to worry."

"That's because Wash is in a hurry to desecrate my boat with his nakedness in my absence. What's that?" Mal asked, peering over Kaylee's shoulder as she opened an access panel near the shuttle's hatch.

"Just a port for data access while I'm working out here, Cap'n." Kaylee spent a few minutes fiddling with buttons and peering at gauges, then headed purposefully to another panel, bouncing her toolkit against her thigh as she went. Mal followed her after a brief look at the instruments she'd just been using.

His mechanic answered each of his questions patiently, but Mal was familiar with her tone, a voice he privately called Help Him Lord, He Ain't That Bright. He figured it was counterproductive to hold her up, having her explain every little thing to him. Besides, the problem wasn't immediately apparent and Kaylee was getting more and more preoccupied with her own thoughts. He figured he'd go check on Inara, and crossed the scrubby, wild ground between the shuttles.

He stuck his head in the open door and saw her standing near the shuttle's bank of controls and monitors. One hand stroked the pink cover at the top of the pilot's seat. "Nice place to crash - wouldn't do to light somewhere homely, I suppose."

Inara turned and smiled. "The terrain is so flat, I could see this stream a long way off. I thought it might be a good landmark, if nothing else."

Mal nodded. "Kaylee's had enough of my chuckleheaded questions, I thought I'd stretch my legs. Care to join me?" Inara fetched the thin wrap that matched her gown and they walked down to the stream. The cold, shining water ran slowly over and around large stones and driftwood that dotted the stream's bed and its wide, flat bank.

"We're going to be here for a while." Kaylee hadn't stopped working to greet them on their return. "I don't know how things got to this kind of state...I waved Wash, told him we'd be back come morning."

"Morning? What have you been doing?"

"Stuff you can't, Captain Crabby." Kaylee sent him a brief scowl over her shoulder, her hands still busy with the shuttle's innards.

Mal grew suspicious. "How much Wash and Zoe pay you to keep us here all night?"

"Wish I'd thought of that, they'd have paid, and dearly." The mechanic rubbed her hands on the seat of her overalls, then peered up at the sky. "I got a start, but it's going to take a while and there's only one o'me. Besides, I can't work in the dark." She wrinkled her nose in sudden excitement. "We could have a campfire!"

Mal turned to Inara with a wry expression. "Next time, bat your eyes and hint around about a tuneup."

--------------

The campfire was actually not a bad idea, Inara thought. And dinner had been a true surprise. She thought Mal had just grown exceedingly bored, when he wandered off and she caught sight of him on the shallow edges of the stream, turning over rocks. Then he had sauntered back, looking pleased, and ordered her to fetch him a basket - something with a lid.

This had raised her suspicions. "May I ask what it is that you are collecting?"

"Dinner! Got crawdads in that stream, they cook up tasty."

"Crawdads?"

"Thought you was a cultured woman." He pulled a sand-colored, shelled thing out of his pocket, dangled it in the space between them, tiny and monstrous. It waved its claws furiously. "Crawdads."
"Very resourceful." Inara considered the threatening creature. "I'll open some wine."

It had taken a while - she only had a small saucepan in the shuttle's tiny galley area, so they had to cook the crawdads in small batches. This meant dinner stretched into a few pleasant hours by the fire, while the sun set and a distracting profusion of stars came out.

------------------

The fire was down to sleepy embers and the air had grown undeniably chilly when they headed toward the shuttle, walking slowly in the dark.

"I can't sleep in these." Kaylee examined her oily coveralls in dismay as she leaned carefully against a wall, loosening her short boots. "Wreck your fancy bedcovers, 'Nara."

Inara shook her head apologetically. "I didn't bring extra on this trip, mei mei, everything's back in my storage hold on Serenity. I didn't anticipate -"

"Cap'n will loan me his shirt, won't you, Cap'n?" Her smile grew rascally. "If one of us has to be topless..."

Mal shook his head at her, but untucked the blue shirt he wore and started working at the buttons. "Here," he muttered a moment later, passing her the shirt and crossing to the narrow couch. He looked up as Inara glided behind a screen, a shining length of silk over one arm.

"What're you about?" He heard the suspicion in his own voice.

"I'm not sleeping in this dress...I have a nightgown." She emerged a few minutes later and crossed to the small armoire to put her gown away. The nightdress, deep blue and gleaming, floated behind her in a graceful ellipse.

"What kind of pajamas are those?"

"This gown is completely appropriate, Mal." She didn't bother turning around. "It goes all the way to my ankles."

Mal eyed the slit that traveled up the side of her thigh. "And then it comes right back up to your..."

"Yes, because as we all know, virtuous women don't have legs." Inara passed by him again and sat at her dressing table, taking up her hairbrush.

Mal pulled his boots off and pushed them into the corner. "I'll take the couch."

Kaylee protested from behind the screen. "You don't fit on the couch, Cap'n, not even close."

"And I don't have extra blankets." Inara pulled the brush through her hair a few times as this sunk in. She finished, and reached both hands behind her neck to unclasp the delicate necklace she wore.
She must have wiped the cosmetics off her face when she was changing, Mal realized. Her skin looked fresh and warm, her lips their own natural pink. So graceful, even just sitting and taking off her jewelry.

"Fine. The floor then. Slept plenty worse places." He got up, reaching for the coat he'd left on the unsuitable couch.

Inara rose from the little cushioned stool, shaking her head emphatically. "No."

"No?" Apparently, she'd forgotten that her shuttle was still part of his ship.

"I won't remember you are there in the night. It's extremely likely I'll trip and land right on top of you." Inara, in that nightgown, on top of him in the dark. A circumstance to be avoided. He watched her cross to the bed. "There's room for all of us, Mal."

"Whoa, there." He knew her suggestion was only practical, but somehow Mal found he couldn't acquiesce without some kind of resistance.

Inara sighed with impatience. "Do you suspect I played engine saboteur as part of an elaborate scheme to seduce you? It's late, and I need to sleep. There's room, and a pillow for you here." She smacked the pillow onto the mattress with a decisive movement. "Suit yourself."

Mal watched her march toward the other side of the bed, all frilly and irritated.

"Ever had three in that bed of yours before?" That brought her up quick - she turned around, fresh annoyance lighting her expression. "Oh, 'scuse me. You don't talk about your business."

Inara's eyes glowed with an ungentle amusement and when she spoke, the arresting sultriness in her voice made Mal both sorry and not sorry he'd asked. "Three in that bed of mine isn't about my business, Captain." Her smile was languid, provocative, and started him wondering about several very urgent questions he'd heretofore avoided thinking on tonight. "It's about my pleasure." The last heated word, spoken barely above a whisper.

Mal turned away and peered out each of the windows in turn, scanning the undifferentiated darkness and seeing nothing. Served him right for bringing the subject up, he supposed. One more thing he knew he'd find himself wondering about, some lonely night down the road when he just couldn't pretend for another second that he didn't want her.

Kaylee stepped out from behind the screen, his shirt hanging to the middle of her thighs. "Oooh, Inara, that's pretty!" She took her friend's hand and led her through a turn, beaming her admiration. "Pretty lace - and I like how it dips down low in the back. Fancy."

Inara smiled a little diffidently at the compliment. "I think we both look charming."

Kaylee had woven her hair into two loose braids, and was fastening the buttons at the cuffs. She stood at the foot of the bed, considering, as she bumped a knee against the mattress. "You ought to sleep in the middle, 'Nara, you're going to get chilly in that nightgown."
Her genteel 'That won't be necessary' put a stop to the 'No!' he'd been about to bark out. Mal looked at Inara quickly, but she was arranging the sheets and blankets with great care as Kaylee slid toward the middle of the bed, grinning with pleasure.

Mal sighed and crossed to the far side of the bed where he stood with his hands on his hips, considering. "I'm not going to get a bill for lying down here, am I?"

Inara narrowed her eyes at him. "Just please try not to drool overmuch."

"You ought to make that into a sign - maybe a fetching needlepoint job - and have it framed on the wall up here." He pointed to a spot above the headboard as he stretched out onto the bed, arranging the blankets over his legs and middle.

They lay straight and quiet and certainly not sleeping for a moment, until Kaylee broke the silence. "This is like an adventure story. Fun."

"It's certainly not what I expected, but none of us are the worse for it."

Kaylee snuggled her shoulders against her pillow. "I still can't figure how the engine got pixilated like it did. Sometimes they're just contrary, like people."

Mal looked up at Inara's ceiling. "That's surely the case with people."

"How'd you know to go looking for crawdads, Cap'n?"

"We had a stream ran through the western pastures at home. Used to ride out there sometimes, swim and fish..."

""Nara, you have coffee for the morning? Or just tea?"

"Oh, I...I have both." Inara sounded a little surprised. "And some biscuits and jelly, we can have a little breakfast." Had her eyes been closed? Was she all the way under the covers, blankets tucked up over her bare arms and shoulders? He had no good excuse to turn his head and look.

"I waved Zoe and Wash before dinner. Well, I left a message. Told 'em it won't take long once the sun's up." Kaylee continued chattering for a few more minutes, but her voice quickly grew languid and drowsy, and the quiet moments between her remarks grew longer and longer. The soft change of her breathing told Mal she was sleeping.

He turned slightly, chancing a look at Inara. She lay quietly, but in the dim starlight he had seen the dark sweep of her lashes move - she was awake. And she had seen him look at her. Mal closed his eyes, intending to keep them closed for the duration, but the near-whispered surprise of her voice had him looking again.

"I was glad you were able to come for me. I'll admit, I was a little apprehensive when the shuttle lost power." Mal heard her take a breath, and exhale. He supposed "apprehensive" was Inara-speak for scared, given that she'd been alone, falling out of the sky into a strange and empty landscape.

"No trouble." A question occured to Mal. "If your client had a fueling station, it's a good bet he has a handyman on staff..."

Inara was quiet for a few moments. "It would have been a trifle complicated. He'd offered to extend my contract, but I'd declined."

This was more information than she'd ever offered about a client, and Mal felt a sudden clutching dread about what he might hear next. He kept his voice even and calm, reminded himself Kaylee was sleeping. "Not a pleasant fella?"

"No, he was perfectly amiable. I'd contract with him again. I just found myself wanting to come home."

Amiable. Mal wondered what that meant, tried to imagine how depressed he'd be if a woman he'd taken to bed with had risen up and pronounced him amiable. A game, to turn his mind away from the real question. What almost-hidden thing was it that he heard in her voice when she said that last word? "Less than an hour back, once we get started. After the biscuits - I always require biscuits of stranded women I come and fetch."

"I couldn't convince you to scour the territory and find us some bird's eggs? Maybe make a breakfast cereal out of prairie grass and dried flowers?" She was teasing him a little, and sounded happy to do it.

"Little late for bird's eggs - baby birds, though, they fry up tasty, once you pluck 'em."

"Dinner was very good." Apparently, she preferred less gruesome fare for breakfast. "Better than the protein bars I have in the pantry."

"Ah, I won you over. You looked a mite doubtful at first." Mal thought about rolling onto his side so he could see her. He didn't. "Campfire was pretty."

"Yes." The campfire had been pretty. Enjoyable too, especially since Kaylee had carried most of the conversation. But now Kaylee was asleep. Of course. She didn't have anything to be tense about, had been delighted with their impromptu adventure. Inara looked up at the draperies hanging from the ceiling, looked down at the pale outline of her arms against the coverlet. She hadn't for a second managed to forget that Mal was under the same blanket, in her bed, and she didn't know how she was going to get any sleep.

"You said the stream on your property was deep enough to swim in?"

"Ah, we mostly just splashed around, but there were a few deeper places."

She didn't hear herself sigh. "I would have thought that paradise when I was a child."
"You liked to swim?"

"For the longest time I didn't think so. But the problem wasn't the swimming, it was the pool. Indoors, and the noise echoed horribly, even with just a few - may I ask what's so funny?"

He stopped chuckling, but Inara could hear his smile. "You were a curlyheaded little fusspot, is what."

"I suppose I was." Inara fell quiet, remembering floating for the first time, held up by hands she trusted, smiling proudly up at a young face very like her own. "When I got the chance to swim outside - I loved it. I still do."

There was a long quiet, and then something different in Mal's voice when he spoke. "Ain't much opportunity for it, living on a spaceship."

"No, I suppose not." But I won't live on Serenity forever, she said to herself, absorbing the stony pain of this realization with her silence. Inara turned her head only a little, to see if he was still watching the ceiling.

"Maybe next time crash on a warm sunny beach." Mal stretched theatrically, then rested both hands behind his head.

"I hope I don't have to resort to such a desperate act - or crash again, for that matter."

"This your first time? Crashing?"

"Yes."

"Well, Kaylee says you got a talent for it. Didn't hurt the landing gear at all. You kept your wits about you."

"I tried. It was over so fast. And the land was quite flat and empty, which made landing easier." Not necessary to mention how worried she'd been, in the first moments after the crash, that the comm system might have been knocked out. Or, even more worrisome, her unacknowledged certainty that, comm system or no, Mal would have found her.

"In the service of accuracy, it might be said that I rescued you. In distress, as you were."

"Might be said by whom?"

"By...folks." He waited a moment and then restated his point. "You were in distress."

"Certainly." She knew he was waiting for more. "It might also be said that Kaylee rescued me, and that you cooked us dinner."

She heard his amused snort, and the whispering of the coverlet as he moved told her he was relaxing toward sleep. Inara closed her eyes.
A few minutes later, in her softest voice. "Mal?" He might be asleep. "Thank you."

Almost a whisper, a voice for her dreams. "Any time."

----------------------------

Something was different, different in a blissfully good way, a way that made him want to remain here, drifting in this wonderful half-sleep. He was warm, intoxicatingly warm, snuggled against her - ta ma de! Mal went perfectly still, trying to make sense of what he was feeling. Soft, alarmingly naked-feeling skin, radiating warmth, pressed against his chest, shifting minutely with each taken breath. Warm, hot, searing suddenly, every nerve ending of his painfully alert. Mal opened his eyes. The dim light allowed him to see an aurora of black curls resting against an elegant neck and a silky bare shoulder. Bare. Definitely Inara. Bare! All the way down to where his own shirtless arm covered hers. His gorram arm! Hell! A man closes his eyes for 2 minutes and his own gorram limbs are in revolt against him! Damn arm! No way I told it to go there. Ai ya, she's gonna be mad. He raised his eyebrows and peeked over the bare shoulder at exactly what there his arm had wandered off to. A tiny strap, a strap that rightfully should have been up on her shoulder doing its job, keeping this butterfly's wing of a nightgown on her body, was instead resting insolently and uselessly across the high, lush, inviting curve of her..of Inara's...of her...his brain was not making words.

His eyes had abandoned all discipline as well, and were busying themselves in the dim light looking at...things that would have him wretched for months. And his lungs carried right on breathing, breathing her in, her smelling like fresh-baked Heaven, if Heaven were a woman, and right now Mal was certain that it was. Predictably for his luck, Hell was the same woman. The hand that wasn't frozen in panic behind his head was curled around both of hers. She had them loosely clasped, intertwined confidingly with his own fingers, causing his fingertips to spread and come to rest gently against the uppermost curve of her warm...damnit to Hell, her breasts. He could feel a tiny rise and fall of satiny skin against his fingertips as she breathed.

He couldn't move. Moving would be a mistake. Moving might dislodge the strap and launch him out of sanity entirely. He wouldn't move. Moving might wake her. He wasn't moving. Not moving anything, no part of his body that she had snuggled against so comprehensively. He could see her ear, the rise of one pretty cheek, the corner of her mouth. She seemed to be smiling in her sleep.

Mal tried to estimate how much of this he would be able to endure. How long he'd be able to stop himself from thinking about all the things he was certainly not thinking about at this moment. How long he'd be able to withstand the growing need to move against her. What was the status of his other arm? Currently on duty as her pillow. He could feel her breath against it, tickling just a little when she exhaled. She was still asleep. He needed to think, needed to prepare a disclaimer that would make clear to all concerned that he had not transgressed in any way, that he was in no way responsible for the strap or the apparent...hand-holding. He needed to think about something other than how warm she was, how he could feel damn near every feminine curve of her above and beneath the blanket that rested over the perfect rise of her hips. Damnit! Should have worn his coat to bed.

Coat wouldn't have been any defense against the sound she just made, a soft, purring mmmmmm noise of contentment. His arm flexed to tighten around her, entirely of its own accord. Damn arm. Was that him, breathing like that? Sounded like gasping. He tried to stop, forced a swallow through his suddenly dry throat. Again he heard her, mmmmm, her tone a little higher this time and inarguably pleased-sounding. He saw her mouth move a tiny bit as she sighed. That, he told himself sternly, he could and would handle. To gain a small respite from the onslaught of feeling, he tried to ease his body away from her slightly. Then came real trouble.

She was moving. Moving her body, moving against him with a little, unabashedly petulant noise when he leaned away and then another sigh when she found him. As if she hadn't pressed close enough before, and wanted more. He heard himself gasp again, heard the blankets rustle as she nestled snugly into him. An excruciating sting rushed across the skin of his chest and belly, along the inside of his arm. She lay still for a blessed moment, then began again. The...wiggling. She moved her legs against his then lifted and dropped her shoulder, causing it to scrape softly against his bare chest. The troublesome strap slipped lower yet. She snuggled the curve of her backside against him, and he had to choke back the helpless moan that rose in his throat. Not her, though. He heard her again as she moved against him more restlessly now, a long, purring sigh of pleasure from between slightly parted lips.

The situation was growing increasingly desperate. He had to think. Not the easiest thing to do, as the first minutes of morning came on he could see more with every moment. Could see how sheer and filmy her nightgown was, could see the curves and shadows of the skin beneath, could see that the edge of the diabolical strap was now resting just a few scant millimeters above...where her curves stopped being curves and started being a breast, in earnest. He'd seen her in a low-cut dress before, but this was entirely different territory.

And she was moving again. Moving and purring, her fingers tightening slightly around his. Mal felt the shivers that ran through her body, and an awed realization surged through him of what might be happening to her as she slept. He clenched his eyes shut. Turned his face away. Held his breath, gritted his teeth in an effort to endure. Couldn't stopper his ears.

"Mmmmmal."

-------------------------------------

Deliciously warm, deliciously comfortable. Relaxed, with a very agreeable tingling sensation throughout her body. Fragments, threads of dreams floated through her awareness. Cool night air on her face, a voice from behind her: just out there, where I'm pointing, mei mei. A winding, pebbled garden path. Scarlet leaves, moving in the wind and showing their green undersides. A boat drifting slowly toward an illuminated shore. Mal, so close...the faint surprise she registered was immediately obliterated by the racing hunger of their kiss. Kisses. Shocking. Scalding. She was dizzy, blistering with need, holding on, greedy Claiming him. The force of her desire, hurtling her past ritual and ceremony, past anything she'd experienced, into something wild and primal and completely new. His skin was - his mouth - her hands - his eyes, his voice, his breath on her neck, oh, his hands...more, now, a revelation,...it was him, him, finally allowed somehow, finally him, she heard herself, heard the joyful wildness of her own voice as she called his name...

Dread. Icy, clanging dread. Inara snapped her eyes open and saw hands. Three hands. One too many. Hers, and one of his. Entwined. She willed herself to remain calm and still. Moved only her eyes to see his hand again, the bare arm encircling her body. The hand wasn't moving. Inara allowed herself a tiny bit of cautious relief. He appeared to be asleep, and perhaps she hadn't been as...loud as she feared. She kept her hands still. Kept her breathing light as she took in more details. His warm fingertips rested gently against her breast. To be fair, it appeared she was holding them there. One arm had somehow ended up as her pillow. The other lay heavy across her own arm. Inara looked down, saw the strap that had dragged off her shoulder under his bicep. Saw she was terribly close to being indiscreetly, well...exposed. Inara studied the situation. The strap wasn't going to budge as long as his arm remained draped across her, there was no use trying to adjust it right now. She'd have to move her hands, and he'd wake up. How convenient, a voice inside her mocked. You find that the most prudent course of action is to remain in bed, holding hands and - snuggling against the half-naked body of the man you're renting this shuttle from. The man you were just dreaming about. The man you love.

I'm not doing anything wrong, Inara protested to herself. I'm not taking advantage of Mal. I'm not hurting anyone. She let the warmth, the wonderful lean masculine strength of his body against hers register. Precious Buddha, he felt good. The lightweight silk of her gown had warmed to body temperature and she could feel his bare skin against her nearly as well as if she'd been wearing nothing at all. Every instinct told her to move against him, to turn in his arms and awaken him to the desire rushing through her. She was somehow fatally certain that Mal would be devastatingly...attentive. Inara found herself biting her lip to keep from whimpering at the thought.

Trying to concentrate, she closed her eyes. Immediately, the rest of her senses seemed to heighten. She became acutely aware of his breath against her neck, of how very close his mouth must be. Couldn't stop imagining what his kiss would feel like, right there. The hand she still held - how might it feel, for him to trail those fingers slowly, please, lightly over her skin? It was growing more difficult each moment to lie still and pretend to be asleep, innocently unaffected by such intimate nearness. To pretend not to notice that his sleeping body was responding to her in ways that made her breathing go shallow and ragged and her body ache with wanting him.

Desire for him was a pull she was used to resisting. Much more troublesome, the man she wanted was also the man she loved. The man she loved, and he was needing and alone. She had seen him shutter his eyes against her so many times, denying his hunger and pain. So strong, stronger by far than her own need, the wish to give herself, join with him, sweep away his bitter, spartan loneliness and in its place offer intimacy and joy.

Nothing would happen. Nothing could. With all that had passed between them, it was impossible. Unbearable, the thought of offering him love, and him making some miserable joke about the evident inadequacy of her last client, or how automatic her response sequence was upon awakening with a man. Worse, the sorrowful pity when he realized the whore had a heart and had given it away in vain. Most of all, the realization of what his pride would and would not allow. His likely response to her, whispering love and desire to him as he wakened? Pity, or suspicious fury that she was trying to gain some kind of advantage over him. He'd never forgive her for what he'd see as ruthless manipulation, for being willing to lie about love for her own gain.

She had to wake him.
"Mal," she whispered. Inara thought his breath might have hesitated for a moment, but he gave no answer. "Mal," again, a little louder. "Mal."

"Mmmmm," he mumbled against her neck, for a moment before his body went stiff.

----------------------

She's awake. How long's she been awake for? Mal thought. He'd been trying to content himself with looking at the curls and waves and shiny places in her hair while praying she stopped the...wiggling, and the...calling out. Calling his name. Mal? Mal is...me! I'm Mal! was the closest thing to a coherent thought he'd had at that moment, fighting to restrain himself from answering the sensual way her body moved and the heat in her voice. He'd lost faith in salvation long ago but still believed, from bitter experience, in punishment. Which is what this was, Inara asleep in his arms, affected as she seemed to be. A few days before, he had accused her of being cold. Now, some sadistic devil with a personal interest in his case was making damn sure he knew otherwise.

Don't mean a thing, he'd told himself sternly. Mal knew, from huddling together against the cold, from all manner of circumstances in the war, that sleeping people said and did...things. Things they might not want to act on in the light of day. Just because Inara had sounded like - well, like she had sounded - like a woman who - didn't mean she wanted him. Probably just a dream.

Oh, God! Inara, dreaming about him? What manner of dream? Mal was trying to put the brakes on this futile and sweaty line of thinking when he heard her whisper his name, her normal voice this time. He'd been too startled to answer. She called his name again, clearly awake and trying to get his attention. Still holding on to his hand with her soft fingers threaded through his own.

"Are you awake?" Inara was relieved. He'd been asleep, earlier. He hadn't heard what she'd said. How she'd said it.

"I'm awake."

She wasn't hissing, like she did when she was well and truly offended. Wasn't using her lofty scholar's voice, either, when she wanted to signal she'd had enough of his unenlightened Rim nonsense. She didn't seem overly mad, Mal thought, unless she'd only just awakened and hadn't had the opportunity to become mad yet.

"You are holding my hand." Her voice came out soft and amused. Inara felt him raise himself a tiny bit as if to confirm her statement for himself.

Mal spoke after assessing the situation. "Technically, you are holding my hand."

"Your hand is on top." She rustled the fingers that were under his hand.

"But your fingers are entwining in some fashion, otherwise I could - " he felt her fingers release his, heard her exasperated noise and began to lift his hand and arm, remembered the nonfunctional nightgown strap. Who knew what might befall the strap - oh, please, no falling - if he moved his arm just any old way.
"Uh, Inara, I think you got a bit of adjusting needs done with your pajama dress." Mal squeezed his arm against hers and paused. "Not that I was looking overmuch, but it seems to have...slipped."

"Oh! It must have got caught under your arm," Inara quickly tugged the strap out from under Mal's arm and back up on her shoulder "when you rolled onto me."

"When you rolled onto me. You are now in the middle of the bed," Mal couldn't help pointing out, "and I am still here on the side where I began."

"I didn't roll under your arm." The arm that was still resting on hers. It seemed to Inara that there was some kind of point at stake here, something to do with who would pull away first.

"Well." Mal raised his eyebrows. "I surely must have put my arm 'cross you to stop all that wigglin' about that you do."

"I assure you I do not wiggle about." She pronounced the phrase as if it were some singularly backward habit, but Inara was relieved. If he was calling what she did wiggling about, he couldn't have noticed how...affected she had been.

"You do at that. I have bedded down with troops more times than I care to recollect, and you are the wiggliest individual I have ever known." Mal reminded himself that he'd claimed a friendship with her, and tried not to dwell on how her body had felt moving against his.

"Oh? Soldiers don't wiggle?" He was still so close, although Inara noticed he'd pulled back discreetly as soon as she'd awakened him. She squelched the impulse to lean back against him.

"No they do not. Contrary to good military discipline, wiggling. You won't catch me or Zoe - or Monty wiggling, not a bit." He felt her start to shake. It took a moment to realize she was laughing.

"You're comparing sharing a bed with me to snuggling up with Monty? Oh, the mental image that makes! Did you hold his hands also?" And the trials of earlier that morning were nothing compared to how it felt now, with her happy and laughing in his arms. To keep himself, still caught by the enchantment of her laugh, from pressing a soft kiss onto her neck. To turn her in his arms and kiss her laughing cheeks, nose, mouth. To bask in the warmth of her shining eyes.

Inara had turned, softly laughing still, her shoulder resting against his chest, needing to look him in the face to see if he could possibly defend his comparison of her to Monty. Shaking her head in disbelief, but when she met his gaze, her laughter stopped. As did his. It was all she could do, as her eyes moved over his suddenly guarded and apprehensive face, to keep from reaching for him. The desire she thought she'd tamped down came rising through her, rushing insistently. Her breath caught just below her throat as the look they shared stretched into a longer and longer moment and she willed herself to keep still and see what would unfold. It was as much as she could do. She waited.

Inara watched Mal close his eyes briefly as he turned away, rolling to a sitting position on the side of the bed with his back to her. She heard him clear his throat as she moved the blankets down and turned away to sit on the opposite side of the bed.

"Would you pass me my robe, please? It's hanging - yes, thank you," she finished as Mal reached across the bed, the silk of her robe bunched in his hand.

Fancy robe. Figures - Companion gear. Wonder if she has that little request memorized. Some kind of closing act - get up, get dressed, good bye. Not new to her, waking up with...company. He remembered her voice - he knew he'd remember it forever. Didn't seem likely, for her to be dreaming about who - what she might have been dreaming about. She ain't exactly hurting for that kind of attention...is she? Mal was more curious than he'd ever let on about the exact details of her business transactions. Was a Companion's satisfaction not part of the deal? Could a man take her to bed and somehow not care? Were it ever me, I'd make damn sure the job got done before anyone's feet hit the floor.. He imagined man after man sitting where he now sat, and felt a stab of lustful envy, followed by a primitive, prideful thought he almost couldn't admit to: Bet she's never called out for a one of them in her sleep.

"Some good reason it's like a cryo unit in here? Like to freeze all of us." She saw Mal reach for his shirt, folded on a table near the bed.

'No, I -" Inara frowned. "Is the climate control system out?" For the first time that morning, she remembered Kaylee. Mal must have had the same thought - he was moving toward the door in his unbuttoned shirt and stockinged feet. "Did you plan to freeze us, Kaylee-girl, leaving this door open!"

Kaylee's laugh came in through the door. "Didn't want you snoozin' the day away, Cap'n!"

Mal shook his head as he walked back to the bed and sat down where he'd been. "She's having a laugh at our expense. Nice prank, that." He considered for a moment. "Reckon that's why we were sleepin'...close."

Inara nodded. "I have a vague recollection of feeling cold in the night - maybe it was early this morning. That would explain why I...moved toward you."

His voice was markedly less tense. "Must have been why I -" he began to reach for a boot, let out a soft chuckle of relief. "Didn't want you thinkin' I would take advantage of you in your sleep."

Inara sighed. For some reason it sounded like she was trying to be patient with him. "And you can be reassured to know that wasn't my intent either. Toward you." She heard him stop moving entirely.

"Huh?"

She was quiet for a moment. "We were pressed quite close together when I woke. Not all of you was asleep, Mal."

'"Well, that's only-" he was wrestling with his boots again now. Only because you're more tempting, even sound asleep, than any woman I've known. Only because it's been - longer than I care to contemplate. Only because of how you looked, and smelled, and felt, and sounded...

Inara's voice was calm and even. "I didn't want you to think I would exploit you for my own pleasure."
"Can't have that." Mal stood and began to fasten the buttons of his shirt.

"You must know you're a physically attractive man, and not at all annoying when you're fast asleep." Her pleasant, perfectly dry tone communicated her true message unequivocally.

Mal abandoned the buttons and turned toward Inara. "I could go back to sleep right now if you need me to, darlin'. Out like a light soon's my head hits the pillow." He waited until she turned around, her eyebrows raised in mild incredulity, before he continued. "You're welcome to exploit me six ways from Sunday. Not a thing you could do to me will wake me up, no matter how many times you crave to do them. Just let me rest," he put out a hand as if to slow her approach, "and I mean rest, rest, not the fun rest - for a few minutes in between rounds, and please don't judge me too harshly. I'm not as young as I once was."

Inara's smile was wide. "How generous of you."

"Do you need me to sign a waiver, some kind of affadavit? I'd swear with my hand on the good book, or anywhere else you'd like it." He pretended to think for a moment. "Fair certain I'm of the suggestible sort as well, so you can just whisper any special requests in my ear. Would you like me on my back, then?" He was complete solicitousness as he positioned last night's discarded pillow at the top of the bed.

"My heart's all aflutter." Her eyes were shining, she was near to laughing again, the most enchanting thing about her. Which, with all that he'd witnessed this morning, was saying something.

Mal hitched one thumb in a signal over his shoulder. "Let me just pop out for a second and tell little Kaylee you need to amuse yourself with my semiconscious body."

She didn't answer, just giggled in earnest now at his shameless silliness, and it felt like a supreme achievement. She woke up so cheery and sweet, and for once he hadn't said the wrong thing and angered her or scared her off. It was a pleasure he hadn't hoped for in a long time, waking up with a happy woman, and Mal found himself thinking he could gladly waste the entire day in the shuttle with her, just to be close to her and hear her voice and see her smiling face. If he ever had such a thing, had a day to waste without fretting about some new job or some old enemy, if he could spend it without having to explain or justify himself somehow, it would be right here with her. Or maybe, if he was being honest, back there on the bed with her.

But then he was moving, with her close behind him, because of the loud crash and the scream they'd both heard. Kaylee.

--------------------------

Mal was down the ramp before the sound had died in her throat. Kaylee saw him advance as she struggled against the grip of the filthy, muttering stranger who'd attacked her. Kaylee heard a thud and felt the man's grip on her loosen as Mal pulled at the man from behind. She'd never heard her captain make a noise remotely like he was making now, a terrifying roaring growl. His face hardly looked familiar.
Sick panic clutched at her insides as she backed away, still watching Mal grapple with the stranger. They were weaving erratically from side to side as they each gripped each other's upper bodies, trying for control. In a moment they were on the ground. The alien, terrifying noise continued. It was Mal.

And then Inara was with her, hands pulling Kaylee back, her elegant robe blowing around her as she stared at the struggle in front of her. Kaylee had never seen her friend so white.

"I don't - "

"He musta seen us and come to see if there's -" it was hard to think. She had been nearly finished with the repair to the shuttle, and a foul shadow had loomed over her. Blind luck, she had hit out wildly with her toolkit and slowed him for a moment. Something had flown out of his hand in that moment, to clang menacingly against the shuttle - Kaylee didn't know what it had been, maybe a knife.

The frantic gasp Inara made brought Kaylee out of her brief confusion. Mal and the stranger had rolled, in their struggle, onto the rocks near the stream, and the stranger had used his momentum to jar the Captain violently, several hideous times, against the edge of one boulder. Mal made an enraged noise, and grabbed viciously at the man's stringy hair, forcing his assailant's head back while he struggled to get out from under the attacker.

It was grotesque, nightmarish. Although thin nearly to emaciation and rather diseased-looking, the stranger was as tall as Mal. A fierce, unblinking aggression seemed to course through his sinewy body, and he punched, kicked, bit, and clawed at Mal with keening rage. Mal screamed something that Kaylee didn't understand, and Inara disappeared from her side.

---------------------------------

"Gun!" he had bellowed, in a voice she hardly recognized. The command in his voice shook Inara from her horrified paralysis, and she sped into the shuttle to find Mal's gunbelt. She freed the pistol with shaking hands and ran, praying all the while, back to where Mal still struggled with the attacker.

She'd never seen anything so fearsomely violent. It was apparent from the first moments of the struggle that the man was trying to kill Mal - several times he attempted to get both hands around Mal's throat, or to shove his head or body against a nearby rock. Inara could only assume that the man was some kind of outlaw who had happened upon their shuttle and, seeing Kaylee outside alone, had figured them for easy targets. There were tools scattered around the site, but Inara feared to get too close to the grappling men. They were turning over and hitting out so rapidly she could hardly pick a safe way to approach, much less strike out with any tool without risking hitting Mal. When he had screamed, Inara understood what he meant. One of them needed to have Mal's gun ready, in case the attacker got the best of him and came to attack her and Kaylee. In case the attacker killed Mal.

Inara was shaking, her mind blurred by the horror in front of her eyes. There was blood now, both men were sweating through their torn clothes. They scrambled across the ground, grappling each other in a sickening intimacy. Those were the arms around her this morning. That was the hand she had held. That was the body he'd surrendered to her this morning with his sweet, silly jest. And now he might die, he was fighting for his life against this sudden, bloodcraving nightmare of flesh.

She bit back an anguished, disbelieving scream as Mal and the stranger slid down the short, gravelly bank to the edge of the stream. Mal's attacker was trying to straddle him now, hands around his throat, clearly aiming to force his head under the water. Getting as close as she dared, some long, metal tool of Kaylee's suddenly in her hand, Inara watched Mal claw with one hand viciously at the man's face, gouging his eye, while the other grabbed at the chokehold around his neck. Both men were making gruesome, enraged noises, sounds she could hardly believe were human.

It seemed to go on for a long time, watching in sickeningly helpless desperation while Mal and the stranger tried to kill each other. Then suddenly, it was over. There was a rock in Mal's hand, a bloody rock, and the attacker sprawled limply in the gravel at the stream's edge. Mal was standing nearby, his hands braced against his legs in an effort to stay upright, bleeding from seemingly dozens of ugly wounds. His breath came rapidly as he watched the stranger. The other man lay twitching on his side, panting irregularly, his eyes staring unblinkingly at the water in front of him. His vestigial clothes were stiff with layers of grime. He had a clouding, rancid smell about him, long, feral fingernails, and the skin on his face, neck, and hands were as repulsively filthy as his clothes.

"Was he a Reaver, Cap'n?" Kaylee gave voice to all the terror of the moment with the one word.

Mal gasped out his answer. "No." His gaze traveled over Kaylee for a moment, then back to the wreck of a man on the ground. "No." Mal moved, put his hands on the man. Inara saw what he meant to do, and turned away as he did it. It took longer than Inara had imagined. No one but the dying man made a sound.

---------------------

Got his blood on her pretty robe when she helped him back to the shuttle. Laid him out on that bed of hers too, filthy as he was, while Kaylee sent Zoe a wave. Nothing funny about how she looked at him while she got those buttons undone and eased his shirt and trousers away from his sticky, torn skin. Probably none of her clients had got up from her bed and beat a man to death for her morning's entertainment. I'll only be a moment, she said as she brushed his hair back from his face.

Heard Zoe's voice as if she were standing right beside him. Get out of there. Keep him still. More words to Kaylee, soothing and kind. Kaylee lifted off soon after. Mal guessed she'd finished the repair job.

He found himself staring distantly at Inara's hands, moving intimately over him, barely shaking as they did. Warm water in the basin, some kind of soap that must have stung as she passed the sponge she held over the cuts and scrapes and scratches and bites. Watched her hurrying back and forth, back and forth, bringing clean water. She'd given him a smoother, Mal remembered, from the little medkit she'd fetched. There was some kind of salve, after the soap and the water and the gently blotting towels and the whispered prayers she carried on with, never checking his face to see if he appeared to object.
It hurt to breathe. Something was moving, clicking in his chest, something that shouldn't and usually didn't. He wanted his gun, tried to get up. She stopped him from rising, light hands on his shoulders and pleading eyes. '"Zoe said not to move. Please, Mal."

"Had to finish it." Now she'd seen what he was. Now she would leave.

Her hand went around one of his, gently but insistently. She waited until he met her eyes. "I know."

His voice came out as a mumble. "Didn't want you to see -" He was remembering the whole hideous thing. The need to get away moved him to try to push himself upright again.

"You may have broken something when you -" There was fear on her face as she touched his shoulders again. "Just wait for Zoe, Mal."

"Not fixin' to die, Inara." The pain was making sweat break out across his skin. "Just messin' up your bed until I get back to my boat."

He looked at her while she looked at the battered hand she held. Her voice was just above a whisper. "You wouldn't have been here if it weren't for me."

If she was going to cry, he needed to get away or pass out. Or both. Mal tried to rise again, but stopped at the fresh alarm in her eyes.

"Please!" Her voice was high and a little panicky, but when she spoke again, she sounded calmer. "Please, Mal. It won't be long before we're home, just...lie still. Please."

He nodded, and saw the relief in her eyes. But she kept watching him and saw the shivering start - the air in the shuttle was still cool from this morning, and they'd had to pull off most of his clothes. Inara pursed her lips in concern, then pulled one side of the coverlet over him. Leaned over him, took the other half of the blanket in both hands, and draped that across him as well.

"Is that better?"

It was warmer, and he tried to stay still but with the blankets pulled up he couldn't see everything, and he needed to be able to see. Their weight lay unfamiliar against his skin, his screaming, hypervigilant nerves. He couldn't, it was too much, and he heard his own choking breath as he pushed and kicked the blankets off his chest, struggled to sit up.

"It's ok." Her face was so pale. "Just...stay here with me. Please." And she sat down on the bed, then slowly stretched out next to him, pressed herself, shaking, against what she evidently judged to be his less wounded side, her breathing hitched and shallow, her anxious eyes never leaving his face. "Just til we get back to Serenity, Mal."

One arm she lay so gingerly across his collarbone, her hand resting curled like a sleeping leaf against his neck. He unclenched his arm and circled her in and she sank slowly down until her face rested against his shoulder. His hand settled in halting exhaustion on the skin of her hip where the gown had fallen away. Her bare, restless knee held the middle of his thigh below it. He was watching and so he could see that she shut her eyes tightly as she said what he realized she needed to hear as much as he did. "We're going home."