If you haven't read the trilogy I was working on for the last five months or so (Anniversary, Renewed, and Burned), I just wrapped it up, so please check it out! You'll be the lucky ones who didn't have to deal with all my annoying cliffhangers.
Anyway, this is literally like the last post-Tahoe fic I can write, because it's going down TONIGHT. I'm so excited. The promo pics for episode three give me hope about the premiere…all I can say is that Paige looks a lot more flirty with Walter than mad. Fingers crossed! But I wrote this after being awake for way, way too long so it might suck, just warning you.
"You didn't kiss him like you kissed me."
There was a logical lead-up to that statement in his head. He couldn't stop himself from flashing back to the moment he arrived at the hotel, wide awake even though he'd had the longest day of his life, only to find Paige fused to Tim. There was no way to ignore it, so he settled for analyzing it, hoping to gain some insight into whether or not she had truly moved on.
But contrasting that with their kiss—awkward, messy, intense, her hands doing all the work his couldn't—had given him a bit of an epiphany. He'd never meant to say it out loud, but he did and now Paige was staring at him like he lost his mind, which was possible. He had been awake for nearly seventy-two hours.
He muttered it quietly, too, mostly just to himself, but Paige was clearly standing just close enough in the kitchen to hear him. Her car had sustained some damage during the case and he offered to take her home, which Tim reluctantly accepted since he had to wake up in four hours for a physical exam. Ralph passed out in the backseat, and Walter carried him up the stairs and tucked him into bed while Paige brewed a pot of coffee just so he'd have enough energy to make it home.
They weren't really talking about anything, just standing on opposite sides of the counter and staring intently at the coffeemaker. Paige was a little tense around him ever since he'd gotten on the plane in Tahoe. He knew she didn't buy his story of going to see the festival, but she didn't quite know what to think, and there wasn't exactly ample opportunity to set the record straight.
And now…now, when they were alone, and Ralph was asleep and Tim wasn't going to come waltzing in unexpectedly, this would have been a great time for Walter to ask her to talk, but until he had his moment of brilliance and blurted it out like a child with no verbal filter, he'd been deathly silent. He still wanted to tell her—he needed to tell her like he needed air, which also seemed to be in short supply right now—but all he could think about was the distance she had been consciously putting between them all day. Nothing felt right, nothing was the way it was supposed to be, and now to cap it off, he'd said the most genuinely wrong and confusing thing possible.
Paige just blinked for a few seconds, tightening the grip of her fingers on the edge of the counter and averting her gaze. "How did you…" She stopped. "You saw us? At the hotel?"
Well, it looked like they were having this conversation after all. Walter considered telling her to forget he'd said anything, forget the coffee and just forget every event that happened after she left for Tahoe with Tim. But he couldn't go back. Not from this. "Uh…yes."
Her eyes narrowed, but she was still watching the machine like it was going to give her the answers she wanted. "So you were…spying on us?"
"What? No." Walter cleared his throat, sounding surprised by the accusation even though in retrospect it wasn't too far off. "I went to the hotel and I…I saw you. So I left."
"Okay, back up." Paige finally twisted around, resting her elbows on the breakfast bar and bringing her hands up to her temples. "Walter, maybe I'm just braindead right now, but I don't understand the timeline of events here. I need you to start at the beginning. You gave Tim and I the tickets, and then decided that you wanted to go to the festival and stay at the same hotel? Why wouldn't you just keep all of your arrangements, then?"
Just tell the truth, Walter, what the hell are you waiting for? A sign? "You're right, it doesn't make sense because…that's not what happened." Crossing his arms over his chest, he rocked slightly on his heels and alternated between glancing up at her and staring at his feet. "I told you there was another reason I drove to Tahoe. I didn't go for the festival. I went to tell you…uh, to ask you…not to be with Tim."
That was enough for Paige to finally drop her hands and make eye contact with him, raising her brows. She was looking at him like he was speaking another language, and why on earth had he chosen this moment to tell her? Like there hadn't been enough bombs dropped today.
"Are you serious?" He thought that might be a rhetorical question, but he wasn't sure if she expected him to answer until she continued without waiting for him. "You encourage Tim to ask me out—yeah, I know about that—and then you tell us to go away for the weekend, just so you can swoop in and stop it? What kind of twisted game is that?"
A game? He never realized she would see it that way. Walter wasn't particularly fond of games, but he knew they were supposed to be fun, and watching her with Tim had been anything but. "That's not what I meant," he insisted, the fire in her expression almost more off-putting than the missile they'd evaded earlier. "I wasn't just going to interfere with your relationship and then leave, Paige. I went to Tahoe for you. To tell you t-that I made a mistake and see if there was a chance that you might…you know."
She was frustrated with him. That was an emotion he'd learned to identify, since it was so often directed at him, but it wasn't always useful since he still didn't know what to do when he observed it. Paige straightened herself up and walked around the counter, meeting him at the corner where it connected with the living room and glaring up at him.
"Why did you have to drive seven hours to say that, Walter?" she snapped. It had all the venom of shouting, but she didn't want to wake up her sleeping son. "I was right here. I stood right in front of you and I gave you every opportunity to keep me here and you told me to leave."
Walter swallowed, thinking all the wrong things now that she was closer to him, because he should have been trying to address her concerns but all he could focus on was how good it would feel to melt into her.
"And now!" Paige hissed, taking another step toward him until they were impossibly close, and they were both delirious and overwhelmed and he should just walk away, save them both from trouble, but how could he? "I'm standing right here, again, and you still can't tell me what you want! If you would just—."
He kissed her.
This...this was stupid and reckless and probably going to make her very angry, but she'd been practically daring him to do it, and he regretted the last time he failed to read between the lines, so here they were.
Walter's hands had gripped her waist to crush her against him, and now they were trailing up her sides, over her tank top but under the flimsy sweater she'd thrown on. This wasn't exactly the romantic way he had imagined telling her, but she certainly wasn't fighting him as his lips pressed forcefully against hers. Her fingers were in his hair, on his face, just like the first time, but somehow even more frantic and desperate.
Through the haze of whatever sensation was taking over his body as he clutched at her, the genius felt Paige moving backward and traveled with her. The air was knocked out of his lungs as she pushed him onto the couch and settled on top of him, recapturing him before he'd even recovered. She moaned deep in the back of her throat as his palms danced along the outside of her thighs, up to her waist again and just under the hem of her shirt. Her skin was blazing and Walter couldn't imagine how he hadn't passed out yet from the stifling heat and lack of oxygen.
He wanted this and he wanted her, forever, but this was frenzied and muddled and she wasn't his yet. Walter needed to know, needed to make sure that she wasn't going to sober up later and call this a mistake and tell him to leave—he would deserve it, but he didn't think he'd survive it. "Paige," he gasped, ducking his head as she reached for him again and resting his forehead against her shoulder. "Paige, stop."
When she pulled back, he could see the hurt in her eyes and she just shook her head, looking disappointed. She pressed against his chest, starting to climb off the couch, and he had to grab her waist firmly to keep her pinned to him. Paige stared down at him, the darkness in her eyes sending a fresh wave of heat through his body.
"Stay," he said simply, and she relaxed slightly back into his arms. If she'd thought for even a second that he wanted to—or would be able to—walk away from her after that, he'd screwed up fiercely. "I just…Tim…" Walter wasn't capable of full sentences at the moment, so he hoped she would understand. "Are you…?"
He wasn't even quite sure what he was asking her, but her features softened and she linked her fingers behind his neck, grazing his skin with her thumb. "Like you said. It's not the same with him." Uncertainly, she slid her hand to his cheek and cradled his jaw. "You and me…?"
Walter nodded, and Paige smiled softly before claiming his lips again, gripping the collar of his shirt in her fists. Walter marveled that just like that, they'd managed to convey more honesty than they had with millions of words over the past two years. He wasn't even sure that she'd heard him when he mumbled that he loved her, for good measure, but he wasn't concerned.
One way or another, she would know.