There was something surreally but legitimately preciously perfect in the way she was holding a half emptied wine glass along her abdomen, her head turned laughingly bright into the way Wendy was telling her and Venus a story that he hadn't necessarily needed to hear. The lay of her hips was slanted back into the break of the counter, her other hand braced flat against it as her head turned into his entrance, the caramel of her eyes too near to innocently accepting in light of the day's rigged up length.
"You boys are late." Venus' tone tripped over them lightly, a trepidation in her tone that proved how noticeable his swayed stalling in the doorway had been.
Ally's hand blindly shifted the wine glass to the counter and he blinked a wincing look over the way she was wearing her gunbelt and badge with her jeans, her hips lifting off the edge of the counter as she studied him. "What?"
"Nothin'." He hushed into the kitchen, licking against his lips as he exhaled and passed around a forced smile, ignoring the other two women as he turned his steps forward into meeting the stretch of her. "Just been a long day."
She was knowingly silent in the face of his too obvious lying, her eyes tightening over his face before he curled hands against her and pulled. The jamming line of her spine was straight at first but he figured he'd found a forgiveness when she laxed into his leaning, her jaw angling along his head as he curled on her. Her palms worked into the tensed muscles of his upper arms, the dark of her glance lifting behind him to the blanked blue way Trager was meeting her glance. He lifted his hands into a weariness of his own before stretching a palm into the way Venus was already moving toward him.
"Need to talk, Lieutenant." The words were rubbed along her ear on a hummed exhaustion as his hands shifted up her ribs.
"Seems we do." She lagged quietly in response, letting her fingers work into the tensing of his arms before she reached back, "I'm bringing the wine."
The dipped and patiently tired smile he lifted was warmed by the blink he gave her as he reached past the glass she'd picked up and grabbed the whole bottle.
"Christ, Scotty," she blatantly watched the pass of his hips to his ass as he moved from the kitchen, "you think I'll need the whole bottle? That bodes well."
"May I remind you," she was all long and lean as she swayed on a heeled turn, her pants low along her hips and the belt riding the flaring of her pelvis as she stepped backwards down the walk, the bottle wrapped up in long fingers. "that I am an officer of the law."
"I hadn't forgotten." He glanced down at the way she'd silently pressed the mostly empty glass into his hand in exchange for the bottle, wondering how it had even happened. "We need to - "
"May I also remind you," Ally dipped the words between them on a slow angling onto his bike, voice hazing lower as she sat sidelong onto it. "that we don't discuss business."
"Are you drunk?" he blinked a thinned glance into the brightness of her eyes under the outdoor light, "Did Venus get you - "
"Well," she swung the bottle between them as she crossed one long leg, drawing his glance down her boots and back up as she stretched her spine straight, "you're late. Third bottle, Braveheart."
He cocked a lazed glace over the stretch of her, the shirt she was wearing long in the sleeves but still tight right along everything else, "Y'know that there isn't a Scot in existence who appreciates that joke?"
"May I also remind you," she continued on with a lightened tone, keeping fingers curled around the bottle neck even as one lifted to point in his direction, "I have a gun."
He arched a brow at her, stuffing his hands into his pockets as he leaned his steps forward, angling his head over her buzzed haughtiness, "Your overall point, love?"
"Just reminding you in case what you have to tell me is as bad as the way you're looking at me says it is." She lowered the bottle wearily, hanging it to her side as she slowly shook her head, her hair loose as she lifted her jaw, "Because you look like…"
He cocked his head cautiously into the loss of her words, bending to place the glass beside the front wheel before rising back into her watching. "Like?"
"Like you're gonna break my heart again." She blinked an aching honesty in his direction.
"Again?" Chibs frowned into a sharp swallow, the oxygen feeling sharded down his throat.
"Scotty, you break my heart once a day." The lift of her free hand waved idly between them as she shrugged, banking her glance away as she breathed out a laugh to soften the words, "I don't even try to pick up the pieces anymore."
"Ally."
Her eyes slid back to his slowly, something in the color of them fractured like glass and cracking light, "Just… kick 'em under the table."
His shoulders dropped in a weariness that aged the way he was standing before her, "Ally."
"Hide 'em in couch cushions. Like loose change." She teased the bottle against him, nudging it playfully into his chest to rock him back slightly, a cagey smiling playing over her lips that said she was drawing strength back into her shoulders regardless of the vulnerability of her admittance.
His hand braced onto the handlebar nearest him, his head angling back and forth over her slowly, "Althea."
"Trade 'em for those chocolates I like." She took a swallow from the bottle but didn't loosen her eyes from his as he watched the wipe of her tongue against her lips after.
"The dark ones y'hide in the liquor cabinet?" He twitched her a bittersweet smile.
Her eyes widened large as she angled her jaw, shifting the bottle away from the way he was reaching against the back of her head to draw her closer, "You thieving bastard. I knew some were missing."
"I dunno if I can beat him, Ally." He bent his jaw along the side of her head, disregarding the aching in the way her voice had dropped and replacing it with a range of affectionate honesty that he hadn't realized he was entirely ready to give her. "Not the way y'want me to."
Her head turned into his, the tip of wine on her breath as she rubbed her lips against the corner of his mouth before kissing against him, "I want you to want to beat him that way, Scotty. Because it's what you want, not because it's what I want."
"I want to beat him bloody, darlin'." He countered sharply into drawing his head back, turning his jaw down far enough to catch the pretty softness of her eyes, "Can't change the way I am. Y'know that."
"I know." Her empty hand was fiddling the hem of his pocket and he smirked into the realization that she couldn't keep still, the bright buzzing of the wine lighting up her eyes.
"But I want to do it your way." He shifted the weight of his boots, dragging her up tighter into the way he was leaning, "Because I'm tired of things gettin' bloody. And right now your way gets me more than I've gotten the other way, yeah?"
Ally sucked in a deep swallow of the close scent of him, blinking into the familiarity of its heat, "Tell me."
"He's got me pinned. Need you to stay off him. Feed everything to Patterson but keep your hands clean, all right?" He slowly dug into her loose and lush hair, tipping her head back with a slow and softened pulling, "He's on Kerrianne - "
"All right." She nodded quickly into the way his voice frayed worry on his daughter's name, "It's okay."
The sure acceptance of the situation surprised him enough to search over the flush that rode her normally pale cheeks, a smile broaching his lips as he watched her blink slowly and drop her head back into the gripping of his fingers.
"You're adorable when y'can't hold your drink."
"I'm holding it just fine." She idly lifted the bottle to his side and sloshed it playfully as she blinked feigned innocence at him.
"But it's got your mouth runnin' over." Chibs grinned into taking a kiss off her pleadingly lifted lips, "Still somethin' in your eyes you haven't said yet. Have another drink."
She banked him an arched glance, "Don't tease me, Telford."
"Come on then, one more round. I'll join ya, Lieutenant." His fingers dropped and tapped the bottom of the bottle blindly as he gave her a giddied wink.
"Wanna take me home?" She asked into a lusted taunting as he drew the bottle from her, her smile flicking wider when he groaned her a darted look.
"Take another drink and tell me the secret you're keepin'." He braced the bottle between them, blinking surety into his leaning, "Then I'll take ya home, love."
"My secret?" Ally nipped her teeth along her bottom lip, both her now emptied hands rising under his cut to pull and pry tightly against his belt, unchecking his booted balance.
"Mmm." The noise roiled quietly off his throat as he cocked her a sharp glance, "Know you've got one."
"Caffee isn't dead. I know exactly where he is and what he's doing." Her fingers suddenly plucked the bottle back away from him and she took another broad swallow off it, drawing it from between them as her lashes lowered on the mingled up colors in her eyes. "I'm just not telling you because you're possessive and volatile and violent and every time you look at me naked you flinch."
He winced her a sad glance of knowing, realizing silently that she was right, "Tell me."
"No." She shirked off confidently. "We don't discuss - "
"Tell me, Althea." His hand caught up into the bottom hem of her shirt, tugging against it tightly as he crowned over her, "I want him."
"No. You wanna hurt him." She admonished softly.
His jaw flicked tense into the pinned glossing of his eyes, "You're goddamn right I do."
"Because you more than like me." She was letting her eyes drift shut into her sudden smile, intentionally not matching the way he was watching her.
"You're goddamn right I do." He kept watching her on the repetition, marking the moment when the smile broadened farther and feeling it draw on his lungs.
"Braveheart jokes are a little funny." Ally lifted her eyes and shoulders into a stalled up shrugging that made her seem young and brashly bright in her taunting humor.
"They're really not." He sloped her hair back off the flush of her face, holding it back from the way she was looking up at him.
"Better than sheep jokes." She nodded amusedly.
"You wanna sleep alone tonight?" Chibs cocked humor into the long rubbing of his fingers against the base of her scalp, letting her hair slake completely over his hand and wrist.
She damn near purred a pleasure into his touches, her eyes thin as she smirked up at him and laid her tongue along her bottom lip. "Kilt jokes?"
He shifted his hand and wiped his finger lightly along the line of her smile, exhaling yards of bemused patience into her playfulness, dimples twitching briefly into the depth of his scars, "Think I do love you, Lieutenant."
"You… what?"
It was probably just the sound of the bottle and the way it thunked sloshing onto the pavement of the driveway but it sounded like a car had blown up and barraged her ears before leaving a ranging echo of quiet off the house and back.
"Naw, you're not that drunk. Not repeating it." He taunted the whispering over her as he angled his shoulders down, drawing her head higher into the smirk he gave her.
"There was an explosion in my head. It was very loud. I didn't hear what you said." The sudden pulling clutch of her fingers into his shirt leaned him farther over her as her voice threaded softly quietly innocent but still giddy, a smile brightening the tint of her eyes, "My ears are ringing. Say it louder, Filip."
Chibs just grinned a chaste kiss against her lips, tugging light against her hair before he withdrew from her reaching, "Saying g'night. Then takin' you home, Sheriff."
Her exhalation seethed annoyance as he moved toward the house, "Scotty?"
"Before you drunkenly shoot somebody with a loaded pistol on your belt and three bottles of wine under it."
"I'm nowhere near that incompetent." She argued as she curled her arms against her chest, catching the way he glanced back in pausing.
"You coming with?"
Ally pressed off the bike, dropping to catch up the glass and bottle as she stepped toward him slowly on heeled boots, watching his smile meet her steps, "You'd be cute in a kilt."
"Althea."
She just passed by him with a lidded glance and a haughty shrug, "Easy access."
