Once again I'm going to start by thanking everyone for reading the last chapter and special thanks to eelise187, 098, jujuone23, MkSC, mullallygurl, sundishine2, Elaine Huang, Thaleis Von Paris, seaford71, MaxiP99, Cris and the two Guests for leaving such lovely and welcomed reviews. I would continue to write this story down regardless because one day I hope to read it myself but it heartens me to know that others are reading and enjoying it too. I'd very much appreciate your thoughts on this chapter because it's no exaggeration to say I've put a hell of a lot of time and effort into it and I'm rather pleased with it. If you want to find me on Twitter I'm DHPLover.
This chapter takes place at the very end of White Lies Part Two 5x12 and is self-explanatory. It could work as a stand-alone story if not for a fair number of running gags in it. Note: This chapter does use one piece of M type language at the very beginning and I step right up to the line in a couple of flashback sections (the second of which I had only intended to write a few lines about but the more I remembered what I'd written about it in previous chapters I decided to expand on it a little more) which means I'm well out of my comfort zone writing that sort of thing but I wanted to give it a go but came to a halt before anything happened.
A lot of the dialogue for this chapter was written nearly two years ago after the episode first aired (in particular the chat they have about Rusty and the 'D' word) with all Andy's random facts coming courtesy of the QI Elves. Andy also tells a rather revolting and ridiculous story in this chapter and I'm ashamed to admit it is one hundred percent true but it happened to me and my Godfather on New Year's Eve 1988 instead when I was about 8 and if you find it unbelievable right now you should imagine what my teacher said when I told her about it when I returned to school after the holidays. I'm relatively sure she never asked 'What did everyone do over Christmas?' in her classroom ever again.
This is the longest chapter to date at over 73,000 words and is very silly, fluffy and without an ounce of plot in it so tea is needed more than wine this time around. According to my timeline the action takes place very early on the Wednesday morning with Sharon going to Confession sometime on the Sunday (two days after the shooting) which means they'd been living together for eleven days.
As usual I don't own any of these characters etc etc.
Enjoy.
At the End of the Day - Chapter Thirty Eight
Andy rolled over in bed with a little contented moan escaping from the back of his throat before he woke up with a start when his hand didn't land on a warm body beside him, his head snapping up from his pillow as looked around as best he could. He was alone in bed but more importantly than that, a hand sliding across the sheet revealed that Sharon's side of the bed was cold meaning that she had been gone for a long time and once again he'd been too dead to the world to notice. He craned his neck and squinted to look at the clock on Sharon's nightstand. It was just shortly before three o'clock in the morning, yet again. He flopped back down against his pillow with a sigh, his hands coming up to cover his face.
"Fuck!" He sighed again. "I'm going to have to start cuffing her to the God damn bed."
Although Sharon had been chattier that evening over dinner, her appetite for food and for a normal evening in with him and Rusty slowly returning, pillow talk had still been somewhat limited, Andy so tired that he was asleep before his head even hit the pillow but she still wasn't herself. It was the fourth night in a row that Andy had woken up in the wee small hours and found himself alone, the bed beside him cold and meaning that she had snuck off and away from him as soon as he had gone to sleep. But unlike the first night when she went on a wine, guilt and grief filled cleaning spree and eventually locked him out on the balcony to get him away from her for a few moments, the second time he had found her curled up on the couch and watching The Way We Were with a large glass of wine. She was unable to sleep that night but still he did finally manage to get her to go back to bed with him again once the film had finished (not prepared to leave her alone with Robert Redford in his uniform even if he was only on TV) but how long she actually stayed in bed with him afterwards he didn't know. She was at least lying next to him when their alarm went off the following morning even though she didn't look like she'd just woken up, her hair far too tame for that.
On the third night when he woke up and discovered himself alone he found her sitting on the balcony, propped up in a chair and wrapped in his green bathrobe with the hood up, looking like she was preparing for a boxing bout as she sipped on a large cup of tea. He took it as a small sign of improvement that her chosen beverage was camomile tea rather than a bottle of red wine unlike the previous two nights. Despite the apparent improvement it still took him a couple of minutes before he found the courage and ventured outside to join her, the fear that it may have been some sort of elaborate ruse to lock him out again as she battled, largely in vain, to stop taking her anger and her upset out on him. He joined her anyway and she was honestly glad of the company despite how much she wanted him to go and get some much needed sleep himself. That night he couldn't get her to move at all and despite sounding better she still wasn't one hundred percent back to her old self so he sat behind her, pulling her against his chest while he wrapped his arms around her and looked at the view on the horizon until he eventually fell asleep through sheer exhaustion but Sharon stayed awake, her mind still unable to switch off and allow her to recharge her batteries. Rusty found them still sitting on the balcony when he got up the next morning, Sharon's bright and cheery exterior only serving to increase his fear over her mental wellbeing despite the reassurances that Andy continued to offer him.
Sharon had actually started to remind Andy of Nicole a little bit. To his eternal shame he wasn't around for most of her childhood due to work and then his drinking which led to his divorce but while he was in her life and relatively sober (most of the time anyway), Nicole was the very definition of a 'Daddy's Girl.' Bedtime dictated that Andy (if he wasn't at work) was the one that had to put her to bed and read her a story, possibly even twice. The problem was she would never stay in bed for very long. On an average night she'd usually put in her first appearance about ten minutes after he had kissed her goodnight and put on her nightlight. Only wanting 'Daddy,' Andy would pick her up and take her back to bed again but by the time he made his way back to the living room and turned to sit down, Nicole would be standing right behind him again, following him with all the stealth of a ninja. That was how it felt with Sharon during those restless nights only without the same kind of bedtime stories being involved.
With another exasperated sigh, his frustration clearly showing, Andy slowly climbed out of bed and padded his way towards the bedroom door, more than a little unsteady on his feet and still groggy from being mentally and physically exhausted, not just from all that had happened over the previous few days but the lack of sleep too from his frequent trips to the living room to find Sharon in the middle of the night. On his way to the door Andy once again kicked one of the boxes piled in the corner containing his belongings that they'd still yet to find time to unpack, work well and truly getting in the way of clearing out the closet. That made it forty six times he'd kicked one of those boxes since moving into the condo eleven days earlier, surely he pondered, some sort of record.
As had become tradition Andy hopped up and down on the spot for a moment as he held his toe, it becoming his ritual like finding Sharon missing over the previous few days, if anything his annoyance only becoming worse because he kept doing it without thinking, his foggy brain clearly at work. "Shit!"
He carefully felt his toe, it getting more sore and swollen by the day (lucky not to have broken it already and wearing a pair of clown shoes to work seeming all the more likely before the end of the week if he banged it one more time) before he set off towards the living room with a slight limp. He briefly closed his eyes as he moved, desperately hoping not to find her cleaning again. Much to his relief Sharon was sitting in the chair closest to the television and looked truly at peace with herself for the first time in days but even so she was still staring into space with her right hand to her temple and shaking her head ever so slightly, a worrying sign of her continued mental unrest over everything that had happened and the challenges that continued to face them at work.
He very slowly and very quietly walked over to her, trying to keep his voice low when he spoke so as not to startle her since it was clear she didn't have the faintest idea she was no longer alone. "Sharon" he said, his voice a low rumble as he approached her.
"Oh" Sharon said in response as she looked up and handed him her hand as he knelt down beside her, a smile etched on her face as she looked at him adoringly. There was no denying that she was sad that she had probably woken him once again but she was utterly delighted to see him nonetheless.
Despite the fact that Andy had been staying the night more often than he hadn't over the months that led up to him finally moving in with her officially (usually staying there every night except when he went to an AA meeting across town since they decided to move in together), having him there more permanently was still so new to her and much to her surprise it was a constant source of joy despite her nerves about it. She really had worried a lot in the very beginning, just the idea of completely sharing her life and her home with someone other than her children for the first time in over twenty years. She worried she would feel suffocated by him (or vice versa), in need of an escape so that she could breathe and it would end up straining their relationship more than it would enhance it especially since they lived and worked together but she was extremely relieved to say that hadn't been the case. Yes they'd only been living together for a grand total of eleven days and they were still in the midst of what could best be described as a 'honeymoon period' (despite the shooting in the courtroom) so the real test was still to come when life settled back down but regardless she was extremely happy by what they had achieved up until that point and she utterly adored having him there with her permanently, sharing her life completely with him although how long that was going to last she wasn't quite sure, but she was going to enjoy it while she could.
It was actually hard for her to believe that it wasn't all that long ago that she insisted they didn't share a bed during an active case, telling him on more than one occasion that she needed to focus on the task at hand without distraction to get her mind working properly and he was the very definition of a distraction when he was in her bed. But that was the point. Andy, in her home, in her bed, in her life was the perfect distraction even when she didn't realise she really needed one. She had missed him when he wasn't there and that was despite spending all day together at work, missing her boyfriend and how relax she felt just by having him sitting next to her on the couch. Despite her nerves that still lingered on the subject of living together, having Andy there in her life, in her home, in their home as it now was permanently with not even the sanctuary of work to hide from him was simply bliss…as long as he continued to stack the dishwasher properly, never left the toilet seat up, put his shoes away and any wet towels and agreed that, even though they never ran out of things to talk about, that a companionable silence was not the worst thing in the world for two adults who loved each other.
"You okay?"
"Yes." She nodded at him, a very big, bright smile on her face as she sought to make sure that he could see it was a genuine smile and therefore he didn't need to worry about her because she was not only looking but also feeling an awful lot better than she had been. "Did I wake you?"
He shrugged slightly as he said "No, I rolled over," before pausing to push his lips to the back of her hand, "and you weren't there." The tone of his voice was nothing but kind and loving, showing not even the smallest hint of the frustration he was feeling due to her frequent moonlight trips away from him. She nodded at him with another smile, unable to hide how pleased she was to see him even though she'd rather he be asleep. "You still troubled with shooting Dwight?"
"No. I can feel it now." He frowned at her as he nodded and tried his hardest to understand, the pair of them never likely to be on the same page (no matter how hard he tried and he really had tried his hardest to understand) when it came to her guilt over her lack of guilt at killing a multiple murderer but the rest of what she was feeling he could fully grasp. He was unable to hide just how pleased he was that he had been able to help her in a small way while the rest was left up to Father Stan who was more than able to help her realise what she needed in order to move forward in her life. "I still don't trust Wildred Darnell" she confirmed, Andy leaning back and away from her a little while he still clutched her hand tightly in his, more focused on what she had to say as her Lieutenant rather than the love of her life for a brief moment as it was clear that was who see needed right then even though they were dressed for bed and in their living room. "But Detective Nolan said that Graff may have a partner, and these murders have weight." She gestured with her free hand like she could almost feel it in the palm of her hand. "A weight I was having trouble feeling until today. So my question is, who is that heavy? Of all the people we've connected to this case, who is that heavy?" Sharon's mind raced for a moment as she stared into the distance with unfocused eyes, continuing to search for an answer, doing it on her own if she needed to because with the loss of Chief Taylor as well as DDA Rosen, it was a crime that she had taken very personally.
Andy frowned at her as he continued to hold her hand. He was beyond pleased that Sharon not only looked but also felt so much better while at the same time Captain Raydor seemed to be making some real progress in the case too but it was three o'clock in the morning and neither of them had slept all that much over the previous five nights in a row and if he was ever going to get her the rest and relaxation that she so clearly needed then he had to get her back into bed and provide her with a suitable distraction to enable her to clear her mind and finally go to sleep.
"Which is a great question Captain and one we really need to find the answer to and quickly at that but right now Sharon we're at home and we're most definitely off the clock." With an adoring smile she laughed at him, conceding his point in the matter with a little nod of her head. "It's also just gone three o'clock in the morning so I definitely think you should come back to bed with me." Despite still kneeling on the floor he tugged at her hand in an attempt to make her stand.
"Oh Andy I'd only keep you awake if I did" she told him as she smiled at him weakly. Unlike the first time he had woken in the middle of the night and found her missing and cleaning the hell out of the kitchen, she had left their bed this time solely to ensure she didn't wake Andy up with her continued tossing and turning as she struggled to find a way to sleep.
"You still can't sleep?" he asked her a little pointlessly given that if she could sleep, she would be asleep. She shook her head a little sadly, wishing she could but had sadly long since accepted it just wasn't on the cards for her in the foreseeable future. "Well if it's not about Dwight, do you want to tell me why?"
She sighed as she battled long and hard to not get emotional about it all, thinking that she had shed enough tears of late and although more would be fully justified, allowing herself to get that upset again wasn't going to help her sleep. "I can see it every time I close my eyes."
"Taylor?" he asked. He asked the question because it was the same thing that he saw every time he closed his eyes, Taylor getting shot and being unable to stop it and then Dr Morales trying his hardest to save him while he just stood there and could do nothing to help.
"Taylor, DDA Rosen, Dr Joe, Dwight. The list goes on and on" she shrugged. "I see it all." She shrugged again, having spent the previous few days battling long and hard to try to think of anything else when she closed her eyes, picturing the faces of her children and Andy's smile and imagining all the holidays and vacations she was going to enjoy with them in the future instead but in the end nothing seemed to work. The happy and exciting images always faded away and were quickly replaced by Taylor's lifeless eyes as they stared up at the ceiling.
"Okay" he nodded, an air of finality about it and understanding fully before he kissed the back of her hand again, realising that sleep wasn't going to be on the cards for them that night yet again unless he could find a way to really distract her first. Thankfully, distracting Sharon Raydor was something he was really rather good at, it his speciality. "Well what can I do about that?" he asked with a suggestive smile.
Sharon continued to smile back at him adoringly, appreciating the thought more than he would ever really know but she also wanted him to get some rest for his own sake and that meant him going back to bed without her. "Nothing Andy I'm fine. I don't want to keep you awake again so go on without me, I'll be fine out here, honestly I will" she told him with another smile.
He smiled back at her, not prepared to leave her alone should the demons come back with a vengeance and take over her mind again in his absence. "Well that all sounds great but I wholeheartedly disagree with you so, before you feel the need to start obsessively cleaning the kitchen again or I don't know painting the living room," he joked and being greeted with the inevitable laughter he was expecting, "or whatever I think you should come back to bed with me and yammer my ear off until the sun comes up instead. What do you say?" Without waiting for an answer he took to his feet, his knees cracking again as he groaned at the ache before he attempted to pull her towards him. Sharon remained seated, not moving so much as an inch. "Come on" he added softly when he saw her reluctance, nodding in the direction of their bedroom.
"Are you sure?" she asked, not wanting to keep him awake.
"Yes I'm sure. I'm fine. Sleep is over rated and I'd much rather talk nonsense in bed with you anyway." He winked at her as he tried to pull her to her feet once again.
"Okay." With that Sharon stood, taking to her feet a lot more gracefully than Andy did, not that it was at all surprising but even just getting up from a chair Sharon Raydor still managed to do it with grace and elegance. Once up and standing directly in front of him she pulled her hand from his and gently cupped his face, kissing him deeply on the lips and wanting him to know just how much she appreciated and loved the way he took care of her. Even when she fought so hard against it like she did a few nights earlier when she locked him out on the balcony, she still appreciated the thought and the effort. "Thank you" she told him before she kissed him again. "I love you my darling boy."
He winked. "I love you too babe" he replied before he kissed her back. "Come on."
Andy turned out the lamp on the end table before he put his arm around her waist and they slowly moved back towards their bedroom, her head coming to rest on his shoulder as they moved, leaning into him as much as she could, exhausted but still not at all sleepy. As they approached the bedroom door Rusty rather cautiously came out of his room, having heard the noise and being more than a little worried about her once again and what she was potentially cleaning this time (or perhaps even finding Andy locked in the hall outside their front door in his underwear this time or maybe even naked). Just like Sharon and not at all surprisingly, Rusty had also found sleep to be rather elusive as he worried about Dr Joe as well as grieving the loss of Chief Taylor. Although Rusty and Taylor weren't exactly close by any stretch of the imagination, Taylor had helped him over the years, not just with his vlog but in essence keeping him alive and in Sharon's care during his time as a material witness when Emma Rios in particular wanted him literally any place but Sharon's condo. But Rusty was still a young man, a young man who had spent a great deal of time with little to no family around him and as a result Taylor was actually the first person he had ever known who had died, the sudden fragility of life hitting him like a sledgehammer to the gut especially since both Sharon or Andy could have so easily died instead. On top of that Sharon was also continuing to worry him, the way she was dealing with things since she took a life, having never seen her so distressed and that was enough on its own to keep him awake.
Andy caught sight of Rusty immediately out of the corner of his eye but Sharon didn't, the young man having experience in staying out of the way and going unnoticed over the years and so hid just out of sight. Andy held his hand up, eventually giving him the thumbs up to tell him that everything was okay and he could handle the situation from there like he had done of the previous few nights since the shooting. Andy saw it as his job now that he lived with them, to take care of Sharon so that Rusty could sleep, to take care of them both when they needed him. Rusty nodded and went back to bed, closing his door without making a single noise.
Once they stepped into their bedroom, Andy allowed Sharon to go on ahead as he shut the door. He watched from his position with his hand on the door handle as she removed her robe and draped it over the armchair in the corner of the room before she climbed back into bed, putting her glasses on her nightstand. Just as she was getting comfortable and about to completely slide under the covers she noticed that Andy was still stood on the other side of the room, just watching her. "Aren't you going to join me?" she inquired.
"Sure, but I was just looking for something to strap you in with first."
Sharon laughed at him, accepting his point but couldn't help but see his words as a thinly vailed sexual innuendo. "Oh yes? Like what exactly?"
"Well I was thinking that I could maybe cuff you to the headboard or alternatively I could just strap your wrists up with my ties instead. Maybe put a little bell around your neck too" he suggested and easily making her laugh again, his tactic for the rest of the evening already clear, hopefully laughing her into a deep and peaceful sleep if he played his cards right. "You know anything to stop these little midnight flits to the living room without my knowledge."
"Oh really? Are you sure it's not just to give yourself a cheap thrill?"
"Oh believe me babe, it wouldn't be cheap if that was my intention. There is absolutely nothing whatsoever cheap about Sharon Raydor, I promise you that" he practically growled.
Sharon laughed again as her cheeks flushed from the compliment. "It's not like it's a regular occurrence and I only get up so that I don't disturb you. There's no reason why both of us should be awake all night" she explained, wanting to make it clear that she was running away from her dreams so as not to wake him up rather than running away from him specifically.
"Sweetheart I'd gladly have you wake me up at any time of the night so I can help take your mind off things and attempt to make you feel better rather than sleeping right through it."
"Then get in here with me" she said as she patted the bed beside her. Andy smiled and crossed the floor quickly, giving his pile of belongings a wide birth before he climbed into bed. Once he was settled on his back and comfortable Sharon cuddled up to him, putting her head on his shoulder and laying her hand on his chest above his heart, his arm around her. They lay in companionable silence for a few moments before she looked up at him and kissed his chin. "You can go back to sleep if you want. I don't mind."
"And if I did you'd only run away into the living room again and besides I want to talk to you" he told her before he suddenly yawned, his evident tiredness contradicting his words.
Sharon laughed at him, if his long yawn didn't let her know that he was lying then the way she could see his nostrils flaring in the darkness did. "Then why are you yawning?" she asked him.
"You haven't said anything interesting yet. Come on Raydor, entertain me a little!" he all but demanded. Sharon laughed and immediately pinched his knee, causing him to playfully yelp a little before he kissed the top of her head.
"Hey I was more than content to just sit in the living room for a couple of hours rather than disturb you. You're the one that propositioned me here," she reminded him as she poked him in the chest with her finger, "so if anyone is going to be doing any entertaining here, it's you boy."
"Propositioned huh? Well then I'm definitely not going to sleep now." She laughed at him as her left leg slung over his, effectively pinning him to the bed as his hand moved to her back and he kissed the top of her head.
As she pinned Andy to the bed beneath her it was worth noting for the record that Sharon Raydor was traditionally not much of a cuddler. She didn't mind the odd five minutes in bed or on the couch in front of the TV, savouring being held lovingly in the embrace of someone she adored but on the whole she had never been one for too much contact in bed when she wanted to go to sleep. Nor was she a particularly clingy person either, needing that constant contact with another person (except when she was feeling particularly unwell and violently sick of course). That all changed with Andy Flynn. It wasn't just that she loved him more than she'd ever loved anyone and therefore wanted to be near him, it was the warmth that radiated from him and the soothing and peaceful breathing behind or below her which made her feel more relaxed and content than she had ever been in her entire life up until that point. The problem was simple, Jack was never a cuddler, feeling suffocated and in all fairness sometimes the way that he breathed and snored so loudly meant that she spent many nights fantasising about killing him, therefore wanted to keep her distance as much as possible from him. With Andy though she felt peaceful, content and lying in his arms was far from too overwhelming like it had felt with Jack, it instead being the best way for her to sleep much to her surprise. Once again it was another example of Sharon not thinking she liked something because she had learnt to live without it while married to Jack and then decades on her own.
"Did erm…" he said quietly before he paused, his reluctance to say what was on his mind abundantly clear to her. "Did going to church and speaking to Father Stan make you feel any better?"
Sharon smiled up at him, it was easy for her to tell from the nervous way that he asked the question that he was a little worried about it and in fact it had been nearly forty eight hours since she had stopped by St Joseph's before work very early on the Sunday morning to talk to Father Stan about the many demons waging war inside her head. Andy had seen with his own eyes that she seemed a little lighter since she had been to Confession but he had yet to pluck up the courage to ask her about it until that moment. In truth his delay in asking was mainly because they'd both been so exhausted the previous two evenings that they'd gone straight to bed once again without the usual lengthy round of pillow talk that had become so common between them since they started to share a bed. Then when they were awake in the middle of the night and either watching TV or sitting on the balcony together he didn't want to ask her because it wasn't exactly going to relax her as he aimed to get her back into bed to attempt to sleep. Even as he finally asked her the question he still knew it wasn't the perfect time to ask, them lying in bed and him coming up with plans on how to make her relax and sleep but it was still a question that needed to be asked regardless, if for no other reason than getting it all off her chest may make her feel a little better.
"Yes. It did. Lots in fact" she told him before she pressed her lips to his pyjama clad chest as his hand continued to move slowly up and down her back. "Thank you for suggesting it and pushing me into going to see him" she added before she kissed the bottom of his chin again. "I'm not entirely sure I would have found my way there on my own this time without it" she confessed.
Her guilt over her lack of guilt at taking the life of Dwight Darnell was still causing her to call her faith and her moral compass into question, losing a part of herself in the process. As a result of that she had never felt more apart from the church in her life because her actions and more specifically her response to those actions had made her feel unworthy of God's or even Father Stan's forgiveness. As she waited patiently for Father Stan to join her in the Confessional she quickly realised that without that little push from Andy, him imploring her to go and speak to him, she doubted she would have ended up there at all. In the end it had helped her more that she initially realised, her relationship with Father Stan over the years enabling him to understand exactly how she felt, letting her know what she needed and from whom to finally feel it and get over what she had done and how she felt about it. She had felt better just talking to him but speaking to Wildred Darnell earlier in the day had really done the trick, with her offer of forgiveness and understanding being what she desperately craved but hadn't realised she needed before then.
"You're welcome" he replied between gentle kisses to her forehead. He was still determined not to ask any more about it or push her on the subject for the time being at least as he sought not to start another argument since he really didn't understand and he didn't want to upset her further. "See I can have really good ideas from time to time" he said instead.
Sharon laughed as her leg that was already thrown over his moved up a little higher to the point where she was almost completely lying on top of him. With how she was feeling over the course of that week, she needed that connection with him, not just his warmth and to feel his arms around her but also to feel him beneath her, his heart beating in her ear as a constant and very welcome reminder that she still had him.
"I know you do my darling boy but don't worry, I'll be sure to let Lieutenant Provenza know all about it tomorrow morning." Andy laughed as he kissed the top of her head again. It took her another couple of minutes to continue with her train of thought, wanting to share that part of her with him even though she was finding it extremely difficult to express it in a way that he would understand given how they clashed on the subject. "We managed to talk everything through and despite how I felt when I went in there Father Stan was very helpful. He helped me realise what I needed to move forward with life and I do surprisingly feel a lot better about the whole situation now."
"Good" he replied with a nod before he kissed the top of her head again. He wasn't going to push her for any more information because firstly what she said to a Priest during the Seal of Confession was her own damn business and no one else's, not even his. Secondly he knew that it wouldn't help matters. There was obviously a lot more to it, they could all see that but one of her biggest problems was her lack of guilt over taking a life and he knew they would never be on the same wave length in that regard. He would never understand her guilt because he didn't think she should have any in the first place. Even though that wasn't the main issue there was no chance of them really ever getting past it first and then covering all other aspects on her guilt later so he felt that under the circumstances it was best to leave it up to Father Stan to deal with while he remained there for her in every other way, listening to her if that was what she wanted from him, the one true constant in her life aside from the church and needing to lead her back there if he could.
As silence settled between them again she started to play with the buttons on his pyjama top, her fingers caressing them as she moved up and down his torso very slowly, touching each and every one. It was actually the first time she'd been in bed with him in a pair of pyjamas and she enjoyed the novelty of it, their presence a sign that he was no longer just an overnight guest but rather a member of her family. She looked up at him, biting on her bottom lip while building up to another confession of her own. "I may have also spoken with Father Stan about you a little" she finally said as she continued to chomp on her bottom lip, a look that screamed guilt but also had an air of mischief about it.
"May have?" he questioned.
"Definitely did."
Andy laughed, his hand continuing to move up and down her back. "Okay. What? What did you say to him about me? I hope you said nothing that'll damage my reputation."
Sharon laughed, knowing he was joking. "Well regardless of the real reason that I was there to see him, it was Confession after all and I now have something rather serious to confess to him." The playful way she spoke had his shoulders relaxing, not consciously aware that he had physically reacted to her confession but it was clear from her tone that a bombshell was not about to be dropped on him. "I told him that I have recently started to cohabit with a man to whom I'm not married" she told him as her eyes sparkled like she was the getting one of the biggest thrills of her life from breaking some of the rules of not only her church but more importantly rules that her Grandmother would go ballistic about. In truth that slight tinge of Catholic guilt she felt every time she indulged in sex out of wedlock with Andy paled into insignificance compared to how turned on she got from the idea that they were now 'living in sin.'
He laughed again, enjoying the return of the very playful Sharon who had very sadly been missing since the shooting, coming back to him little by little, inch by inch every day. Despite the improvement she wasn't yet the Sharon that only he knew, the Sharon who laughed and joked with him in bed for hours before they went to sleep every night.
"And what punishment did you get for that egregious sin?" he asked while trying his best not to make it sound like he was grumbling too much about it in case he unwittingly talked his way into couple's counselling at the church one day precisely because they were indeed now living in sin and he very much enjoyed that fact. "Four Hail Marys? Seven Our Fathers? Or have you been excommunicated now?" he suggested. "If you're about to break it to me that we've got to attend some sort of couple's counselling with Father Stan every week then I'm warning you now, you're better off telling me that sort of news while you're completely naked."
Sharon laughed again as an idea started to form in her mind, an idea she'd enjoy tormenting him over for her own amusement for a little while. "No. It's nothing like that although the whole idea of couple..." she started to say as Andy's face dropped, the horror hitting him like a frying pan to the face that he'd jokingly suggested it and now he was going to be subjected to it without complaint in order to keep the peace. She couldn't help but laugh at him, Andy looking truly distraught despite him doing his best to hide it. "Oh I'm only joking" she laughed loudly as Andy breathed a massive sigh of relief (even though, if he was being completely honest, he would attend that sort of thing if it was what she really wanted, not that he was ever going to tell her that). "It seems that since you're also Catholic and not to mention divorced too, Father Stan didn't see it as much of a problem." She shrugged again, actually very pleased that she had received a 'rubber stamp' of approval on her relationship with Andy which she hoped would ease any lingering thoughts in the back of her mind going forward about her behaviour with him 'out of wedlock.' "So, that's that."
"Really?" he asked and not hiding his surprise from her. He knew from personal experience that Sharon wasn't going to let the opinion of the church stop her doing things, for example she had slept with him and he had moved in without even considering getting married first but at the same time he knew what having the permission of the church meant to her which meant she grabbed it with both hands when it was available. "He had no problems with it?"
"None at all. We are all good in the eyes of...well not the church as a whole exactly but certainly with Father Stan."
"Huh!" was all Andy could say in reply as he nodded, his surprise still there for her to see. "That's good since I've basically already sold my house and I no longer have anywhere else to go except my storage space or maybe my car."
"And don't you forget it either" she teased with a poke to his chest before laughing again. "You don't think Lieutenant Provenza would take you in for a few weeks out of pity?"
"Why are you planning on kicking me out sometime soon?"
"That all depends on if you stop bowing to my every whim or not" she teased again as her hand moved slowly down his chest and danced back and forth across the top of his pyjamas pants. "You made some pretty big promises to me last week when I agreed to let you move in here after your house sold." She raised her head so that she could kiss him on the lips, it lingering for a few moments. "And believe me, I fully intend to make sure you keep your end of the bargain." Andy laughed and nodded, that a deal he would gladly live with. After they settled down again he just looked at her for a moment, admiring her with a smirk as his eyes went up and down her gorgeous satin clad body, Sharon looking even more beautiful than ever in his eyes and she was only lying in bed. Once again he just simply couldn't believe his luck, his luck of getting her to look at him twice outside of work let alone allowing him into her home and her heart. She frowned at him, confused by the goofy looking expression on his face as he gazed at her. "What? What's that look all about?"
"Nothing," he said with a casual shrug, "it's just I finally move in here with all of my clothes coming with me and suddenly you stop wearing my shirts to sleep in and produce this..." he paused as his hand gestured up and down her body, "this satin magnificence. Are you trying to give me a heart attack?" he asked before she laughed and her cheeks began to flush.
The night that they slept together in the same bed for the very first time was filled with a steady stream of unfortunate moments, most of which were highly comic on the whole but nonetheless each one only served to make them both laugh and as a result made them relax a little more. The biggest and most embarrassing errors of them all came in the shape of unfortunate slips of the tongue brought on my extreme nerves and in Andy's case, all of the blood from his brain being directed to where it was more urgently needed to help him 'rise' to the occasion so to speak. But before they even made it into the bedroom Sharon was mortifyingly under the assumption that Andy was going to need Viagra when he mentioned taking a pill after she had asked him to spend the night (that pill actually used to lower his blood pressure) and then later Andy was under the equally mortifying assumption that pregnancy was still a real risk (and not just because of his self-proclaimed 'Super Sperm') and much to his horror he realised that he didn't have a condom with him (assuming that there was zero chance they'd end up in bed together as they left PAB that evening, the thought never even crossing his mind for a second as he obediently followed Sharon's painfully slow lead in their relationship, in fact not even thinking that sex was a remote possibility when Sharon was in the process of asking him to spend the night), prompting the debate in his mind over the merits of getting dressed again and running out to get one and praying to God that Sharon hadn't changed her mind (or fallen asleep) when he returned versus wondering if a plastic sandwich bag would work as a fitting substitute.
When they finally stopped talking and laughing (the best thing about their relationship as she would later find out being how easily they were able to laugh with each other, more so when they were in bed) about everything and finally got down to the act of consummating their physical relationship things went better than either of them ever dared dreamed for a first time, both of them keenly aware that it wasn't always the case and it could end up being an unmitigated disaster. Thankfully it simply wasn't an issue and everything went like clockwork, something they were both rather relieved about. When the afterglow faded, Sharon had peed (having to think about stopping UTIs before they arrived one of the things she hadn't missed about sex during her painfully long abstinence, the second being the mess. It was actually the first time she'd had to deal with that particular issue since Ricky was born. After his birth she insisted that Jack use a condom, stating it was a 'belts and suspenders' type of scenario and being extra careful since they couldn't afford a third child but the truth was she just didn't trust him any longer and wanted to ensure she didn't catch anything from him. Well past the menopause and trusting Andy implicitly when he told her he had a clean bill of health, that first time with him was the first time she'd had sex without a condom in over thirty years. She had certainly not missed the excessive bodily fluids in that time, not even wanting to think about them to be fair, but it was oh so worth it in order to really feel him) and a contented sleep started to call them, spending their first night together properly in each other's arms the rather unfortunate misunderstandings returned with a vengeance and made them both more than a little anxious again.
Sharon was keen to go to sleep if not fully clothed in her usual pair of comfortable pyjamas then at least in something and wanted Andy to do the same should Rusty suddenly want her in a hurry in the middle of the night for any reason (which was not a common occurrence by any means given that he wasn't five years old unless Jack was trying to break into his room but Sod's Law meant that the first time she had Andy finally spend the night in her bed and they both went to sleep naked as the day they were born then Rusty was bound to walk in feeling unwell or after hearing a strange noise and thinking that Phillip Stroh was hiding in the bathroom). Fresh from the first orgasm that either had experienced with another person in a very long time, it was actually a good long while before Andy finally moved off her, Sharon holding him in place and asking him not to move yet, having missed that weight on top of her as she clung to him, the man who was the love of her life and had come to realise just a few hours earlier that he felt the exact same way. Andy didn't object, rolling next to her being too much effort at that point in time anyway (realising that if the building caught fire he would die a very happy man since his legs had well and truly gone). Andy pushed his lips to every part of her body that he could reach as she relaxed and ran her hands up and down his back and then into his hair, scratching his scalp in the way she knew he liked.
When he eventually had to move and they'd both used the bathroom, Andy spooned up behind her but didn't yet realise (because of the sheer exhaustion and both of them feeling ever so slightly overwhelmed by the whole evening) that long talks in bed where going to be a very big part of their future, the inevitable 'Was it worth the wait?' nervously escaped Sharon's lips, terrified of the answer she was about to receive but needing to ask anyway. Andy initially laughed which calmed her nerves somewhat before he confirmed 'It was so worth the wait' which had Sharon quickly agreeing and all was right with their little corner of the world until she rather cautiously whispered 'Andy, can I ask you a favour?' Leaping to the wrong conclusion almost immediately Andy was under the false assumption that she was just about to ask him to leave because of Rusty and her not wanting him to see him in the morning and realise he'd spent the night (when in reality they ended up meeting at around 4am in the kitchen instead anyway, the cat well and truly out of the bag even if she had wanted to keep it a secret from Rusty), preparing to get up and leave.
Sharon soon cleared up the misunderstanding as Andy tried to pretend that he wasn't upset that she was essentially trying to throw him out on his ear after everything that had happened between them since they left PAB, telling him emphatically that he wasn't going anywhere but she needed to get dressed and unlock the bedroom door just in case (although if the kitchen meeting had not happened and Rusty had experienced some sort of very early morning crisis and came bursting into her bedroom and discovered Andy in there then they could only imagine how much he would have screamed, screaming until he was sick she imagined). Andy was more than a little relieved despite feeling like an old fool and more than a little embarrassed, preferring to sleep in something anyway so he had no issue at all in pulling his t-shirt and boxers back on. He quickly found them on the floor before he pulled them on and then unlocked the door again. Just as he was in the process of asking if he could get Sharon's pyjamas for her to save her getting out of bed again he turned to see her slipping on his dress shirt and doing up a couple of buttons, the single sexiest thing he had ever seen in his life.
Sharon claimed at the time that his shirt was closer than her pyjamas and that's why she had slipped it on instead (to also save him the effort of digging in the drawer of her bureau since all she wanted was for him to get back in bed with her and lay in his arms for the first time). The truth was however, that she had always loved sleeping in a big shirt like that, liking how it offered her freedom of movement while she inevitably tossed and turned in her sleep like she was possessed by the devil (something that Andy would learn all about in the coming hours as she beat him time and time again and eventually gave him a black eye with her elbow in her sleep). She used to sleep a lot in one of Jack's shirts but after he left her that first time she didn't want his shirts anywhere near her as a constant reminder of his absence any more than she wanted to buy her own just to sleep in, switching back to pyjamas again.
Since those first few night with Andy she had either slept in a shirt she had stolen from him or one of his t-shirts (which were also stolen from him it must be noted), feeling like the very definition of a cliché but she really didn't care, she felt more comfortable when she slept in one of his big and baggy shirts, not to mention that she felt cooler in one with the hottest person on Earth usually pressed against her back with his arm draped over her but moreover she just liked doing it. That all changed however when she asked him to move in with her at the condo and her sudden desire to try to make more of an effort for him rather than taking him and their still growing relationship for granted once they started to live together so that meant coming to bed in something satin and very sexy. Not that she really needed to given that he practically drooled over her in pretty much anything so the only reason she went to such great lengths was because she wanted to, to make herself look nice for him, to make an effort for him because she loved him.
Sharon had always taken great pride in her appearance, feeling good when she looked good but more than that her chosen career path meant that enough people disliked her at work, the least she could do was ensure she looked good while being badmouthed by all and sundry, her appearance not giving them extra ammunition on top of everything else. Plus her self-esteem was virtually none existent and got smaller and smaller every time Jack left her. The whole situation was then compounded further by everyone at work knowing what had gone on between them, seeing Jack staggering out of bars at all hours with a different blonde, stick thin twenty something year old woman on his arm every time which meant the gossip about them both was rife in Parker Centre (one of the reasons why she treasured her privacy with Andy so much). The least she could do was maintain her dignity and ensure she looked good regardless, like anything thrown in her direction was nothing more than water off a duck's back.
Sharon chuckled to herself as her hand unconsciously moved down her satin clad body, rather enjoying the feel of her new night-time attire on her skin despite how much she liked to sleep in one of Andy's shirts. "You like it?" she asked.
"Like it? Are you kidding me?" he cried before he laughed at the understatement, 'like' not even coming close to describing how he felt. "This is the single sexiest sight I have ever seen in my entire life. You look so breathtakingly beautiful and you're just going to bed. How is that even possible?" Still not used to Andy's compliments (with part of her hoping she never would be so that she didn't start to take them for granted), Sharon couldn't help but blush, her cheeks warming quickly as she chomped on her bottom lip. "Plus you know your legs look amazing in it" he added, Andy not able to tell her how beautiful he thought she was without giving a special mention to her legs at least once. "If I didn't know it before I sure as hell know it now."
"Know what now?"
"That I am without a shadow of a doubt the luckiest son of a bitch on the face of God's green Earth" he told her sincerely, still not able to believe his luck. With Sharon looking up at him he couldn't help but push his lips to hers, languidly moving together.
Sharon laughed when they pulled apart, her fingers once again playing with the buttons on his pyjama top. "Smooth talker" she winked and not for the first time before she kissed him again.
"I'm just making sure you don't find a reason to kick me out anytime soon" he joked. "I have to prove my worth to you" he added and then kissed her again.
"I had the same thought actually" she replied. He looked at her a little confused as she ran her hand back down her satin covered body again. "Since I'm now sharing my life and my bed with a boy again," she clarified as her hand moved to stroke his cheek, "and full time too at that I thought I'd better start making more of an effort for him."
He grinned at her, still adoring every single time she used that word to describe him. "With a boy?" he repeated, bringing her hand to his lips, kissing her knuckles.
"Oh yes" she confirmed before she kissed his lips. "My beautiful boy" she added before she kissed him again. "I don't want your eye to start wandering a little because I'm not making an effort now that I've finally got you exactly where I want you and I start to let myself go or something" she joked.
He laughed. "Well that's never going to happen babe. You," he said before he paused to move a stray lock of hair from her face, "are it for me Raydor, until death do us part." He pressed his lips to hers as a way to confirm it, the two of them staying nose to nose for a moment when they broke apart. "And for the record since you've gone to such efforts just for me I'd like to confirm that I love it," he told her as his hand continued to move up and down her back, "like a huge amount," he added as his eyes bulged and she laughed at him, "but you could come to bed in a garbage bag and you'd still be the most beautiful creature on the face of this Earth."
She laughed again as she looked up at him adoringly. She sighed. "You really do have a way with words Andrew Flynn" she told him as her words were punctuated by kisses to his jaw. "When you're not using pigeon Italian to woo me of course" she laughed, Andy quickly laughing and nodding in agreement. "I really like these by the way" she said as her hand stroked down his pyjamas, it again having a novelty factor because aside from when he stayed at the condo before and after his surgery it was actually the first time she had ever seen him in any.
He looked down at himself, beyond boiling hot by that point because of them but he saw them as more of an olive branch than anything else. He sighed and shrugged as he told her "Yeah well the last time I went to find someone in the living room in the middle of the night they locked me out on the balcony in just my underwear and I nearly froze to death." She laughed at his exaggeration although she still hated herself that she had done that to him especially since he just wanted to help her at a time when he was also suffering but she had been too blind by grief and guilt to notice it. "I thought I'd better start dressing a little more appropriately just in case there was a repeat performance when I came a looking."
Sharon laughed a little again, more embarrassed than anything about her behaviour a few nights earlier. "I know." She began to play with the buttons on his top again, avoiding his eye as her embarrassment level peaked. "Andy I am so so sorry I did that to you. I promise it'll never ever happen again."
He smiled. "Well then it was worth it" he replied, dragging her chin up so that she would look at him and he could plant another kiss to her lips.
She looked away again, avoiding his eye for a moment as she felt uncomfortable about what she was about to say to him but conceded that she needed to say it to him regardless, she owed him that much at least. "I'm sorry, I know I haven't been myself over the last couple of days and I..."
"You don't need to explain" he stated very matter-of-factly when he cut in. "I understand. Believe me Sharon if there's one person in this world that you don't need to explain yourself to or apologise to it's me. I am always going to be here for you no matter how you're feeling and what you've done. I'm always going to be here for you. Okay?" he asked, pushing his lips to the top of her head.
She nodded as she once again realised that despite some of the similarities they had on the surface, Andy and Jack could not be any more different to each other at that point in their lives, the one always there for her even in the moments when she tried so hard to push him away and the other barely even there in the good times. "Okay" she nodded.
"Good."
She stroked his cheek as she gazed up at his face from her position on his shoulder, the stubble she found there delightfully scratching her fingertips. Andy may not have really understood how lost she felt over the previous few days or her guilt over her complete lack of guilt when she shot and killed Dwight but regardless he was always going to be by her side, always ready to listen and to find a way to help her even if he couldn't do it himself like he had done when he encouraged her to go and see Father Stan. For Sharon it was probably the thing that was taking the most time to adjust to in her relationship with Andy (despite the experience that came with being his friend over the years before they started to date properly), for so long being in a relationship with a man who never even attempted to try to understand her at times and then up and left the moment things got bad or when he got a little frustrated with her. Andy would always try even if he just couldn't understand because he loved her and he wasn't going anywhere. He was a real partner in her life in the true sense of the word and with every passing moment she spent with him she began to realise just how lucky she was to have him in her life, how lucky they both were to have found each other given that they started off their relationship in extremely combative circumstances.
"God I love you" she told him as she continued to gaze up at him adoringly.
"I love you too" he confirmed with a kiss to her lips.
She continued to just study his face in silence for a moment, her eyes travelling along every single line across it as she smiled at him. "Thank you."
"For what?"
"For taking care of me better than anyone ever has in my entire life, even when I try to resist it. For always being there for me. For being the one person I can always rely on no matter what." She shrugged as her words tailed off, thinking that she could go on and on until she was horse listing all the reasons why she felt such gratitude to have him in her life. "For everything."
Her hand moved to stroke his cheek again but he quickly caught it and brought it to his lips to kiss her palm. "There's no need to thank me, that's my job in this life" he said with a little shrug.
"From past experience that doesn't mean that people still hang around when they're met with a little resistance."
"That's because those people are idiots" he cried. She couldn't help but laugh given the way he said it, really emphasising 'idiots' so she knew who he was referring to. "I'm never going anywhere babe, even if you try to make me. You're stuck with me now."
She sat up a little and kissed him on the lips again. "Thank you" she repeated. Andy went to protest, to tell her that he didn't need to be thanked for taking care of the love of his life but she stopped him with a finger to his lips. "I know, I know but still, thank you my beautiful boy." She kissed him again but this time it was long and slow, his hand moving into her hair until they broke apart. She settled down on his shoulder again as they lay in silence until her head suddenly snapped up to look at him. "But just to go back a little for one moment, you came to bed in your pyjamas and you didn't know for certain I was going to get up then" she pointed out as she looked at him quizzically since she was pretty sure that was not the real reason that he had come to bed in his pyjamas for the first time in their relationship.
Andy shrugged. "Yeah well after I moved in properly Rusty not so subtly let me know once again that he was ever so slightly fed up of seeing me walking around every morning in just a t-shirt and my underwear."
Sharon frowned, unable to hide her annoyance at what she was hearing. "Why? What did he say to you?" she asked.
"Something along the lines of 'Don't you ever wear clothes?'" he said before he laughed about it and letting her know that it didn't bother him in the slightest even though Sharon looked less than impressed by the whole affair, his laughter ending when he realised that fact. "I took it as a hint to cover myself up a little more while we go through this rocky..." he said before he paused and thought of the appropriate phrase to use, "transition period shall we say."
"Transition period?"
"Yeah, you know the next couple of months as he gets used to me living here officially."
She smiled at him. Despite her annoyance at Rusty dictating dress code to one of the two people who were now paying the mortgage together, at the same time she was also pleased that Rusty was thankfully now completely accepting of Andy not only being in his life but also in his home. "Well in my opinion, since it was his idea in the first place that you move in here with us rather than buying a house together, I think he's already there." She continued to smile at him because she knew how much he craved the acceptance and the blessings of all three of her children which he now had but her smile quickly turned back into a frown again. "But more to the point, let me remind you that this is your home now Andy. It's your home as much as it is mine or even his for that matter. You're not a visitor here anymore, you're not an overnight guest, you're not here as just my boyfriend." Her hand went back to his cheek again, his hand quickly coming up to take hold of it so that he could push his lips to her palm as she spoke. "You are officially a member of this family now, a member of my family, of Rusty's family and when you are here you are in your own home, in our home my darling boy. Never forget that." She kissed him on the lips, letting it linger to reinforce her point. "And soon, when we finally find the time and work stops getting in the way of us living our lives, your name is going to be added to everything to make it official too. So what I'm trying to say is, if you want to walk around the place in just a t-shirt and your boxers at any time of the day or night then just do it because you're home."
Andy smiled at her mischievously, his eyebrows waggling. "You just like to ogle me."
She grinned back, playfully biting at his jaw a couple of times. "Possibly but that's not the point I'm trying to make here" she confirmed. Andy laughed as she propped herself back up on her elbow for a moment to make sure that he was listening to her and taking in what she was telling him. "Being considerate and respecting Rusty's wishes as much as possible is one thing Andy but pandering to him and constantly allowing yourself to feel uncomfortable because of a few complaints from someone who, let me remind you by the way, doesn't pay the mortgage around here is another thing entirely."
Andy couldn't help but look at her rather surprised. To Andy it wasn't a big deal at all and he'd do a lot of things within reason as a way to keep the peace with his would be Step-Son as they adjusted to living together and had assumed that Sharon would also feel the same way so he couldn't help but be surprised by her response.
"So in this debate you're taking my side?" he asked.
"Always and not just because I love to ogle you over breakfast whenever opportunity presents itself." They both laughed again before she stroked his cheek, desperately wanting him to take what she was saying seriously as she continued to try her hardest to make him feel comfortable in his new home since he had moved in with her. "Andy if this is ever going to work now that we've made this step you need make yourself at home. Don't make yourself uncomfortable because it's what you think Rusty or I want from you. Okay?"
He smiled and nodded. "Okay, not a problem but I'll probably give him until the end of next week, you know lull him into a false sense of security and then they're gone" he joked and making her laugh.
"But aren't you hot in these right now?" Her hand moved up and down his chest again. It was hard for her to tell when he was feeling hotter than usual (for example if he had a fever from a bout of man flu) because he was always hot to the touch, every single part of him but he very rarely sweated or complained about it, still given how he always slept with his feet and legs out of the bed, it was hard to believe that he was wearing a pair of pyjamas in bed and not overheating.
Andy puffed out his cheeks, absolutely dying he was that hot and feeling like he was sitting on the surface of the sun. "You have no idea. I'm boiling in the bag here" he complained.
Sharon laughed. "Then take them off. Right now!" She clapped her hands together and then rolled off him to encourage him to strip and make himself more comfortable. "You've never needed to sleep in them anyway, just put them on if you leave the bedroom if that's what you want to do."
Andy smiled and jumped out of bed with an awful lot of energy given how draining the previous few days had been to him and he'd had very little sleep. He started to unbutton his top as Sharon propped herself up on her elbows to watch him, a very dirty smile making its way to her face. Noticing the way he was being watched he stopped. "Are you ogling me right now?"
"Always. It's practically a full time job on its own, ogling you my boy." Andy laughed as he continued to undo the buttons, only doing it a lot more slowly as if he was performing a striptease just for her. He only stopped when Sharon looked on her nightstand and then opened the drawer, just stopping short of putting her glasses back on to see as she rooted around inside.
"What are you looking for?"
"A dollar to throw at you?"
"Just a dollar? A lousy dollar for this? For all of this?" he asked as he gestured the full length of his body as if he was going to remove his clothes and reveal a body like Thor.
Sharon laughed. For a guy who acted on the surface like he had confidence literally oozing from every single pore, he sure sucked his stomach in around her an awful lot, especially when he was partially or even fully naked. "Well now that you've moved in I don't feel the need to pay as much anymore when I'm enjoying the show" she teased.
"Oh I see but what happened to making an effort now that we've moved in together?"
She shrugged. "I meant in regards to my night-time attire and not how much I'll be willing to pay you in the future for doing your duties as my," she paused and then sighed, making it sound more like a little aroused moan, "official live in lover."
He grinned and winked at her as he removed his pyjama top. "I knew you'd start to love my official title sooner rather than later" he joked and getting a little laugh. "You know it might even look good on the name plate on my desk. I could do with an upgrade after all these years. 'Detective Lieutenant Andrew Flynn: Major Crimes and Live in Lover'" he said as he winked at her again.
Sharon laughed again (thinking that perhaps that might be a good gag gift to have him made in time for Christmas even if it only lived in his desk drawer at work rather than anywhere a bit more public for all the world to see) as Andy quickly removed his pyjama pants and unceremoniously dumped them on the armchair in the corner of the room on top of Sharon's robe with zero intention of putting them back on again even if he had an early morning trip to the kitchen before he showered. Feeling a lot cooler he climbed back into bed, Sharon waiting for him to lie down and get comfortable again before she lay back on his shoulder, his arm around her.
"Better?" she asked.
"Much" he confirmed with a kiss to the top of her head before they lay in silence for a few moments, that only being interrupted when Andy kicked his legs out from under the covers and into the cooler air, sighing from being far too hot as he did it. She laughed at him before he looked down at his legs sticking out from under the covers. "You know I'm starting to develop a major complex about my legs the way he keeps complaining about them all the time." Sharon laughed at him again as he raised his legs slightly so that he could see them better. "I mean are they really that hideous?" he asked as Sharon laughed again. "I always thought I had a rather good set of legs."
"Oh you do my darling boy, believe me, you definitely do." She kissed him on his cheek as she laughed, her foot moving up and down his leg after slinging it over him again. "I love them almost as much as you love mine" she joked, her mind instantly going to the moment that Andy first ran his hands and his lips all over them, the night they first slept together.
There was no denying that Andy Flynn was somewhat obsessed with her legs, being unable to take his eyes off them for more than five seconds at a time in the weeks after they first slept together and after taking a few years longer than he had initially hoped for, he finally had his suspicions confirmed that her legs did indeed go on forever. Likewise he also found it more difficult to keep his mind and his eyes off them after he knew just what it felt like to have them wrapped around his waist. In the weeks that followed them sleeping together that first time Sharon had to stop wearing skirts and dresses to work until she was certain that Andy could keep his mind and his eyes off them before Chief Taylor caught him staring once too often and brought their professionalism into question. In fact Andy was so in love with her legs that the first time he saw her completely naked he still focused on her legs more than anything else, especially in the lead up as she tried to eradicate some of her all-consuming nerves by stripping in front of him as he watched.
They were both incredibly nervous that first time they slept together, Andy secretly even more so than Sharon despite the cool and calm exterior that he tried to show her because of what he perceived to be her extremely high expectations of him given all of the rumours that had circulated about him at PAB over the years, feeling under intense pressure to serve up a plethora of multiple orgasms from the get go, like he'd be breaking a contract with her otherwise. When they finally made it into the bedroom, Sharon very slowly and calmly leading Andy in there by the hand, a nervous and trembling hand that is, the whole act more sedate that the frantic and passionate stumble through the door with lips and hands moving everywhere like they'd both envisioned in the months that lead up to it, their abundance of nerves clear for both to see despite their best efforts to hide them. It had hit both of them very early on, this was it. There would be no going back after taking this step together even if they wanted to. For Sharon, making love with her friend, her Lieutenant, crossing that barrier, if it didn't work out between them then there was no way they could ever go back to being just very good friends like Andy had promised Taylor when they informed him of their 'change in status' and that's what scared her most of all. Losing Andy completely by taking that step with him and it not working out was terrifying because she had come to realise that she could simply no longer live without him anymore.
After closing and locking the bedroom door behind her Sharon remained with her back pressed up against it, staring nervously up at Andy with her bottom lip stuck between her teeth, almost making it bleed, while Andy's eyes scanned the room as he took several deep and calming breaths. If he was being completely honest his nerves were so bad in that moment that he feared he may end up locked in her bathroom for the rest of the evening before long, his nerves making him break out into hives or something like Cary Grant at the end of That Touch of Mink. He had been in Sharon's bedroom before, as recently as that evening in fact when he went to get her Uggs for her. Andy had the habit of going to fetch them for her as he waited for her to come home from work before and after his surgery, Rusty joking on many occasions that Andy was very reminiscent of a dog the way he waited for her, holding her slippers except that Andy had a pair of salad tongs in his hand to pick them up since he wasn't allowed to bend over before the clot was removed. When he had been in her bedroom in the past, he hadn't been in there very long, much like when Sharon was in his bedroom on the way to the bathroom, neither wanting to appear like they were snooping and in truth he didn't want to spend too much time in there until he was invited in to spend the night, avoiding 'spoilers' you might say. But despite having seen it all before (even at a fairly high speed) the room looked different. The only light with the exception of the moon coming through the blinds was the lamp on the left hand nightstand, Sharon having the foresight to put it on when she excused herself to go to the bathroom an hour or so earlier, already deciding that it was the night when they were finally going to sleep together no matter what, even if she had to oil herself up and throw herself at him to get him to take the hint and therefore as well as putting the lamp up she also changed her underwear, putting on a pair of panties that didn't scream 'Untouched by man for close to a decade.' It was far from set up for a romantic evening, none of the candles and soft music playing that she'd planned in her mind over the months leading up to that point but that only seemed to make it all the more perfect. It was happening naturally rather than forced and therefore it was all about them being together for the first time rather than what was around them.
When Andy turned to face her he smiled, more than aware of the tension in her shoulders that matched his own. Finally she smiled back at him as he took a small step towards her. He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand, a blatant signal about how he was feeling given the step they were about to take together.
"I don't know about you but I'm suddenly as nervous as all hell right now" he told her sincerely as he laughed about it, not wanting to laugh but his nerves simply made it unavoidable.
It had been quite the turnaround in the time it had taken them to walk from the kitchen and into her bedroom. After starting off nervous and frankly stunned (in truth she could have knocked him over with a feather he was that surprised by it all) when Sharon invited him to spend the night with her in her bed (a feeling that only increased when a few seconds later she wrongly assumed that the pill he needed to take was Viagra rather than his blood pressure medication), he was suddenly calm while Sharon went the other way, practically trembling with nerves while she watched him take his medication. Now in her bedroom his nerves had come back with a vengeance, something that he'd waited so long for, patiently waited for at that, to be able to show her just how much he loved her and he wasn't entirely sure his nerves weren't going to get the better of him. But he needed to be honest, needed to tell her how he felt because he was pretty sure she felt the same way and he hoped that by telling her that, it would make them both relax a little more.
Sharon laughed and seemed to relax a little more almost immediately as a result of his words and his confession, glad that he felt the same way that she did. "Then that makes two of us" she admitted, them laughing together this time. "We make quite a pair, don't we?" she added with a very nervous and shaky sigh before they laughed again. Despite their laughter Andy could see that Sharon was still tightly clutching the door handle behind her until her knuckles were practically starting to turn white, doing the same thing as she'd done in the kitchen moments earlier as she clung to the fridge handle and watched him while he took his (suddenly much needed) blood pressure medication.
Andy took a step closer to her which made her breath hitch, part from the anticipation and part from the sheer weight of her all-consuming nerves because it really was finally about to happen, they were finally about to consummate their relationship. He raised his hand and slowly and gently allowed his fingers to stroke her cheek, trying not to crowd her and add yet more pressure to the mix while at the same time being unable to keep his hands off her for a moment longer.
"Look Sharon, we don't have to do this tonight you know" he told her quietly and sounding like he genuinely meant every single word.
It was the second time he'd said it to her in the space of a couple of minutes, saying the same thing when he realised just how nervous she suddenly was in the kitchen despite being the one to ask him to spend the night. Both times he couldn't believe the words that were falling out of his mouth when he was being offered sex with the love of his life for the very first time, having never said 'No' to anyone over the years. He loved her and he wanted her, he'd wanted her for so long that he could barely remember a time when he didn't feel that way but he was never going to push her into anything she didn't want to do even if it did mean going home with balls so blue he could barely sit down.
"I can go home or I can still stay the night and we can just go to sleep" he suggested, offering her more than one way out if she had changed her mind.
She smiled at him as she felt her knees go a little weak, wanting him all the more for the way he had now twice offered to go home right then without (at least to her) complaint. Her hold on the door handle loosened a little. "Yes we do" she replied emphatically.
"But…"
"Andy," she smiled as she blushed a little more, "it's time." She bit on her bottom lip as she sighed once again. "I love you and it's long past time that I showed you just how much."
He could see in her eyes that the uncertainty and the caution that was there before had gone and instead it was replaced with want and need and adoration. She was nervous and a little worried even but it was time and she wanted him. He nodded in reply, unable to keep the smile from his face as he closed the gap between them, standing right in front of her so that they were essentially sharing the same air and she could feel the heat that radiated from him, her chest beginning to heave with anticipation. His hand slowly came up and cupped her face. Oh so gently he brushed his lips against hers before pulling away slightly, her hands still behind her, one still clutching the door handle as if she would drown if she let go.
"We're going to take this nice and slow" he told her. Once more the tone of his voice and the love that she saw in his eyes made her knees weak and her throat dry. She wanted him, oh God did she want him but she needed to let go of the door handle first. "Okay?"
Andy didn't know precisely how long it had been for Sharon but he knew it had been a while and hurting her by rushing was at the forefront of his mind, knowing there was a very good chance that their first time was potentially going to be more discomfort than pleasure for her on the whole but likewise it had also been a long time for him too and therefore not only did he need to go slow to avoid what could essentially be called a 'teenage virgin explosion' and embarrassing himself if his abstinence caused him control issues, but he also wanted to go slow to savour every single second of the first time with the love of his life. This was going to be his last ever 'first time' and he knew that. He'd already had his last ever first date and his last ever first kiss, both of which were made all the more special because he knew going into those events that he was experiencing them with the love of his life and they were indeed his last 'firsts.' He may not have liked it in the beginning (loathed may actually be the more appropriate word as he let his frustration get the better of him at times when he felt like their relationship had come to a complete stop) but going slow had become their 'thing.' They had taken their whole relationship up until that point so ridiculously slowly, making it so much easier for them to work together and date that he saw no reason to change it, wanting them both to savour and enjoy every moment of it because they were never going to have another first time, this was it for the rest of their lives but more than that, he had waited so long for that moment, he was not about to rush it.
Sharon nodded before she could speak, clearing her throat a little. "Okay."
Andy nodded back, a large smile on his face as he inched his lips back towards hers, both hands moving up to cup her face before they finally kissed. It started off very chaste and slow and gentle until Andy finally deepened it. Their lips moved deliberately against the other's until they needed more and his tongue made its way into her mouth at the same time as his left hand moved to wrap around her waist in an attempt to draw her away from the door, a deeply satisfied moan coming from her throat as a result. They stayed like that for a minute or two, their lips hardly parting as it continued to build slowly. Finally, and just when they both thought it was never going to happen, Sharon released her almost vice like grip on the door handle (Andy hoping beyond hope that she wasn't going to use a similar tight grip on the more overly sensitive parts of his anatomy in the coming minutes).
Sharon's hands moved to his hips, drawing him closer before slowly making their way around to his back and underneath his jacket as they always did, her chest pressing flush against his. She could feel him smiling against her lips as a result almost immediately, unable to not smile back at him in the circumstances. In need of a little more air they regretfully broke apart but that only meant Andy had the opportunity to give her the same goofy looking smile she fell in love with as he winked at her and their foreheads came to rest together.
Her hands started to move again, once frozen but suddenly almost restless, travelling back around to his stomach, almost dancing on their journey before they very slowly moved up along his suspenders until she reached his shoulders, instantly slipping his suit jacket off. He took his hands away from her for a moment to allow it to fall down his arms and to the floor, neither one concerned with picking it up again until morning. Keeping her eyes locked on his, another nervous smile on her lips, she took hold of his tie just like she had done at Nicole's wedding when she dragged him to the dancefloor by it to force him to dance with her, only this time she dragged him towards her bed by it, slowly moving backwards with a different dance entirely in mind.
When her legs finally met the end of her bed she let go of his tie, straightening it as she always did even though it was going to be removed and flung across the room shortly, her eyes locked on it while his hands moved back to her hips, his thumbs moving in little circles once again as if he was trying to calm her nerves. Unable to delay the inevitable any longer Sharon looked up and met his eyes, her hands moving up to touch his cheeks before they slid down to his shoulders and then around his neck, her fingers running through his hair at the back of his head. Andy remained motionless save for the way his thumbs continued to slowly make circles on her hip bones, despite how much he wanted to touch and kiss every square inch of her he remained painfully patient, waiting for her to make the next move as he had done throughout their entire relationship thus far. Eventually she did, stepping up onto her tiptoes to crash her lips against his in a searing and frantic kiss, practically devouring each other.
Slowly and gently Andy edged her backwards until she sat and then lay down at the foot of the bed, Sharon reaching up quickly to grab his tie again and pulled him down to join her, already missing the feel of his lips against hers. He obliged instantly, not that he had much choice in the matter with the way she pulled on his tie like he was a dog on a leash who was about to cock his leg up a flowerbed, collapsing next to her in a heap before their lips came back together again.
They stayed like that for the longest time as, true to his word, Andy made sure that they continued to move at a snail's pace not only because they were both nervous but also because now that he finally had her where he wanted her after so much time waiting and his accident derailing them when his health got in the way, he wanted to savour every single moment, every sight, every sound, every taste, every touch, every sensation as their lips moved languidly together. After a while and with Sharon's hands moving up and down his back and into his hair, fisting one and then the other as she moaned into his mouth, Andy finally moved his own, unable to keep them off her body for a moment longer. Using one arm to prop himself up as he loomed over her, starting with his other hand just resting on her waist, making sure that she didn't run away from him but it slowly moved down to her hip and then along her leg, finally getting his hands on the part of her anatomy he'd spent so much of her previous twenty years plus that he'd known her staring at longingly, her skin softer and smoother and silkier than he ever dared imagine before his hand sneaked up and underneath her dress, forcefully grasping her hip. In response Sharon moaned into his mouth again, her whole body already on fire and they hadn't done much more than kiss, her nails scratching his scalp until she suddenly and rather abruptly pulled back from him. As Sharon closed her eyes tight and bit on her bottom lip once again, her nerves more than evident, Andy could only think the worst and wanted to kick himself for pushing her too hard too quickly. Why didn't he keep his hands on her waist? Why didn't he let her make the first move? Why? WHY?! For the love of all things Holy, WHY?! Then suddenly and much to Andy's surprise she smiled at him, her hand moving back down to his cheek.
Sharon closed her eyes again and swallowed. She was nervous, possibly more nervous than she had ever been in her life and that had nothing to do with her Grandmother's words of wisdom running through her mind. 'Sharon! Keep your knees together and your hand on your Moo-Moo!' It wasn't just the idea of having sex again for the first time in a long time although it was a major factor and she certainly wasn't frightened by it (unlike her first college roommate Mindy who was probably still frightened by the sight of a penis to that day) but it was a big step for her and it was a big step for them. She loved him, he was the love of her life, she was sure if it and she couldn't help but feel the pressure on both of their shoulders as they moved forward. Bad sex with someone you'd known for a couple of months was disappointing but not the end of the world. Bad sex with the love of your life after waiting months, even years for it was a complete and utter disaster in her opinion and she worried they would struggle to come back from it if that was the case. She was relatively sure that sex hadn't changed in the years since she'd last been naked with a man, feeling a little like Tom Hanks in Sleepless in Seattle and the conversation about 'tiramisu' but she was still rather anxious about it. On top of that she had nerves about the state of her body, being naked in front of someone (other than her Doctor) for the first time in a long time was a very big deal. She was far from Jabba the Hut in a wig and glasses but likewise she was also far from the twenty something year old Goddesses that Andy was accustomed to sleeping with, women who hadn't raised two children and didn't have breasts that looked like they were try to run away from each other. She took another deep breath and decided that there was only one way for her to combat her nerves about everything including her body and letting someone, her best friend her and colleague, see her naked for the first time in a long time and that was just to get it over and done with, like pulling off a Band-Aid except with more nakedness and hopefully a little less pain.
She sighed again as she registered the worried look of Andy's face. She knew what he was thinking, that she was about to call the whole thing off and send him packing, sending him home in desperate need of a very cold shower. She smiled again before pressing her lips gently against his twice, a promise for more and hoping to let him know that their evening was far from over.
"Andy…" She paused as she sighed again, the words suddenly stuck in the back of her throat just like 'I love you' had been for so many weeks as it became dry like the desert. "It's been a very long time since I last…" She closed her eyes tight before she continued as if not seeing his face would make it easier to say the words out loud, all of this despite the fact that she'd already told him once in the kitchen. "Andy it's been a depressingly long time since I last…you know." She laughed at herself and was relieved to see him smiling at her when she opened her eyes again, moving his hand back to her face and hoping to offer no pressure whatsoever despite having very little blood left in his brain and therefore was no longer thinking all that clearly.
Her revelation wasn't exactly breaking news to him. He had figured as much based on a few conversations they'd had here and there over the years of their friendship without everything that she'd said to him subsequently to explain one of her many reasons for wanting to wait a little before moving their relationship along so slowly. But it had been a while for him too so he understood her nervousness in that regard completely but like he'd already told her in the kitchen when her trembling hands made him realise just how nervous she actually was, it was just like riding a bicycle, once you know, you never forget (the fact that he'd already said 'bicyclist' rather than 'bicycle' to her before she led him into the bedroom revealing that he'd already stopped thinking with his brain and that only served to make her laugh and relax a little more). It was going to utterly kill him to end their night right there, in fact he worried that he balls were about to explode one way or another but he loved her so if that was what she wanted, he would end it there and go home even though he desperately didn't want to.
"I just…" she said before she paused again, looking at his tie for a moment before meeting his watchful eye, "I just need to do this my way for a moment, okay?"
Andy looked at her a little confused but nodded anyway. "Okay" he said finally. He had no idea what that meant, just like he didn't really know what 'slow' meant when she made her irrational demand in his car after their first date ('slow' turning out to mean a 'painful act of self-imposed celibacy that lasted five long, torturous months' but of course at that point he had no idea at all that Sharon had been trying and failing to put a move on him several times before his accident) but he was willing to go with it to make her feel comfortable and move things forward, letting her take the lead in whatever way she wanted, knowing that not only was she accustomed to it but moreover she just liked taking control of a situation.
Sharon placed a hand on his shoulder to make him move from his position looming over her, allowing her to stand. Andy obediently rolled onto his side as he watched her closely, his eyes never leaving her for an instant as she moved. She stood, moving very slowly onto unsteady legs (of the opinion already that it wasn't going to take much more before she could barely stand at all, coherent thought soon joining her legs in abandoning her and stopping her from running away from him), making her feel like a new born foal but hoping she looked a lot more graceful, aiming for sexy but knowing full well that wasn't going to happen. It's far too hard to look even remotely sexy when you're on the verge of wetting yourself with nerves. She didn't look particularly graceful either but Andy was never going to say anything about it because he barely noticed, she was already the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen in his entire life.
She moved to the nightstand on the left hand side of the bed and removed her glasses, half so that they didn't get in the way and break when things got moving again and half because she wouldn't be able to clearly see the disappointed look on Andy's face when he saw her naked body for the first time. As she removed them she suddenly thought about turning off the lamp, thinking she was going to look a lot better in near darkness. She suddenly wished she'd had the brains and the foresight to light some candles in there a little earlier in the evening instead, thinking that everyone (even her) looked better in candlelight. Beginning to overthink practically everything she thought that if she turned the lamp off to hide her body in near darkness Andy may take it the wrong way and she was avoiding seeing him in all his glory rather than the other way around. She was suddenly desperately hoping for a power outage before she removed her dress, the darkness protecting her a little but the damn thing stayed on and she couldn't wait any longer. Feeling more than a little flustered she ended up doing neither one thing or the other, leaving the lamp on and placing her glasses on the shade, letting them dangle (as she would discover a few hours later when she went to search for them after she was woken by Andy shouting in pain following her elbow to his eye).
With another deep and calming breath she moved around the bed to stand in front of her bureau, her eyes locked on Andy as he followed her movement. She may have been without her glasses which made Andy a little blurred around the edges, just like how she felt about her body it must be said, but she could still clearly see the expression on his face, one that was completely neutral as he wondered what she was about to do next while he continued to allow things to be done 'her way.' Standing well out of his reach she took another deep breath and began to very slowly slip off her cardigan. This was not a striptease. It was not slow and sexy with the occasional sway of her hips in order to tease him and get his engine running (it was already running, it was on the verge of overheating and exploding). Neither was it particularly rushed to get it over and done with either but it was what she needed to do to get over her issues by presenting herself to him in all her glory and in one go rather than inch by inch as he explored her body. She knew it was perhaps unfair to him but Andy would have plenty of opportunities to remove her clothing piece by piece in the future, to travel her skin with his lips and his tongue as he did it, but for now this would have to do. She dropped her cardigan to the floor just like she had done with his jacket, not bothering to hang it up because they simply didn't have the time for that, they'd already waited long enough.
Another deep breath followed as she reached behind her and very slowly began to pull down the zipper on her dress, the grey material hugging her body tightly all day and accentuating every single curve that was about to be unleashed. Her eyes were clamped shut as it slowly pooled at her feet before she stepped out of it and fully exposed herself to him for the first time, battling long and hard to stop herself from folding her arms in front of her chest to hide her body. She wasn't completely naked, she still had her underwear on (underwear that looked a hell of a lot better than what she left the condo in that morning), leaving that for the man still patiently propped up on her bed to remove but it was enough for her to get over her initial insecurities.
To Sharon it felt like hours ticked by as the room remained still and silent but it was more like seconds as she stood before him in just her underwear, her eyes shut, her heart seemingly beating so loud it was almost deafening and without Andy moving or saying a word. She was just beginning to wonder if he'd fallen asleep or jumped out of the window when she forced her eyes open to look at him. What she saw through her slightly blurred vision was Andy still lying in the exact same position, his expression still nothing more than neutral, not having moved so much as an inch with the exception of him starting to tug on his earlobe for some strange reason (it taking her a few more months before she worked that one out), staring at her in complete silence. She waited patiently for a few moments longer, hoping for any sort of reaction but Andy still didn't move or say anything, Sharon quickly beginning to feel more than a little exposed and even frustrated under his intense gaze. It was a move solely to calm herself and try to eliminate her lingering insecurities that she had about her body, removing her dress the way she did but it only served to make her look all the more confident and sure of herself in Andy's eyes and therefore even more attractive, his fingers itching to touch her even more as he tried to remain motionless with the exception of the way he was turning his ear bright red, wanting the go-ahead from Sharon before he moved.
Sharon was just about to have a full blown panic attack for the first time since she was in pigtails and preparing for show and tell when she noticed that Andy's eyes had darkened significantly and revealed just how much he wanted her. He wanted her regardless of her age and numerous imperfections and the amount of time she had forced him to wait for her. Despite what Sharon thought about herself and her body (all of her worries and insecurities Jack's influence once again) she was still in excellent shape for someone even half her age, rounded in places that she wasn't when she first met Andy and she had literally stolen his breath away in that dark, damp corridor of Parker Centre just like he now was but that only made her all the more appealing to him. She was more real to him as a result and not like the fantasy she assumed he had in his head about her given the time she had forced him to wait to get them to that stage.
Andy's eyes remained fixed on her legs for the longest time, his eyes wide and the size of saucers, moving up her body so painstakingly slowly as he remained propped up on his elbows and stared at her hungrily. Feeling impatient and anxious and more than a little exposed given that she was standing there virtually naked and all he was missing was his jacket, she felt compelled to push him into a response one way or another.
"Well?" she asked. Despite her very best efforts to suppress it she still sounded frustrated. She wasn't angling for a compliment or for him to say that he thought she was the most beautiful woman he'd ever seen in his life but some sort of response would have been nice rather than the way he just continued to stare at her, looking like he was a sandwich short of a picnic.
Without saying a word Andy stood and walked over to her, his eyes finally meeting hers and tearing away from her legs. Her breath hitched again as he approached. "Good God, you are so beautiful" he told her in a low whisper, almost like a growl and it instantly had her knees buckling underneath her, only staying upright because Andy cupped her face and kissed her so deeply it was a wonder she didn't melt on the spot.
When they finally pulled apart, he grinned at her. "I especially like these" he said as his eyes moved downwards, her following his gaze and assuming that he was talking about her breasts or more likely (knowing Andy Flynn like she did) her legs given the way he had stared at them after her dress fell to the floor. She was wrong. She was oh so wrong. Sharon's eyes widened in absolute horror as she realised that, rather regrettably, she was still wearing the pair of Ugg boots that Andy had fetched her to put on when they got home that evening, her usually always putting them on when she took off her heels following a long day at work but which she had forgotten all about the moment she had decided that was the night they were going to finally take that next step forward and consummate their relationship.
Encouraged by Andy's laughter Sharon likewise laughed hysterically at how utterly ridiculous she looked, both of them eventually having to shush the other as they continued to laugh so that they wouldn't wake Rusty. The last thing they needed in that moment was to wake him up with their laughter and have him walk in to see what all the noise was especially since he didn't know that Andy would be staying the night. But more importantly than that, although Andy was only missing his jacket, Sharon was missing almost everything and she really didn't like Rusty disturbing Dr Joe in the middle of the night, especially when he was not capable of making anything other than high pitched, horror filled, screeching noises as words eluded him. Still laughing hysterically but trying to be quiet, Sharon rested her forehead on his chest as he gently kissed the top of her head and his hands came up and landed on her hips. That was it, the catalyst, touching her naked flesh for the first time as a surge of excitement and electricity shot through the both of them, speeding up their heart rates instantly. Although they would end up in fits of nervous laughter again and again, including when Andy brought up the subject of contraception, in that moment everything stopped being funny. Sharon lifted her head from his chest before their lips met again, colliding together as his hands moved and splayed across her rear, pulling her flush against him until Sharon pulled away a little, very keen to get her Uggs off since, in her opinion, it was far from the sexiest look in the world although Andy thought she pulled it off well.
Seeing her intent immediately, Andy stopped her when she went to bend down to remove them. "Allow me" he growled almost possessively, another shot of desire surging through her body as a result. He may not have got to remove her dress on that occasion but he was absolutely going to remove her footwear for her, especially since it would give him a chance to run his hands up and down her legs at his leisure, something he'd wanted to do for the longest time. He very slowly dropped to his knees, ignoring the way they cracked and ached, kissing his way from her neck to her stomach as he lowered himself to the ground and then moved his lips agonisingly slowly from her hip to her ankles once settled on his knees, doing the same down each leg as he removed her Uggs. Feeling like a pool of Jell-O as his lips and fingers continued to caress her skin, Sharon was forced into putting her hand on the top of his head to steady herself, feeling him smile against the inside of her thigh as a result. Finally free from her rather fetching footwear and left in just her underwear Sharon offered Andy her hand to help him back up off the ground but Andy was quick to shake his head at her in response, giving her a typically cheeky wink. He had plans for his hands, none of which included her holding them to help him to his feet. His hands reached out and slowly trailed back up her legs, tracing every square inch of them as he practically growled again and he worked his way back up, his lips caressing what his fingers didn't.
"You have no idea how long I've wanted to run my hands up these legs" he told her as he slowly inched his way back into a standing position.
Even with her chest barely concealed and heaving dramatically from the anticipation, Andy still couldn't take his eyes off her legs, practically drooling as he got back up on his feet. At that point he had what was one of the goofiest looking smiles on his face that she had ever seen, making it hard for her to tell precisely what was really going through his mind at that moment although she had a fairly good idea and it was the same thought going through hers. In fact at that stage in their relationship she had only seen him look stupider twice before, the second time being when she responded with 'Fine' to his offer of dinner at Serve but the first time was long before they were even friends let alone dating.
Shortly after what fondly became known as the 'beanbag incident' Andy's attitude changed towards her quite a lot, as did the attitudes of the rest of the Major Crimes division in all fairness (Provenza even going as far to give her a little smile and nod of approval when he had previously been planning her retirement party). This abrupt change in attitude didn't just manifest itself in Andy picking up the beanbag and keeping it in his desk (it still sitting in his desk drawer five years later much to Sharon's surprise and utter delight it must be said) but also in the little smiles and nods that headed her way along with generally being slightly less obnoxious to her than he had been in the twenty years that led up to that moment.
Two days after Sharon had more than proved her worth with a gun and following the end of another very long day she was making her way back to her car in the parking garage when she just so happened to notice Lieutenant Andy Flynn walking about twenty paces ahead of her and clearly headed in the same direction. Then he saw her. Not Sharon, but a stunning little redhead wearing nothing more than hot pants and a bikini top and probably only about a third of his age if that. She was on the other side of the street and walking in the opposite direction, coming towards them and it was obvious to Sharon that Andy couldn't take his eyes off her, only seeing him in profile but it was enough for her to see the most ridiculous expression on his face that she had ever seen (or at least until they started to date and then she started to see it a lot more regularly), Andy practically drooling over her until…WHAM! He walked face first straight into a telephone role, breaking his sunglass immediately and (as she would come to discover the next day) giving him a very large and nasty looking black eye. Sharon laughed, trying her hardest to stop with a hand across her mouth as she slowly approached him and began to walk past. Too busy cursing to himself, wincing with pain and inspecting the damage to his sunglasses Andy failed to notice 'Darth' behind him right away but was horrified when he finally saw her and realised that she'd obviously seen the whole thing, glaring at her and spitting out 'Something funny Captain?' Once again she could only laugh gaily in response, shaking her head at him before she said 'Nothing at all Lieutenant, nothing at all' and then continued on her merry way.
The following day found a distracted Sharon already in the elevator with her head buried in a file when Andy and another Officer she hadn't met before stepped inside without either of them noticing the other (several years later she would later go on to know this Officer very well indeed as Andy's buddy in Operations, Clint). She wasn't paying much attention herself to what was going on around her until she heard 'What happened to your eye?' and then a very familiar sounding voice reply 'Some asshole punched me yesterday.' Her head snapped up immediately to confirm her suspicions as she battled hard to stifle her laughter as much as possible, biting her file to stay quiet. When they arrived on the ninth floor and Andy stepped out of the elevator, he immediately heard the familiar and much dreaded sound of high heels clicking on the floor behind him which forced him to turn and come face to face with Darth Raydor herself, standing behind him with an incredibly large grin on her face after clearly hearing the whole conversation. In truth his eye looked awful, far worse than anything that was to come from the bathroom floor tile or even Sharon's errant elbow for example. Much to his surprise she didn't say a word about his eye, his lie or what had happened the day before, instead she just nodded and said 'Lieutenant' and then made her way passed him and into the Murder Room. It was the second time in a couple of days that Andy came to realise that Darth Raydor wasn't anywhere near as bad as he first thought she was, a kind soul to go with those utterly fabulous legs (especially when they were spread a little for balance because she had a beanbag gun in her hands) and that huge stick up her ass.
When Andy met her eye again he put his hands back on her hips, desperate to touch her all over but while still waiting for her to make the next move and not prepared to derail her if she had anything else in mind as far as her 'I need to do this my way' plan was concerned. He didn't have to wait long. She moved her lips to his ear, sucking on his lobe for a moment as he closed his eyes and his grip on her hips tightened.
"I think you're a little over dressed" she told him on a whisper into his ear before she pulled back and pecked him on the lips. "Allow me."
With slightly trembling hands still she slowly undressed him. Like Andy she had been waiting a very long time for that moment, to finally get her hands on his bare skin and with plenty of time to kill, so she was determined to take full advantage and take her sweet time while Andy watched with rapt attention, his hands clinging on to her hips when he wasn't raising or dropping his arms to help her get him out of his suspenders, dress shirt and then finally his t-shirt, stealing quick kisses if she got too close to him as he allowed her the time and space to ensure she was comfortable. With his t-shirt falling from her fingers and to the ground, Andy left in just his pants and shoes, she just stared at him for a moment before her fingers and then her lips travelled the length and breadth of his chest, moving across his skin just like he had done with her legs when he removed her Uggs earlier, covering every single scar he had. She had seen him shirtless once before but it was still a surprise to see how thick and expansive the hair on his chest and down to his stomach was.
In the immediate aftermath to his accident and the several cracked ribs he sustained from the impact with the ground, Andy initially struggled to get his own t-shirt off the following evening without wincing, the problem only compounded further when he flat out refused to take any opiates. With the rest of the division searching Noah's bedroom to find the murder weapon and the money he stole from the illegal card game and then with the help of Hobbs getting the deal agreed and signed, Sharon was free to accompany Andy to the hospital in the back of the ambulance and then stay with him until Rusty drove them both back to the condo, giving him zero choice in his final destination. The Doctor had told them both that Andy needed care and supervision and that was what she intended to give him whether he liked it or not. Andy thought about arguing with her but he knew better even by that point in their relationship. The simple fact was he didn't want her to mother him, to see him as weak and feeble and someone who was a burden that she had to take care of even if only for a couple of weeks following an accident but at the same time he was in a lot of pain, it hurt him to even breathe so it wasn't like he had a lot of choice in the matter. When they arrived at the condo he was desperate for a shower but he was struggling to even get his tie off because of the pain from head to tie so Sharon naturally offered her assistance. The situation was not ideal for either of them to say the least, neither expecting the first time she got to slowly peel his clothes from him to be when he was too injured to do it himself (or indeed anything else for that matter). She stopped short of helping him remove his pants with Andy able to help himself from there, which was a slight exaggeration on his part but he was absolutely not going to allow the first time she got to see him naked to be a night he could hardly breathe without crying out in pain as he battled long and hard at the same time to stop his body from reacting to her touch, focusing on the pain and the idea of Provenza in a bikini to stop that from happening rather than the very slow and tender way she lifted his t-shirt up and over his head, her fingers lightly brushing his skin as she moved. As for Sharon, well she tried to make it look like her eyes were permanently fixed on his and not on anything else but she saw his chest, the muscles up his arms and across his shoulders, wanting to know what it felt like to run her hands and her lips all over him until…it was a thought that was going to have to wait until he was better and wait she did until just over a month later and she finally got to remove his t-shirt again but this time in her bedroom and this time it could and was about to go much further.
She ran her hands all over him, touching everything she'd so desperately wanted to the last time but he was simply too injured to even attempt it. His chest was undoubtedly hairier than she remembered, his necklace almost glistening in it but that only meant she liked it and him all the more. Jack's chest was the same or at least it was when they first met until he started to wax it, something that became a regular occurrence for him much to her displeasure. Over the years Gavin had been big into 'Bears,' vocally so and the hairier the better in his eyes, once telling Sharon that he could 'never be with a man who waxed more than I do.' Sharon quickly began to feel the same way about Jack, him spending more time in the bathroom and in front of the mirror than she did. All men between Jack and Andy (none of whom she was proud of sleeping with not just because she had broken her marriage vows for nothing more than meaningless sex and caused her Grandmother to turn in her grave for having sex at all let alone with a man that wasn't her husband while she was still married) barely had time to get their pants off much less anything else, Sharon wanting a man-made orgasm from them and nothing more and so sent them on their way almost immediately afterwards (and not just because one man, 'Weird Harry' as he affectionately became to be known, neighed like a horse as he climaxed and another immediately burst into tears and sobbed long and hard over his Mother).
The following night as they indulged in their first real round of pillow talk and she scratched her nails up and down his chest for the first time, she would ask if he'd ever waxed it out of curiosity, but in that moment as she looked at him, natural woollen sweater and slightly rounded belly and all, he was the single sexiest thing she'd ever seen in her entire life. As her fingers continued to slowly trace his chest she took a deep and calming breath but that only meant she inhaled the scent of him a little more. 'Oh God he smells good' she thought to herself as she groaned but then again he always smelt good in her opinion. She'd thought about it a lot over the years. Back when she was working for FID and she was done listing all of his bad qualities she had to admit (aside from being the most handsome man she'd ever seen in person) that not only did he dress better than any man she'd ever met before but he also smelt so so good too.
The first time she confirmed up close and personal just how good he smelt was at Nicole's wedding when she forced him into dancing with her. With a couple of glasses of wine in her to loosen her tongue Sharon would later admit that part of the whole 'misunderstanding' with Nicole and Sandra was her fault because of the way she danced with him, deliberately picking a slow track to drag him to the dancefloor before she wrapped her arms around him in a way not too dissimilar to how Nicole was dancing with Dean. She knew full well what she was doing and that it would look like they were much more than friends to his family, especially because of the way she ran her hands up and down his back and buried her face into the crook of his neck (despite telling him to introduce her as 'my friend Sharon,' the very moment she saw the way his former in-laws looked at him it made her want to give them something to talk about, to show that someone liked him, the person he had worked so hard to become was a long way removed from the alcoholic Sandra divorced). But none of that mattered to her at the time, she was fully embracing and enjoying the rare opportunity to dance with a handsome man, a handsome man who smelt divine and was on the fast track to becoming a very good friend. She held him close the entire time as they danced, partly because she didn't want him running away to sit on his own in the corner again and partly because she just wanted to. Eventually she forced him into doing the same thing when he finally felt brave enough to hold her the same way as she was holding him, his hands landing on her back and his eyes drifting closed.
Being that close to him, holding him securely in her embrace and breathing him in was just intoxicating back then at what was the very start of their friendship. Two and a half years later with him standing shirtless in her bedroom, his hands still gripping on to her hips, his chest and broad shoulders right there in front of her and ready for exploration, he smelt even better and if nothing else she felt she could quite happily spend the rest of her life just holding him in her embrace and breathing him in.
Sharon was instantly hit by how warm he was. It wasn't exactly something she didn't already know, she'd been cuddled in his embrace on the couch on many occasions leading up to that point and she'd felt just how warm he was underneath even with his shirt and a sweater on. Without his shirt he felt so warm that to the touch her fingers almost tingled as they came into contact with his chest. There was an awful lot that she going to enjoy first but she suddenly couldn't wait to fall asleep in his arms for the first time, his warmth a comfort and guaranteed to lull her to sleep just as quickly as their exertions beforehand and the fact that she was going to sleep with the man she loved in bed with her for the very first time would do.
In all honesty actually sleeping with Andy, falling asleep with him lying next to her in bed was just as significant a step to her as consummating their relationship and letting someone other than a Doctor see her naked was. In the two decades between Jack and Andy she never allowed anyone to actually spend the night. With all of them she was looking for an orgasm and nothing more. She wasn't looking for a relationship. Despite Jack being gone and never coming back (despite repeated attempts and occasionally succumbing to his charms) she was not looking for love and she felt truly awful for breaking her marriage vows but she also had an itch that needed to be scratched desperately and once it was she sent them on their merry way with thanks. Likewise when she foolishly did allow Jack back into her bed for the night over the years since he left that last time she always regretted it almost immediately, usually before he'd finished and kicked him out seconds later. Sharing a bed with Andy was new and scary but it was something she was looking forward to and in all fairness Andy was in a similar position. He hadn't slept in the same bed with someone (other than Provenza on his last but one wedding night) since his divorce, always 'fleeing the scene of the crime' so to speak as soon as his latest conquest had fallen asleep so he was looking forward to it just as much as Sharon was (just like he was looking forward to the moment she spent the night at his house for the first time, completely alone).
As her hands continued to move up and down his torso and just when she was beginning to think that Andy didn't have any of the same insecurities that she had she felt him suck his stomach in, eliciting a little chuckle from her and a few kisses all the way across his waist as a result until he released it again and relaxed. To her he was perfect, scars, belly and all and she was determined to spend the rest of the night proving as much to him, but first she had to remove the rest of his clothes.
Before she had time to stoop and take off his shoes and socks so she could get rid of his pants he did it for her, kicking his shoes to one side with a quick flick (making the position of one of them on the nightstand in the middle of the night all the more baffling as to how it ended up there) before pulling his socks off one by one and discarding them in an equally haphazard way. It was a ridiculous thing for her to focus on, the fact that Andy took his socks off but it was genuinely important to her. After Emily was born Jack never took his socks off in bed and it drove her out of her mind. Towards the end of their marriage he would claim that he left them on because Sharon had cold feet to go with the rest of her ice cold body and frozen heart but he kept them on long before things started to disintegrate between them. Being naked with the exception of a pair of black socks was not the sexiest sight in the world (about as sexy as underwear and Ugg boots in her opinion) and neither was sex with a man in nothing but socks either although if anyone could carry that look off it was the man she was currently slowly undressing but Jack certainly couldn't and yet he wondered why she wasn't interested in sex towards the end (the socks certainly a contributing factor but it was mainly because of his drinking, his gambling, his cheating and all round vile and obnoxious attitude towards her).
With Andy left standing in just his pants and underwear, his hands still resting on her hips but his teeth gritted together, taking every single ounce of focus and self-control he had not to take over and take charge of the situation, desperate to run his hands and his lips all over her but still waiting until she was ready, still in a state of disbelief that it was finally about to happen (Sharon thinking that the man honestly deserved a medal as he proved once again that he had the patience of a Saint), Sharon moved her attention to them, her fingers dancing down to the button and the zipper as his suspenders remained dangling by his sides. She looked him in the eye and smiled at him as she popped open the button and slowly but tantalisingly pulled down his zipper, Andy smiling back at her. His hold on her hips loosened as she bent over slightly to lower his pants and helped him extract his feet from them. The first thing she noticed was his boxer shorts, baggy and stripped using all the colours of the rainbow and then some. Robin and Justin had demanded that they be allowed to buy them for him for his last birthday, them looking utterly ridiculous especially on someone his age but the moment he unwrapped them she knew he'd wear them just for the boys even though they'd never see him in them, Sharon chuckling at the sight of them. Repeating his earlier motion, her fingers slowly dragged up his legs again until she was greeted by his obvious desire for her that was barely concealed by his novelty boxers. Indeed Viagra was certainly not needed and because of that the need to go slow and take her time suddenly evaporated into the night sky. She wanted him and quite clearly he felt the exact same way. She wanted him desperately, she wanted him right then and there, so the moment she was fully upright again she crashed her lips against his in an instant, the force of which almost knocking him off his feet as his hands moved back to her hips and then around to her ass. Eventually they pulled apart, that same ridiculously goofy smile back on his face as her hands travelled up and to his shoulders, moving around to the back of his neck.
Sharon nodded at him before she kissed him gently on the lips and then rested her forehead against his, both of them with their eyes closed for a moment as they shared the same air. "Okay" Sharon said as she exhaled. That was it, she had seized control of the situation to make it easy for herself but she was done now. Her still growing list of insecurities, although not completely gone, had certainly decreased in size because of the way he looked at her, the way his eyes drank her in with such love and desire (and not to mention what the sight and feel of her had done to the arrangement of his boxer shorts) meant that it was time that she stopped running their relationship and they finally became equals, proceeding from that point on together. She nodded again. "Okay" she repeated.
Andy nodded back and very slowly moved in to kiss her before her hands on his shoulders suddenly stopped him dead in his tracks. The frown on her face meant that once again he was expecting her to call the whole thing off so he was naturally stunned when he processed the words that fell from her lips seconds later.
"Would it be a bad idea to check your blood pressure right now?" she asked him, her face screwing up anxiously as she waited for an answer, realising that it wasn't exactly the best time to bring the subject up but at the same time she was also scared to death about killing him. Over the previous month and a half she had stressed about his health if he so much as sneezed in a way she deemed too violent so in comparison an orgasm was going to have her reaching for a defibrillator just in case, especially since not even a month had passed since he had surgery.
Andy's mouth dropped open as he struggled for words for a moment, not really sure himself why he was so surprised by what he was hearing. "What?" he said finally, his voice an awful lot higher than usual.
"Just to be on the safe side" she clarified with a small shrug. Andy couldn't help but laugh at her, thinking that only Sharon Raydor would pause sex to take his blood pressure on the odd chance he may keel over. Sharon battled not to laugh with him, wanting him to take her suggestion seriously for his own sake but eventually she succumb to it, her head briefly resting on his shoulder. Seizing the opportunity Andy kissed her on the cheek and snaked his arms around her waist to ensure she couldn't so easily wriggle away from him again. "You did have lifesaving surgery less than a month ago remember" she reminded him as if he was likely to forget. Sharon pulled back a little so that he could see her face and realise she was being deadly serious and her suggestion needed to be addressed before things were going to go any further. "I just want to make sure I don't kill you and not only because I don't want to explain to our children and Lieutenant Provenza what we were doing when you died."
As much as Andy wanted to smile at her use of 'our children,' talking about them as a whole and the united family they were quickly becoming, he couldn't stop himself from laughing at her and the idea that she could kill him with sex (not yet aware that she had ridden her first real boyfriend right into hernia surgery). His laughter in the face of what was a very serious subject meant that Darth Raydor soon put in a surprise appearance, intent on getting him to agree to what Sharon wanted for his own sake. Sadly it didn't work. Little did she know that was the worst thing she could have done at that moment because as a result he was never going to take that look at work seriously ever again with his mind undoubtedly going straight back to those moments as they stood virtually naked and what they were about to do if she used it on him in the future.
"Sharon," Andy said quietly as he cupped her face and gently brushed his lips against hers, "I understand and believe me I appreciate your concern but trust me, what we're going to do is very beneficial for my blood pressure." Seeing no need for further discussion since he was right and his Doctor had told him as such (thankfully when neither Sharon or Rusty were in the room) he moved to kiss her once again but she pulled back a little to move out of his way while still keeping her hands on his shoulders. Andy laughed before he sighed, realising they needed to have the conversation if they were going to move any further forward. "Okay fine but answer me this, where are you going to get a blood pressure monitor from while in nothing but your underwear at close to Midnight in Los Angeles?"
Sharon's mouth opened and closed for a moment as she searched for an answer, eventually and rather reluctantly conceding that he had a valid point and it was something she should have thought of a hell of a lot earlier. Before she opted to quickly get dressed again and go out and find one (although where that would happen neither knew) or thought of anything else to derail them, Andy covered her lips with his, hungrily devouring them as his hands slipped down to her backside before he suddenly lifted her up as easy as anything. Sharon squealed and then laughed against his mouth as she did what he'd been dreaming about for a very long time, she wrapped her legs around his waist while he turned them and walked them slowly towards the bed.
Sharon's cheeks began to flush a little as her mind drifted back to that first time and the first time he really drooled over her legs until she was brought back to the present and the man with his arms around her who was still trying to laugh her into a blissful sleep.
"Wow! That much?" Andy laughed, of the opinion that if Sharon loved his legs anywhere near as much as he loved hers then she spent a great deal of her day thinking about them instead of working. Sharon laughed at him before he kissed her on the top of her head and began to rub his hand along her left leg as far as he could reach, making it down to her ankle before working his way back up again. "But is that just to you or is this something that is discussed about me behind my back at work?"
Sharon laughed again, shaking her head at the complete moron she adored who could make her cry with laughter one moment and then make her knees weak the next. "Are you asking me if other people at work openly discuss with each other over the water cooler what a fabulous pair of legs you have?" she asked.
"Yes" Andy nodded as if it wasn't a ridiculous question in the slightest. "You know like guys feeling jealous about them and women wanting them pressed up against their own in bed" he added and making her laugh again. "You know, stuff like that. Well? Do they?"
For a moment Sharon struggled to speak she was laughing so hard. "Oh of course they do Andy. All the time! It's a wonder anyone gets any work done at all. In fact I hear that Chief Pope is going to send out a memo next week to ask people to put an end to it once and for all and to start to focus more on work again because they're causing such a distraction. You don't have the same briefings as I do but the unsolved crime statistics have gone through the roof as a result" she proclaimed before laughing at herself again.
Andy gave her a withering look, trying his hardest to look annoyed while he waited for her laughter to subside. "Are you making fun of me?" he asked, trying not to smile and reveal that he was only joking.
"Of course not my darling. Why would I make fun of you and your fabulous legs, legs that are no doubt famous the world over?" she crooned before she laughed into his chest.
He frowned at her. "I'm going to ignore that" he replied grumpily before he paused for a brief moment. "How would you rate them?" he asked, raising them into the air again so that he could look at them.
"Rate what?"
"My legs."
Sharon laughed again, unable to stop herself. "What like out of ten?"
"No of course not because I mean I already know that they're a ten, maybe even an eleven" he joked, smiling at her as she laughed again. "I meant more like in comparison to the rest of my body, how would you rate them in comparison to my other assets?"
"On well in that case I'd say they're definitely in the top five of your best features."
"Top five?"
"Yes. First comes..."
"My ass" he cut in quickly and causing Sharon to laugh once again. Oh how she adored that man. Without fail Andy always managed to find the perfect way to not only distract her from whatever was troubling her in that moment but to also make her laugh, laughing until all she really cared about in the world was the happy little bubble they inhabited together. Sharon had thought about it a lot over the previous twelve months and she had concluded that she had never laughed that much with anyone before, not even Jack who she had to admit was very funny and charming when they first met and he put his mind to it. But Andy just knew how to make her laugh, seemingly without much effort on his part and it was one of the many reasons that she so quickly became his friend after she got to really know him and then found herself in love with him, Andy basically laughing his way into her heart and into her home. "You have this unholy obsession with my ass Raydor, though not that I blame you in the slightest, it is rather magnificent."
Sharon laughed again, her leg moving further across his waist and almost pinning him to the bed which inevitably led to his free hand moving down to it again, just resting it on her knee while the other continued to stroke her back. Andy may have been hot ninety percent of the time but he never once complained in the slightest when she would drape herself over him in bed, loving it just as much as she clearly did. "Oddly enough your backside was not what first attracted me to you" she revealed.
"Oh that came later?" he asked innocently.
"Yes" she laughed. "That came when I finally got my hands on it the first night you stayed over here with me."
"So you'd just admired it from afar before then? Imagining what it looked like under my pants? Stuff like that?"
"If you like" she laughed again, tears now forming in her eyes she was laughing so hard.
Andy tried to look annoyed at her continued laughter but it was very hard to hide his smile and the sense of relief that Sharon not only looked but sounded so much better than a few days earlier. "Will you stop laughing at me and take this seriously please" he demanded.
"Okay I'll try my very best" she promised with her laughter suggesting otherwise.
"Good, thank you." He paused for a moment before he asked "So if it's not my ass then what is it?"
"First up is your smile" she told him as her fingers traced his lips. "The beautiful smile I fell in love with. The smile that makes everything in life seem so much brighter no matter what and which always gets you out of trouble even when I'm on the verge of murdering you." With that they both laughed, Andy nodding in agreement since it had saved him more times than he could count in his life thus far. "Your secret weapon" she confirmed with a kiss.
"Okay, then it's my ass?"
Sharon laughed. "No, then it's your eyes. These big brown, soul searching pools that I can and do frequently find myself getting lost in" she told him before she kissed him again.
"Okay, next."
"This isn't going to give you a big head I hope?"
"Oh it's too late for that babe" he said almost arrogantly and making her laugh again. "That ship sailed long ago. So come on, what's next on the list?"
"Well it's not so much a physical feature but rather a characteristic that I have found is simply impossible to resist."
"Oh yeah? What?"
"It's the way you make me laugh. You told me on the day of the move that you had a little crush on me following Nicole's wedding, after I dragged you to the dance floor by your tie," she said before he nodded, confirming what she'd said, "well my boy I had more than a little crush on you too by the time you'd dropped me home and we said goodnight and it was all because of how you made me laugh that evening." She kissed him on the lips, it lingering again. "Despite everything you were feeling and how nervous you were and the fact that I was supposed to be the one there for you and not the other way around, you made me laugh that evening like no other."
He smiled, the sound of Sharon laughing at him being his current addiction of choice and one he didn't intend on ever giving up. "But mainly it's my ass right?" he asked jokingly and making her laugh before she kissed him again.
"You really can be a colossal idiot at times but that just makes me love you all the more" she laughed again. They returned to just cuddling in silence for a few moments as she gazed into his eyes until Andy yawned long and loud. "If you want to go back to sleep I don't mind."
"I'm not going to sleep. I'm not tired."
"Yes you are, you're absolutely exhausted and we both know that you'll be snoring in under ten minutes unless you have a very big distraction" she told him.
"Nope. Not going to happen Raydor" he said almost defiantly and more determined than ever not to go to sleep until she had drifted off peacefully.
"Andy you can go to sleep standing up in the middle of the Break Room when you're not even remotely tired." He went to object, to tell her that she was exaggerating but Sharon quickly brought her finger to his lips to stop him. "Don't even bother, it was only four weeks ago that Rusty found you asleep in the kitchen with your finger on your phone and a coffee cup still in your hand. He thought you were dead. You nearly gave him a heart attack" she reminded him and making them both laugh as they recalled Rusty's panicked 'Mom! Mom! Is Andy dead?' echoing around the condo.
"Yeah well I was talking to Provenza so it's only to be expected that I would be bored into having a quick power nap while he bleated on repeatedly at the other end about Patrice's sister."
"What about Patrice's sister?"
"I don't know. It was something to do with her dogs and a yard party and a pair of shoes he can't wear ever again, I don't know" he shrugged, missing the best part of the story after he fell asleep, something he would regret if only he knew what Provenza had been trying to tell him.
"But you never usually fall asleep at the drop of a hat at all? That was all down to the Lieutenant" she laughed.
"Yes! It was!" Andy cried and making Sharon laugh again, not believing a single word. "Hey, I may not be twenty anymore but I can still go all night when I need to."
"In the Murder Room maybe when you're hard at work and the adrenaline of the moment is pumping through your fabulous fur covered body but not when you're already flat on your back in a bed you can't" she reasoned although she had seen with her own eyes him having a very fleeting cat nap at his desk in the middle of the night when they'd been working for forty eight hours straight, everyone usually succumbing for a few moments here and there, not that it was a problem and never once picking any of them up on it.
"Don't worry about...did you just say 'fur covered body'?" he asked. Sharon laughed which only served to make him glare at her even more, his fake sense of great offense making her laugh hysterically once again.
"I actually said fabulous fur covered body" she corrected. "There's a difference."
"Is there really?"
"Yes. Absolutely."
He eyed her suspiciously for moment, Sharon fully aware that he wasn't being serious and he was only doing it to make her laugh. "Yeah well don't worry about my stamina Raydor, worry about your own right now" he stated, the idea that Sharon would fall asleep before him making her burst out laughing. "I can keep going all night even without a pill."
"What pills? Amphetamines?" she joked. They laughed again but Sharon quickly stopped, abruptly so. She pressed her lips to his chest as she sighed sadly, her face moving back into the crook of his neck.
Andy rubbed her back for a moment in silence before asking the question. "What's the matter? What's on your mind?" he all but whispered before kissing the top of her head again.
"I'm sorry but I still can't help but feel guilty about everything" she told him before she sighed and took a big calming breath of him.
"Look Sharon I know we see things very differently when it comes to Dwight and other associated dirt bags that we come across on an almost daily basis and what you had to do the other day, I know that but you can still always talk to me about it. I'll always be here to listen to you to hopefully make you feel a little better even if I don't quite fully understand how you feel" he told her, always willing to listen no matter what.
She moved her head back and onto her pillow for a moment so that she could smile up at him more easily, her leg and arm still draped over him. "I know. I know you are and don't think I don't appreciate it," she said before she kissed him on the lips, "but that's not what I meant."
"Okay. Then what? What else have you got to feel guilty about, huh?"
"Isn't it obvious?" she asked with a sigh, receiving an uncertain shrug in return since Andy had no idea what she was talking about. "Here I am in bed with you. You've just moved in. We're just starting our lives together and we're laughing about your pyjamas and your fur covered body…"
"Fabulous fur covered body" he corrected her.
Sharon laughed despite the serious point she was trying to make. "Right, but across town…" she said before her words trailed off and all she could think about was the Taylors, knowing that likewise they probably weren't able to sleep either with life never the same for them ever again. This new and exciting adventure she was just starting with Andy in comparison to how Russell and Lydia's adventure was now over never failing to make her feel guilty because of how happy she felt.
Andy nodded as he suddenly understood what she was trying to say to him. "I know. I know." He held her even tighter to his chest and kissed to top of her head as she moved to lie on his shoulder again, not for the first time taking a deep breath of him as her face moved into the crook of his neck. He easily understood how she felt because he felt the exact same way, feeling all the more grateful that he still had Sharon in his life precisely because Lydia Taylor was now alone and grieving across town. "But we'll take care of them, we will. If there's one thing that the LAPD does better than anyone else in this world it's taking care of its own. And he wouldn't want you to not laugh anymore just because he's gone." He kissed the top of her head again. "I've known Russell Taylor my whole career, from my very first day on the job even. He'd want us to get this whole mess figured out, lock up the assholes responsible, throw away the key, have the appropriate time to grieve and then live our lives. That's what he'd want," he rightly pointed out before kissing the top of her head again, "not for you to feel guilty or to miss out of life because he's not here. Right?" he reasoned.
"Right" she agreed. "You're right but it just feels so hard."
"I know" he said before he kissed her forehead. "I know."
They went back to just cuddling in silence again, savouring the feel of the other while they still could, Andy's eyes eventually falling closed in the hope that she was about to drift off to sleep. He was wrong. She turned to look up at him. "Are you asleep yet?" she asked quietly in case he had even though a helicopter landing on the roof would fail to wake him.
"Nope" Andy replied as his eyes snapped open again and he kissed her on the top of her head as if to prove it, more determined than ever not to fall asleep.
"You sound sleepy."
"It's just my bedroom voice" he growled and making her laugh. Her hand, as it always did, moved to underneath his t-shirt to rake her nails across his chest, not just because she knew how much he loved it but as a thank you for staying awake with her even though he was so tried himself. "Don't worry if it arouses you to the point of madness, it's a common side effect" he joked, again almost growling his words. Sharon laughed as she swotted his chest beneath his t-shirt and he kissed her on the top of her head.
They lay in silence again, Andy's eyes closing as he let out a deep breath, making no attempt to go to sleep as Sharon's nails went up and down his chest while she stared into space. "Did I hear you talking to Jason on the phone earlier?" she asked finally. "After dinner?"
"Yeah. He has a couple of houses in the Hills he thinks we should try to take a quick look at" he told her with a yawn before he shrugged far too casually for someone who was supposed to be interested in that sort of thing. "Perfect for us as a family apparently."
"Uh-huh" Sharon replied, her response really drawn out and revealing her confusion and, it must also be said, her suspicion. Andy laughed at how unbelievably suspicious she sounded, Sharon looking and sounding exactly like Chief Pope used to back in the day when Brenda started a conversation with the words 'Lieutenants Flynn and Provenza.' "So what's the catch?"
Andy shrugged before he answered. "I don't know, he didn't say. A freeway right through the kitchen maybe" he suggested to the sound of much laughter. "Perhaps a graveyard in the bedroom." Sharon once again laughed at him but it was easy for her to tell from his tone that he still wasn't really all that interested in moving again, especially not so soon, he had moved in with her and that was enough for the time being but it still begged the question 'Why was he still looking at houses?' if he wasn't that interested.
"They sound lovely."
"Yeah right, anyway I told him we were kinda in the middle of things at work and I'd call him back when we have more time."
She looked up at him with surprise once again, not really sure what he was thinking anymore when it came to looking for a house, telling her one thing but contradicting it with his actions. "But I thought you said you'd be happy if we stayed here instead."
He smiled at her through the darkness. "I did and I am." He kissed her on the top of her head again as if to confirm it and to put her mind at rest that he wasn't about to go all house crazy again since she continued to worry about the stress of it all given that he had decided to take it all on his shoulders without asking her for help.
"Then why is Jason still searching listings for us if you've no intention of buying?"
"Why? Because that gigantic asshole waited until I'd shown both you and Rusty around every square inch of that place and got you all excited about living there with me before he told us about the God damn black mould!" he cried. Sharon laughed as she quickly realised that he was never going to let that go until the day he died, just like his (frankly sick) Badge of Justice obsession. "That asshole more than deserves the run around for a while just so I can get a little even with him." Sharon laughed again, shaking her head. "But like I've said to you before, should Jason find another house just like that one in the same price range but this time without the murder victim in the pool and black mould everywhere then," he paused as he shrugged casually, "maybe we take a look at it."
In truth Andy was more than happy and content to stay at the condo for the foreseeable future and even beyond. At the end of the day all he wanted was to live with Sharon and Rusty (going to great lengths to always include Rusty when he said something like that so that they would both understand that he wasn't trying to push the young man out) and to share in their lives with them, to call them his family, he really didn't care where, which he thought he had already made abundantly clear to her when he suggested it and hoped that moving in together right away was an option (though at the time neither Sharon or Rusty were even close to ready for that step). All he wanted to do was live with the love of his life and her son, to live with his family, to him everything else was just background noise though if a dream house did suddenly appear then they'd be foolish not to at least take a look at it.
"Okay. It sounds like a plan to me." Sharon paused for a moment before she looked up at him, nervously chewing on her bottom lip before she asked the burning question. "You're really happy here?"
He smiled at her before he gently pushed his lips to her forehead. "I am deliriously happy here babe, believe me, I couldn't be happier." He met her waiting lips as if he confirm it, a little contented hum coming from the back of her throat before he added "But to fair I'd be happy any place you are."
She smiled at him again. "Is it starting to feel like home yet?"
"Anywhere that you are feels like home to me."
Sharon laughed at how unbelievably corny Andy could be when he set his mind to it while still believing every single word he said. "Smooth talker" she laughed as she kissed his chin. "You really can charm the birds from the trees can't you boy?"
"Oh you have no idea" he said with an exasperated sigh which made her laugh, Andy making it sound like the worst thing on earth. "It's like a scene from The Birds or signalling the end of days or something when I really turn it on." Once Sharon's laughter had died down they went back to just cuddling in silence, Andy's hand moving up and down her back to let her know that he wasn't going to sleep and instead he was trying to think of something to say that they keep her entertained as they waited for dawn to break. Then inspiration hit him. "When I moved into what is now thankfully my former home," he started to say, Sharon smiling at him and kissing his chest, just as thankful as he was that it was now his former home, "and I started to unpack and you know make the place my own, I found something more than a little unexpected." With her interest peaked she lifted her head to look at him with a mixture of amusement and dread written across her face since his stories frequently took an unexpected and often sinister turn much to her horror. "Directly under the sink in the bathroom I found a very small, very old looking metal box, no bigger than my thumb and with the initials 'CB' engraved on the top. Now obviously I assumed it had been accidentally left behind by the previous occupants of the house. It was wedged right behind a pipe and completely out of sight, I mean I only saw it myself because it glinted when I shined my flashlight under there to find where the pipe was leaking so naturally I just assumed they'd left it behind in error given where it was. Anyway I opened it up to see if it was anything they might want back and you'll never guess what I found inside."
"What?"
Andy smiled before he answered, knowing full well she was going to recoil in horror. "It was filled to the brim with teeth."
"Teeth?"
"Yep."
"Human teeth?"
"Human teeth. It was practically overflowing with nothing but children's teeth."
"Oh my God!" Sharon cried, suddenly wondering what the hell had gone on in that house before Andy moved in.
"I know right, terrifying" he laughed. "Now once I'd gotten over the initial shock at my horrifying discovery and stopped screaming long enough to draw breath," he explained as she laughed again, "I quickly picked them all back up from the floor where I'd accidentally scattered them like confetti at a wedding," he said as she laughed again, "and put them all back in the tin again all the while as I desperately tried to work out which incident was the creepiest thing I'd ever seen in my entire life, the box of teeth in my new bathroom or the time I arrested a guy who was running down the street in Boyle Heights wearing his wife's head as a hat." Sharon laughed again as she shook her head, thinking that the time she witnessed him accidentally kick a severed head several yards across a beach like a soccer ball when he was distracted by Nicole on the phone was top of her list by a long way. "It was the teeth obviously" he confirmed finally with her laughing once more. "Anyway I got to thinking that maybe they were the previous owner's kid's teeth or something and they might want them back since they'd kept them like that, treasured you know?" She nodded, having the first teeth that Emily and Ricky lost along with a lock of their hair in her storage space along with Emily's first ballet slippers and hundreds of drawings and cards they'd made her over the years in her collection of most prized processions. "So I found out where their mail was being forwarded to and I carefully wrapped the tin up and posted the box back to them" he said before he paused. "Then a week or so later I was talking to the lady across the street and I find out the previous owners didn't have any kids."
Sharon's head snapped up, her horror apparent. "What?"
Andy laughed. "I sent some strangers a box of random human teeth."
Her horror subsiding Sharon started laughing hysterically, drawing a smile to his face. "Did you include a note?" she asked once she was capable of speech.
"Kind of. I wrote on a Post It 'I thought you might want these' and stuck it to the lid of the tin" he said and making her laugh again, Andy quickly joining in with her. "At the time I figured they'd realise that the new owner had obviously sent them until I realised they didn't actually belong to them" he explained as she continued to laugh. "I kept expecting Taylor to call me into his office at any moment and ask me why I was mailing random body parts to strangers." Sharon continued to laugh, unable to stop, Andy laughing with her as a result. "I knew you'd like that story."
"I don't think 'like' is the appropriate word here Andy" she told him with another chuckle. "I wish you'd told me this sooner."
"Why?"
"Because on one particular evening I spent a great deal of time lying on that floor with my head wedged between the wall and the toilet bowl" she reminded him as he laughed, their only Valentine's Day as a couple so far memorable for several reasons, not least for how violently ill Sharon was all evening. "I'm starting to worry what some of the former owners used to get up to in there."
"It's best not to think too long and hard about these things. Or tell Provenza in case he starts to look into it and then before you know it a pot plant mysteriously moves in the middle of the night and you consider calling in a priest" he said extremely casually.
Sharon looked at him baffled but highly amused for a moment. "What?" she asked. Andy shook his head and laughed back before they settled down again, her head landing on his shoulder again while her nails scratched up and down his body. As they lay in silence her eyes scanned the darkened room, that one bone of contention coming back to her mind again and forcing her to voice it. "Do you think we should redecorate in here? Try to put your stamp on the room?" she asked.
No matter how many times Andy told her that he didn't care about home furnishings and he was perfectly happy and content in his new home the way that it was Sharon still continued to worry that with the exception of his clothes (when they finally had chance to unpack all of his belongings) it didn't look like he lived there at all. She had begged him to at least bring his ratty old armchair to replace the one they already had in the bedroom, not just to make it feel like his home but also because it clearly had sentimental value for him but Andy being Andy, he just continued to shrug his shoulders and repeated that he didn't care about any of it. The truth was (and although Provenza would claim he was whipped even though he had no right to say that with what Patrice did to their house when she moved in) he liked living surrounded by Sharon's possessions. She had excellent taste, far better than his anyway and despite the abundance of ballet paraphernalia (which he admitted Nicole's boys loved on the few occasions they'd been over) it was the one place he had felt most at home for years (except for the Murder Room), even before they were dating. It just felt like a home to him and he was more than happy there as it was.
Andy laughed. "My stamp?"
"Yes, to at the very least make it look like you live here too. Right now the only signs that you share this room at all are you bathrobe and your reading glasses" she rightly pointed out and ignoring the pile of boxes in the corner that contained his belongings that were yet to be unpacked, the pile so big it virtually had a mountain goat on the top. "So? What do you say?"
Andy shrugged his shoulders. "Sure, if that's what you want."
"I was thinking more along the lines of because it's what you want."
Andy smirked, it being at least the tenth time they'd had that particular conversation since he'd moved into the condo eleven days earlier. "Okay. I've actually been thinking about this a lot recently" he said as he continued to grin mischievously.
Sharon smiled brightly up at him with excitement, her joy that Andy might finally be about to agree to it making her dismiss the smile on his face, the smile that screamed 'I'm not to be trusted.' "Oh really?"
"Yeah."
"And what do you have in mind?" she asked. In the back of her mind she was a little worried that something utterly hideous like his John Wayne doorstop (something that lurked within his boxes in the corner and she was planning on dropping down the garbage shoot while he was at an AA meeting one night in the near future) was about to be suggested but if she was being perfectly honest she didn't really care. She loved him, adored him, even his frankly shocking taste in home furnishings and just like how he loved living surrounded by décor that screamed 'Sharon Raydor' she wanted to live (in the bedroom at least) surrounded by a little décor that screamed 'Andy Flynn.'
He smirked again before he spoke, Sharon missing it completely and therefore being totally unaware of what was about to come. "Well firstly I think we need some huge mirrors from floor to ceiling, you know because who doesn't love to watch themselves make sex faces right? Then I thought maybe we could have a revolving heart shaped bed, maybe even a vibrating one. Black satin sheets. Then of course we could use a sex swing from the ceiling and a camera set up in the corner of the room because multiple sex tapes at our age are a must right? We could even get rid of these boring old doors and replace them with saloon type doors like we're living in the old West. Plus a spittoon would be a nice touch and of course some sort of porn mountain next to the toilet for when guests come over. What do you think?"
She just stared at him for a moment, far from amused. "Is that it? Are you done?" she asked as he laughed and she gave him a withering look, Sharon waiting for him to shut up before she continued. "As side splittingly hilarious as this is can you be serious for just one minute and give me a sensible answer please?"
Andy laughed again and kissed her forehead, hoping the gesture would stave off his knees coming under attack. "Sharon I've already told you, I don't care about any of it. I don't care how we live or where we live for that matter, just as long as I get to live with you and the kid." He shrugged again. "End of story. The colour we paint the walls just doesn't matter to me in the slightest but living with you, living with my family does." He kissed her on the lips as if to confirm it. When they broke apart he found her smiling at him. "What?"
"How do you always manage to find the right thing to say in every situation?"
"Years of putting my foot in my mouth, saying the wrong thing and getting into trouble I guess" he suggested. Sharon laughed and nodded in agreement, knowing first-hand how he had finally managed to stop getting himself into trouble with his mouth running off, at least some of the time anyway when implants weren't involved. "Plus, as I've already told you, your kids gave me a user's manual after our second da…" Before he could finish the sentence he came under attack, Sharon pinching his knees before she gave him a playful slap across his chest. "Ow! You're always beating me!" he whined as he smiled at her.
She pinched his knees again as he laughed and squirmed beneath her, unable to run off because he had him effectively pinned to the bed. "That's because you deserve it."
He wrapped his arms around her even more tightly to stop the assault on his knees while he continued to laugh. Eventually they began to settle down again in silence until Andy asked "So that's a 'No' on the revolving bed then?"
Sharon sighed before she pulled her hand from under his t-shirt and moved to quickly pinch and tug on his chest hair that was peeking out from the neck of his shirt. "What do you think?" she asked, giving him a pointed look.
He laughed as he rubbed his chest, letting out a whiny "Ow!" She kissed him on the lips a couple of times before they both laughed and settled back down again, her hand going back under his t-shirt with her nails raking up and down his skin in a slow caress. Yet again silence descended for a short while as his hand moved up and down her back to match what she was doing to his chest. Andy adjusted his legs a few moments later, kicking the remaining covers off his feet even more before inadvertently snagging his big toe on his other leg and briefly snapped it back awkwardly, the same toe that had repeatedly kicked the pile of the boxes at least four times a day since he moved in. He grimaced and hissed with pain. "Ow!"
"What's the matter with you now?" she asked with a biting tone, thinking he was still complaining about the way she had attacked his knees to make a point rather than being in any genuine pain.
"Nothing."
Sharon looked at him with a frown and waited for him to answer her, the whole not telling her that his medication was making him dizzy (and EXTREMELY dizzy at that, not to mention that his Doctor had told him to come in immediately when they discovered the blood clot which he also kept to himself) prior to his collapse in the bathroom meaning that she always waited for an answer if he even slightly grimaced (just like she had done a couple of nights earlier when his shoulder started to hurt again following his clash with Detective Nolan in Nazi World). When it came to his health it was the only trust she didn't have in him much to the surprise of many who always assumed she would be more cautious when it came to his fidelity given his rather chequered history with women, often seeing more than one woman at a time for as long as he could get away with it (Mark Hickman's outburst in the Murder Room being one hundred percent right about that) back when he was still drinking after his divorce. At the time it was as simple as him looking for a little meaningless sex to fill the void in his life left by Sandra and his children.
Andy sighed with more than a little frustration that she didn't trust him about his health but he only had one person to blame about that and he knew it. "Okay, fine." In truth it wasn't that big of a deal, he had just banged his toe once again but he'd only done it because Sharon was yet to even contemplate emptying the closet and she had enough to worry about right then without that too before he broke a bone. "I stubbed my toe on all of that crap in the corner of the room when I came to look for you earlier."
Sharon laughed before she repeated "'All of that crap in the corner'?" Andy smiled at her, his amusement clear because that was the second time he had heard her curse in a couple of days much to his continued surprise but elected to keep quiet about it since the last time he brought attention to it he ended up being locked out on the balcony for half an hour in just his underwear. "Do you mean all of your worldly possessions? All of that crap?"
"Yes that's what I mean, all of that crap."
She laughed before she sighed and lifted her head to look at it across the other side of the room, just making out the outline of the mountain in the near darkness. She sighed at it again, the pile slowly starting to gather dust it had been there that long.
"Are you ever going to find the time to unpack and move in here with me properly?" She looked up at him. "I can't help but feel that this situation looks awfully temporary, far too temporary for my liking. It's making me nervous."
Andy laughed, having once said something very similar to Julio about returning to his old desk following his anger management suspension. "Oh believe me, I'm not going anywhere babe" he promised before he kissed her long and slow on the lips, sealing his declaration. "I know the plan was to do it all over the weekend but we were somewhat busy at the time."
"Were we? I never noticed" she joked.
"Yeah right, well I guess if we haven't had a day off before Saturday and we're not at work I'll try and do it then."
"So until the weekend it's just one suit at a time?" she asked, feeling guilty for her part in him not yet being able to move in properly, it clearly bothering her a lot more than it was bothering Andy.
"It looks that way but mainly because I can't fit anything else into your closet at the moment until you've had a major clear out."
"'Your closet'? Don't you mean 'our closet'?" she corrected him.
"Not at the moment, no. That's definitely still your closet and that's my pile of crap in the corner until we can find time to join forces."
Sharon laughed, admitting that he had a point. "Okay, point taken. First day off, we tackle it all together no matter what. I'll clean some space in the closet and the bureau and then we can squeeze yours in."
"It's a date" he nodded before he kissed her on the lips.
"Is it bad luck that you've not unpacked?"
"What?"
"Your stuff. Is it bad luck that we've not found time to unpack it all yet?"
Andy laughed. "Oh yes, clearly, of course it is. Didn't you know all bad luck comes from the strategic placement of boxes? Its proven fact" he insisted while she just stared at him decidedly unimpressed. "Frankly I'm surprised that we're both still alive to tell the tale."
"Are you done?"
Andy laughed and kissed the top of her head. "No Sharon, I don't think that not unpacking is bad luck. Trust me, our world is not about to come crashing down around our ears because I haven't unpacked. I'm not about to drop dead as a result." He kissed her lips. "I promise" he said before he kissed her again. "Anyway it's not so bad living like this right now. I managed to pull my pyjamas out of there at first time of asking tonight" he told her. "Be grateful you're so lucky, I could have come to bed in a Santa suit instead."
She laughed again before she told him "I see no problem with that" while her eyes sparkled and met his lips in a long and slow kiss, not denying that the sight of Andy Flynn walking out of her bathroom on Christmas Day in a Santa suit made her knees weak.
"I didn't think you would" he laughed before he kissed her back. "You have a Santa fetish, do you know that?"
"It's not a Santa fetish at all" she protested.
"Then what is it?"
"It's an Andy Flynn looking incredibly sexy in virtually anything including a Santa suit fetish" she told him, kissing him again. "There's a difference."
Andy laughed. "Oh I see."
"And speaking of things you look incredibly sexy in," she said and making him laugh as hers nail stopped at the waistband of his boxers and slowly ran back and forth along the top of them, "is your uniform in there somewhere?" she asked, pointing at the pile in the corner.
"Of course."
"Do you know where?" she asked before she sighed a little sadly. "I was thinking about getting Rusty to drop them both off at the dry cleaners tomorrow so that they're all ready in time for the funeral."
Andy nodded, holding her closer to him as the mood between them shifted towards their sadly departed friend and colleague once again, none of them really able to grieve properly until the case was over. "Good thinking. I'll dig it out in the morning." He kissed the top of her head as his mind drifted back to his friend. "Have you heard when it is yet?" he asked as his lips remained pressed to her scalp.
"Yes. Chief Howard said it's going to be a week on Tuesday." She sighed sadly again. "I just hope we have some answers for Lydia and the boys by then, not that it'll be any consolation for them if we do."
"Don't worry, we will. I'm sure if it."
"I wish I had your confidence."
"Yeah well your sad lack of confidence is just because you don't know my badass Captain" he said as if he wasn't describing the woman currently in his arms and making Sharon laugh. "If anyone can figure this whole mess out in the next few days it's her. She could probably do it singlehandedly. We probably slow her down."
Sharon laughed. "I see. Is that what you'd have said about her five years ago when she was running a different division and you were obstructing her every chance you got?"
"Maybe not" he conceded. "I would have said something more along the lines of 'Oh my God! How unbelievably sexy does Darth Raydor look with a beanbag gun in her hands!' Then I'd probably have said a little something about how good her legs looked."
Sharon laughed and shook her head. "What a surprise!" She again laughed before she raised her head from his shoulder and turned her attention back to the pile of boxes in the corner. "Is all that stuff just shoes and clothes?" she asked, biting her bottom lip for a few moments as she feared she might have to wave goodbye to a lot more of her much cherished wardrobe than first thought to squeeze all of his stuff in.
"No not all of it. There's a little pile of crap that needs to be dumped in the back of the closet and forgotten about too."
Sharon laughed, distracted from her original fear that she was going to have to part with half of her shoe collection for a moment. "What like?"
"You know," he shrugged casually, "just general crap." Sharon looked at him, her eyes almost burning into him as she waited for a real answer and rightly assuming that he was trying to hide something from her. "Stuff like my calendar and crap like that, you know, nothing that important."
Sharon frowned at him, more than a little confused. "A calendar?" Andy nodded and then closed his eyes as an attempt to end the conversation right there and then without it going any further but Sharon refused to be so easily fooled. "Why would you put a calendar in the back of the closet?"
Andy shrugged again, trying to be as dismissive as possible. "Because it's out of date" he told her. He then closed his eyes even tighter as if he was pretending to go to sleep and that would result in the end of the discussion but Sharon was on to him and was feeling a little like a dog with a bone, not prepared to let it go without a fight. She propped herself up onto her elbow and just stared at him, his nostrils starting to flare like he was about to breathe fire and therefore tipping her off that he was trying and failing to keep something from her.
"Then why keep it?" she asked. Andy didn't answer or even open his eyes, his attempt to make her believe he was asleep fooling no one (even though he could fall asleep at the drop of a hat and she knew that). "I know you're not asleep," she said as she poked him in the chest, "so you might as well just tell me."
Andy sighed as he opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling. From the corner of his eye he could see that Sharon was looking at him with great interest and she could see that he really didn't want to answer her which made her all the more desperate to get to the truth. Andy sighed again when he realised he had no choice but to spill his guts to her, finally turning his head to the left to see her. "Because I'm in it okay" he finally admitted.
Sharon immediately sat up, her interest peaked more than it had been for a very long time. "What?" she laughed. "What do you mean you're in it?"
Andy sighed again as he rubbed his face with his hands and knowing full well what was about to happen and the story he was about to tell was going to be the best thing that Sharon had heard in a very long time. As reluctant as he was in that moment to tell her he suddenly wished he'd thought of it a couple of nights earlier as a distraction when he found her sobbing while frantically cleaning the kitchen. Sharon was about to go crazy and as embarrassing as it was going to be for him, her joy would make it all worthwhile in the end, without a doubt.
"Okay." He sighed yet again before smiling at her very alert and intrigued face. "You know the charity calendars that the LAPD do every year for the memorial fund over the holidays?" Sharon nodded with her brow furrowed, not putting two and two together yet. "Yeah well I got hit up to be in it the one year."
Sharon's smile slowly grew. "What? You were in the LAPD charity calendar?" Andy nodded and hummed his confirmation in reply. "And you kept it?"
"Of course I kept it. How often do you get to appear in a calendar?"
Sharon thought for a moment as she wasn't entirely sure why he was so reluctant to tell her about it and why he'd never mentioned it to her before, clearly being proud of it if he'd kept it. "Why have you not told me about this before?" she asked.
He shrugged. "It's never come up before."
"Well what are you wearing in it?"
"Huh?" Andy replied dumbly as if he had not heard the question.
Sharon smiled at him and laughed with the way he was deliberately trying to play dumb and stalling letting her know she'd accidentally stumbled across something very good indeed as the pieces started to fall into place in her mind. "In the calendar, what are you wearing?" she asked again as her smile started to grow by the second. It was at that point that she realised that those particular calendars usually involved the selected officers wearing next to nothing except a smile and maybe a pair of fluffy handcuffs. It was not the sort of thing that she normally liked especially when women were involved, finding those sort of calendars crass and sexist with the way men drooled over them highly degrading to women (especially since she was once the LAPD's Women's Coordinator until Major Crimes meant she had a lot less free time and handed the job off to a colleague) on the whole but Andy being in it had got her mind racing with lots of tantalising possibilities and she was suddenly in complete favour of them.
Andy smiled a little shyly at her. "My hat."
Sharon's face suddenly erupted and he wasn't sure that he'd ever seen her smile like that before, or not since Taylor had died at least. "And?"
"And what?"
"That's it?"
He grinned. "It wasn't on my head."
"Oh my God!" Sharon cried loud enough that she was lucky she hadn't woken Rusty. In a matter of seconds she jumped up, turned on the lamp on her nightstand before grabbing her glasses and leaping out of bed, approaching Andy's pile of boxes like she was a little girl on Christmas morning who was getting ready to tear into all the presents Santa had left her. "Where is it?" she asked as she stared at the pile, the dozens of boxes meaning she had no idea where to start her search.
Andy laughed as he sat up in bed to watch her on her treasure hunt, having seen her like that in the past when she was looking for her Christmas and Birthday presents only this time she seemed even more excited. He smiled at her again, it was a side of her that only he and her children were fortunate enough to see, a fact that made it all the more special. "Look at you! I haven't seen you this excited unless a glass of wine or Robert Redford in a Navy uniform was involved" he laughed.
"That's probably because you'd never told me you'd posed completely naked for an LAPD calendar before."
"I wasn't completely naked" he corrected. "I've told you, I was wearing my hat. That makes all the difference."
Sharon hummed before she said "I'm sure." Not waiting for him to give her any clue as to where she might find it Sharon started to open the boxes looking for it but found mostly shoes to begin with, still firmly of the opinion that Andy owned more shoes and clothes than she did and perhaps they both needed to have a cull of their wardrobes before they joined forces in the closet. "Where is it?" she finally asked as her frustration grew.
"I don't know" he lied. "It's in there somewhere."
Suddenly Sharon's frantic search paused as she started to imagine what the picture looked like when another thought popped into her mind. She lifted her head and frowned at him as the wheels turned in her mind, looking like an animal around the watering hole when they sensed a predator in the area. "When was this?" she asked. "It's certainly not been in the last ten years or so or I would already know about it. How old were you exactly?"
Andy paused before he answered. "Twenty seven" he told her and was immediately rewarded with an aroused groan escaping from Sharon's lips, a groan the likes of which he had never heard from her when she was that far away from him before. Andy laughed. "Are you okay over there?"
Before she answered Sharon started to dig through the boxes with even more haste, the incentive to find it now all the greater given the age he was when the picture was taken. "I will be when I find it" she told him.
With the cat well and truly out of the bag Andy felt he had no real choice but to tell her where it was despite feeling like a pool of Jell-O in comparison to how he looked back then, one of the many reasons why he was always trying to suck his stomach in around her when he was in a state of undress and could get away with it, Andy always caring a hell of a lot more than Sharon that he was a little soft around the middle. "Try that box against the wall" he suggested.
Sharon smiled at him as she opened the box in question very slowly like she was teasing him, finding it almost immediately leaning up again the side of the box so that it wouldn't crease. She grinned at him again as she closed up all the boxes again, pushing them all back into the corner and out of the way before she brought it back to bed. She sat next to him above the covers with her legs crossed and it on her lap.
Once settled and comfortable she looked at him. "So come on then? What month?"
"You're not interested in the rest?"
She grinned at him again as she shook her head, having zero interest in any one else other than her Andy. "Nope. Just you. Just my beautiful boy."
Andy laughed and nodded. "July. I was Mr July."
"And they went with just a hat rather than some sort of Fourth of July theme?"
"It was suggested but when you're completely naked the last thing you want close to you is any sort of flame or sparklers" he replied with a shudder.
Sharon laughed. "Especially with your track record of fire related disasters" she joked before she leant forward and kissed him on the lips, quick and chaste it was a thank you for telling her about it when it was clear that he really didn't want to.
Settling down to the task at hand Sharon opened the calendar just enough to see the dates on the bottom of the page but not the pictures themselves because she simply wasn't at all interested in looking at anyone else other than the man lying next to her. When she reached July she stopped and smiled at him, the beginnings of a smug smile appearing on his face before she took a very deep breath and finally opened it up.
Sharon's eyes widened almost immediately as they landed on the image before her. There he was in all his glory, her Andy Flynn aged just twenty seven and indeed wearing absolutely nothing except a smile and his hat covering his unmentionables. His hair was longer than he had it now, jet black and slicked back with more product that Rusty used. He was tanned all over (his chest waxed it must be noted for the record) and his muscles glistening with the oil he was presumably covered in before the picture was taken. Even a neutral would have to admit that he looked indescribably beautiful, like he was carved out of marble and perfect in every single way.
On one of the many mornings since they'd finally seen each other naked and Sharon had been forced to tell him off once again for sucking his stomach in around her, he had rather regretfully told her that he had once been able to do his washing on his abs and it was by no means a lie. Just looking at that picture she realised she could have done the washing for the entire building on his stomach. Add to that the look on his face was one that she knew all too well over the last year since they had started dating, it was the simply irresistible smoulder that, when she saw it, usually had her underwear off and her legs wrapped around his waist before she even registered what was happening to her.
He looked utterly beautiful in that photo and as she continued to gaze at it with wide eyes a noise escaped from her throat that made it clear to Andy that this was as close as she had ever come to having an orgasm without Andy even laying so much as a finger on her. Most people acknowledged that Andy had always been a very handsome guy, the first time Sharon had ever seen him (when he was fully clothed it must be said but he could wear a suit like no other which made him seem all the more attractive to Sharon especially) some twenty plus years earlier she thought he was without doubt the most handsome man she had ever seen in person (an honour he would go on to share with a rather famous actor that Gavin had set her up with a few years later on a blind date. Gavin had asked his friend to take her out for the evening as a favour to get her feet wet dating again once it became clear she was never going to take Jack back but didn't want to file for divorce just yet, an actor she really didn't want Andy to know she'd had dinner and a very brief kiss with for fear she'd never be able to watch his movies again such was his highly amusing and exaggerated jealous streak when it came to her and other men). Some fifteen years earlier than that and he looked even better and that was just his beautiful face and big brown eyes.
In a fleeting moment when she looked at that picture and thought about something other than sex it crossed her mind that it was no wonder that he had literally piles of women almost throwing themselves at him if they'd all seen that particular photo of him. With that in mind it made it all the more surprising to her that he'd been completely faithful to Sandra during that time and as their marriage started to fall apart but it was something she was never going to say to him such was his worry about the issue and Sharon not trusting him. Where women were concerned Andy had a reputation of that there was no doubt but a lot of it he had gone to great lengths to tell her was completely untrue. It was very important to him that not only did Sharon know that but also his kids (not that Daniel believed him for a second) and Sandra too for that matter, that he never even came close to sleeping with someone else while he was still married. Despite the offers (a lot of which were a direct result of that photo) he had never cheated on Sandra. In fact he never slept with anyone else until his divorce was finalised, something that neither Sandra or indeed Sharon could claim about themselves. Andy knew Sandra didn't really believe him (bringing it up at Nicole's house on Christmas Day when she set about attacking Andy as much as possible for example) but he always maintained his innocence and had said the same thing to Sharon when they started to date for real in case she ever worried about his wandering eye (and indeed wandering something else for that matter). Andy hadn't exactly been faithful between the end of his marriage and Sharon, he freely admitted that to her long before Mark Hickman mentioned his habit of cheating on his girlfriends in the middle of the Murder Room (that comment not bothering Sharon in the slightest unlike Andy who stressed about it for days and Provenza who was livid about that more than anything else including being accused of mummifying at his desk) but he had never cheated on the woman he once loved and the one that he did love even though the sight of him in that photo made his first claim seem a little harder to believe for Sharon.
Sharon couldn't take her eyes off that photo like she was mesmerised as she planned where she was going to keep it now that she knew of its existence (also planning on how she could subtly show Gavin without Andy finding out about it because she needed to brag a little and even more so because Gavin had once openly admitted just how hot he thought Andy was), well out of the view of her son obviously because there was no way Rusty wouldn't think he was gorgeous when he first saw it until he realised who it was and that was just going to be downright awkward and possibly result in an extra appointment with Dr Joe each month for several years.
Sharon's smile continued to grow by the second as she turned towards the more mature version of Andy Flynn she had in what was now their bed. He was a lot older, greyer and, much to his regret, he was a lot heavier (something that Sharon was forever telling him not to be stressed about because she didn't care about it. Andy was fit, going to the gym twice a week at least and that was just his body shape and she loved him for it) but to Sharon he was so much better in every way imaginable and she was oh so glad she had that Andy in her life while still very much appreciating the younger version on paper when she could. However, with that being said looking at that photo she could see how much Daniel looked like his Father, that photo could almost be him but since the subject of his son was still more than a little delicate it was an observation she would wait to point out.
Sharon closed the calendar, sliding it very carefully into the top drawer of her nightstand and letting him know without words that, like many of his shirts and the odd pair of shorts, it was now hers and he had no choice in the matter at all. She took her glasses off and put them back on the nightstand but much to Andy's surprise she didn't turn the lamp off again. Instead she lay down, sliding back under the covers before she rolled towards him, looming over him as she propped herself up on her elbow and traced his face with her fingertips with the help of the light like she was studying him, never getting tired of seeing him smiling up at her especially as he lay next to her in bed and illuminated by the soft glow of the lamp. With every square inch of his face mapped out by her fingers she kissed him long and deep on the lips, leaving them both breathless by the time they broke apart and his hand buried deep into her thick mane.
"See I told you I could do my washing on my stomach back then" he said with a wink.
Sharon laughed and nodded. "And as I've told you many times before we have a washer dryer for that and I have other much better uses for you" she told him once again and then kissed him as if to reinforce her point.
"Oh God I hope so" he practically groaned, eliciting the inevitable laughter from Sharon as she kissed him again. When they broke apart Sharon discovered that his face was a little screwed up as if he was in real pain. "Can I just ask the one favour?" he said tentatively before she nodded. "Please don't keep it where people can see it like you do with that stupid letter."
Sharon sighed and rolled her eyes, her aggravation clear. "It's not a stupid letter" she told him for the hundredth time.
"Please?" he begged, not allowing himself to be side-tracked.
"Oh don't worry. This is just for me" she told him. "I promise" she added and confirmed it with a kiss to his lips. "Plus the more people that see it the more will want to try and steal you away from me" she joked.
"Well that'll never happen."
She leant back down kissed him slowly before telling him "Thank you."
"Thank you for what?"
"For sharing your life with me, all of it, even the more embarrassing bits you'd rather I didn't know about" she said with a little chuckle.
"Well it's not like I have much choice is there? It's a well-established fact that I can't keep anything secret from you Raydor."
"Except for Barstow?"
"Right, except for Barstow."
Sharon paused for a moment and just stared at him, once again thinking that her intense gaze may make him finally crumble once and for all and tell her what happened. "How bad can it really be?" she asked when it was clear his lips were sealed.
"You'll never know."
"You're so mean to me" she pouted.
"Leave to live with it" he shrugged.
Sharon laughed before she settled back down on his shoulder again, her hand immediately going back underneath his t-shirt while his very slowly returned to stroking her back just like he had done a few nights earlier as they watched TV in the wee small hours of the morning in an attempt to make her fall asleep. He pressed his lips to the crown of her head a couple of times before she looked up at him and kissed his chin after playfully biting it a couple of times first. "Tell me a story" she requested.
"Tell you a story? What kind of story?"
"Anything. Something that you've never told me about before."
"Okay. Let me think" Andy said as he began to rack his brain. Silence fell as he tried to think of what to tell her that she would find funny but wouldn't disgust her too much, his options certainly limited on that front.
"Nothing to do with women please" she said after a moment.
"But I thought you liked those stories." At the heart of it Andy was often very shy when it came to openly talking about his history with other women, especially to Sharon because he was so ashamed of some of his past behaviour but on the whole she usually liked to hear about what he got up to with girls when he was a boy and turning into a man.
"I do and as much as I love hearing about all the trouble little Andy got into with girls as a teenager I'm really not in the mood for those sort of tales right now."
Andy smiled and kissed the top of her head. "Finally starting to get jealous, huh?"
"Oh shut up" she told him to a ripple of laughter as he kissed the top of her head again. "And nothing else to do with random body parts in rooms I've spent a lot of time please."
"Well that's a shame because I had a great story about the severed toe I found in the drain of my shower" he said as casually as he could. Sharon looked at him utterly horrified as he laughed, not sure if he was telling the truth or not. "I'm kidding! I'm kidding! Okay, give me a second." He thought for a moment, trying to come up with the perfect story that would not only amuse her but also distract her from the demons still waging war inside her head. "Have I ever told you about my Uncle Seamus and his teeth?" he asked finally.
"What's this sudden obsession you have with teeth?" Sharon said as she laughed.
"It's just a coincidence, I promise. So have I told you about it before?"
"I didn't even know you had an Uncle Seamus much less anything interesting about his teeth" Sharon told him. "Your Dad's brother I assume from the name?"
"Yep, he was Dad's brother so Irish. Well Uncle Seamus, he was..."
Sharon held her hand in the air to stop him in his tracks. "Wait before you go any further I have a question."
"Just the one?"
Sharon laughed. "I'm sure I'll have plenty more later. But for now it's just this, if you had Uncles and Aunts who were, I'm assuming, living in the same State if not City as you and your parents, then why did you have both sets of Grandparents living with you?"
"Well as much as my Mom and Dad hated their in-laws...and each other too for that matter..."
"Andy they can't have hated each other all that much, they did have seven children together after all" she reasoned, thinking that proved how much they loved each other even if they didn't really show it in front of their children a lot of the time.
"I think you're mistaking love with being Catholic and horny babe" he replied. Sharon laughed as she nodded, accepting his point. "Anyway as much as they hated their in-laws with the fire of a thousand burning suns," he said and making it clear that it wasn't even the smallest exaggeration as Sharon laughed, "they were family and as far as family was concerned in my household, you did everything you could to take care of them even if they did irritated the crap out of you."
Sharon smiled at him, her family being a lot like his in terms of closeness and how they were always there for each other regardless but that was where the similarities ended, still to her it did sound like something she very much wanted to be a part of, to be a member of his very large family. "I think I'm going to like being part of your household" she told him before he kissed her on the lips.
He grinned at her. "Me too" he confirmed before he kissed her back.
"Since he was your Dad's brother was he also crime...adjacent shall we say?"
"Not exactly. Uncle Seamus was more the reason why my Dad and as a consequence me and my brothers were crime adjacent" he explained. Once more Sharon laughed and shook her head, realising more and more each day that she was sharing her life with a man who could so easily be spending the rest of his life behind bars if he hadn't been put back on the straight and narrow (the story of how that happened being explained to her as they sat on the floor by the front door after Elliot Chase had come perilously close to murdering him) and she was incredibly relieved that he had been put on the path that led him to her. "My Uncle Seamus as it turned out was really quite high up in the Irish mob" he confessed.
"Oh my God!" Sharon cried with horror.
"A little fact I've obviously kept to myself over the years that I've been working for the LAPD."
"And with good reason." She sighed dramatically before she said "I'm living with a felon."
Andy laughed, Sharon making it sound like he was Al Capone. "Are you regretting letting me move in with you now that you know I was once related to the Irish mob?"
Sharon laughed. "Not at all. If I'm honest it's a bit of a turn on" she told him as her nails really started to scratch up and down his chest before she kissed him long and slow on the lips.
Andy smiled as they pulled apart. "Oh really?"
"Really" she confirmed as her eyes sparkled and she kissed him again.
"That figures. Rich..."
"Oh my God! We were never rich!" Sharon shouted for at least the thousandth time since they'd become friends, Andy laughing once again at her outrage which was precisely why he said it in the first place.
It was a common topic of conversation between them, Andy pointing out the significant differences between how they grew up and inevitably exaggerating about it. Although his family were poor, he did have more toys than a stick with some cat shit on the end like he claimed and likewise Sharon's family were wealthy (you only had to look at where she lived and what was in her wardrobe to realise that it came from a trust fund and money left to her rather than from a police salary) but if you listened to Andy then Sharon grew up with golden chandeliers, had her own personal butler on hand twenty-four hours a day and ate crushed up diamonds on her cornflakes when the truth was that the O'Dwyers were a little better off than 'comfortable' financially but nowhere near as rich as he joked.
"Yeah okay, let's just pretend shall we that when you were a kid your parents weren't so rich your Mother practically ovulated Faberge eggs" he joked. Sharon laughed but on the whole just decided to ignore him about it because she knew arguing with him would only encourage him more. "Really rich, well-educated, Catholic girls with ponies always like to go for a bit of rough as far as men are concerned just to piss off their Fathers."
"In this case it would be my Grandmother and for the hundredth time it wasn't my pony!" she cried at him, knowing the more she argued the point the more he would continue to say that sort of thing to her. The pony in question was her friend's horse (only owning a riding helmet as a child because of the dizziness she experienced due to her lazy eye and resulting eye patch) and she rode it about three maximum but that didn't stop Andy from teasing her about it.
"But I am your bit of rough?" he asked.
"And don't you forget it" she told him with a poke to his chest. They both laughed before they kissed, her nails scratching his chest and making him practically growl into her mouth. It was true, all of it. Andy Flynn was her very own bad boy, her bit of rough and she loved him all the more because of it, getting turned on by the mere idea of the opposite worlds they came from. "One of the perks of being a really good girl all of your life is getting to fall head over heels for a very bad boy" she told him which made him laugh, his hand grabbing her ass. "And the PAB grapevine keeps telling me that I have picked the baddest of the lot" she grinned, meeting his lips.
"You don't believe them do you?"
Sharon shrugged. Some of the stories she'd heard about him sounded just like the sort of thing that Andy would do while others seemed way off the mark. In the end however it just didn't matter to her, none of it did because the Andy she knew, the Andy she had invited into her home and into her heart had never given her a reason not to trust him and that was all that mattered to her. "Sometimes but I also trust you my darling, I trust you implicitly because you've never given me reason not to" she told him emphatically.
"And I don't intend to either."
"Then that's enough for me" she told him, kissing him again. "But anyway, teeth!"
"Anyway his teeth right" Andy said before he paused to remember where he'd got to in his story. "When Seamus was younger he was a boxer, this was just before they all moved to America en masse, you know fleeing the Garda or whatever" he explained and not at all joking about it. "He was a good boxer too by all accounts my Uncle Seamus but for some reason he would never raise his guard to defend himself during a bout. He said pain didn't bother him and guarding himself was a complete waste of time and energy" he shrugged. "He preferred to get hit in the face time and time again because he didn't want to waste energy defending himself. So not surprisingly by the time he was nineteen he didn't have a single tooth left in his mouth."
Sharon laughed as she said "Ooh he sounds lovely."
"He was a good looking fella even if I do say so myself but only when he was wearing these big expensive pair of false teeth. And I'm talking huge here. He looked like a nut cracker" he explained as he gestured with his hand, making each of them sound bigger than his fist.
"How did he afford those?" she asked when her laughter subsided. "When was this?"
"I'm not sure. As a guess? Late 1930s maybe so these things were rare and ridiculously expensive. He paid for them from his winnings and gambling on his fights."
"Gambling on his fights?" Andy nodded which made her roll her eyes. "Let me guess, he might have known when he was going to get knocked out?" she asked, already knowing the answer.
"He may very well have done, yes" he confirmed while she laughed. "Anyway so here he is with, by this point, a very old but still fairly expensive pair of false teeth on New Year's Eve nineteen sixty...two, something like that. Now my family always spent New Year's Eve together no matter what and well I'm sure you can guess what they got up to every year."
"A large family that was a mixture of Irish and Italian? I'm sure alcohol was involved."
"And a lot of it too plus the occasional fist fight after midnight but on this night in particular my Mom insisted on forcing everyone to play a game instead of just drinking all night."
"So what did you play?"
"Poker except there was no money involved and instead you had to drink a shot when you lost a hand" he stated rather proudly.
"Oh God" Sharon laughed. "I think I know where this is headed. Is it too late to pull out of this whole arrangement?"
"What? Living with me?"
"Yes."
"Not a hope in hell Raydor" Andy told her as he tightened his grip on her and kissed the top of her head. "Now if there was one thing my Dad knew how to do better than anything else, other than setting a new land speed record every time he heard a police siren or impregnating my Mom of course."
"Oh of course" Sharon laughed.
"The one thing he could do better than anything else was cheating at cards so my Uncle Seamus didn't stand a chance. Now my Uncle could drink with the best of them, like he had a hollow leg even just like the rest of my family. I'd go as far to say that he was even better than me in my prime but on this night in particular after losing hand after hand after hand to my cheating Father he was without a doubt drunker than he'd ever been in his entire life" he explained as she laughed again. "Midnight came and went and they kept going until a little after one in the morning when I had to give up my bed so that Uncle Seamus could lie down."
"That was very good of you."
"Yeah well I'd only just climbed up the drain pipe and through the window so it wasn't that big of a deal, I wasn't asleep" he said casually with a shrug of his shoulders.
"But very tired from your many exploits I imagine" she laughed.
"Naturally. So anyway he was lying on my bed groaning and clutching his stomach as the room spun when he called me over and went 'Hey AB...'"
"Wait, AB?" Sharon asked as she cut him off mid-sentence.
"Yeah, Andrew Benito" he clarified. Sharon instantly went to laugh, still not believing Andy when he insisted that his middle name really was 'Benito,' him silencing her with a finger to her lips. "Do not even think about laughing at that" he warned. "It was what he used to call me."
Sharon laughed anyway, unable to stop herself. "Just to get side tracked for one moment if I may since we're touching on the subject, Nicole informed me on the day you moved in here that you always told her as a child that your middle names, and I do mean plural here, that your middle names were 'Bonzo Tiger'" she told him as she gave him a little Darth Raydor glare for good measure, hoping that might make him tell the truth. At one point in their relationship Sharon would just kiss him in order to bend him to her will, Andy pretty much agreeing to anything she wanted or spilling his guts instantly as a result (Sharon having the same tendency to crumble when Andy rubbed her feet, as unaware of it as he was) but she had recently discovered that a little flash of Darth was as equally effective.
Andy smiled and laughed to himself, not aware before that moment that Nicole still clearly remembered what he'd told her when she was no more than four years old. "Ah well that was just a little white lie to make her laugh" he explained.
"And telling me that your middle name is 'Benito' wasn't a little white lie to make me laugh?"
"No because it's the truth" Andy insisted.
"Then why don't I believe you?"
"I have no idea. It's probably down to you being overly suspicious after spending too many years working in Professional Standards" Andy suggested.
"Oh I'm sure that's what it is rather than because this whole thing is utterly ridiculous" she laughed, still not believing him no matter how many times he insisted it was the truth.
"No because it's what it is, I promise you. My middle name is 'Benito' because my Mom had a serious crush on Mussolini" he said once again.
Sharon laughed. "Of course she did, I mean who wouldn't? If we're being completely honest here you're handsome enough in your own inimitable way but you're nothing in comparison to a bald headed fascist are you?" she joked, shaking her head as she laughed.
"It's a good job I know when you're joking with me Raydor" Andy replied grumpily.
"Am I?" she joked before laughing again. "I'm sorry but the whole thing is just so utterly ridiculous."
"Why is it? It's my name."
"And yet I've not seen a single piece of paper at work or at home that confirms it."
"Then..." Andy said before he paused. He was about to tell her that all of his important documents were in his safety deposit box and that she was more than welcome to go with him the next time he went to the bank and see for herself except the box now also had something else in it, it contained the engagement ring he bought so very early and some might say hastily (Andy would disagree) in their relationship and until he was ready to ask her the question he wasn't going to allow her anywhere near that place.
"Then what?" Sharon prompted, a little puzzled by the way he had fallen silent.
"Then...," he said again as he searched for something else to tell her, "ask Sandra about it at Christmas when they come here. She knows the truth, she'll tell you."
"No Andy, no!" Sharon cried, horrified by the suggestion. "I'm not going to ask your ex-wife those sort of questions about you for goodness sake, no!"
"Why not? What's the big deal? It's only like asking a previous owner about mileage and fuel consumption on an old car or something" he suggested, not seeing the issue at all.
Sharon laughed. "Exactly, that's my point" she cried with laughter. "Andy I won't ask her that sort of question precisely because she was your...your last owner," she joked as they laughed, it as good an expression as any, "and I don't want her to think that firstly you lie to me..."
"Which I don't, never have done, never will do" he insisted.
"And secondly that I don't know you as well as she clearly still does."
"Which is absolutely not true." He just stared at her for a moment, looking into her eyes as his hand came up to gently caress her cheek with her fingertips. "You know me better than she ever did and I like to think that we've only just got started" he told her before dropping his lips to hers.
She smiled at him, unable not to smile back when he looked at her like that, the smile on his face and gazing at her so adoringly. "You really can sweet talk your way out of most things can't you?" she asked him.
"Well I certainly try my very best" he told her with a kiss. "Actually on second thoughts, don't ask Sandra about it at Christmas."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't want Rusty to overhear the conversation."
"What?" Sharon laughed.
"Why do you think I told Nicole it was 'Bonzo Tiger' rather than the truth? If Rusty finds out my middle name is Benito then before long Provenza knows followed by everyone else and then it's the only thing I'm ever called at work" he explained more than a little grumpily as Sharon laughed. "And don't even think about telling either of them about that or about Andy Pandy either" he warned her.
Sharon grinned mischievously, her nails running back and forth across the waistband of his boxers again in a tantalising fashion. "Oh really? And how are you going to stop me?"
"Easy. I have two words for you. Red. Beard" he stated clearly before he grinned at her victoriously. In truth Andy had absolutely zero intention of telling anyone about the rather unfortunate nickname Sharon earned at school or the reason why, realising that he was in a very fortunate position to be told about it in the first place with her not even telling Jack or her children about it.
She frowned at him as she raised her head off his shoulder a little, her hand stilling. "Is this how we're starting off our new life together," she asked, "by you threatening me and trying to blackmail me into keeping quiet?"
"A little bit. Maybe" he said as he laughed before he kissed her on the lips and she laughed with him. "Why don't you believe me? It's my name."
"Because it's so ridiculous" she said again.
Andy shrugged. "I don't know what else to tell you, my Mom liked Mussolini."
"Exactly" Sharon laughed.
"You should have tried being me and having to grow up with it. As soon as the school yard found out about it my life as I knew it was over" he told her with no hint of exaggeration.
"Why? What happened?"
"Aside from the laughter and the name calling? They used to beat the crap out of me. I'd be in class having my knuckles whacked with a cane for using my left hand in the morning and then I'd go outside during recess and get repeatedly punched in the eye because Ritchie O'Brien's Uncle got killed by an Italian in the war, like because of my name he thought I was Mussolini's nephew or something" he explained with a roll of his eyes. "Then we'd be playing stick ball and suddenly some wise ass would decide that because I was the 'wop' in the group I had to switch sides half way through the game like they did during the war. It was a nightmare!"
Sharon laughed while at the same time she felt his cheek, feeling so sorry for him and the way he had to grow up, explaining a lot about his combative attitude as an adult. "So what did you do?"
"What do you think I did? I beat the crap out of them in retaliation before my Mom forced me into attending ballet classes with my sister because I was always getting into trouble with my fists when it was all her fault to begin with!" he complained, still annoyed about it nearly sixty years later.
Sharon laughed as she continued to stroke his cheek and thought of her childhood of large family picnics and her friend's pony, the complete opposite to Andy's upbringing where he literally had to fight to survive. "Oh my poor boy."
"You say that, you say 'Oh my poor boy' and look all sympathetic but we both know that given the chance you'd be telling Provenza and the guys all about my middle name as well as 'Andy Pandy' and then I'd never hear the end of either of them" he joked.
"I take great offence to that!" Sharon hit back, giving his chest a little slap.
"Why? It's true."
"No it isn't."
"Oh really? Then how about all the other times you've told them things that I didn't want them to know about?" he asked, thinking his point had already been made.
"Like what?"
"Like me setting my menu on fire during our first date."
Sharon laughed, unable to dispute that she had told almost everyone they knew about it in the year since. "Andy my darling, explaining to our friends why we couldn't go back to Serve on our anniversary is hardly telling the world all of your secrets. What else?"
"I'm thinking."
Sharon laughed. "Then you'll be thinking for a very long time because I've never told anyone anything you didn't want them to know. You said the other night that my secrets are safe with you well guess what? Your secrets are safe with me too" she told him, kissing him on the lips to confirm it.
"Yeah okay" he agreed before he paused as he thought of another way he could prove to Sharon what his middle name was without taking her to his safety deposit box since it was deliberately omitted from his passport and driving license. "You should have asked Lizzie when we were in New York. She would have told you."
"I didn't think about it. At the time I was far too busy hearing dozen of other embarrassing stories about my darling boy to ask about your middle name. I need to make a note to ask her the next time she calls."
Andy frowned at her, already alarmed by the amount of time Sharon spent talking to his sister on the phone since they met on their weekend getaway in New York. "Why? How often does she call you?"
"More often than I'm sure you'd like" she grinned before she kissed him on the lips. "'Benito'" she added, laughing hysterically as she kissed him again.
"Do you really think I'd lie to you?"
"No, not lie to me exactly. More like that you'd be a little creative with the truth in order to make me smile which it certainly has done" she explained as she laughed again.
"Okay granted but I promise that is my real name, Andrew Benito Flynn. Maybe one day, a little way down the road I'll stand up in front of everyone we know and love and say it out loud and prove it to you" he said as he winked at her, hoping that she would get his meaning without having to elaborate further.
She smiled at him as she blushed and bit down on her bottom lip, her nerves over the topic of conversation evident. She remained silent for the longest time, Andy just about to panic when she brushed her lips against his, the contact so gentle that it was hardly even there. "Maybe" was all she could say in response to his promise for the future with a little shrug of her shoulders, the same answer as she gave Rusty when he asked, his disgust more than clear to her, if he was one day going to find Andy sitting at the table eating breakfast in his robe without any warning. Sharon kissed him again, deepening it and desperately wanting to add 'I'd like that' to remind him and sooth any concerns he may have that they weren't on the same page as far as their shared future was concerned but opted against it once her fear kicked in since they'd already taken a big enough step forward recently without pushing him into that before they were really ready, but that wasn't to say she didn't mean it. "Okay" she said, kissing him one last time. "Carry on with your story."
"Where did I get to?"
"Your Uncle was calling you."
"Right. Yeah so anyway my Uncle called 'Hey AB. I'm going to throw up. Get me something to chuck up in'" Andy said in a near perfect Irish accent to imitate his Uncle, a talent that Sharon had never heard before.
"This is a charming story."
"Just wait it gets better. So I look around and I can't give him my trash can because it had a hole in it so the only thing to hand was my school bag" he explained, the smile on his face making it look like he was telling a story about his athletic prowess in his youth rather than a story about vomit.
"Your school bag?"
"Yeah. So I emptied it on the floor and gave it to my Uncle. A couple of minutes later the vomit was practically pouring out of this thing as he gave it back to me so I run with it to the bathroom and poured the contents down the toilet and flushed."
Sharon laughed, already knowing what was coming. "I think I know where this is heading."
"Just wait. So I go into my sister's room and switch book bags with her..."
"What?!" Sharon cried. She looked at him stunned for a moment before she gave him a quick smack across his chest for the sake of his sister who she had become so fond of since she first met her at the start of the summer.
"What? It was covered in vomit. What did you expect me to do with it?" Andy asked.
"Oh I don't know, clean it maybe" Sharon suggested. In was in that moment when she suddenly remembered a similar incident with Ricky when he was roughly the same age. He had gone on a field trip with St Joseph's so she had packed him a lunch. She found the box three weeks later under his bed (while retrieving a sock which was crusty to say the least rather than snooping), his food completely untouched as they floated in a pool of vomit.
"Too much effort" Andy dismissed without any thought. "It was much easier to switch it with my sister's and leave her wondering what the hell happened" he explained as he laughed to himself, Sharon feeling compelled to join in with him despite the way she was shaking her head at him.
"What did she do when she found out?"
"Let's just put it like this, I woke up the next morning, unable to see and with the heavy smell of vomit in the air."
With that Sharon laughed hysterically once again, her face pressed into his chest to muffle the sound a little so that she didn't wake up Rusty. "She put it on your head while you were sleeping?" she asked once she was capable of speech again.
Andy nodded, looking very pleased with himself. "She did indeed."
"And to think you didn't wake up. What a surprise that is!" she told him with sarcasm almost dripping from every single word. He stared down at her far from amused as she laughed, her hand moving to poke him in the ribs a couple of times before she returned it to under his t-shirt, her nails continuing to trace lazy patterns on his chest.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah" he replied with a roll of his eyes. "So anyway after I flushed it I went back into my bedroom to see my Uncle and check that you know he was okay and everything and he said to me 'What did you do with that bag AB?' So I told him what I'd done and that I'd flushed it and that's when he starting screaming at me because his teeth had fallen out of his mouth and into the bag while he was being sick and I'd accidentally flushed them down the toilet" he announced with a smile.
Sharon laughed hysterically once again as Andy joined in, still finding the whole thing funny all those years later. "What did you do?" she asked finally.
"What do you think we did? We spent the rest of the night with all the drains up in the street and holding candles and flashlights down them trying to find his teeth" he explained, the sight of his extended family lying at regular intervals throughout the neighbourhood and shouting at each other 'FLUSH!' as they passed the message up the line at three o'clock in the morning only adding to their reputation as a family of troublemakers.
"Did you find them?"
"No, they were long gone. Some alligator in the sewer probably had them."
"So what happened?" Sharon asked as she continued to laugh.
"He ate nothing but soup for about three weeks until he got some replacements and made me run errands for him around the neighbourhood as a punishment."
"Errands?" Sharon asked suspiciously, already dreading the answer.
"Trust me babe, you don't want to know" he replied, never asking what was in the various small packages he was delivering to some rather seedy looking individuals but nevertheless he had a fairly good idea.
Despite her perfectly justified levels of horror Sharon laughed because given how hard and frankly horrific the majority of Andy's childhood had been (and that was just the things she knew about, having no idea about the way his Father used to beat him) he told his stories with such humour that she felt like she was there with him at the time. "The fact that you weren't killed as a teenager and I have you at all is a minor miracle" she told him as she laughed again, it starting to get a little loud from being so wrapped up in their conversation and had forgotten how late it was and that Rusty was fast asleep.
"Good story?"
"Oh, a very good story" she confirmed as she continued to laugh and for a brief moment acted like she didn't have a single care in the world rather than having spent the last week with a black cloud permanently hanging over her and looking at times like she was literally holding her breath.
Andy laughed along before he tried to shush her, kissing the top of her head as he did it. "Keep the noise down or you'll wake the kid up" he reminded her. "Let's not add waking him up at all hours of the night to the list of reasons why he doesn't like me."
Sharon lifted her head from his shoulder, stunned to say the least as her laughter ended more than a touch abruptly and she stared at him in disbelief. "Andy. What are you talking about?" she asked, almost starting to sound upset that Andy was under the impression that Rusty didn't like him much less love him but rather tolerated his existence. "He likes you. Of course he likes you. Surely you know that by now?"
"No he loves you more than anything in this world so therefore he puts up with me, that's a lot different to actually liking me" he concluded, not sounding that bothered by it but more just stating a fact as he saw it.
Propping herself up on her elbow while she addressed this subject, not prepared to drop it until she managed to convince him otherwise, Sharon's hand started to move up and down his chest again. "That's not true at all and you know it" she said more in hope rather than expectation. "Of course he likes you, well when you're not trying to annoy him at least and," she said before she paused and poked his chest with her finger again, "he's hugged you twice recently, don't forget that."
"I think he was just trying to steal my wallet that second time" he joked and making her laugh again. They just lay in silence for a moment, Andy giving it some serious thought. He never saw it as an issue, Rusty didn't need to like him as long as Sharon loved him and as a result he wasn't going to let it bother him. "You really think the kid likes me?" he asked a few moments later. He wasn't after sympathy or compliments or to make trouble between Sharon and Rusty (although that was never going to happen, the love they had for each other and the way that she had saved his life giving them an unbreakable bond and no one was ever going to get in the middle of), it was just that Andy genuinely didn't think that Rusty liked him all that much, feeling like he tolerated his existence in his life and now his home because Sharon loved him and therefore he made the effort for her which was very different to him actually liking him in the true sense of the word.
"Yes. Of course he does!" she cried, her shocked face saying a lot more than her words alone. "What makes you think he doesn't?" she asked, thrilled by how well they'd been getting on at late, at least from her point of view anyway.
"Well firstly there's the fact that I've tried and failed to take away the only home the kid has ever really known and loved to move into some hell hole held up by black mould and dead bodies" he pointed out, Rusty not at all happy when the idea of a move was first brought up by him, thinking he was planning some sort of sit-in protest at one point to stop it from happening.
"That's not entirely true" she replied quickly. "A few months ago maybe you may have been right but he genuinely started to show real interest in moving to some place bigger before you sold your house and you informed him that you'd changed your mind about the whole thing for the foreseeable so that's one off your list for starters" she proclaimed, fully prepared to listen and then dismiss every point on his list for the rest of the night if need be so that she could convince him that he was wrong. "And the next reason?"
"The main reason."
"Oh yes? And what would that be?"
"The big one. The biggest of them all. Huge. Massive. Insurmountable even" he added.
"What?"
He grinned at her before he answered, in full knowledge that he was about to get himself into trouble but wanted to say it anyway. "The fact that I'm banging his Mom" he said smugly as his hand drifted south to cup and then squeeze her ass before he gave it a little slap.
Sharon couldn't help but laugh despite the crassness of his words. "Well that, I'm sorry to tell you, he'll never get over or used to..."
"And neither will Ricky I guess" Andy surmised.
"That is very true but more to the point, let me tell you this now, if you use that word again in reference to me and, what I consider to be, our hugely enjoyable and satisfying sex life, the only thing you'll be 'banging' over the next couple of months is the balcony door when I lock you back out there again" she told him simply, giving him a little Darth Raydor glare for good measure to ensure her point was well made. Andy laughed and nodded as he strained to press his lips to her forehead while she still loomed above him. "And this time you'll be completely naked" she added as a final warning as she pinched his knees. "Despite that small and unavoidable snafu he does like you, really he does" she told him sincerely as her hand moved to stroke his cheek. "He loves you Andy. I hoped you knew that by now."
"I wouldn't go that far and say he loves me but I guess you're right he has hugged me twice recently but I could have died before each time so that's probably why" he shrugged.
"That's not the real reason."
"Yeah you're right. I still think he was trying to steal my wallet that second time. Or my car keys. Or maybe both" he joked.
Sharon laughed before she told him "Don't be so negative, it's true, he loves you." Andy continued to look at her less than convinced while she remained propped up to look him in the eye as the conversation took a more serious turn. "Have you given it any thought about how you're going to respond when he calls you 'Dad' for the first time?" she asked. Almost instantly Andy burst into laughter, laughing harder than Sharon had a few moments earlier. "Don't laugh at that! I'm being serious here" she told him as she took a swipe at the back of his head, Andy laughing so hard he had to hold onto his ribs, the whole thing becoming too painful.
"What? You've got to be kidding me" Andy said after he finally stopped laughing.
"No, I'm not. What are you going to..."
"Listen Sharon, with all the will in the world there is more chance of Provenza giving birth to a live unicorn in the middle of the Murder Room than there is of Rusty ever using the 'D' word to describe me" he insisted, the thought never even popping into his head once over the previous twelve months plus that they'd been dating.
"Dirt bag? That's two words" she joked.
"Trust me, it's not going to happen."
"I think you're wrong" Sharon told him simply, as unlikely to be convinced otherwise as Andy was or at least that's how it seemed.
Andy shrugged dismissively since he couldn't see Rusty ever saying anything like that to him but Sharon knew him far better than Andy did he reasoned so if anyone would know it would be her, but he still didn't believe it. "If you say so" he shrugged again.
She gave his ribs another swift but forceful poke with her finger before she settled back down on his shoulder again. "I do say so" she insisted with an air of finality about it all. "I'm not saying that it'll happen next week or next year even but it will happen, mark my words boy, it will happen someday."
"Sharon he still calls me Lieutenant when you're not around and sometimes even if you are if we're being honest here" he reminded her.
"Granted but just think about it for a moment, ten years from now when we're both retired, older, greyer and incontinent…" she started to say before Andy's laughter cut her off.
"Oooh what a beautiful image you paint. I can hardly wait. I can almost taste the Flomax already" he joked.
Ignoring him, she continued. "Ten years from now when he comes to you for advice because he's having a tough time with his editor..."
"Hold up a second. Editor?" he questioned with a smug smile. "I thought you said the other week that he was starting to sound more like a lawyer these days. In fact you even put money on it. Have you changed your mind?"
"Oh shut up" Sharon told him as she pinched the back of his knee, never liking to admit that she was wrong but was still firmly of the opinion that wasn't the case when it came to the various wages they'd placed on Rusty's future. "Ten years from now when he comes to you for advice about his editor or his client or the District Attorney or whatever and he says 'What do I do Dad?' what are you going to say to him?" she asked, genuinely thinking that it was a possibility given that Andy was the only real positive Father figure he had and was ever going to have in his life.
"Is this before or after I've swallowed my tongue from the shock?"
"Will you take this seriously please?" Sharon demanded.
Andy shrugged. "Oh I don't know babe. I guess I'll try to help him out as best I can and then completely ignore what he'd said to me because I'm a guy and that's what guys do" she said very casually as he pulled her close once again and pushed his lips to the top of her head.
"You're hopeless" Sharon said with a shake of her head as she tangled her left leg with his again, returning to her previous and extremely comfortable position on his shoulder.
"Where are you in this scenario by the way? Why isn't he coming to you with this problem?"
"Oh I'll have left you by then" she answered quickly as her hand moved back under his t-shirt again, her nails raking up and down his chest while she pressed her lips to his jawline. "I'll be living with my twenty one year old sex slave called Raul in our beach house on Maui."
Andy laughed. "Oh really?"
"Absolutely. Don't get me wrong Andy, I mean I do love you but you have already started to annoy me since you moved in" she stated with the humour clear in her voice while he began to laugh. "I'm sure after five years I'll have given up completely and be looking at a," she paused as she continued to kiss along his jawline to his chin, "much younger model."
"I haven't even unpacked yet and already I'm annoying you?"
"In my defence have you met you?" she joked. Andy's mouth immediately dropped open with fake offense, making it look like he'd just been stabbed straight through the heart. Sharon laughed as she kissed him. "Oh I'm joking. Why would I want to trade you in for someone a third of your age when you've promised me a steady stream of multiple orgasms whenever I want them?"
"But if I struggle to keep up with demand you'll go and find your man Raul on Maui I guess?"
"Something like that" she laughed before she cupped his cheek. "Oh Andy my darling boy I wouldn't trade you in for the world" she assured him before she met his lips.
"Even though I don't have a beach house on Maui?"
"Absolutely. Who needs a beach house anyway? Let's be honest here, sand gets everywhere and after my fifth UTI in three months I'll be utterly exhausted anyway" she joked.
"Oh sure! Meanwhile while you're off riding Raul right into an operating theatre, I'm back here nursing my broken heart and taking care of all of the parental duties" he complained without really registering what he'd just said.
Sharon smiled at him before she stroked his cheek, a little choked up. "Parental duties?"
He smiled and nodded when he realised how much those two little words meant to her, that he clearly would still be there for Rusty even if she wasn't one day. "Yeah."
"Have I ever told you how much I love having someone to share 'parental duties' with again?" she asked, unable to hide the smile on her face.
"Well it's not like I do a lot around here."
"You don't need to do a lot. You just have to be here when he needs you" she told him, not asking for any more where Rusty was concerned and yet delighted that Andy would step up without a second thought if the need arouse. "Like when he needs some advice on how to deal with the DA for example."
Andy laughed again. "Care to make a wager?"
"What kind of wager exactly? We're already betting on whether he switches his major to law or not" she reminded him.
"And I look forward to taking that twenty bucks off you when he shows absolutely no interest in the law whatsoever and continues on his path which leads him to become a journalist" he stated with supreme confidence.
"Do you have any idea how much it'll annoy him if he finds out how often we bet on him?"
Andy smiled, a smile filled with mischief. "Only if someone tells him."
Sharon sat up quickly to look him in the eye, a finger pointed in his face. "But no one is going to tell him are they?" she stated.
"Of course not" he insisted while that mischievous smile remained.
Satisfied that he wouldn't say anything to Rusty she lay back down again. After a few more moments of silence she asked "What kind of wager?"
"How about the winner gets an additional irrational demand?" he suggested.
"I hate to point this out Andy but if he never says it to you, you won't have chance to use your additional irrational demand because you'll be dead."
"That's a fair point" he conceded as morbid a thought as it was. "Okay we have to have a cut-off point, say something like ten years from now. By the time that we celebrate our eleventh anniversary," he said and prompting a beaming smile from her because of the way he always thought long term about their relationship (not that it should have come as a surprise to her since they were living together after all and yet it was still a lovely surprise), Sharon pushing her lips to his chin, "if he hasn't said it to me then, I get another irrational demand."
"And if he does say it, I do."
"Okay."
"It's a deal" Sharon confirmed as they shook hands as best they could without moving too much. "You just have to hope that we both remember this conversation ten years from now and that you haven't tried to die on me again before then."
Andy laughed before he crossed his heart with his free hand. "I promise you Sharon, I am not going to try to die on you again for a very long time" he told her, a promise that he was going to struggle to keep but regardless kissed her on the lips as if to confirm his intentions as far as jumping on moving vehicles was concerned.
"See that you do" Sharon replied, curling into his side even more. They remained like that for a few minutes in silence, just holding each other, their hands making lazy patterns on the other while Sharon occasionally pushed her lips to his chest. "I'll put money on him saying it to you eventually" she said after a while, having spent those few minutes of silence thinking about the vastly improved relationship between the love of her life and her youngest son. "You are the only Father figure he's ever going to have Andy" she stated once again.
"Yeah, yeah, yeah" Andy replied dismissively.
"Don't 'Yeah, yeah, yeah' me like that, you are" she told him once again with a pinch to his knee. "I'm being deadly serious here."
Despite Sharon's best intentions it was an uphill battle to make Rusty see Andy as a member of his family rather than just her boyfriend or even her husband one day. The cruel fact of the matter was that history and misunderstandings were the foundations upon which Andy and Rusty built their somewhat rather rocky relationship in the very beginning. There was simply no denying the fact that Rusty had an extremely traumatic history when it came to 'Mom's boyfriends' (the complete opposite to Emily and Ricky who had never met a single person Sharon was involved with between Jack and Andy and therefore loved him almost instantly) and that instinctively made him extremely weary of Andy even though he knew him very well before they started to date. Despite Sharon never giving him cause to fear for his stability in the only real home he'd ever known it still worried him that he may be asked to leave one day because of Andy, not expecting to be abandoned at the zoo again but more along the lines of being encouraged to spread his wings and leave the nest earlier than he'd like before he started to outstay his welcome after getting in the way too much. All of that was nonsense of course but Rusty was in long term therapy with Dr Joe for legitimate reasons.
Then there were the little misunderstandings between them that didn't help matters. For example when Rusty brought Gus to the Murder Room that first time so that Sharon could break the bad news to him about Mariana's death, Andy told him that he'd done a 'Hell of a job' but the way that he said it to him made Rusty think that Andy was pissed at him for just dropping it on Sharon rather than giving her any kind of advanced warning (something that Judge Grove had encouraged him to stop doing and likewise he had told Sharon to 'let it be a surprise' if he identified her). In truth Andy's heart broke for not only Gus but also for Sharon in having to deliver that devastating news. At the time of the case and Slider's arrest it hit Andy hard and in the end he was the one that insisted they have a little memorial for her because he didn't like the idea of her being wrapped up and dumped in the 'Burrito Room' but of course Rusty didn't know that. He was around a lot of their investigations over the years but at that particular time in his life, when Mariana was murdered his focus was on Jack offering him a part time job as a way to poke him for information on Sharon's love life and the not so small fact that Sharon wanted to adopt him. All of that meaning he didn't show his usual levels of interest in the case they were working on except for the nature of it giving him pause for thought in terms of his adoption.
However all of the eye rolls, the smart remarks and put downs, the muttering under his breath and suspicious looks that headed his way didn't bother Andy in the slightest. Andy took everything that was thrown at him like it was water off a duck's back because he loved Sharon and that was that. As far as he was concerned and trying his hardest to see it from Rusty's point of view he knew that he was encroaching on Rusty's territory and he was fully prepared to wait him out which he'd done and was now reaping the benefits, living with them and having a very good relationship with Rusty on the whole.
Andy laughed, not believing he was having that particular conversation. "What's brought this on all of a sudden?" he asked.
"I don't know. I was just thinking about Chief Taylor's boys and how they must be feeling right now" she replied quietly, never going too long without thinking about Russell's family no matter how hard she tried. Andy kissed the top of her head as he held her even tighter, knowing that she still needed it. Eventually she looked up to meet his eye. "You know even when we're older and greyer…"
"And incontinent" he added.
"Absolutely" she agreed as they laughed. Once more she made sure that her eyes were locked on his as she spoke. "Even when we're older and greyer and a touch incontinent I'm still going to want you" she told him before she kissed him long and slow on the lips.
"Even with no teeth?" he asked when they broke apart.
"Especially with no teeth" she confirmed with a little chuckle before kissing him again.
"We'll get Rusty to put everything in the blender for us. If we're not gumming it we'll be drinking it through a straw" Andy stated nonchalantly and making her laugh.
"I'm still going to be chasing you around the bed when we're in our nineties."
"You think I'll need chasing then?" Andy asked.
"Why? Because you're so so easy or because you're likely to be attached to an oxygen tank and not running anywhere by then?"
"Both I guess."
She laughed. "Probably not" she agreed before she kissed him again. "And for the record since we're on this subject, when we're older, greyer and incontinent I'm still going to need you too" she added, her eyes locked on his until she closed them to kiss him. "It doesn't matter what I said to you in the past before we were together, I'm always going to need you Andy Flynn. Always" she confirmed, kissing him again. She'd said it to him before, the day he sold his house and then again a few days earlier as he consoled her in the living room but it was still worth repeating. It was true that she didn't need anyone in her life either at home or at work and she hadn't for a very long time. In truth she still didn't need anyone, but Andy wasn't just anyone any more. He was the love of her life and she most definitely needed him now, she needed him more than she ever felt possible.
Andy had nothing to say in response. He'd already made it clear many times just how much he loved her and how much he needed her in his life. His life had changed dramatically over the previous twelve months plus but she was now the reason he got out of bed every single morning and the fact that it was abundantly clear that she felt the same way about him made his heart feel like it was skipping a beat.
Silence fell between them again as Andy continued to stroke her back while his lips pressed to the top of her head and Sharon essentially clung to him, throwing her leg even further over his. "Rusty will never ever call me Dad" he said finally.
"How can you be so sure?"
"Well for example, the other day at work when he thought Dr Joe was dead, he went straight to Provenza to talk to when he walked into the Murder Room rather than me that's why" he stated, thinking that Rusty saw Provenza more as a Father figure rather than him.
In truth it was Provenza who went to him rather than the other way around because he was used to dealing with Rusty in such situations and doing so before Andy had chance to move let alone register what he needed to do. With Sharon out of action until she was cleared by FID and Behaviour Sciences he was in temporary charge of the division and as such took it upon himself to do all he could for her during that difficult time even dealing with her son. Plus in the back of Provenza's mind he knew full well that Andy would be worried about Sharon like he was worried about her and again took it upon himself to spare Andy that conversation since he had enough on his plate already.
Not being there at the time because she was still talking to her old friends at FID (and rather frantically washing the blood from her forehead), Sharon had no idea what had happened when Rusty arrived at PAB but it was easy for her work out the reasons why it had been the case. "You can't read anything into that Andy. That was probably only because he's just used to having that kind of conversation with him rather than you" she reasoned, seeing nothing negative in Rusty's decision.
"I guess" Andy replied, still far from convinced not that it particularly bothered him.
"Plus at the time he was worried about you too, he told me, because you were there with me and in the line of fire when it happened."
Andy looked at her more than a little surprised, under the impression that Rusty's upset over Dr Joe and Sharon and even Taylor would be a big enough distraction so that he simply wouldn't give him a second thought. "What?" he asked, not hiding his surprise.
Sharon nodded at him with a smile, confirming what she'd just told him. It was true that when Rusty first walked into the Murder Room that day his attention was obviously on Dr Joe (who he thought was already dead) and to a slightly lesser extent on Taylor (although he was obviously very upset about his death too). But after he had spoken to Sharon alone in her office and she had explained that Joe was alive but it was a secret, he slowly began to see past his worry for Joe as it became clear to him why Provenza had said what he did to him and that his Mom really was struggling with what had happened, it slowly becoming clear the reason why too. It wasn't just that she had seen the carnage unfold before her very eyes, she was there in that courtroom, Andy was too, they were both there as Dwight went on his murderous rampage. They could have died. Both of them. He could have lost his Mom and his would be Step-Dad within seconds of each other without having the chance to say goodbye. Rusty couldn't even remember if he'd said goodbye to either of them that morning when they left for work. It was a thought that winded him as he asked if she was okay before hugging her and nearly squeezing the life out of her.
With Sharon seemingly okay (on the outside at least), Rusty turned and looked at Andy through the glass and asked her the same question about him, 'Is he okay?' Rusty had openly admitted that he had grown to like Andy as he took charge 'Flynn sitting' before and after his surgery. Forgetting how he felt about him, it was clear from how Sharon reacted to his brush with death that she really did love him and he was in his life to stay and as a result he realised he had to make more of an effort with him instantly and accepted him as a big part of his life from then on. But it was as he looked at Andy through the glass of Sharon's office and realised that he could have died a couple of hours earlier that it hit him that he actually now loved Andy. He did. He really did. Yes he annoyed him a lot of the time and he made fun of him and he certainly wasn't funny and he would shed in the bathtub and he ate the weirdest and the grossest food but he loved him. He loved him. Without even realising it himself Andy was now the Dad he'd never had but always wanted and he did love him in his own way. It was a feeling he had never experienced before, least of all because it was for a man after he had experienced such a long and awful history with men. He turned back to Sharon to ask if Andy was okay too. Sharon had smiled at him, the only smile he would see on her face for close to a week and told him that he was fine, that they both were and it was then that Rusty said it 'Why is it only in the face of tragedy that you come to realise how much you love someone?' Rusty could have been saying it about Dr Joe or indeed Taylor but he was looking directly at Andy through the glass as he said it so Sharon knew, giving him a hug for a moment but opting not to make a big deal of Rusty's little heartfelt confession. It was on her mind to tell Andy when the opportunity presented itself and Andy's insecurities as far as Rusty was concerned was the perfect time.
"He told me in my office the other day" she started to explain. "He was naturally really upset about what had happened to Dr Joe and Chief Taylor too of course but after he took a moment to think about it he was just as equally freaked out that we both," she paused as she stroked his cheek, "and I do mean both of us my darling boy, that we could both have been shot and killed ourselves." She met his eye again because she wanted him to listen to her and believe what she was saying not just to make him relax in regard to his constantly evolving and on the whole improving relationship with Rusty but because it was the truth. "He loves you Andy, even if he doesn't always know it, even if he doesn't always show it, so please don't think otherwise." Her point made she kissed him, Andy deepening it rather than saying anything in reply.
They settled down again after a moment with Sharon's head on his shoulder as a more than comfortable silence again settled between them. It was clear to Andy by the way her nails continued to rake up and down his chest that she still wasn't even remotely capable of sleep so he began to rack his brain for something to entertain her with. After a few minutes he smiled.
"Did you know..." he started to say before Sharon's laughter cut him off, this topic of discussion already making her smile and he had hardly said anything.
"Oh this should be good" she said as she got a little more comfortable so that she could see his face and give him her complete and undivided attention. "Go on" she encouraged once she was settled.
"Did you know that after a male honeybee climaxes, you know when he's getting his freak on with the Queen bee" he clarified, stopping to make sure she understood.
Sharon laughed. "I understand. What about it?"
"Well when the male honeybee climaxes during sex his testicles explode and his penis is ripped off" he stated matter-of-factly. Sharon instantly collapsed into a fit of laughter the likes of which he had never seen before and Sharon laughed a lot with him, making him laugh with her in the end. "What? That's true. It's a scientific and indisputable fact" he maintained.
"Oh I don't doubt it" Sharon replied as she continued to laugh.
"Then why are you laughing?"
"Because one of us needs to quickly find a pen and write this down. On Wednesday the 22nd of September 2016 at roughly," she paused to look at the time on the clock on her nightstand, "4:13am we have had the most bizarre conversation of them all" she declared as they laughed. "Thank you Andy, thank you" she told him before she gave him a long and lingering kiss on the lips. "Thank you."
"Thank you for what?"
"For being you and for making me laugh more in the last fourteen months that we've been together than I have in my previous sixty years combined."
He smiled at her, as pleased as he was smug about it. "You're welcome" he said simply, his words punctuated by dropping his lips to hers. "It's a noise I will never ever grow tire of hearing."
"What?"
"The sound of your laughter" he told her with a kiss. "It's my new favourite drug of choice and one addiction I don't intend to give up in a hurry."
She smiled at him for a moment before softly making the plea "Please don't ever stop trying to make me laugh" and then pressed her lips to his.
"I don't intend to" he confirmed before he offered a plea himself. "Don't ever stop wanting me to make you laugh." It was definitely a request she intended to follow through on, if not for her than for him. Again a comfortable silence fell between them, not taking their eyes off the other until Andy suddenly said "It would be oh so worth it though."
"What would?"
"Having your junk explode after sex" he declared as if he had given it some serious thought over the years before he reached his conclusion. Naturally Sharon couldn't help but laugh, always amazed by some of the utter nonsense that fell from Andy's mouth while they were in bed, it a bonus of falling in love with him that she never anticipated. "Especially with you. It would be oh so worth it with you" he growled with a wink in what was quite possibly the most bizarre compliment ever bestowed upon the woman in his arms and he'd once told her she was as 'beautiful as chicken feet' in pigeon Italian.
"But a bit messy to clean up afterwards."
"I didn't say it didn't have a down side and quite a big one at that" he joked, Sharon laughing at him again. "But I assume I'd be passed out from the blood loss as well as the unimaginable pain so cleaning up the mess would be the least of my concerns" he rightly pointed out as she continued to laugh. Andy waited for her to quieten down before he said once again "Did you know…" but had to pause again as Sharon laughed hysterically, bringing a massive smile to his face. "Did you know that chainsaws were originally invented as a medical implement for Doctors to use during childbirth?"
This time Sharon grimace as she laughed, drawing her knees together a little as she thought about the pain of giving birth naturally let alone with the use of a chainsaw to perform what she assumed was a fairly brutal and fatal C-Section. "I think I had a Doctor who took that route when I had Ricky" she joked. "Not that I really needed one or even a chainsaw for that matter by the time he took his first breath in this world. Ricky successfully managed to rip almost everything below my waist to shreds all on his own, he didn't need any help. It was nearly two weeks before I could sit down properly again or at least without cursing and wanting to cry" she stated very matter-of-factly. It was only when she finished her trip down a very painful memory lane that she looked up and saw the horrified grimace on Andy's face, the detail she'd gone into almost making his eyes water. She laughed at him. "What? You're the one that brought it up."
"I know and despite how shocked I am to be admitting this especially out loud and to you, but I have to admit that Jack was right, listening to your birth stories really is like picturing your favourite bar burning down" he said a little unwisely.
Sharon laughed as she smacked him across his chest. "Don't agree with him!" she cried as she smacked him again.
"Ow!" Andy whined as he rubbed his chest. "You're always beating me!"
"Well you deserve it."
"But it's true, even though I can confirm from personal experience and after having spent a hell of a lot of time enjoying the hospitality of that particular bar over the last ten months," he grinned, Sharon laughing at him while slapping his chest again, "that the renovation work done on that favourite place of mine in the years afterward is so unbelievably good that you'd never know it completely burnt down to the ground twice in a relatively short period of time."
Sharon laughed again despite the fact that such a reaction was only going to encourage him. "I'm not sure if I should be taking that as a compliment or slapping you senseless right now."
He winked at her, pulling the sort of face that she wanted to slap ten years earlier but now quickly made heat pool at her core. "Oh it's definitely a compliment babe, believe me" he told her as she continued to laugh and shake her head. "It's definitely a compliment." He dropped his lips to hers before he had chance to talk his way into sleeping on the couch for the following week and then asked "When is Ricky next flying down here by the way?"
"I'm not sure, he hasn't said. Christmas if he can't get here any sooner I guess. Why?"
"So that I can beat the crap out of him for hurting my girl so badly" he said as seriously as he could but it still made Sharon laugh as she shook her head. "I assume they kept you in for a couple of days after you had him?" Andy asked. The topic of Ricky's birth had been up for discussion a few times between them, both of them liking to talk about their children being born so that obviously meant Andy was fully aware of what a let-down Jack was that day and how perilously close she came to giving birth in her car while stopping at a set of lights.
"You assume correctly but you know it was different back then. These days women seem to leave hospital ten minutes after giving birth" she observed.
Andy paused before he asked the next question on his mind, always wanting to know about the more difficult parts of her past so that he could make sure he was so much better than that, that he was the man she deserved after everything she'd been through over the years with Jack. "When He-Who-Cannot-Be-Named," he said, pausing slightly as Sharon laughed over Andy's continued reference to her ex-husband like he was Voldemort and saying his name out loud would result in him suddenly appearing, "eventually sobered up, how long did it take the asshole to come by and visit you both in the hospital?"
"It was the same day. He was there before the sun went down I'll give him that but I asked them not let him in to see me under any circumstances." Sharon sighed, still more than a little sad about the whole thing but she would always talk to Andy about it if he asked her a question. "With the surge in hormones I was already emotional enough without having to see him too. I'll be honest with you, I would have strangled him with the IV tubing if they'd let him in."
Andy laughed for a brief moment before he just stared at her in awe, Sharon raising her kids on her own when he struggled to do it with Sandra and he just didn't know how she did it. His hand continued to move up and down her back for a moment before he continued with what he knew was a difficult topic of conversation. "Can I ask you a personal question?" he said finally.
"Always."
"After he left you that final time, how many times did you, you know, almost take him back?" he asked and deliberately treading very careful like he was walking through a field of landmines.
"You want to know how big an idiot I was right?"
"No, not at all. I want to know just how big of an asshole he was to walk out on you after being so fortunate to be taken back again and again. You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," he said quickly, "but you've mentioned him being there and the kids have said things and I..."
Sharon kissed him to silence him. She knew that it was just a genuine interest to know the exact path she had taken that had brought the current incarnation of Sharon Raydor into his life. He had told her all about his marriage over the previous couple of years, how it ended, when Sandra finally gave up on him (minus some details here and there about his drinking which he was still yet to sit down and tell her all about, still waiting for the right time so that he could tell her everything) and so was naturally curious to know more about the life that she shared with Emily and Ricky so that he could know them even better.
"Twice. Twice after he left and took everything" she said and making no attempt to hide the shame she felt in her voice. She sighed before she continued. "The first time I took him back it came with promises and dating and several bundles of twenty dollar bills that I knew he'd won gambling but at that time I took it for the kids because we needed it. That time he was back for a little under two months before he showed up in the middle of the night, drunk off his ass obviously and just as abusive and then vanished in a poof of smoke the next day. The second time was for less than an hour and ended with me pulling my gun on him to ensure he left and didn't come back. After that and a break of just over five years without us seeing or even hearing from him it was two nights on the couch for the sake of the kids but it was over between us."
If she was being honest with herself it was something she didn't want to admit to or even say out loud because she had slept with him on more than a few occasions since the first time she offered Jack her couch to sleep on in the old house for two nights at a time (not wanting him in one of the bedrooms and keeping him as close as possible to the front door) and then relenting and offering him the spare room at the condo before Rusty arrived. She didn't want Andy to know (although she suspected he already did) how weak and pathetic she was at that time, allowing someone who had betrayed her so badly back into her bed because she was embarrassed by it. When he was there it was easy and he was familiar and it was something she just couldn't stop herself from doing when she had an itch that needed scratching because he was fairly good at scratching it but moreover he was there and available. Jack could always be so charming when he put his mind to it which made it easier to fall into bed with him despite always instantly regretting it the moment they were done (and sometimes even before then) but she usually let him finish, not bothering to fake an orgasm if she came to her senses before he climaxed, always pushing him off her and escaping to the shower to remove all traces of him on her skin instantly. It was why he assumed a repeat performance was on the cards the last time he stayed there (and it now really was the last time following the divorce and getting involved with Andy), at first put off his stride a little by the presence of Rusty and then he slowly began to realise that Sharon had changed since the last time he had seen her. She was a lot more confident about herself and she knew what she wanted out of life and that was most definitely not him.
Of course Jack saw their whole relationship very differently, always thinking that they were a little like Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, without a shadow of a doubt the loves of each other's lives and as equally unable to live with each other as they could without. However Sharon did not see it that way. She had been patient with him (far more patient than Sandra was with Andy at least), she gave him the time and the space to grow up a little for her and their children but he didn't. She half expected that he couldn't but that seemed to let him off the hook slightly for his behaviour. Far from being the love of her life she had fallen out of love with him the day that Ricky was born and his selfish and drunken behaviour meaning their son had nearly been born in her car. She tried afterwards to see if she could forgive him, to give him another chance and they battled on valiantly for another couple of years but he soon left, taking their money with him. After that she was no longer waiting for him to get his life together and come home to her for good and had taken off her wedding ring to prove it years before, his ring still on his finger right up until the divorce as he hoped she'd change her mind before it was too late.
Andy just nodded at her, offering no judgement at all. "I guess you think it was pretty foolish of me?" she asked, interpreting his silence as disapproval.
"Not at all. I think it was because, despite everything, you loved the guy and you wanted to believe him and believe that he could change for you" he told her simply before he kissed her on the lips. "You deserve so much better."
"And now I've got it" she replied with a smile and then kissed him back. "Thanks to you."
"I certainly hope so."
"Oh I know so, trust me, I know so" she confirmed emphatically and then once again sealed it with another kiss to his lips, Andy definitely an upgrade as far as she was concerned even though Jack had once accused her of 'trading down.'
"What did you do with Emily? After Ricky was born? I assume she didn't stay with you over night at the hospital?"
"Well thankfully I knew a nurse who worked there, I used to see her all the time during Mass at St Joseph's, and she kept her entertained for me for a couple of hours until Gavin came to collect her, so he had her overnight until I was sure Jack was capable of taking care of her again" she explained before she descended into a fit of giggles. "He had the worst timing too. He walked straight into my room while the Doctor was still inspecting my stitches" she told him as she continued to laugh, Andy quickly joining in with her. "You have never seen anyone go that white that quickly before. He made a noise like Minnie Mouse climaxing" she said, Andy barely hearing her through her laughter, making him laugh all the more especially because of the choice of expression she used, something he would never have imagined falling from her lips in the years before they became friends.
"What did he say?"
"Before or after he fainted?"
"He fainted?" Andy asked, not really sure himself why he was so surprised by that fact.
"He sure did" she confirmed as they continued to laugh. "He still refers to the whole saga as the 'Lady Garden Incident'" she added, the two of them laughing harder than they'd ever done before.
"Yeah well the guy is not exactly in the vagina business is he?"
"The vagina business?" Sharon laughed as she shook her head. "That is not a different career option aside from pet detective after retirement let me tell you now" she told him as they laughed again. "You're much better off as a pet detective, believe me." He nodded in agreement as Sharon's mind went back to the moment Gavin's eyes rolled back in his head and he hit the floor with such force it felt like an earthquake. "When he finally regained consciousness and they'd ruled out a concussion and given him a couple of stitches to the back of his head he compared it to watching a horror film and he instantly became a vegetarian as a result."
Andy laughed as he kissed the top of her head. "The guy doesn't know what he's missing."
"Oh I think he does" Sharon laughed as Andy looked at her with curiosity, prompting her to elaborate further. "He's experimented once or twice with women in the past" she revealed.
Andy's eyebrows instantly flew upwards, looking more than surprised. "Really?"
"Oh yeah."
"Not with you I take it?" he asked, trying his best to hide any jealousy he might be feeling if that was the case.
"Would it matter if it was?"
"Yes! Of course it would matter!" Andy practically shouted as if it was the most ridiculous thing she had ever said. "It's bad enough I know Jack had his paws all over you once or twice let alone Gavin Baker."
Sharon couldn't help but laugh, as annoying as Andy's jealousy could be she also found it highly amusing because his concerns were so ridiculous. "But he's gay!"
"I don't care if he's gay" Andy replied, his voice taking on that really high quality again when he was extremely annoyed by something, getting more annoyed because he was greeted with laughter. "Look Sharon, a guy is a guy regardless of whether they're gay most of the time or not" he stated as she continued to laugh at him. "So? Was it?"
"Was it what?" she asked, deliberately playing dumb just to draw out his agony even more.
"Was it you?" he asked with renewed vigour. With Sharon deliberately playing dumb just to mess with him he sat up a little as he desperately searched for an answer. "Did you sleep with Gavin? Are you the mystery woman?"
Sharon laughed hysterically, this being the exact reaction she was expecting from him but for the sake of his blood pressure she knew she had to put him out of his misery. "Of course it wasn't me! I would never jeopardise a close friendship like that for some hugely enjoyable but ultimately meaningless sex." She smiled at him, her choice of words used just to tease him further.
Instead of taking the bait Andy just smiled back at her. "Why not? You did it with me" he rightly pointed out.
"Ah well that's the exception that proves the rule and anyway," she said before she took a big fistful of his t-shirt and pulled him down towards her to kiss her lips, "I was already head over heels in love with you when we first slept together so although it was hugely enjoyable, it definitely was not anything close to being meaningless sex and nothing more." As if to prove her point she kissed him again, swallowing his moans as her tongue scraped across the roof of his mouth. "So boy, I clearly wasn't jeopardising anything except perhaps my reputation at work with all of my former colleagues in Professional Standards" she laughed, laughing all the harder because of how pissed Andy looked as a result.
"Gee thanks" he grumbled. Sharon just laughed before she kissed him to let him know that she was only joking, something he already knew. "So who was it?" he asked as he lay back down and Sharon settled on his shoulder again.
Sharon sighed, already regretting bringing the subject up. "If I tell you you've got to swear to me that you'll never breathe a word of it to anyone, least of all to them. Okay? Understood?"
"Yes" Andy nodded.
"Promise me."
"I do, I promise."
Sharon sighed before she answered, it being clear she was having second thoughts about the whole thing but it was too late to turn back time. "It was Andrea."
"What?!" Andy cried at such volume that the word echoed around their bedroom. Andy sat up animatedly with it clearly being one of the best things he had ever heard in his life and as a result sending Sharon flying off his shoulder. "Andrea Hobbs?! Gavin and Andrea slept together?"
"Yes. Twice in fact. In the summer of 2002."
"Oh my God! And he survived it?"
Sharon immediately smacked him across his shoulder, not prepared to allow the name of one of her best friends to be dragged through the mud like that even if it was the love of her life. "Andy!" she shouted as she smacked him again.
"What? It's a reasonable question to ask" he replied as he rubbed his shoulder and laughed. "I always assumed she instantly killed after mating. Wrapping the poor dude up in a cocoon to eat at her leisure or something along those lines" he said unwisely and was instantly given another smack around his shoulder. "What?"
"And you wonder why I've never told you about this sooner."
Andy lay back down before he pulled Sharon back onto his shoulder, wrapping his arms around her. "I don't believe this" he said with his disbelief evident before he shuddered. "Well that's an image I'll never be able to get rid of."
"You didn't have to picture it" Sharon laughed.
"It's not like I've done it on purpose. It just popped in there from out of nowhere and now all I can think about is Andrea's tattoo."
"Andrea doesn't have a tattoo."
He grinned at her. "She does in my mind. She has my name in a little love heart" he said with a wink, sounding incredibly arrogant as he did it.
Sharon rolled her eyes. "Of course she does because she's always been your number one fan" she pointed out.
"I wish I'd known this a year ago."
"Why?"
"Because it would have given me some ammunition and a little something to deflect the attention and knock them out of their strides while they were threatening my testicles if I ever even thought about making you cry" he stated, still annoyed by how close Andrea got to his 'boys' with her nail file as they took it in turns to threatened him about his behaviour, not that they needed to, he had no intention of ever doing anything to hurt her.
Sharon laughed as she watched his hand unconsciously move to cover his crotch. "Then you're very fortunate that they never came after you following your attempt to be an over the hill action hero aren't you?" she told him with a smile.
Andy looked at her shocked for a moment before he sat up to loom over her and look her in the eye as her head lay back on her pillow. "What?" he said like he'd just heard the most surprising thing in his life. "I made you cry when I fell from that car last year?" he asked with genuine surprise.
On the surface of it, it seemed like an utterly ridiculous question to ask, assuming that his girlfriend wouldn't be upset when his life literally hung in the balance but throughout the whole experience Sharon had successfully been able to get her emotions in check around him because she simply didn't want to add him worrying about her and how upset she was on top of everything else going on. Aside from when she initially visited him in hospital when he collapsed in the bathroom, she only truly let her emotions out when she was at home, hardly sleeping and on the night before his surgery going and sitting on Rusty's bed as she held one of Andy's shirts in her lap and inhaled his distinctive scent that still clung to it. Rusty found her when he went to the bathroom, opting to sleep on the couch rather than in his own bed because it was currently Andy's and he wanted it waiting for him when he was finally released from hospital. She had obvious tears in her eyes and he tried as best he could to comfort her like Provenza tried the following day as he held her hand while he was in surgery but that was it. Everything else she kept to herself and was only released when she was alone in her bedroom with the door closed and Rusty fast asleep.
"When you collapsed several times and had to have lifesaving surgery? What do you think?" she asked rhetorically. Andy looked at her a little lost for words for a moment since she had hidden her torment and upset from him at the time so well. He knew she was worried about him obviously but not to that extent, the smiles and laughs and the 'Andy, I'll wait for you' as he was wheeled away for surgery fooling him completely. "Yes," Sharon said with a little sigh as she slowly stroked his cheek, "oddly enough I did shed a tear or two over you last year when I thought you could be snatched from me before we'd even got started."
Again Andy just stared intently into her eyes, never wanting to put her through something like that again. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her even closer to his chest, kissing her long and slow on the lips as his eyes slipped closed. "I love you you know" he told her when they pulled apart.
"I do" she replied with a kiss. "I most definitely do know that" she told him before she kissed him once again, it lingering a little longer.
"I mean how did that even happen?" Andy cried after a moment.
Sharon immediately frowned, jumping to the wrong conclusion for once. "What? You falling in love with me?" she asked dryly and preparing to attack his knees in retaliation if he was to answer in the affirmative shortly.
"No. Andrea and Gavin sleeping together."
Sharon laughed as she quickly realised that Andy wasn't going to drop that particular topic of conversation for a very long time to come. "I'm not entirely sure if I'm honest with you but I imagine vast quantities of wine were involved somewhere along the road" she told him with it being a conversation she wasn't so keen on having with either of them in case she was told certain intimate details that she desperately didn't want to know about two of her closest friends.
"You've not asked them what happened?"
"Of course I haven't asked them!"
"Well don't come to me with half a story Raydor!" Andy cried rather animatedly and more than a little frustrated at the lack of information heading his way. "I need details here! Details!"
Sharon laughed at him. "I'm so sorry. I should have thought to myself roughly fourteen years ago 'You know what? Just on the off chance I happen to lose my mind one day and start dating Lieutenant Smug Hot Pants himself, I should find out exactly what events led to two of my friends sleeping together. In fact I should get a full transcript and possibly even some sort of drawing done by a sketch artist'" she told him dryly.
"Thank you" he replied enthusiastically as if Sharon had just agreed to record the whole encounter in the event of a repeat performance which inevitably made her laugh at him. "Keep that in mind from now on please in case it happens again." Silence fell again but the way that the smile on Andy's face seemed to grow by the second meant that she already knew what was coming and she had no way to stop it. "'Lieutenant Smug Hot Pants'? I always knew you'd ogled me for years Raydor. I knew it" he said as he lay back down, drawing Sharon back onto his shoulder
Sharon laughed with a roll of her eyes, accepting that she had walked right into that one. "No I didn't" she insisted and trying to her hardest to stop being drawn into yet another argument about it even more so because Andy was right and she had frequently looked him up and down during the years between their first meeting and going to Nicole's wedding with him.
"Yes you did. I know these things" he insisted, sounding as smug as he did arrogant.
"No you think you know these things but in reality what you really know, you could write on a grain of sand" she told him with a pinch of his knees as he laughed. "She did tell me one thing but…" She paused before she shook her head, having second thoughts about telling him anymore. "No never mind."
"Oh come on! You can't leave me hanging like this! What were you going to say?"
She sighed as she put a hand on his cheek to make him look her in the eye. "If I tell you you have to promise that you will never breathe a word of it. Okay?" she said, it a demand more than a request.
"Okay. I promise."
Sharon sighed again. "Andrea may have let it slip after a bottle of wine or two that Gavin..." she said until she paused, having more then second thoughts about it before finally opting to just spit it out. "That Gavin might have three testicles."
"What?!" Andy cried again as he laughed himself silly, easily making Sharon join in with him.
"Andrea said it was one of the weirdest things she'd ever seen in her life" she added as they continued to laugh. "In fact she said it was 'utterly disgusting' and it turned her celibate for six months." They laughed again, Sharon even more so as she recalled the way that Andrea told her all about it over a bottle of wine, comparing his undercarriage to a snake with three pool balls wedged in its mouth.
"What...how...like three together in a row?" he asked, struggling to picture it in his mind.
"No Andy. He has two where they belong and another hanging behind his right knee" she told him sarcastically as she rolled her eyes since it was one of the stupider questions he had asked her during their relationship. "Of course they're in a row!"
"Hey it's not such a dumb question."
"Oh really?"
"Yes, I meant were they in a row or in a sort of clump?"
"She never went into that much detail for obvious reasons" Sharon replied with a slight shudder at the memory of it all. At the time when Andrea told her all about it she was both intrigued and horrified by the rather unexpected topic of conversation between them as she drank more wine than usual to get over the trauma of it all.
Andy was silent for a moment before he simply said "Wow!"
"Yes I know. There's a man out there who probably has sperm more super than you do" she joked and laughing all the harder for the way that he glared at her, Sharon always in trouble for bringing his so called 'Super' sperm into disrepute.
"My super sperm are not to be mocked" he told her grumpily.
"Okay" she laughed in reply.
"I'm being deadly serious here Raydor. You're taking a terrible risk every time you take advantage of me without protection."
Sharon grinned, already having the perfect response. "Well there's an easy way to solve that" she replied extremely casually as her eyes sparkled at him, the mischief on her face evident.
"I hope you're talking about birth control" he replied instantly as his voice took on a very high register again as if he had just taken a kneecap to his crotch.
"Of course not" she assured him. "Surely no birth control can suppress your potency, even using more than one method at a time" she suggested, her laughter following immediately afterwards as she pressed her face into his chest, her body shaking like a paint mixer.
For a brief moment Andy had to bite on the inside of his cheek so that he didn't laugh with her, trying his hardest to seem annoyed and offended by the jibe. "Are you mocking me?" he asked finally when her laughter had reduced to something more like an amused titter.
"Not at all," Sharon insisted, an amused lilt still in her voice, "just stating that if it's such a risk then at our stage of life our only recourse is complete abstinence." She let that thought linger in the air for a moment as she tried not to laugh at his rather horrified face. "I'm not going to lie to you and say that I won't miss not just the sex and that release but also having that connection with you but if needs must, cold showers and lots of hand holding it is" she stated like the deal was done and his crotch was never going anywhere near her ever again. She smiled up at him, having realised many months earlier that the only way to stop him from bring up how potent he thought he was (especially since he had zero evidence to back it up) was to threaten him with never having sex again, at least not with her.
"Yeah right" Andy laughed as a smug smile of his own settled on his features. "There's not enough money in the world to pay you to leave me alone Raydor."
Sharon shrugged. "Whatever makes you sleep better at night boy."
Fairly confident that she was only joking (although he certainly wasn't going to push her on it and therefore that meant the subject wouldn't be raised again for a couple of months at least) Andy laughed again, his mind drifting slightly to an alternative universe he knew would make her smile. "Can you imagine the look on Rusty's face if he was told he was getting another baby sibling?" he said with Sharon instantly laughing as much as he was about the idea.
"Well all you'll be able to do is imagine it because if by some freak of nature it were to happen, you'd be swiftly murdered and I'd be trying to poke pieces of your body down the garbage disposal" she warned him, long since passed the menopause meaning that if it were to happen Andy wouldn't live long enough to know about it.
"There is no doubt we'd have made one good looking kid though babe had this started thirty years ago" he commented and not for the first time making it clear that he wished they'd have found each other a hell of a lot earlier than they did, not that Sharon felt any differently but rather preferred to focus on their future rather than the past they didn't have as a couple.
"Admittedly but if it was born with a head as big as yours," she said as she pinched his chin with a little smirk, "I'd have been unable to sit again until we were waving them off to college so you still wouldn't be having sex, well with me at any rate, for a very long time."
Andy laughed for a second before he pressed his forehead to hers, his eyes closing as they just shared the same air for a moment. "And who would I be having it with instead?"
"I wouldn't want to speculate" she replied with a little shrug.
"Only you sweetheart" she said softly before he covered her lips with his. "Only you" he said again with another kiss thrown in just to confirm it.
She smiled up at him as his forehead rested on the top of her head again, his eyes slipping closed for a moment. She pushed her lips to his chest and let out a contented sigh, her own eyes closing for a moment as she just lay in his arms, feeling as comfortable and as at peace with her little corner of the word as she had done for days. Although she didn't really need them she still appreciated Andy's little declarations of fidelity when he frequently offered them to her, him repeating them because he wanted to make sure that she knew she could trust him. He didn't need to, she knew she could, knew everything he said to be true and that he really did only have eyes for her, that she could and did trust him implicitly when it came to his fidelity (it more of a moot point these days because of his age but at the same time it was hard to teach old dogs new tricks and he certainly had a history of cheating since his divorce was finalised), relaxing about it in a way which surprised a lot of people who had seen him in action, people who didn't know him like she did.
Suddenly Andy's head snapped up as he started to laugh. "Oh my God" he managed to get out as he continued to laugh, his laughter causing Sharon's even though she had no idea what they were actually laughing about. "Can you imagine what would have happened if Andrea had got pregnant from one of their trysts?"
"Trysts?"
"Oh yeah, this is definitely a 'tryst' type of scenario here" he confirmed, with two friends (one of them gay) sleeping together not falling under the heading of an 'affair' so it had to be a tryst. "Although to be fair it would probably be the other way around and she'd implant eggs in him that would burst..." Before he could finish his thought he received an inevitable slap across the side of his head. "Ow!" he cried as he rubbed it. "What was that for?"
"You know what that was for."
"That hurt."
"Well you deserve it. Stop making fun of my friends!" she told him with another firm tug on his chest hair.
"Oh because you never make fun of my friends" he laughed. She wanted to deny it but he did have a point, Sharon reluctantly acknowledging that she did make just as much fun of Provenza and their relationship, frequently calling him his 'boyfriend' when she could get away with it outside of work. "The love child of Andrea Hobbs and Gavin Baker" Andy pondered once again. "Jeez! That would be a kid in a hell of a lot of therapy. But incredibly well dressed too."
"Please don't say anything to them about it, especially Andrea" she pleaded. What followed was inevitable, Andy smiling at her in such a way that she regretted saying anything to him about it at all. "Andy, I mean it, don't."
"Of course I won't. I treasure my balls too much to say anything to them. They may attack."
"Exactly. Think of the health of your nether regions if you won't do it for me. Think about their continued protection" she advised him, fully prepared to give them a quick kick of her own if he dared even hint that he knew the truth to either of them.
Andy grinned as he nodded, another thought hitting him. "Did you know..."
"Oh God!" Sharon laughed, wondering what random piece of nonsense was going to fall from his lips next.
"Did you know that hippos can retract their testicles to a foot inside their bodies to protect them from rivals?" he stated as if he'd told her nothing more unusual than 'the sky is blue.' Once again Sharon laughed, her face pressed into his neck. "What?"
"And you tried to do the same thing to protect you from Gavin and Andrea I take it?" she asked as she looked for the common thread in their current conversation.
"No" he said as innocently as he could which meant that she missed the sly look he was giving her from the corner of his eye, knowing full well that he was setting himself up to be attacked again but simply couldn't help himself. "They used to do that of their own accord some five years ago plus whenever I heard your voice coming towards…" He didn't get any further before Sharon viscously pinched the back of his knee in retaliation, not caring in the slightest that he was joking. "Ow!"
"Well once again let me say, you deserve it" she told him, Andy laughing in reply as he kissed the top of her head. "Andy why exactly do you know so many random facts about the genitalia of various animals?" she asked finally, that a sentence she never expected to utter but then again she never expected to be lying in bed with Andy Flynn while he told her about bees exploding after sex, her life changing for so much the better by offering to go to Nicole's wedding with him.
Andy shrugged in reply. "I don't know. I just find it interesting."
Sharon laughed, that a response she expected from the often goofy love of her life. However her laughter didn't last long as her face slowly contorted into a grimace and her mind went back to the secret she had foolishly shared with him about Andrea and Gavin. "Please don't tell them you know" she pleaded once again, pushing her lips to his chin.
"I won't, I won't. I promise" he assured her but with the wicked smile on his face telling a completely different story, a smile she knew all too well, a smile that meant he was not to be trusted.
"Andy!" she said as a warning, not needing anything else to put her point across.
"What? Why would it really matter if I did anyway?" he asked. Sharon went to reply, went to tell him that of course it would matter because she had been sworn to secrecy but before she could he spoke again and diverted her focus. "Like you haven't told them overly personal stuff about me in the last twelve months."
"Like what?"
"I don't know. I dread to think what the three of you talk about late at night around a bottle of wine or five" he told her and sounding far more grumpy about it than he actually was.
"What? That has never happened" Sharon protested.
"Oh yes it has."
"Name one time."
"Okay if you want specifics, how about the day after your birthday this year. I went over to Provenza's for a couple of hours so that the three of you could have your little birthday get together without me intruding on your nail painting and your drinking games," he joked and was met with inevitable laughter once again, "and when I came home you were all sitting round the table, drunker than I'd ever seen any of you and cackling like those three witches in Shakespeare's whatever it was."
"We weren't talking about you" Sharon insisted as she laughed.
"Then why did the room suddenly fall silent the moment I walked in? Huh? Answer me that" he said as he cupped his free hand to his ear so that he didn't miss a word. Looking just like a goldfish Sharon's mouth opened and closed repeated as she struggled to come up with a reason as to why they stopped talking the moment he walked through the front door since they had indeed been talking about him and his particular skill set with his hands after the wine had for once loosened her lips. "Come on! I'm all ears."
"Well they're my friends" she said to justify her behaviour. "It's only natural that I talk about what's going on in my life with them, and what's going on in my life is you."
"Right and so it's only natural that you'd tell your boyfriend about what's going on in your friend's lives too."
"Yeah I don't think they'd see it like that."
"So what have you told them about me?" he asked, suddenly sounding concerned.
"Oh you know, just this and that" Sharon replied with a shrug and deliberately teasing him.
"No I don't know. That's why I'm asking and I'm currently so utterly terrified."
Sharon laughed again as her hand started moving up and down his chest once more, hoping that the sensation would distract him or at least placate him. "You've got nothing to worry about I promise. I've only ever told them good things and they're both suitable impressed with what they've learned."
"Oh yeah? Such as?"
"Such as after I've had two or three large glasses of wine I may have let slip just how good you are at certain things" she told him in a sultry whisper while her lips pressing to his neck punctuated every word and her hand slipped into the waistband of his boxers to tease him a little.
Refusing to be distracted by such blatant manipulation tactics and not wanting her to think he could be so easy bribed with sex (even though he could and frequently had been), he frowned at her like he was actually rather annoyed and gave her pause for thought. Her worry, as it turned out, was short lived, the twinkle in his eyes letting her know that he didn't really care all that much as long as she only told them good things. "You'd better be talking about my cooking skills" he grumbled.
"What does it matter if I'm not? Does it not enhance your reputation?
"They're spreading it around?!"
Sharon shrugged far too casually for Andy's liking, almost flippant about the whole thing. "I've really no idea" she told him and sounding all innocence and light to the point where he actually started to worry. Andy's jaw immediately dropped open with a genuine sense of horror. Although he didn't want to encourage it he had no issues with Sharon telling Andrea and Gavin anything overly personal about him, seeing it as perfectly natural to talk to two of her closet friends about the man she was going to spend the rest of her life with but the idea that they could be spreading it around was truly horrifying. "Oh Andy!" she laughed before she planted a kiss to his worried face. "How well do you know me? Do you really think it's likely that I've been discussing our sex life with people? Even with people I love? Really?"
It was a lie but she sold it well enough to fool him or at least to stop him from fretting about it. Sharon hadn't gone into great detail despite the ever constant demands for information coming her way from Andrea and Gavin because that just wasn't her, it wasn't her style, Sharon always a very private person. That didn't mean to say that the odd story didn't escape her lips, it was only natural and since they started dating she was so obscenely happy she wanted to talk to her friends about her life. It took nearly a bottle of red wine to loosen her lips but when it did she told Andrea and Gavin all about the events of that first night with him. They both knew that something had gone on, Andrea seeing Andy's black eye the next morning and had tried to get some details from her in her office but to no avail and that was without the added spring in her step and the ever present smile on her face giving the game away completely. When they finally got something out of her (sitting across from her at the dining table like they were in an Interview Room at PAB, ensuring her glass never got too empty) they were not disappointed. She bragged a little, well she bragged as much as Sharon Raydor was capable of bragging about the more intimate parts of her life, because not only was Andy Flynn ridiculously good in that department and they were at it like rabbits in those weeks around Christmas but also because it had gone so unbelievably well for a first time with someone new. However the real reason that she told them that their relationship had progressed was because she had come to realise that Andy was indeed the love of her life and he'd written her a letter saying he felt the exact same way about her which meant she was the happiest she had ever been in her life. She had found who she was going to spend the rest of her life with and she just wanted to tell someone about it even though Andrea and Gavin weren't all that interested in that part despite being pleased for her, only interested in sex stories and none were really that forthcoming no matter how much they begged her for all the gory details.
"That's true," Andy acknowledged, "you can barely talk about it with me." Once again she took a quick swipe at the back of his head, disagreeing with the insinuation. "What are you smacking me for this time? It's true!"
"No it isn't."
"Oh yes it is! I'm not talking about some of the filth you come out with in the middle of things when your eyes darken and words tumble from your lips that would make even the crudest of sailors blush" he clarified, the love of his life most certainly not backward in coming forward when it came to sex, knowing what she wanted and getting it too. As if one cue Sharon laughed instantly as she hid her face into his chest from the embarrassment since she knew it all to be true. "Or when Darth Raydor suddenly puts in a rather dramatic but certainly very welcome appearance in the bedroom and she basically orders me to go 'Harder!' or 'Faster' or 'A little to the right!' in a tone which means I'd be foolish to ignore her even though, I'll be honest, it kind of feels like I'm in the midst of a threesome as a result" he joked. "Thankfully I'm more than used to taking orders from her at work" he went on as he kissed the top of her head. "I'm talking about in a quiet moment when nothing is going on and we're just relaxing and you tell me 'You know I really liked it last night when...' before your words trail off and you start making high pitch squeaking noises that only dogs can hear as you hide your face in my shirtfront and your cheeks turn bright red" he pointed out with great humour. Once again Sharon had no answer other than to laugh as her cheeks blushed and thus proved his point, everything he'd said one hundred percent accurate even though she was embarrassed to admit it. "That's what I'm talking about. I always know I've done something right although I've absolutely no idea what it is."
"I'm not that bad" Sharon insisted.
"Oh yes you are and you know it" he grinned as his free hand moved to her leg that was comfortably thrown over his, his fingers dancing up and down her thigh. "Case in point, that first night we spent together, you woke me up early the next morning by repeatedly poking me in the face because there was something you, and I quote, 'badly needed' me awake for," he reminded her, the memories of that encounter causing her to blush again as she laughed, "and yet a few hours later we were in the kitchen getting ready to leave for work and you said to me something along the lines of 'Now I know what talents you have' without being able to elaborate any further before you hid your face in my chest again and then fled to the bedroom to get your cell phone to call Provenza and lie to him about why we were going to be late. Remember?"
Sharon shyly sucked her bottom lip into her mouth, a move that let Andy know that she was a little embarrassed while at the same time usually making all the blood in his body quickly rush south of the border. "Vaguely" she finally replied with a little shrug.
"Vaguely?" he laughed, the look on her face telling him all he needed to know. "Yeah right. So you admit I'm right about this?"
"No I don't, not at all" Sharon insisted and not just because she hated it when he proved her wrong (mainly because on the rare occasions when it did happen he usually wouldn't stop gloating about it for several weeks). "Look it's not that I'm...it's just...I don't know" she said with a sigh. "I guess away from the heat of the moment I just get a little..."
"Embarrassed?"
"I was going to say tongue tied because that sounds less ridiculous than admitting I actually feel embarrassed by mere words in the aftermath…when I've just…you know" she said and once again being unable to finish the sentence and proving his point further.
"Screamed your orgasm loud enough that Mrs Rose has called a condo board meeting to complain about you?" he suggested playfully and finishing her sentence for her with a rather smug smile, always rather pleased with himself when Rusty was out and he managed to get her to truly cry out her release. It annoyed her when Andy was right and she simply couldn't deny it but she still opted to give him a quick swipe around the side of his head. She practically buried her face into his chest again as he laughed and kissed her hairline. "I don't think it's ridiculous at all" he told her very softly. When that failed to get a reaction from her he moved his hand to her chin and forced her to look him in the eye. "Okay look, I know you're not a prude babe, not by any stretch of the imagination" he assured her just in case she was at all worried about how he saw her given that he knew Jack had used her shyness as a weapon to justify his behaviour at times. "And when it comes to sex I don't think I've ever communicated better with someone in my life," he stated and genuinely meaning it, "so I think the way you get a little embarrassed with me in the aftermath is one of the most wonderful things about you and what makes you the person you are, the person I love and I most certainly wouldn't have you any other way."
He smiled at her with another little shrug, more than satisfied with the state of their sex life as it was, even more so because of the way that Sharon could become embarrassed with him in the aftermath. Sharon moved off his shoulder and propped herself up on her elbow, tracing his lips with her index finger for a moment before she practically devoured them, her tongue running across his teeth in a way that made him moan into his mouth and his hand moved to bury into her hair. When the need for air forced them apart he just smiled up at her, not having any complaints with his life with her and had no qualms about telling her as such as often as he could. Sharon lay down again, virtually lying on top of him with her chin resting on his chest. A companionable silence settled again as his hand continued to run through her hair and she just stared lovingly at him.
"Jack thought I was a prude" she said with another sigh after a few moments of silence, secretly worrying that Andy thought the same thing especially since she had forced him to wait so long before they moved their relationship forward.
Sharon hadn't honestly believed it at the time because she knew Jack well enough to realise that he was using it just as a way to hurt her, twisting the knife in her heart and to justify the way that he would repeatedly cheat on her with anyone who had a pulse. Despite knowing that and shrugging it off it still had an effect on her, the more that he said it, the more she slowly started to believe it. Part of the blame for the way she was, private and reserved when it came to discussing her sex life was because of her upbringing. She came from a very traditional Catholic family with a Grandmother who thought a penis was how the devil got inside you. Sharon (and her Mother) grew up being repeatedly told that sex was something a woman had to endure for the sake of your husband and if you wanted children but they most certainly were not going to enjoy it, making it a minor miracle that Sharon had ever been conceived with those words ringing in her Mother's ears from a very early age. For a long time Sharon believed her too, contemplating becoming a Nun as a very young girl when her friends wanted to grow up to be princesses or unicorn breeders. Omar Sharif in Funny Girl first made her think that perhaps her Grandmother was wrong, then she went off to college and after her first orgasm she began to feel very sorry for her Grandfather. With that in mind and with her spending so many years as a child being told that 'sex is between you and the person doing it to you' (assuming that her Grandmother would lie perfectly still and silently pray until it was all over) that it was hardly all that surprising that as an adult it was something that she simply didn't talk about openly. In the early days with Jack she was more open but as their marriage fell apart that all came to end, not wanting to talk to him at all let alone about sex. After that she still kept everything to herself, not wanting anyone to know that she'd invited Jack back into her bed as she already knew how stupid she was without having the likes of Gavin and Andrea say it too. Likewise any dalliances between Jack and Andy weren't up for discussion, uncomfortable admitting that she had broken her marriage vows even though she had been abandoned by her husband, plus who in their right mind would honestly want to brag about sharing a bed with a man who neighed like a horse as he climaxed? (Though Sharon did eventually end up telling Gavin about it after half a bottle of wine since he had set them up to begin with and couldn't understand why she didn't want to see him anymore, lying to him when he said 'Please tell me you at least got a semi decent orgasm out of it,' the headboard barely moving let alone the earth) It was just something she had never openly spoken about to anyone and just like how living with someone other than he children again was going to be an adjustment to her, that was too but luckily for her the love of her life had turned out to be the most loving and patient man she had ever met in her entire life.
"Well Jack was and still is a gigantic asshole" he stated which earnt him a small chuckle and a gentle but lingering kiss to his lips. "The woman I know is definitely not a prude," he said as his hand continued to run through her hair lovingly, "not in any way shape or form. She just on occasions struggles to pay a compliment or to request something specific she might like...and I'm not talking about orgasms here by the way. She has no problem demanding those and writing them into the conditions for allowing her boy toy to move in with her." Sharon laughed again, her face momentarily being hidden in his chest out of sheer embarrassment since once again it was all true, she knew what she wanted and she got it, even if she had a rather shy and quiet way of asking for it. "But when it comes to requesting something specific she might like later at nine thirty in the morning in her kitchen, naturally she gets a little tongue tied" he said and not seeing it as a big deal in the slightest since they still managed to communicate extremely well with each other on the subject, if anything finding it all the more charming and only made him love her more.
"How do you know me so well?" she asked. It felt like a cliché, like something you'd hear in an awful Hallmark movie during the holidays when a department store Santa would finally realise that his best friend, a perky blonde who woke up every morning with perfect hair and makeup and cooked elaborate breakfasts that people would leave as they rushed to work, was the person he was meant to be with but it was true. Sometimes it really did feel like Andy knew her better than she knew herself, loving all of her little quirks because they made her the person he fell in love with.
"Because I'm lucky enough to have your trust," he said before she covered his mouth with hers and then he added, "and your heart."
"I think I'm definitely the lucky one" she insisted, kissing his chest and taking a big deep breath of him. "Which is why I may, and I don't want to by the way," she said with her hand across her heart like she had been water boarded, "but I think I may have to…show Gavin and Andrea that calendar." She grimaced as she expected Andy to complain quite loudly about it but instead he just rolled his eyes, already resigned to the fact that they were going to see it and he had no choice in the matter. "So that I can brag about how beautiful my boy is" she added, meeting his lips as her hand snaked back under his t-shirt again, her nails scraping down his chest and making him grunt a little.
"Was" Andy said when they broke apart, seeing himself as anything but beautiful when he looked in the mirror.
"Was and still is" she stated categorically, kissing him again as if to prove her point. Yes she wore a pair of rose tinted glasses when she looked at him just like the rest of the world did when they looked at their own partners but that didn't make it any less true. Both of them were far from being in the prime of their lives physically but those sort of insecurities all melted away when they saw themselves through the eyes of the other. Sharon was truly terrified the first time she was naked in front of him, the main reason why she elected to just strip and get it over and done with because not only was she in her sixties but Andy was used to dating women less than half her age. However the way that Andy looked at her, the way he worshipped her in mind, body and soul with every fibre of his being made her feel like she was in her twenties again. Andy was the exact same way, getting a little ego boost every time she called him her 'beautiful boy' or variations on that which made him feel like a kid again…while still sucking in his stomach though admittedly. More than once he had sung to her You Make Me Feel So Young as they danced in the living room while Rusty was out for the evening, the lyrics 'You make me feel so young, you make me feel there are songs to be sung, bells to be rung and a wonderful spring to be sprung and even when I'm old and grey I'm gonna feel the way I do, today 'cause you make me feel so young' being as close to the mark as they could possibly get making it seem like they had been written just for him to sing to her in that moment.
"So I can show them?" she asked him with it not sounding like a question, but rather a statement of intent and he was going to have very little choice in the matter. "Okay?"
"You're saying that like I have a choice. Do I?"
"Not really no" she answered honestly, laughing at his extremely unimpressed frown before she kissed his lips a couple of times as if that would make up for it and reluctantly get his permission. She had spent decades listening to stories from Gavin about his latest conquest and seeing photos of the man in question on his phone, usually dressed in next to nothing with muscles quivering and flexing, so she was naturally looking forward to casually letting it slip into general conversation that her Andy, her beautiful boy was once a former LAPD pin up before showing him the evidence and watching his eyes pop out of his head. If Andy was being honest with himself, although he didn't particularly like it he didn't expect anything less once Sharon had seen that calendar but that didn't mean he was going to encourage it.
Slightly concerned that by showing Andrea and Gavin that photo and them having plenty to say about it to him it would sadly lead Andy to accidentally on purpose revealing that he knew about their experimental romps, she sought once again to get him to swear not to tell anyone about it. "Andy please don't say anything to them about sleeping together. Gavin won't care one way or another but Andrea will" she told him, Andrea mortified about the whole experience because it was so awkward after that first time and yet it didn't stop her from doing it again. Andy just scoffed at her, teasing her as much as he dared with no real intention of mentioning to anyone (even though Provenza would be very interested) simply because he would never betray Sharon's trust like that. "She has feelings you know."
Andy scoffed again as he tried his hardest not to laugh. "If a snake bites Andrea Hobbs, the snake dies" he replied quickly.
The result was immediate and not entirely unexpected, Sharon pinching the backs of his knees and making him squirm beneath her. "Stop making fun of my friends!"
"Why? You make fun of mine" he said again.
"No I don't!"
"Actually I guess that's true." He rolled his eyes as he thought about it for a moment, the way that Provenza seemed to charm his way into the hearts of most people. "Whether it's you or Chief Johnson, everyone has a soft spot for Provenza no matter what the guy does, like he exudes this irresistible charm that makes everyone love him and usually marry him meanwhile it's muggings here," he said as he jabbed himself in the chest, "who takes all the shit."
Sharon laughed at him. "Oh my poor Andy Pandy" she cooed as she stroked his cheek and then pushed her lips against his. "Always in the dog house with everyone and it's never ever his fault."
"It's not! It's always Pro..."
"Oh please my darling, let's not have this debate again" she said before his protest turned into a full blown rant about how he was always the innocent party and yet Provenza found a way for him to take all the blame. "You're both as bad as each other, end of discussion."
Andy didn't respond other than to grunt as Sharon dropped down next to him again, her head on his shoulder and her leg slung over his while her fingernails continued to rake up and down his chest very slowly. "I still can't believe she didn't eat him afterwards" Andy said of Andrea after a few more moments of silence, unable to stop thinking about it. "I would have put money on her swallowing him whole and maybe picking her teeth with one of his bones" he suggested. "A finger maybe before turning his other hand into a back scratcher or his skull into an ashtray."
Sharon was desperate to laugh at him but managed to hold off, not wanting to encourage him as she took a deep breath to compose herself. "I'm sure many people said the exact same thing about me and you" she speculated and expected some smart remark to fall from Andy's mouth shortly. It was only when Andy surprisingly remained silent that she looked up at him, a frown occupying his features and unsure as to why she would think that anyone would say something like that about her, about the woman he'd got to know better than anyone else over the previous five years that he'd been directly under her command.
"Why would they?"
"Andy this can't come as a surprise to you surely" she said as she settled back down again. "You don't need to pretend, I heard all the rumours when Jack moved to Vegas, about how I'd ripped off his balls before I swallowed him whole."
"I wish you had."
Sharon chuckled at him before admitting "Not as much as I do" and making him laugh with her. "But I'm pretty sure lots of people were very surprised to see you walking around and seemingly unharmed after we first slept together."
"Are you forgetting about my black eye, ringing ear and incredibly bruised balls?"
"No but I wish you would."
Andy laughed, him forever teasing her about the way she beat him during their first night together and not likely to stop anytime soon either. "But more to the point babe how would anyone know that was the first time we slept together?" he asked.
Sharon shrugged nonchalantly. "Word of mouth maybe" she suggested. Andy remained silent in response which once again caused her to look up at him. He stared back at her absolutely baffled with no idea how people would know what had happened that night with the obvious exception of Rusty but he wasn't likely to open his mouth about Andy staying the night for the first time to anyone other than Emily and Ricky. He would only have told them to share his horror about finding Andy in the kitchen in the dead of night in his underwear too so it wasn't like many people knew. Sharon looked back at him equally baffled but this time by his surprise at her assumption. "Andy are you seriously telling me that you didn't fill Lieutenant Provenza in on what happened that night?" she asked.
Andy shook his head simply. "No."
Sharon sat up a little again to look him in the eye. "Seriously? No water cooler bragging about it?" she asked, always assuming that he told Provenza about it as soon as the opportunity presented itself.
Andy shrugged again. "No. Not with you." Sharon looked at him frankly stunned by what she was hearing. She knew he wasn't going to shout it from the rooftops because firstly he loved her and he obviously respected her and therefore he knew she was such a private person and almost shy when it came to her personal life and her relationship with him, not seeing it as anyone else's business but their own. But moreover he just wasn't that kind of guy anymore. Ten years ago maybe he might have run his mouth off when he had sex with anyone who would let him and Provenza pretty much did likewise but not the man she had invited into her bed that night, the man she loved (Provenza turning the same way when he met Patrice to the extent that Andy didn't even know they were dating until she walked into the Murder Room with her suitcase). However not telling his best friend about what had happened that evening and how their relationship had finally progressed was nonetheless very surprising to her.
"I'm not saying he wasn't able to work it out for himself, he is a Detective you know" he told her and making her laugh. "I guess he probably knew that we hadn't slept together before my little accident because he, like everyone else in the God damn world or so it seemed, had managed to work it out from me sleeping in Rusty's room rather than in your room before and after my surgery" he said with a little exasperated sigh and a roll of his eyes. He was still annoyed about it nine months later. Knowing Sharon like he did he had tried so hard and to his credit succeeded to be as discreet as possible during those first few months, from the outside it being hard to tell that they were dating at all but one little accident at work and his resulting sleeping arrangements while he recovered inadvertently let the world and his wife work out that nearly five months into their relationship they still hadn't slept together. "So when we showed up at work together the next day, you know late and I had a black eye..."
"And we were forced to tell the truth to Chief Taylor to save our careers."
"Exactly" he laughed. "So after that I'm pretty sure he managed to work it out without me having to say anything about it to him."
Sharon's smile beamed brightly as she listened to him. As awkward as it would be as his Commanding Officer, Sharon had still expected Andy to tell his friend what had happened as soon as he could so she was utterly stunned to realise that he really hadn't, that Andy was the gentleman she thought he was. "You really didn't say anything to him at all?" she asked.
"No" he smiled back at her. "Well not really" he then admitted with a little shrug and was immediately greeted with a roll of her eyes, it all being too good to be true that Andy would keep their private life completely private. "It's nothing bad I promise" he told her when he realised she was taking it the wrong way and he needed to clarify matters. "I guess before everyone rolled out that morning he took me to one side as he was putting on his jacket and he quietly said something along the lines of 'I take it the circumstances which led to that black eye have something to do with that letter you gave me to hang on to?'" he explained.
"And what do you say?"
"I didn't say anything to him," he said with another nonchalant shrug of his shoulders like he saw his discretion as no big deal at all, "I just dropped a nickel in his jar to pay for something I'd printed." Once again Sharon's smile slowly grew from ear to ear, it meaning so much to her that he hadn't told his friend all about it and, more specifically, her the moment she fell into a blissful sleep. "Then he asked me if you felt the same way about me."
"Really?"
He nodded as he smiled back at her, Provenza more of a sentimental old romantic than he appeared on the outside. "Even though he's told me since that he already knew how you felt before then which is why he held your hand the entire time I was in surgery."
"I guessed as much myself" she confirmed, smiling brightly once again. At the time Sharon knew that Provenza had held her hand that afternoon for his sake as much as for hers with him just as worried about Andy but that didn't make the gesture any less significant to her, appreciating it more than he would ever really know. In that situation it didn't take a genius to work out that Sharon was already in love with him from the way her eyes lingered on him as she battled to not tear up while he was wheeled away and around the corner into surgery, her colleagues and friends gathered around and seeing for themselves that despite hardly being able to tell they were together from the way they handled themselves at work, it had gone beyond just dating, they were going to spend the rest of their lives together. The only exception was Provenza himself who had (unfortunately in his opinion and he had spent an awful lot of time vocalising his displeasure) been forced into having a ringside seat for the whole saga since he asked the question 'So how was the wedding?' and was frankly shocked when he heard 'It was wonderful! Sharon and I had a great time.' After initially worrying about Andy ending up with a broken heart since their relationship only lived inside his head for longer than they'd been together, he could see Sharon was in love with him before that first date at Serve.
"And what did you say to that?" she asked.
"I put another nickel in his jar" he confirmed, Sharon laughing at him again before she very gently deposited a kiss to the side of his mouth. "He got all he needed to know from that."
"He didn't ask you anything else?"
"Not a word and he hasn't asked me about anything since then either" he confirmed, not that he would have told him much anyway, both of them becoming extremely tight lipped when they started dating the love of their lives. "He just smiled at me and shook my hand and that was that. So if everyone knew what happened that night it didn't come from me babe, I didn't say anything."
"Not verbally sure, but I'm pretty sure you were still the one to give the game away" she told him without elaborating further until he looked at her with a puzzled expression on his face, not at all sure what she was referring to. "People probably worked it out from that overly ridiculous goofy smile on your face" she told him with a gentle slap to his cheek. She laughed at the memory for a moment and the way she had to avoid looking at him at work in the days that followed them crossing that boundary together because of the ridiculously happy and frankly smug smile on his face kept bringing a flush to her own cheeks, unable to stop thinking about the reason why he was so happy.
"Why would they?" he questioned with a frown still occupying his features. "It's not that unusual for me to smile at work is it?"
"No of course not," she confirmed, "but that sort of ridiculously goofy smile sure was and that was without the little added spring in your step for the next month." She pinched his knee as he laughed and nodded. She didn't blame him in the slightest for showing just how unbelievably happy he was at the time, actually rather pleased about it because not only was she the cause but she also felt the exact same way, nevertheless it did somewhat give the game away that their relationship had progressed. "Oh and let's not forget that you looked so happy it was like you'd been snorting something illegal."
Andy laughed, that fact indisputable. "Yeah well, sorry Raydor but I simply couldn't help myself, I was obscenely happy."
"I did notice" she replied, her smile once again spreading from ear to ear.
"Well in my defence it was the greatest night of my entire life" he told her and not for the first time, his voice nothing more than a low rumble that instantly had her cheeks turning a lovely shade of red. Their lips came together as she melted into him once again before he added "And for the record it was most definitely worth the wait" and kissed her again. "But do you know what the best part was?" Sharon shook her head as her eyes remained locked on his, the evening in question having an awful lot of highlights not least Andy giving her the letter he wrote from his hospital bed and then finally telling her 'I love you' for the first time so it was hard to narrow it down to just one moment that outshone the rest. "The fact that it wasn't at all like I'd imagined it."
Sharon's smile grew again. "Oh really? Is that a fact?"
"Oh yes. It was so much better than I ever dared dream" he told her, his voice nothing more than a growl. Sharon's response was instant, kissing him long and languid on the lips, his big hands going into her hair and ensuring she didn't run away from him until they were both more than a little breathless. When they finally broke apart she buried her face into his neck again as he held her tightly, her lips pressing to the small mark that was the only evidence of his surgery. Eventually the silence was broken with laughter after Andy stated "And believe me I'd imaged it a lot," the humour in his voice making it sound like he'd thought of little else from dawn until dusk for several years. "I'm talking since Nicole's wedding type a lot." Sharon laughed again as she sought his lips, herself not willing to confess that like Andy, she had climbed into bed the night of the wedding and gone to sleep thinking about how good he smelt and how good it felt to have his arms wrapped around her as they slowly danced together, unable to stop herself from wondering if he was as good at 'horizontal dancing' as he was vertically on the dancefloor. "But anyway," he said with a little contented sigh as he turned his attention back to where the conversation began before they got side tracked once again, "I had nothing to fear that first time. I knew there was zero chance you'd kill me because, as I have already proven to the world and quite recently in fact, I'm immune from such things...unless I'm thrown from a moving car."
Sharon laughed, Andy's claim that he was impervious to illness and injury somewhat having the dampers put on it due to the vast amount of time he'd spent in a hospital bed over the previous twelve months. "Oh really? Then why did an eighty six year old lady, no bigger than Mark tackle you to the ground and hurt your shoulder a couple of weeks ago?" she asked with a smug little smile, her point well-made and not expecting a rebuttal.
Andy shrugged as Sharon laughed at him. "It was a fluke" he insisted. "She caught me off guard and I lost my balance." He shrugged again rather dismissively but that only caused the rather sickly pain he'd been experiencing in his shoulder to come back again and making him battle not to grimace, a sickly pain that he had been downplaying to Sharon to ensure that she didn't stress about him and insist that he had a couple of sessions with a chiropractor.
"If you say so" she replied.
"I do say so but that's not the point. The point is there is no denying that on Valentine's Day you kissed me on the lips, with tongue may I add, a kiss which lets be fair tasted an awful lot like vomit," he said casually before his knees were inevitably attacked, "and I didn't catch it, therefore I'm impervious to these things."
Sharon looked at him far from amused, not just because he still found the sight of her with her head in the toilet bowl so highly amusing but that, regardless of what he said, he was such a huge hypochondriac most of the time, imaging he had everything from a ingrowing toenail to being on the verge of a stroke while he recovered from his surgery before Patrice had chance to set him straight. "I'll be sure to remind you of that the next time you're hiding from Rusty when he has a head cold" she said dryly, Andy virtually walking around the condo with his handkerchief permanently pressed over his nose and mouth the last time.
Knowing better than to protest any further about it, Andy pressed his lips to the top of her head as she again settled on his shoulder with her face into the crook of his neck and a very comfortable silence descended. "It was so be worth it though" he said finally, his comment coming completely out of the blue.
"Are you talking about your...your unmentionables exploding again?"
Andy laughed with Sharon once again proving his point that she got a little embarrassed using particular words and phrases of a sexual nature, even around him, for example even unable to say the word 'penis' to him at the same moment as she had his own in her hand. "'Unmentionables'? Are you getting tongue tied again?" he laughed as Sharon just shook her head and rolled her eyes at him. "I meant if you had tried to swallow me whole the first time we slept together" he told her with a wink, his knees once again coming under attack as he laughed. Andy dropped his hand to her chin and lifted her head to make her look at him. "Just to have that one time with you," he said softly before he gently brushed her lips with his, "it would have been oh so worth it."
She laughed against his lips before she said "If you're waiting for me to say 'thank you' for that...attempted compliment you're going to be waiting a very long time."
He laughed again, pressing his lips to her forehead as her hand went back under his t-shirt. "Did you know..." he said again, his lips against her forehead as she laughed. It was in that moment that Sharon was reminded of the evening they had Christmas drinks with Provenza and Patrice and a very nervous Andy, in an attempt to stop himself from putting his foot in his mouth (and yet he still ended up doing it anyway before the evening was over), regurgitated dozens of random facts like it being illegal to kill a hedgehog with a machine gun in the UK instead. "Did you know that the male scorpion fly uses its penis to swat away spiders?" he asked as if it was common knowledge and featured on the SATs. A second later and Sharon had burst into laughter, her hands over her face as she rolled onto her back in an attempt to not wake Rusty. "What? What are you laughing about now? This is scientific fact" he cried again like he was truly offended by her laughter when in reality the sound of her laughter was still music to his ears.
Sharon continued to laugh as she battled to speak, her words coming out a little breathless as a result. "Where are you getting these from?" she asked, the words barely discernible due to her laughter. "'The Big Book of Penises'?" she giggled. No sooner were the words out of her mouth then Andy's jaw dropped open with shock, probably looking more surprised than if he'd walked into the Break Room and found Provenza trying on a dress. "What?" she asked him once she had managed to get her laughter under control.
"Nothing I just don't think I've ever heard you use that word before Captain Tongue Tied" he teased, being able to count on one hand the amount of times he had heard her curse or use any sort of crass or sexual language away from a work environment in the twenty plus years he'd known her especially since he had just laughed at her use of the expression 'unmentionables' instead of anything else.
Sharon laughed. "Which word? Book?" she asked, deliberately playing dumb.
"No" Andy said before he raised his head and looked around as if he was making sure they were completely alone before he mouthed "Penis" at her with great exaggeration. Yet again Sharon couldn't help but laugh at him, hiding her face into his chest to stifle the noise as she fisted his t-shirt. "You're making me blush" he added when she started to calm down, giving his face a quick fan with his hand. "I'm usually completely naked and lying flat on my back before that kind of filth comes out of your mouth" he again teased as his lips barely left her forehead.
"Oh shut up" Sharon laughed. "Don't you know any non penis related facts?" she asked when her composure had been fully restored.
"Sure I do. I know other things too."
"Oh yeah? Like what?"
"Like for example that sloth sex only lasts about two minutes." No sooner were the words out of his mouth then Sharon went to respond. Anticipating the joke about his stamina or lack thereof that was about to head his way he quickly put his hand across her mouth to silence her. "Don't even think about it babe" he told her as she laughed beneath his hand. "Unless you want me to start bringing a stopwatch to bed with me?" he added and not at all joking as he removed his hand and kissed her on the lips.
"I wasn't going to say anything" she insisted but clearly lying.
"Sure you weren't."
Sharon laughed again, still hiding his face in his chest while he just smiled. Sleep still didn't look like it was going to be on the cards for either of them that night but at the very least Sharon looked and sounded better by the second. "So what else have you got?" she asked after she caught her breath.
Andy thought for a moment, searching his brain for any fact that didn't include a penis but was still good enough to amuse her. "Did you know that a whale's vagina can be big enough to walk through?" he asked, barely finishing before she laughed hysterically again, her sides beginning to hurt. "Hey you asked for non penis facts and that's what I've given you" he stated and feeling very pleased with himself.
"I know Andy but honestly I was hoping for something that didn't involve the genitalia of various mammals" she laughed, that a sentence she never expected to say in her life.
"Then you needed to be more specific. I'm not a mind reader Raydor" he cried but with great humour in his voice so she knew he wasn't being serious. "Okay did you know that the first occupational disease ever recorded in medical literature was 'chimney sweep scrotum'?" Once more she laughed, tears beginning to form in her eyes and making it impossible for Andy not to join in with her. "What? It's true."
"And what was it exactly?"
"I don't know. I didn't read any further" he said with a slight grimace and shudder. "That much information was already enough to put me off my breakfast."
"Oh so this type of book is your idea of breakfast literature?"
"Hey I had to find something to entertain myself with in the mornings while I was still single" he said as if he had spent every single moment between his divorce and going to Serve with her just waiting for her to love him, doing whatever he could to pass the time. "It's all right for you, you had Rusty to keep you entertained during those years."
"I wouldn't call his frequent and lengthy complaints about being a witness and his security detail entertainment unlike your big book of penises."
"That wasn't the title" he laughed with a shake of his head.
"Then what was it?"
"I don't remember. 'A Hundred Facts To Keep Your Girl Laughing When She Can't Sleep' maybe" he told her with that sweet little smile she found so irresistible.
She kissed him softly on the lips before confirming "Then it was a real stroke of luck you read it when you did."
"Don't I know it" he winked, slowly returning the kiss. "Did you know that potato aphids will not have sex if they sense a drop in air pressure?" he asked casually once again like he was asking her nothing more unusual than 'Did you know that water is wet?' as she laughed again. "No mile high club for those guys" he noted with a mischievous waggle of his eyebrows. As Sharon continued to laugh, a thought occurred to him as a lascivious little grin put in a more than welcome appearance. "Have you ever...you know?" he asked once she was capable of responding without laughing.
"What? Joined the mile high club?"
"Yeah" he nodded as his fingers started to stroke back and forth on her hip. "Have you?"
"What do you think?"
Andy laughed and nodded, firmly of the opinion that it wasn't the sort of thing that she would ever have done in her life, not because she was unadventurous in that respect (she had after all been extremely easy to convince that sex in the back seat of his car was a good idea at their age for example) but because of how things had ended with Jack some twenty years earlier and not having a real relationship to speak of since then, or rather at least not one that included joint air travel to even have the opportunity. "It's not exactly the easiest thing in the world to do in those ridiculously tiny bathrooms" he said as if to indicate she hadn't missed much, having come very close to knocking himself out after one ill-advised encounter.
"It's not so bad in first class" Sharon replied on a sigh and so nonchalantly he could have missed it if he wasn't paying attention. As it so happened Andy was very much listening to every word she had to say, his mouth dropping open as he stared at her with shock and just a dash of arousal as he realised he was so very wrong about her. "What?" she asked him rather innocently.
"How do you know that?"
Sharon shrugged, again trying to look as casual as possible. "Maybe when we finally get away on that little vacation we've been talking about," she said as her hand came up to stroke his cheek, "I can show you." Andy didn't respond other than to grin at her, his mind whirling as he loved Sharon all the more for the way that she continued to surprise him on an almost daily basis. "The look on your face" she laughed.
"God I love you Raydor" he said finally, an expression of such heartfelt longing on his face that it almost brought a tear to her eye. He wriggled out from beneath her, Sharon's head landing on her pillow as he rolled her onto her back and loomed over her with a fair amount of intent. Seconds later their lips met, Sharon's hands moving up to wrap around his neck as a little moan built up in the back of her throat. When they broke apart his lips moved down the long column of her throat and to her chest before he stopped abruptly, settling above her, shifting his position not because he was trying to initial anything but because her head on his shoulder was causing that sickly pain to return but he didn't want to make a big deal about it and worry her. "Did you know," he said as she laughed again, "that the Hungarian equivalent of the bogeyman is the Copper-Penis Owl." As Sharon again descended into a fit of laughter he busied himself tracing his lips along her collarbone, her feeling him smile against her skin. "Which sounds much more frightening if you ask me."
"Well that depends on what it does when it sneaks out from under your bed and gets you I suppose" she suggested.
"It gives you chimney sweep scrotum I guess" he said with a shrug, Sharon laughing again as his lips resumed their very slow journey across the skin on her shoulder. "This one will really interest you, I know it will" he announced between kisses until he raised his head to look her in the eye, an amused twinkle very much present. "Did you know that the word 'orchid' comes from the Greek word for 'testicle'?" More laughter followed as Andy nodded towards the purple orchid that sat on Sharon's nightstand, the orchid he had given her as a present that first Christmas they were friends following the ballet with Sharon keeping it by her bed without a second thought either way, liking it to be the first and last thing she saw every day even when they were just starting out their friendship. "You my dear, have a lot of very colourful testicles in this apartment."
"It's just as well, most people at work think I have enough of them kept in jars in the desk drawers of my office anyway" she said in anything but a joke.
"Is that where you'd keep mine if I ever stepped out of line?"
"Of course not. They'd be made into earrings immediately" she told him before leaning up to playfully bite at his chin.
Andy laughed and nodded. "Good to know."
Sharon moved to wrap her arms more securely around Andy's neck as he continued to loom over her, the lower half of his body resting between her legs. She sighed. "Why didn't we do this sooner?" she asked and getting a little confused hum from Andy in return. "Why didn't we just accept that Rusty and Nicole were right all along and that we were dating back then and moved forward at Christmas last year instead of waiting? Why was I too stupid to not have another six months of this at least?" she said with an exasperated sigh, her right hand moving to stroke his cheek as she gazed up at him.
Andy smiled at her, his smile quickly turning into his trademark smoulder as he growled "Are you talking about sex again?" Sharon sighed and rolled her eyes at him, not because she was of the opinion he wasn't funny but because she knew Andy was about to go on one of his 'I'm more than just a piece of meat' rants and she'd have to wait until he was done before telling him what she had actually been talking about. "It's always about sex with you isn't Raydor?" he grumbled as if he was constantly being taken advantage of and he was hardly ever vertical. "I'm just a piece of meat with eyes, here to satisfy your never ending sexual needs aren't I?"
With one arm still looped around his neck Sharon smiled and pointed at her eyes. "What about 'My eyes are up here'?" she reminded him.
"Right. My eyes are up here," he said as he pointed at them, "and not on my ass you know. I'm more than just a great pair of buns in a suit."
"Great?"
"Okay, spectacular pair of buns in a suit."
"Are you done?" she asked through her laughter.
Andy thought for moment, searching his brain for anything else he could say that would make it seem like Sharon only wanted him for his body. Finally he nodded. "For now."
"Good because that's not what I meant at all" she insisted. He looked at her suspiciously with a rather large smile as he waited for her to crumble and admit that he was at least a little bit right. "That's not solely what I meant" she admitted. They laughed, Andy relishing his small victory before he dropped his lips against hers, it once again lingering for some time as her fingers ran through his hair and scratched his scalp. "I meant why didn't we go out on a real date sooner? Why didn't we go out on a real date after the ballet and having Nicole here for dinner? Why did we wait another seven months?" Her right hand moved to gently slap herself on the forehead as if she couldn't help but dwell on how utterly stupid they had been to not act upon their feelings earlier than they did, a thought that hadn't been far from her mind since Taylor died in front of them and she focused on how much time she'd made them waste when life was so finite. "Why on earth did we wait so ridiculously long to do this when it was clear to practically everyone we knew, everyone that loved us that we were already dating and obviously had feelings for each other?"
"Oh well that's an easy question to answer."
"Is it? Then why? Tell me."
"Well to begin with," he said before he paused, planting his lips against the base of her throat, "you know how nervous I am right now about ruining what I have with you and destroying our relationship and how incredibly irritating you find it?"
Sharon stroked his cheek again as she shook her head. Even if it took forever she was going to make him understand how she really felt on the subject because 'irritating' wasn't even remotely close to being accurate. "Let me stop you right there. Andy I don't find it irritating at all," she insisted, "I just find it so unbelievably frustrating and I'd wish you'd relax more about us because if I hadn't already made it clear to you, I am not about to and never will end this relationship between us. You don't need to be nervous or to worry about it all the time. I'm with you until the very end Andy Flynn," she told him as she cupped his face with both hands, "whether you want me or not." Andy laughed as he nodded, that situation being highly unlikely. "I promise you that and I need you to finally accept that fact and relax. Okay?" she asked, hating that Andy always seemed to feel like his days could be numbered if she one day changed her mind about him, that they weren't equal partners in their ever growing relationship but he was there only until she had enough of him.
"Okay" Andy nodded, leaning down to meet her lips. "I'll try my very best."
"You've said that before."
"And I'll probably say it again too but I promise you, I am working on it" he confirmed with another lingering kiss to her lips. "Well anyway, like I was saying, if I'm still this nervous right now as I lie in our bed, in our condo with you in my arms," he started to say, Sharon smiling up at him as her nails scratched his scalp as she enjoyed hearing him say those sorts of things now that they lived together, "just imagine for one second how unbelievably nervous I was back then when I had absolutely no idea how you really felt about me and ask again why I didn't ask you out on a real date any sooner."
"You really didn't know how I felt about you after Nicole came to see me at work?" she asked him, it not being the first time they'd had that particular conversation but it had never been made clear just how clueless Andy was as she instantly started to look at him differently as a result.
"Well not exactly. Deep down I hoped, or more accurately I guess, I prayed," he corrected himself and earned a little chuckle, "that you might like me in the same way that I liked or rather loved you but let's face facts here sweetheart, you didn't exactly react well when the truth came out after Nicole's visit. I thought you were going to hit me at one point."
"So did I" she revealed, them both laughing at the thought.
Sharon smiled at him as she thought about what had happened some two years earlier when the truth finally came out. Just the knowledge that Andy had been telling his family that they were in a relationship, lying to them and lying to them about her made her blood boil, coming very close to smacking him when she offered to help him tell Nicole the truth. But when she calmed down, when she took some deep calming breaths and really thought about it her cheeks instantly began to flush in a very good way, them only growing warmer when she realised she couldn't ignore the feelings she had for him anymore, for Andy, for her friend. That didn't mean to say she was going to act on those feeling in the near future however, acknowledging what a huge risk it would be to even contemplate entering into a relationship with him. Still, despite all that, she couldn't stop herself from looking at him differently, looking at him more romantically as a result of his lie while still feeling so very angry with him, that anger lasting until Nicole came over for dinner.
Sharon sighed, her eyes locked on his as he continued to loom over her. "I was so angry with you that day, just thinking about the way you'd been lying about me to everyone." It didn't come as a surprise to her when Andy's eyes dropped with embarrassment, still mortified by not only his lie but that he was caught so very publically, but Sharon soon put an end to it, dragging his face to look her in the eye again. She smiled at him as she stroked his cheek, pulling him down to kiss him on the lips. "But more than anything I was embarrassed and more than a little confused by everything" she revealed for the first time, getting a confused look in return. "You were my friend Andy, my closet friend in the world even and I just didn't know what to do. I know I tried to push you away at the time and I'm sorry for that but I was in a state of shock, at not just that you'd lied to Nicole about what was happening between us but because it made me realise that not only did you probably have feelings for me but that I also had feelings for you too and realising that at my age, after being alone for so long and not just feeling that way for my friend but also someone under my command," she said as she briefly closed her eyes, "was utterly utterly terrifying. It just seemed easier at the time to push you away and scowl at you as much as possible" she admitted with a shrug, them both laughing as a result.
"You could have said something to me about it you know" he pointed out, the two of them only discussing it twice before they started dating, once in her office when she all but ordered him to tell Nicole the truth and then when Nicole came to the condo for dinner, them both trying their hardest to forget it ever happened after that.
"I know I could but at the time I was more likely to throttle you with my bare hands rather than anything else" she replied with a little glare as he laughed, still a little annoyed about it all over eighteen months later and despite them living together. "I just didn't know what to do for the best but don't forget we still went out to the movies the day after the ballet," she reminded him, "and I freely admit I deliberately kissed you on the lips under the mistletoe to give you a little hint as to how I really felt at the Christmas Eve party in the hope that you might make a move now that everything was out in the open."
"Right I know," he shrugged before he pressed her lips to her breast bone, still not believing his luck that he was allowed to do such a thing, "but without some sort of really blatant hint as to how you felt I was still afraid."
"Afraid?" Sharon asked with a furrowed brow, Andy she knew not afraid of anything. He nodded, the whole conversation more than a little uncomfortable for him but it was a conversation worth having as they discussed the road that led them to where they were. His discomfort over it however was clearly apparent to her, Andy busing himself by peppering her chest with gentle kisses rather than meeting her curious eyes. "Afraid of what?" she asked, her nails scratching his scalp as she made it clear that she was expecting an answer and wouldn't be distracted by his ministrations.
Andy avoided answering for a moment, his head bowed as his lips pressed just above her heart. Finally he looked at her, offering a lopsided grin as a way to deflect away from what he was about to say. "Losing you" he shrugged. Lost for words for a moment, she moved her hands to the back of his neck, forcing him to lower himself and meet her lips. It was long and slow, an attempt to remind him that she wasn't going anywhere. When they broke apart her hands moved back into his hair, lazily scratching his scalp and making it stand on end even more than sleep had done while his lips moved back to her chest. "Don't get me wrong here," he said with his voice slightly muffled as he spoke against her chest, "it was one hundred percent a conscious decision on my part. At that point in our...," he raised his head briefly as he sought the appropriate phrase, "somewhat complicated relationship shall we say," he offered with a grimace and making her laugh, "not thinking there was a hope in hell that you felt the same way about me despite that kiss under the mistletoe at the party I decided that I'd rather keep you as my friend and my Captain and spend as much time with you as I could rather than lose you and the friendship we had together if I asked you out on a real date and you said 'No.'"
"But why would I say no?"
Andy shrugged again, his chin coming to rest on her chest, his forearms taking his weight so that he didn't crush her. "Like I said babe, regardless of that kiss, you really didn't react well when you found out I'd been lying to Nicole about us."
"Then why did you finally ask me?" she queried, never having discussed why he picked that particular ordinary day in July to change the course of their lives for so much the better rather than any other.
"I couldn't wait any longer," he told her with two more quick kisses being planted to just above her heart, "and just being grateful for what I had wasn't working for me anymore. I really didn't want to lose you from my life but I also had to know how you felt about me." He paused before he continued, his forehead resting on her chest, breathing her in for a moment as her nails continued to scratch his scalp. When he met her eye again he smiled brightly. "You only get one life, sometimes not for that long and after making such a hash of mine over the previous sixty plus years leading up to that point I was determined to at least attempt to put that right while I had the chance and that meant biting the bullet and asking the most incredible woman I'd ever met in my life out to dinner on a real date. I knew I was already in love with you long before I asked you to Serve and after seeing so many lives cut short at work I finally decided that I needed to find out one way or another how you felt about me." Sharon couldn't help but tear up a little at his words, Andy kissing her on the lips as they both thought about what was now the greatest decision of his life and they'd only just got started. "If there really was no hope of you feeling the same way then I needed to know that so that I could at least attempt to move on as best I could without you."
"And what if I had said no? What if I'd panicked at the word 'romantic'?" she asked, still incredibly relieved that it hadn't happened since she could quite easily have freaked out about it.
Andy laughed more with relief than anything. "Or what if you hadn't realised it was a date?" he offered as they both laughed. "Don't think I didn't wonder about that myself in the days that came before I finally managed to pluck up the courage to ask you." He shrugged again. "I figure I would have needed a clean break and probably asked for a transfer out of Major Crimes. It would have been the only way to get you out of my system for good, not seeing you at work every day although that didn't seem all that likely. I will never get you out of my system" he told her, his eyes almost burning into hers before he kissed her. "Not ever" he virtually said against her lips. "So I would have transferred out of the division even though I suspect Provenza would have tried everything within his power to stop me from doing that to keep me where I was and at his beck and call."
"And if I'd said 'No' and Lieutenant Provenza had managed to convince you to stay with us?" she asked, her voice breaking a little and clearly getting very emotional by what he was saying, her eyes filling with unshed but nonetheless happy tears.
"I would have stayed at my desk outside your office, casting longing glances over my shoulder every chance I got to see if I could maybe guilt you into it one day" he declared, pulling his best puppy dog expression as she laughed. "I would have spent the rest of my life loving you from afar...well as afar as my desk is from your office."
Sharon laughed as she nodded and wiped her eye with the back of her hand while he dropped her lips back to her chest. "What happened to me being 'high maintenance'?" she asked before they both laughed, Andy once joking with her that the reason why he hadn't asked her out following Nicole's visit was because she was too high maintenance for him when in fact it was just because he was terrified, even more so following her reaction to the lies he'd been telling about her. "That's what you said."
Andy shrugged and grinned. "I lied" he confirmed, Sharon laughing and nodding at him as she stroked his cheek with her thumb.
She gestured with a nod for him to come closer, her lips waiting for his. "I love you my darling boy" she told him when they broke apart, remaining almost nose to nose as they shared the same air.
He smiled dopily, causing her to chuckle. "I know that now" he confirmed with a wink. "And for the record, I love you too" he told her in nothing more than a whisper, a prelude to their lips crashing together.
Sharon wiped another stray tear from her cheek and then told him "I'm so very very glad you asked me out on that date" before wrapping her arms around his neck and pulling him down to her, his face buried into the crook of her neck as he battled not to crush her with his full weight, that position beginning to hurt his shoulder just as much as Sharon lying on it was.
"Me too" he confirmed as he pulled back after she finally loosened her hold on him. His lips once again trailed slowly across her collarbone before he pulled back to meet her eye. "But you could have always asked me out on a date instead you know" he pointed out as he looked to lift the blame a little since they could have been together seven months longer than they had. "This is the twenty first century after all, girls can ask guys out on dates."
"Not according to my Grandmother."
Andy laughed and nodded. "Yeah well according to your Grandmother you should also have stabbed me in the crotch with a knitting needle the first night I slept in this very room so I don't think her opinion on the subject would have mattered all that much."
"Only because I couldn't find a knitting needle to bring to bed with me" she told him, her eyes sparkling with menace and making him laugh in reply. "That's why I kneed you in the crotch instead and pretended I was still asleep and oblivious to your screams."
"I knew you'd done that on purpose" he jokingly grumbled as he attempted to settle a little more comfortably on his elbows, continuing to loom over her. Sharon laughed, her nails still scratching his scalp as she hooked her left leg over his as he lay between them. "Did you ever even consider asking me out instead?"
"Yes I did."
"Really?" Andy asked with surprise, getting a little nod in reply. "And?"
"And I'm sure it won't come as a surprise for you to learn that you weren't the only one who was scared about moving things forward between us" she revealed and prompting Andy to drop his lips to hers again. Her mind drifted for a moment to the night she tried so very hard to move things forward between them, her second aborted attempt to get him into bed some months before they finally did which just so happened to also be the night before he fell from a moving car. "Do you ever think about what might have happened that night before your accident if you hadn't been rolled out?"
Andy shook his head with confusion. "What do you mean? What night?"
"Well if my memory serves me correctly and I'm pretty sure it does, we were at your house having dinner when Lieutenant Provenza called to tell you to join the rest of the division at the hospital. Or to be a little more accurate we had finished dinner and were sitting on your couch," she said before she paused and smiled up at him, her cheeks starting to flush a little from the memory, "I had my tongue down your throat while your hands were under my blouse and it finally felt like you were just about to unhook my bra and..."
Realising which night she was referring to Andy frowned, looking just like he did that night when he saw Provenza's name appear on his cell phone caller ID when it started to ring, panting furiously. "And my God damn cell phone rang! Provenza!" he cried with annoyance. Sharon laughed instantly, having already anticipated that Provenza was about to get all of the blame for the interruption. "Even when the guy didn't know we were fooling around together he still found a way to keep us apart."
"It's not like he killed any of our victims himself" she laughed.
"I know but I still prefer to blame him when I can, it makes me feel better."
"Believe me Andy, I'd noticed" she laughed. "So, early November time last year, about a month and a half before we did finally sleep together for the first time, what do you think would have happened if your phone hadn't rang?" she questioned, at the time genuinely thinking that their evening was going to end with them in bed together and then twenty four hours later Andy had been in hospital twice, had cracked ribs and could barely breathe much less anything else.
"I don't usually like to deal in what ifs" he said with a shrug, it being something that he had taken on board in AA with his life and his addiction what it was and he couldn't change the past, only change who he was and what he did in his life moving forward. "What happened happened and I'm sure some people would say it all happened the way it was supposed to and it all happened for a reason" he said matter-of-factly before he smiled down at her. "But in this instance I'm not one of those people" he said with a wink and making her laugh. "I don't know" he shrugged. "It would have been up to you I guess."
"Why up to me?"
"Well let's face it, when you did ask me to spend the night with you I immediately thought you meant on the couch rather than you know, in here with you" he reminded her to much laughter once again. "It seems I'm really not that what you'd call, quick on the uptake as far as you're concerned, especially when you're putting a move on me."
"That's an understatement" she laughed.
"Yeah right, I know. Plus you know I was still beyond nervous at that point. My hands were staying exactly where you could see them...or rather where you could feel them on your back and well away from the most important and let's face it, away from the fun parts of your body," he said with a waggle of his eyebrows, "until I had explicit verbal and maybe even written permission to send them exploring on their merry way around the bases."
Sharon laughed again. "And yet the fact that I was straddling your lap with my tongue down your throat and palming you through your pants wasn't explicit enough?" she asked, at the time beginning to think that Andy just didn't find her attractive since he kept his hands in such annoyingly safe areas of her body at all times, feeling like she was going to have to physically place her breast in his hand to get him to cop a feel.
"Not for what I needed, no" he admitted, them both laughing about it. "To be perfectly honest you didn't have my full and undivided attention at the time."
"Oh really?" she asked with surprise. "And what pray tell were you thinking about as I wasted some of my best moves on you?"
"Mainly Provenza in a Speedo."
"What?" Sharon laughed.
"I didn't want to rush you which I know now seems utterly ridiculous given what was happening," he said and rolling his eyes at his own stupidity, at the time Sharon trying her hardest to rush him, "so I was trying to do whatever I could to stop my body reacting to what you were doing."
"Oh my God!" Sharon laughed, suddenly realising why Andy wasn't responding beneath her in the way she wanted.
"I know" he said with an utterly disgusted grimace. "It's a huge shock we've ever managed to sleep together at all with that image popping in to my head every time you kissed me" he added with a horrified shudder, Sharon laughing at him. "It still pops in there now and then. Do you have any idea how hard it is to maintain an erection with that image hammering on the door of your subconscious and desperate to break in?" he asked, Sharon once more laughing hysterically at him. "It's hard or rather it isn't if I can't get rid of the image." She laughed again before she kissed him, just checking to see if his mind would indeed drift to somewhere he'd much rather forget all about. "Go away Provenza" he said against her lips. Sharon's laughter broke them apart, Andy sighing instead, his regret over some that had come to pass with her evident. "It won't come as a surprise to you to learn that there are many many things that I've done in my life that I now deeply regret. You know like drinking too much, failing both Sandra and my children, not being there for them financially and emotionally when they were growing up, being a general asshole to everyone and even not asking you on a real date any sooner than I did, but not picking up on what were some pretty blatant hints sent my way from you that it was time to move things along is also pretty high up on the list."
Sharon smiled as she stroked his cheek. "I see, so you now finally admit that you were totally oblivious to my hints rather than them not being clear enough?"
"I think it's about fifty fifty babe." Despite knowing full well what the consequences would be and that the backs of his knees were under threat of being attacked, Andy crossed his eyes and stuck his tongue out in what was his imitation of her infamously bad sex eyes that she'd used on him to hint that she wanted him to put a move on her in the months before they finally slept together. In truth he still thought they were pretty bad eight months later but at least he knew what they meant. As expected Sharon's retribution was swift and painful, pinching the backs of his knees and causing him to squirm on top of her. "Okay, maybe it was a little more like seventy-five twenty-five" he said before he paused. "With your sex eyes obviously being the seventy-five." Inevitably his knees came under attack again as he laughed. "What do you think?" he asked finally as her hands came to rest on his backside, partly because that's where they usually ended up and partly because it would enable her to pinch him much quicker should he step out of line again.
"About what would have happened that night if you hadn't rolled out?"
"Yeah, what do you think would have happened since you know I was pretty paralysed by fear most of the time and you were leading the charge so to speak?"
"I don't know" Sharon replied once she'd stopped laughing at him. "If you want me to be completely honest with you I wanted you to be the one to initiate sex that first time."
"Why?"
"Because at the time I didn't feel that our relationship had been on...I don't know, that it hadn't been on an even keel shall we say before we reached that point" she explained.
"How so?"
"Look it's like this, I know you were the one that started all of this by asking me out on our first real date to begin with but I was the one that insisted we take everything so slowly after that. I'm the one that took your hand that first time as we walked on the beach. I was the one to say or rather scream 'I love you' first" she reminded him as they laughed. "I was the one that did everything first or at least that's how it felt to me at the time, how it still feels to me if I'm being honest, like I'm somehow in charge at home all the time as well as being in charge when we're at work when we are supposed to be equals, equal partners in a real relationship." Her hands moved back up to his neck again as he couldn't fail to notice just how serious she appeared about the whole thing. "There has never been a discussion about...well anything like we agreed in the beginning and that made me feel and still makes me feel like I have all the power in our relationship and you are always secondary."
Andy smiled at her, trying his hardest to alleviate any fears she may have on the subject because he didn't see it like that from his point of view. "Trust me babe, I've never seen myself as secondary in this relationship, I promise" he declared, pushing his lips to her shoulder a couple of times as if to prove it. "And honestly I never minded waiting for you, I still don't mind waiting for you and you didn't take all the power, I willingly gave it to you, fully aware of what I was doing. I did it simply because I didn't want to rush you."
"Because I was the one that insisted we take it slowly in the first place. Would you have done it otherwise?" she asked. Andy had no answer to that because Sharon was right, he only waited as patiently as she did because she had asked him to. If she hadn't then he would undoubtedly have been putting a move on her inside of a month (waiting perhaps a little longer than usual because of how intense his nerves were and how much he loved her). "I felt to make our relationship more even you had to be the one to initiate sex that first time."
"Which was never going to happen" he said a little ruthfully.
"I noticed" she confirmed, the pair of them thankfully able to laugh about it. "I guess it doesn't really matter now because we got there in the end" she offered, Andy agreeing judging by the way he met her lips. "But I do hope that I would have eventually sent you a clear enough signal that it was time." Andy didn't answer but rather just looked at her sceptically. "Or maybe not" she conceded, them laughing again.
"Regardless it was still a gigantic pain in the ass driving to the hospital that night and leaving you behind."
"Surely if it was that big of a pain then you wouldn't have jumped on a moving car the following afternoon would you?" she asked rhetorically with a little glare.
"Hey I wasn't expecting her to keep driving and then hurl me across the parking lot at high speed you know" he insisted, Sharon just rolling her eyes at how stupid he had been. "It may have derailed us for a few weeks but at least I got to spend the next night here with you" he said, looking at the bright side and being able to laugh about it. "Admittedly and I'm sure this won't come as a huge surprise, I hadn't exactly anticipated that the first time I stayed here it was going to be down the hall in Rusty's bed instead of in here in yours but hey, you play the hand your dealt."
"Okay, so if I hadn't asked you to stay with me that night, if I hadn't all but demanded sex before I exploded from too much built up sexual frustration," she said in anything but an exaggeration as they laughed, "you would never have made a move on your own?"
"I don't know, probably not."
"Really?"
Andy nodded. "I think so yeah."
"But did it not cross your mind at all that I might want sex? That our relationship was more to me than just hand holding and the occasional make out session when Rusty was out?" she questioned. "That I did want you for something other than just a little companionship?"
"Yeah but..."
"But what?"
"I was afraid" he said simply with a little shrug. "It was as simple as that. I know it's a lame excuse but it's all I've got." Sharon went to object but he continued before she had chance. "Look Sharon it's like this," he sighed as he looked away from her for a moment with him about to discuss something difficult that he'd much rather forget and he'd not really said to her before, "not a lot of people have stuck around in my life and I'm talking in general here and not just when things got tough okay? And I know that's partly if not completely my fault and I have fully accepted responsibility for that and for what I did and how that effected the people I love but," he met her eyes as he lowered his voice, a tenderness there that had her melting beneath him, "I was in love with you from the very moment they cleared away the appetisers before the ballet that first time." He let that thought sink in for a few seconds before he continued. "I really was Sharon. I think I was probably in love with you from the moment you dragged me to the dance floor by my tie at Nicole's wedding but it just took me a while to realise that's how I felt because of my nerves." He laughed nervously with Sharon quickly joining him. "And although I wanted more between us back then and I wanted more between us the day before we told each other how we felt and slept together that first time and if I'm perfectly honest I still want more between us now," he declared, causing Sharon to shuffle a little awkwardly beneath him for a moment in case the current topic of conversation had unwittingly pushed him into a proposal before either of them were really ready, "but I felt then as I feel now," he paused, gazing into her eyes, "I would be happy and content for the rest of my life just being able to kiss this hand," he said as he brought her right hand to his lips and kissed it, "if I couldn't have any more rather than losing you altogether. Just being able to have you in my life in any way I could would have done it for me, like it was before I asked you out on a date. I didn't want to risk that to have more and be greedy because you're the love of my life and I would have taken any scraps I was offered even though admittedly I have always eventually pushed for more." He shrugged again. "That's why."
"And yet you asked me out a real date anyway" she said, his actions contradicting his words.
"Yeah well, I reached a point where I just had to know."
She lifted her head to meet his lips, devouring him as her hands went back into his hair. "Never let it be said that you don't have a way with words Andrew Flynn" she told him, kissing him again and gently forcing him to roll back onto his back.
"What can I say? You turn me into a poet Raydor" he said as he opened his arms and waited for Sharon to settle into his side with her head on his shoulder again, her not needing to be told twice, missing the slight grimace on his face as he got comfortable. They lay in silence again for a while, both of them wide awake, Sharon's nails raking up and down Andy's torso under his t-shirt while his hand moved up and down his back. Eventually he kissed the top of her head, an indication he was about to speak. "So, this last minute vacation we're going to disappear on before the end of the month..."
Sharon sighed loudly to cut him off, thinking she was more likely to fly to the moon than for the two of them to both get time off at work in the near future given what had happened. "Do you really think that's likely with everything that's happened?" she asked, sounding extremely pessimistic.
"Absolutely and not just because I now want to try the first class mile high club with Sharon Raydor" he growled with his lips pressed against her forehead and making her laugh. "The way I see it is this, by the time this is done and we've got these assholes behind bars we're going to deserve a few days off, all of us for that matter."
"But the new Chief..."
"Won't be appointed for a very long time. In fact I can't see it happening this side of the holidays" he said confidently despite the way that Sharon looked at him less than convinced. "Look Pope never rushes these things. When he finally became Chief of Police, Taylor was the obvious choice to succeed him as Assistant Chief, right? Can you think of an obvious replacement this time? Because I sure don't other than you of course." Sharon thought about it for a moment and then shook her head, realising that he was right, about the first part at least, not even remotely interested in the job and much preferring Fritz to keep it since they got on so well and he had an obvious interest in keeping not only Major Crimes going but not making any significant changes to it because of Brenda. "So that can only mean Chief Howard is going to have the privilege of dealing with all this crap for a good while longer and I doubt he'll have any issues with us having the week off."
"Maybe."
"Just maybe?"
"For now. Andy I really don't like dealing with hypotheticals. Once this is all over, well, we'll see then."
"Okay" he said, pressing his lips to her forehead.
As he pulled away he just stared at her for a moment as she rested on his shoulder. It was no exaggeration to say that she seemed like a completely different person to the one he had found in the living room in the midst of a cleaning frenzy a few nights earlier. He had kept his questions about how it had gone with Father Stan to a minimum because he knew she'd gone there to talk about something that she didn't think he would understand although he was always going to listen to her if she wanted to talk to him about it. Whatever he had said to her, it had obviously done the trick although he also suspected that Wildred Darnell telling her that she understood that she had no choice but to kill Dwight had played a great part too. With that in mind he had just one question to ask her to put his mind at ease a little even though he knew it had the potential to upset her.
He kissed the top of her head again as he held her a little tighter, wanting to surround her with his warmth while they had what was sure to be an uncomfortable conversation. "Are you feeling better? You seem better" he said quietly, kissing her forehead again and again. It would be quite a significant exaggeration to say that all the clouds had lifted from her mind over the previous couple of days but she was certainly brighter. On the whole she did seem better about killing Dwight and dealing with her lack of guilt as a result as well as taking a life for the first time which was what was really plaguing her mind to such extremes in the immediate aftermath but things like Taylor's death, not being able to stop it and feeling so guilty for being relieved that it was him who died rather than Andy weren't going to go away any time soon but they both knew they would with time. Those feelings manageable with Andy and Amy feeling the same way, feelings that everyone could understand.
Sharon paused before she answered, really thinking about how she felt so that she could give him an honest answer. "Yes. I do" she said finally and sounding very positive about it. Andy remained silent, sensing that she had more to say once she'd pondered on it for a moment longer since he didn't want to derail her. "Speaking to Wildred helped, a lot more than I expected if I'm honest."
Andy nodded as he listened. It was only as he watched Sharon speaking to Wildred on the monitors in Electronics (ignoring Chief Howard's question as to whether Sharon should be in there talking to her at all) and heard Wildred say that she understood that Sharon had no choice but to shoot Dwight and Sharon's emotion laden response, her breath hitching as her voice wavered slightly as she thanked her that he started to understand more about what was going on inside her head. It was a cliché but it was true to say that opposites did attract and Sharon and Andy embodied that expression in almost every way. They shared some of the same interests but the only other similarity they had aside from work was how much they loved each other so he accepted that they were probably never going to be on the same wavelength when it came to her devotion to her religion and the way they saw the justice system. To Andy the people they encountered at work were always going to be dirt bags and it frustrated him to no end that he couldn't see it from Sharon's point of view especially because she was struggling so much with it and therefore he couldn't find a way to help her himself but it seemed he had managed to help her in the end by pointing her towards the church and although Father Stan didn't give her everything that she needed, he had helped her find the path that led her to it in the end, getting the understanding from Wildred that she craved but didn't really know she needed. The resulting change in her had been remarkable, if only he could now get her to have some sleep.
"I can feel it now" she said and repeating herself from when he first found her in the living room only this time referring to her emotional state rather than the case. "But more to the point, I want you to stop worrying about me" she told him, trying to meet him eye.
"Sorry Raydor, that's not going to happen. That's my job now and anyway I like worrying about you. It reminds me how unbelievably lucky I am to have you."
"I've told you before, I think I'm the lucky one" she said as she moved to prop herself up on her elbow, stroking his face lightly with her fingertips. "But forget about me, this shouldn't all be about me. How are you? How did it go with Matt the other day?"
Andy's sponsor Matt had arrived as expected for coffee in the Break Room with him two days after the shooting on the Sunday afternoon. Thankfully he had time to just hang out and wait for him because as expected Andy had trouble getting five minutes away from work with finding the time to use the bathroom a struggle in those first forty eight hours. The length of time that he was waiting however enabled a chance meeting between him and Sharon for the very first time, not that Andy knew anything about it. Sharon had gone to make herself a cup of tea, still waiting for her final clearance to go anywhere other than the morgue and was so distracted by her thoughts that she didn't pay much attention to the strange man lurking in the corner of the Break Room. Matt on the other hand recognised her immediately, he'd seen enough photos of her on Andy's phone over the previous couple of years. Seeing that she was fairly distracted by her own thoughts he tentatively and quietly called her name before explaining who he was. Despite everything going on inside her head she was utterly delighted to finally meet him, hugging him tightly and repeatedly thanking him for everything that he did for Andy, not least for coming to see him on a Sunday rather than being with his family.
"Yeah it was okay. I said I'd give him a call in a couple of days" he said almost dismissively before he noticed the concerned look on her face, her clearly waiting for him to say a little more on the subject than that to put her mind at ease. "What?"
"You need to take care of yourself too Andy" she told him, the implication being that she clearly didn't think that he was, focusing too much on her.
"And I am. You've got nothing to worry about babe. I promise. Between Matt and myself we've got it covered" he declared with a wink.
"Okay" Sharon replied, sounding less than convinced given that a couple of nights earlier he had told her how much he wanted a drink but taking him at his word. She lay back down on his shoulder, her hand once again going under his t-shirt. "He was a lot taller than I imagined" she said finally.
"What?"
"Matt, he was an awful lot taller than I had expected him to be."
"When did you see him?"
"Before you did" she confirmed, a little amusement in her tone. "I went into the Break Room to get myself a refill on my tea and he recognised me immediately. We had a nice little chat."
"You never told me."
"Probably because we've had virtually no time to discuss anything even remotely personal for the last couple of days" she reminded him, it being one of the reasons aside from not wanting to upset her as to why he hadn't asked about Father Stan before that evening.
"What did you two talk about?"
"Just this and that" she said casually and fully aware that it would tease him. He looked at her more than a little worried. "You can lose the concerned face Andy, it was all perfectly innocent. After thanking him for everything he does for you and saying how nice it was to finally put a face to the name he said it was nice to meet me too and told me that," she paused as she smiled up at him, "you'd never looked happier."
"Oh I see. He was giving you a big head was he?"
"Just a little" she laughed.
"Did you ask what's his wife's name was?"
"No I didn't" she said as she laughed again. Nearly twenty one years earlier when Andy and Matt first met he was introduced to his wife but never paid much attention to her name, a fact that became a problem over the years when Matt started to be his sponsor and their relationship reached the point where he could no longer ask without coming across like a complete asshole, calling her 'Fancy Pants' instead because she always wore yoga pants covered in crystals. "You'll have to go on calling her Fancy Pants until you have the courage to ask yourself."
"I can't. It's been too many years."
"Then I guess you're stuck aren't you?" She smiled up at him again, since Andy continued to keep her at arm's length from his recovery it made a nice change to see a small window into that part of his life. "It was very nice to meet him and to thank him."
"He's a good guy."
"A little like you" she cooed. He smiled at her before he moved in for a kiss but after the briefest of comings together he pulled away rather quickly and winced with pain. "What's the matter? Your shoulder still?" she asked with concern.
"No. That's fine" he lied, it still aching like hell, even more so because she was lying on it but he didn't want to worry her. "My tooth still hurts me from the other week" he said as he rubbed his jaw a little, in truth his whole lower jaw throbbing. "I'm starting to think it wasn't the explosion."
"Imagine."
"Yeah, yeah, yeah. Know it all" he grumbled, Sharon insisting he should go to the dentist the first time he complained about it but he dismissed her concerns and continued to blame the explosion from the Colsons shaking something loose.
"You're going to have to go and see the dentist."
"I know. I'll add it to the list."
"List?"
"Yeah, the list of things that I'm going to do when I finally have time. There's a trip to the dentist, helping you clean out the closet, unpacking, getting all of the paperwork for here sorted and that's without the house sale needing to be finalised" he listed off.
"If I were you I'd add swinging by the old place to air it out a little in case that smell has hung around after your fridge left" she said not at all delicately, Andy's house still smelling like hell in her opinion.
"Yeah I've thought about it but I could do without being attacked by the crazy next door again" he said and making her laugh. "Speaking of crazies, did Provenza," he started to say, having to pause when it made her laugh, "did he tell you that Buzz thinks he's found the Bill Jones he was looking for?"
"No. No one said a word" she told him, pleased but surprised.
"Well I guess they both figured you have enough on your plate right now and it could wait until he was certain it is him."
"How did he find him?"
"The LAPD Library of Annuals." Sharon's smile beamed as she listened to him, so pleased that Buzz was doing so well and with such very little assistance too. "He found a William Jones who went to the same school as Hecht. And get this, the guy has a juvenile record too."
"So it's really him?"
"I think there's a very good chance, yes. Provenza is going to try to get a hold of his records tomorrow."
"I'm so proud of him."
"Well he learnt from the best" Andy said smugly.
Sharon remained silent for a moment, a grin on her face before she took the bait. "I assume you mean you and Lieutenant Provenza?" she asked finally.
"Actually I meant just me" he clarified, Sharon laughing again. "Well I guess we'll see in a couple of hours and where his juvi records lead Buzz next."
Her mind brought back to work again she sighed, it now no more than a couple of hours away and neither of them had slept nearly enough. "What time is it?" she asked.
Andy lifted his head to look at the clock on her nightstand. "A little before five."
Sharon sighed again. "We've got to get up in a couple of hours" she said with another sigh. "I wish I could sleep."
"I know" he said as he kissed the top of her head and then suddenly had an idea. "Here, let me try something." He stretched out his free arm to grab his phone from the nightstand, bringing it to his face and tapping away at the screen with his thumb.
Sharon watched him as he tapped away, unable to see what he was looking at. "What are you doing?"
"Googling ways to help you sleep" he stated and earning a little laugh. "Who knows, I may find something that does the trick." He searched a few pages in silence before finding a list that looked like it may be of some help. His arm around her shoulders started to squeeze her a little more tightly as he settled on a page. "Okay, suggestion one," he said and reading from his phone, "you need to lower the temperature in the bedroom." He paused as he dropped his phone to his chest. "Huh! I guess that means you'd get more sleep if I slept on the couch."
"Not on your life Flynn" she told him emphatically as she grabbed hold on the bottom of his t-shirt to ensure that he didn't even so much as think about running off anywhere. "You are staying right here in this bed. If you think it's difficult for me to sleep right now, trust me it's nothing compared to how hard it is when you're not lying next to me. What's the next one?" she said, gesturing at his phone.
Andy brought his cell phone back to his face, lighting it up as his thumb moved the page up to the next item on the list. "Yoga" he stated, returning his phone to his chest.
Sharon laughed, shaking her head with a little disbelief. "Nice try but I'm not buying it. This is supposed to be helping me sleep not giving you a cheap thrill because you like to stand behind me and watch while I'm doing the downward facing dog."
"It's true" he laughed. "Look." He held his phone in front of her face even though he knew full well she wasn't going to be able to read it without her glasses. Sharon just nodded, not wanting to move so just took his word for it, suspicious though she was about it. "So that's a no on the yoga then?"
"Definitely. What's next?"
Andy looked at his phone again, smiling when he read the next item on the list. "Avoid naps during the day" he told her with great humour as his lips pressed to the top of her head.
"Of course!" she laughed. "We're currently dealing with one of the most heinous series of murders this department has ever had to deal with. Naturally I have time to nap during the day."
"I always knew that's what you got up to Raydor when your blinds are closed" he joked as she laughed. He looked back at his phone again as he found the next suggestion. "The next one is easy."
"Oh yeah? What is it?"
"Listening to relaxing music in bed" he growled, waggling his eyebrows at her as she laughed and he dropped his phone back down to his chest. Andy cleared his throat before moving his lips to her ear, Sharon closing her eyes as she prepared to relax and listen to him sing to her. "My love must be a kind of blind love, I can't see anyone but you. Sha bop, sha bop" he sang, easily making her laugh at him. "Are the stars out tonight? I don't know if it's cloudy or bright. I only have eyes for you dear. Sha bop, sha bop. The moon may be high but I can't see a thing in the sky, I only have eyes for you. I don't know if we're in a garden or on a crowded avenue. Sha bop, sha bop. You are here and so am I. Maybe millions of people go by but they all disappear from view and I only have eyes for you." His song over, Andy moved in for the kill, caressing his lips carefully against hers as her hand came up to cup his cheek.
When they broke apart she just stared at him with a smile, nose to nose and no more than an inch between them. "Please my darling boy, don't ever stop singing to me" she begged him before she kissed him, that being a promise he could quite easily keep.
"I promise, only as long as you don't ever stop wanting me to sing to you" he confirmed as their lips came together again. Their lips still moving slowly against the other's and her eyes closed, Andy briefly opened his own and asked "Are you asleep?" against them.
"No not yet" she laughed, moving to kiss his neck again.
"It was worth a try" he shrugged. "Okay onto the next one." He looked at his phone again, skipping past a couple of suggestions that involved too much effort and he knew wouldn't work anyway such as changing the bedding or going for a run before he found something suitable and smiled. "Apparently you've got to get yourself comfortable."
Sharon laughed again. "I fail to see how I could possibly be any more comfortable than I am right now here in your arms" she said, her hand moving back up his t-shirt again as he pulled her against his chest a little tighter. As Andy turned back to his list Sharon started to laugh again, pressing her face into his neck even more to stifle the sound.
"What's so funny?"
"This just reminds me of something" she said with a slight giggle.
"What?"
Sharon shuffled back slightly so that she could more easily see his face, knowing that she was about to get a strong reaction to her little confession. She sucked her bottom lip into her mouth, making him groan. "The night of our first real date" she said as her nails began to move a little quicker up and down his chest. "As you're now well aware I was obviously a little bit cautious about what to do and what to expect that night at Serve because I wasn't one hundred percent sure if it really was a date or not."
"What percentage were you by the way?" he asked.
"That it was a real date?" she asked, Andy nodding in return. "I'd like to tell you I was about ninety-nine percent certain but it was more like twenty or thirty" she said in what was not a lie exactly but more like an exaggeration. At the time of their first date and the ambiguity of the invitation that featured the word 'romantic' for the very first time, Sharon desperately wanted it to be a date but the closer she got to the time when Andy was due to pick her up she got less certain about it (the wine she'd polished off to control her nerves not helping matters in the slightest). By the time Andy stepped into the condo she was only about five percent sure she was heading out on a first date with her best friend. Andy laughed at her, himself only about five percent sure that she knew he'd asked her on a real date before she plucked up the courage and just asked him. "Anyway Rusty noticed immediately that I was perhaps a little more on edge than usual for dinner with my friend Andy so I had to tell him why I was so flustered."
"What did he say?" he asked a little cautiously and given the way that Rusty initially acted with such hostility towards him when they started to date expected him to be begging her not to go through with it.
"Oh he thought the whole thing was utterly hilarious as you'd expect."
"Actually I expected him to lock you in your bedroom so that it wouldn't happen at all given the way he reacted to me during those first few months."
"I think that came later when he realised that we were serious about each other and dating and suddenly he was dealing with his Mom and her evil boyfriend again" she said, her hand continuing to move up and down his chest as she once again sought to ensure that Rusty's initial bout of reluctance had nothing to do with him personally and everything to do with the men who had been involved with his 'other' Mother when he was still a child.
"So what did he do?"
"He took out his cell phone and Googled 'How to tell if you're on a date or not' while you were waiting for me by the door as I put my flowers in a vase" she confessed.
"I see" he laughed. "Great minds think alike and all that. What did it say?"
"It was largely inconclusive with some of the questions it asked and I was not about to discuss it with anyone else which is obviously why I had to ask you over dinner instead."
Andy laughed, his relief that she asked the embarrassing question never diminishing since he questioned if they would be lying in their bed together at that moment in time if she hadn't sought clarity when she did. "I wouldn't care so much about my own stupidity and not making myself clear to you about what my intentions were but when I told Provenza a couple of days earlier what I was going to do, that I was going to ask you out on a real date and foolishly wanted a little moral support from him, I even said that I was going to make sure that I called it a 'date' and not going out as friends or with family and then it was the one word I didn't use" he cried, his frustration at his own idiocy still apparent.
"I know but being a Detective I did rather like trying to work it out for myself" she told him before she kissed him. "What's next?"
Andy looked back at his phone and frowned. "Turning off all electronic devices. Well that'll have to wait until we've finished with this list. Okay next is aromatherapy." He grinned at her and waggled his eyebrows. "Time to crack out the massage oils that Gavin gave you."
Sharon hummed, certainly tempted by the idea. "That requires moving and I'm currently too comfortable to want to go anywhere" she said, kissing his neck and letting him know that she didn't want him to go anywhere either.
"Okay so we put a pin in that one and I get to massage the crap out of you before bed tomorrow night."
"I look forward to it" she laughed.
"Drink a soothing beverage" Andy read from his phone. "Glass of warm milk maybe? Or a big glass of wine?" he offered, more than willing to go and get whatever she wanted if it meant she might get a couple of hours of sleep.
"Not right now."
"Yeah, we've both reached the stage in life where each drink after 7pm is an extra two trips to the bathroom in the middle of the night" he said with a sigh, Sharon laughing again. "Or today at work even given the time" he pointed out with less than a couple of hours left in which to sleep. "Next is read something which is this list obviously" he said dismissively and quickly starting to run out of ideas. "Next is trying to stay awake."
"I've been doing that for the last couple of hours and oddly enough I'm still awake."
"Good point." He looked back at his phone and declared "Visualise something that makes you happy."
Sharon smiled and kissed his chest. "Oh that's easy. I'm currently thinking about the picture of you in that calendar" she purred as her smile continued to grow. "I'm going to spend an awful lot of time thinking about that picture in the future, possibly when you're at an AA meeting or too tired for anything else" she teased, biting at his jaw.
Andy laughed, assuming as much himself before he suddenly frowned. "Please tell me you're not going to frame that picture like that stupid letter from the hospital?" he all but begged her.
Sharon sighed, about to repeat herself for what seemed like the hundredth time since he gave her the letter. "Firstly let me say once again that it's not a stupid letter at all, it's the greatest thing I've ever been given in my life aside from my children" she told him and fully aware he was rolling his eyes at her. "And secondly if I'm to avoid scarring Rusty for life and ensuring he never looks you in the eye again I'll have to keep it somewhere that he won't ever see it."
"Okay fine" he sighed. In truth he didn't care all that much about it and if he was really that bothered by people seeing it he wouldn't have done it at the time or told Sharon about it or even kept a copy of it but he was still keen for it to be kept just between the two of them regardless of how good he looked in it. "Is thinking about that picture making you feel sleepy?"
"No, it's not." She laughed to herself as it became very clear that a little colour had made its way into her cheeks, visible even in that light. "It's making me feel ever so slightly flushed amongst other things" she revealed, her left leg that was still thrown over his moving her foot up and down his calf.
Andy dropped his phone back on his nightstand before he sat up on his elbows a little. "Oh really?"
"Really" she replied, her eyes sparkling at him.
"Then I think you're going to really love the last suggestion."
"What is it?"
"Sex" he stated with a waggle of his eyebrows as he slipped from beneath her.
Sharon smiled up at him. "Oh well then in that case I think we should definitely give it a try. Even if it doesn't work it'll be a lot of fun to give it a try."
"Oh what the hell! I'll take one for the team if it means you can get a couple of hours shut eye." Sharon laughed at him as she wrapped her arms around his neck but she was soon silenced when Andy rolled her onto her back and loomed above her, crashing his lips against hers. She arched her back and moaned into his mouth as his right hand drifted to her leg, drifting slowly upwards until he could lift her nightgown and grasp her hip. The moment she felt his hand firmly grabbing her flesh she laughed against his lips which caused him to pull back and frown at her. "Are you laughing at me when I'm trying to put a move on you?"
"A little bit, yes." Her hands moved into his hair as she explained, ensuring that he didn't go anywhere. "I was just thinking, that first night you stayed here, after I'd whacked you in the eye..."
"You mean after you assaulted me?"
"It's not like I did it on purpose."
"That's not what you said earlier" he reminded her.
"Oh well that was different. The knee to your unmentionables was obviously one hundred percent deliberate but the elbow to your eye was completely accidental" she said as she slowly moved her fingers to trace the area under his eye where the bruise had been. "Anyway after that and when you came back to bed with your ice, I remember that I straddled your lap to look at it a little more closely to inspect the damage and despite what we'd been doing before we went to sleep you were still too nervous to even so much as leave your hand on my hip for too long. And now...well..." They smiled at each other as his hand kept moving, practically dancing up and down her hip. "I think what I'm trying to say is, as much as I've enjoyed my life and my life with you up until this point, and as difficult as this last week has been and will continue to be, Andy this is the happiest I have ever been in my life" she told him before lifting her head off the pillow to kiss him on the lips, meaning every single word of it and then some.
"Me too."
After taking a little longer than usual, the signature Andy Flynn 'Swirl' and a couple of intense orgasms later and Sharon was finally in a deep and peaceful sleep for the first time since the night before the courtroom shooting. If only it was going to last more than a couple of hours but it was a start at least. In stark comparison with Sharon curled into his side and sleeping soundly, Andy struggled to drift off himself, kept awake by a sickly pain that seemed to move at will between his jaw and his shoulder, blaming the explosion and a combination of the tackle by his former crazy neighbour Mrs Williams and ducking out of the way from Detective Nolan, after all, what else could it be?