A/N: I was going to do more than just this, but I got lazy. Sorry xx Mariah


Melinda lit the last candle in the living room as Jim came in through the front door.

"Honey," he called out, smiling as he saw her there in a white dress, blowing out a match. "I'm home."

"Hey stranger," she smiled, walking up to him. She stepped up on her tiptoes and kissed his lips before standing back on her feet. "You hungry?"

"What's all this?" He looked around at the scene before him.

There were two plates on the coffee table with a glass of wine on each side. The scrabble box was in front of it, for after, knowing Melinda.

"You just worked a forty eight hour shift, Jim." She shrugged, smiling at him. "I thought it'd be nice to come home to dinner and some relaxing time with me."

He came around the couch and sat beside her. "You didn't have to go all out," he smiled. "Though it is nice."

"And I thought we deserved a nice, normal night," she said, putting emphasis on normal. "After everything in the tunnels and how much I scared you that night… I owe you an apology for not letting you know where I was headed. I scared you that night and I'm sorry."

She leaned against him and closed her eyes, relaxing into his arms. The way she was feeling right now was almost indescribable. Or maybe it's just a feeling she hadn't experienced for so long that she'd forgotten what it was. It's beyond happiness or contentment, it's…well, as always, she came up short when it came to words. All she knew was that she felt safer in his arms then she'd felt in a very long time.

Right now, with Jim's arms around her and his head buried in the crook of her shoulder, she was having trouble remembering she'd made dinner that was getting cold on the table.

Jim's voice pulled her out of her head. "Should we eat?" He asked her, his hand rubbing her back as she pulled back from the hug. "It looks delicious. I'm starving."

For a few beautiful moments, they sat in complete silence, both eating, his free hand stroking her arm. She'd stay like this forever if she could. Even with a thousand unanswered questions hanging over her, and the future feeling so uncertain, she could forget everything when Jim just touched her like that.

"How are you feeling, Mel?" Jim asked, breaking the silence. He cut into his steak, the warmth of his fingertips leaving her as she took a sip of her wine.

That question could mean a lot of things, but she decided to take the easy way out. "I'm fine," she responded, setting her empty plate. She'd made steak, potatoes and broccoli. It had turned out pretty well, considering they had both just eaten their food without much conversation. "Full. I don't ever want to get up."

He laughed softly. "Me too," he told her, taking his last bite of steak and setting his plate on the table. "But I'll go grab the rest of the wine and put the plates in the sink." He leaned forward to kiss her cheek as she finished her glass of wine.

When he left, she opened the scrabble game up, getting ready for his return. He returned with the bottle and plopped down beside her.

"Ready to lose?" She winked at him.

"You bet," he chuckled, pouring her a glass. "Just prepare to lose this time, Gordon."

A half an hour later, Melinda pondered her next move. She didn't have much of a letter selection like she had in the beginning of the game, but she didn't care all that much. She knew they wouldn't finish the game with what she had in mind.

She shuffled her tiles around, feeling Jim's eyes watch her fingers as she slowly picked up four of her tiles and brought them to the board.

Jim had played the word cab earlier and she placed her tiles on the end of the word, making it cabaret and earning a measly twenty two points on the double word the t was on.

"Touche," Jim said, looking down at his tiles as he wrote the score down. "So we're making big words off of others, now?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," Melinda snickered, grabbing four tiles out of the box and placing them with the rest of hers as she sat back down on the floor. The heat of the fire Jim had started warmed her and gave her a warm glow as she smiled. "I'm just beating you as usual."

"Mhmm," he said softly, shuffling his tiles around. He brought his first tile under the letter v. She'd done the word violin earlier and he was building off.

She smirked when she saw that the word he used was vixen, licking her lips as she looked back at her letters. Shuffling her tiles around, she looked at the board. What would should she do next?

She placed down a word without thinking, her eyes meeting his as he read it.

Cock.

"Melinda," he flushed a bright red and chuckled, playing the letter y at the end with an eyebrow raise to her. "You're turn."

"I know," she surged forward and cut him off with a hard, almost desperate kiss from across the table.

He made a few half-hearted attempts to speak, but she pushed her body as close to his as she physically could by walking around the table and continued attacking his lips with her own. She sunk into his lap, her nightgown balled up around her knees as his hands held her tight to him around her waist.

"You are so fucking sexy," he growled as she ground against his ever increasing hard on.

A proud little smile blossomed on her lips when his head fell back to rest against the seat. She leaned forward and pressed, hot, open-mouthed kisses along his throat, reveling in the vibrations his moans made against her lips.

His hands deftly find the clasp of her bra under her dress and had it undone in seconds. She smiled, remembering how he had almost struggled the first time they'd been together. He's come a long way. The straps sprung free and he slid them slowly over her arms, watching the telltale goosebumps appear under his touch. His thumb found one of her nipples under her dress and teased it until it stands out firmly against the silk.

His electric eyes flickered toward hers as he leaned forward and brought her dress up, taking it into his mouth, swirling his tongue over the bud until she released a shuddering whimper, letting her hands tangle in his wild hair. She arched against him as he wrapped his arms about her waist again, before switching his attention to the opposite breast. His cock throbbed against his leg, and she didn't know how much longer he could wait. She started to pull off him, standing up and leaving him to look up at her like he was a lost puppy.

"Where are you going?" He asked breathlessly, reaching out for her hand.

"Nowhere. Lay on your back," she said.

He listened, lying down on the couch. She pulled open his work shirt, discarding it as she straddled him better. Jim slipped the thin lace of her panties down her thighs while his mouth moved back up to tease her breast again.

Melinda was half delirious with want as she lifted her legs one at a time to free herself from the small scrap of fabric. His hands were there, slipping inside her, teasing her as they kissed. He grinned and kissed her deeply, his tongue slipping past her lips as he savored every taste of her.

When they pulled apart, she let her forehead come to rest against his with a quiet chuckle before they kissed again, just as someone knocked on their front door.

They both looked up, staring at the door as the person knocked again.

"Are you expecting someone?" Jim asked, grunting as he leaned on his elbows.

"No one," she sighed, pulling the straps of her nightgown up as she moved off him. "You should get it. I think it's Payne."

"I know you guys are home," Payne yelled, knocking harder. "Your cars are out here."

"You're mine the second he's gone," he muttered as he got up, fixing his pants the best he could as he went to open the door.