Chapter 24
Hello my loves, I just wanted to give a fair warning without giving away the plot that there are some more mature themes in this chapter than have been in the story before, so if that sort of thing isn't to your taste I would suggest skipping the last few paragraphs. I, however, think it is worth the read. This is also a longer chapter, almost 5,000 words. Still trying to get a holiday chapter up before the end of the day tomorrow, and don't worry more to come! Much love! And please don't forget to review! I'm quite anxious over this chapter. xxx
The car pulled up to impressive house, and the two prepared themselves to exit. Betty had the pizza box in her lap and Daniel would never tell her but hearing her groans of hunger and her stomach gurgling as he made her wait until they reached the house to eat made him laugh to himself. She was so cute when disgruntled. He wasn't trying to be mean or cruel in making her wait, he simply didn't like the idea of eating in the back of the car considering how few changes of clothes they had with them.
They walked into the large foyer and were greeted by an older man, and if Betty hadn't known better she would have made a dorky reference to Alfred, Batman's butler. She knew it would only be rebuked and corrected as the man was nothing close to a butler or valet. Whatever he was he took their coats, bags, and garment bags and disappeared again leaving again after Daniel told him they would be setting up in the living room for a while and would like a fire started as soon as possible. The one downside to the house was that it tended to be a little drafty at times like this, when the weather was beginning to set in. There was snow expected later that evening and the wind had already picked up as the temperature dropped. He looked over to find Betty standing a little behind him at the table in the center of the room, sneaking a few bites of the pizza looking around the room.
"Betty! You couldn't wait five more minutes?" he laughed at her, and walked over to grab his own piece. "Come on, let's go to the kitchen." He took the box and led the way. If she hadn't been so hungry she would have stopped to take a look at her surroundings a little more, but simply followed him, trying not to drop her piece of the tomato pie. A few more bites and it was gone as they entered into the kitchen set off in the back corner of the main floor. Everything about the home was grand, but somehow being here with Daniel it felt cozy, not as intimidating, and if she honest it was comfortable. She wouldn't go so far as to say it felt like home, nobody can truly relax in a place that could be a museum, but she remembered some of the family videos Daniel had shared with her and she recognized certain rooms as they had passed by them.
He set the box onto the island and motioned for her to sit on the stool at the corner, while he stayed standing. They finished the pizza off quickly not realizing just how hungry they really were. The older man returned to inform them the fire had been lit and their bags had been put into their respective rooms, ready for whenever they wanted to retire. Betty couldn't help her giggle as he left again, thinking it felt like they were at a hotel, despite Daniel's rejection of the idea earlier in the night. Daniel didn't catch it, and busied himself with cleaning up after their meal. Betty suddenly cleared her throat.
"Are you thirsty? I can see what we have in the fridge." He walked over to a cabinet Betty watching as he opened it to reveal an extremely large refrigerator. Papi would kill for a kitchen like this. She realized the sheer size of some of the appliances could accommodate an amply sized staff. In fact, it wouldn't be too far of a stretch to envision a small catering business being run out of the room. Daniel groaned as he discovered there wasn't much of anything to offer in the way of a drink, not having time to ask for the fridge to be stocked before arriving.
"Well, it doesn't look like we have… anything." He closed the door again, it seamlessly blending back into the cherry wood cabinetry. "Is water okay?" he asked as he headed to another cabinet to bring two glasses down to fill in the sink.
"Actually, do you think maybe there's some wine around here?" she asked, sort of embarrassed to ask but resolute in her suggestion.
"Oh! Are you sure?" he asked, thinking back to that Friday night and wondering if alcohol was such a good idea. He could easily send Ernest to the store. She nodded sure of herself. "Then yeah. Definitely. Come on!" he walked over to a small door set off to the side by the back door. He opened it and a rush of cold and damp air rushed past them. He reached out into the dark tunnel searching for the switch. He found it and the light flickered on slowly, revealing that the tunnel wasn't a tunnel at all but rather a set of stone steps leading down to the basement. He turned back to her and smiled warmly. "Wine cellar." He told her.
They wandered down the stairs and made a couple turns switching lights on as they passed through different sections of storage until they finally reached another wooden door. He turned on the switch next to it before opening the door to reveal a medium sized room, but with every wall covered in shelves from floor to ceiling as well as racks in the center of the floor, and a table near the door with stocked with things such as a master list, bottle openers of various types, spare corks, a box of rags, and even a couple sabers hung up above the table. Almost every single cubby held a bottle. There were larger sized bottles on the center rack, and various shades, vintages, and brands were obviously well organized in their various sections of the room. Betty wasn't well versed on wine but could hazard a guess that just about every kind and variation must be represented here. The room was extremely musty and damp, but that was to be expected from a proper wine cellar. Betty let out a breath at seeing the collection. She had just wanted a glass or two, and she remembered Claire's troubles with alcoholism and began to understand more and more why Claire had decided not to stay in the house, the death of her husband being hard enough without having what essentially amounted to a small liquor store in the basement to tempt her to drink more.
"Do you have a preference?" Daniel asked.
"Um, no not really. I'll let you choose." She told him, taking a look at some of the bottles closest to her. "Okay." He replied softly. He grabbed a rag and headed towards the back wall, cleaning off bottles to read their labels. He chose something he thought would be relatively easy on their pallets, a soft and sweet red wine that was older than the both of them. He knew it would be a good one.
"This should do." He held out the bottle to her, and she looked at the French label, trying to decipher the language. She nodded in agreement, not really sure what he had picked but she trusted his judgement. They wandered their way back to the kitchen, remembering to turn the lights off again as they went. He grabbed two wine glasses out of the cabinet and led her back through the house into the living room on the opposite back corner of the house on the same floor. She didn't recognize this smaller room, it not looking anything like the Christmas cards and videos she had seen in the past. It represented something more of a study than a living room. It was obviously well used, but that made her love it even more. There were books lining the walls and a walnut desk in the corner. He lead her over to the sofa in front of the fire, a couple wing-backed arm chairs sat opposite with a coffee table between them with a floor lamp leaning over the chairs. A small table and lamp sectioned off the area from the rest of the room, so they had to walk in front of the fireplace to enter the area, with a large soft rug in front of the hearth.
Daniel placed the bottle and glasses down and fished one of the bottle openers he remembered to bring out of his pocket and busied himself with opening their prize from their little exploration. Betty lowered herself onto the sofa, pleasantly surprised at its comfort, again obviously being well loved and used over the years. She sighed as she grabbed a throw pillow and adjusted herself into a more comfortable position kicking off her shoes beneath the table and bringing her legs up to rest on the couch, leaning towards Daniel as he sat at the edge of the seat on the end closest to the fire. She looked out of the window just behind the chairs and thought she could detect snowflakes beginning to fall as they passed by the window, catching the light from the soft glow of the room and crackling fire. She realized why this room had been so well used because it was absolutely perfect in here. She was brought out of her thoughts at the sound of the cork squeaking open. He poured a small amount into one glass and brought it up to his nose after he swished the liquid around the glass, taking a deep breath he went for a small sip to check the taste and seemed satisfied, only then pouring more and then the second glass not even noticing he had made them perfectly even without even trying. He handed the glass over to Betty who gladly took it.
"Cheers, I guess." She said as they clinked their glasses together. They each took a long sip and Betty had to admit, it was really good. She convinced herself it was much better than anything she may have chosen. Daniel relaxed into the sofa, leaning back and stretching his legs out just beside the coffee table, kicking his own shoes off and hiding them beneath as Betty had done.
"It's snowing." He said as he looked out the window. What had been intermittent flurries just moments before was now almost a curtain of white rushing past.
"Wow, it's really coming down." Betty said watching it fall. Daniel reached into the drawer on the underside of the table and pulled out a small remote. He hit a button and Betty realized he was turning some music on as she heard the Bee Gees blaring out from the speakers near the desk. "Dammit!" Daniel frustratedly shouted as he tried to fix the volume first then pushed another couple buttons changing stations until he heard soft jazz coming out of the speaker, thinking it fit the mood he was going for much better. He wanted calming music, sensing the need to relax and shake off the last seventy-two hours. Betty's twinkling laugh rang out already calming him more than any music would be able to. They sat for a few minutes contentedly listening to the gravelly voice singing to them about life in pink drinking their wine. Finally Daniel decided to break the silence as the trumpet faded out.
"So, did you need your laptop?" he broached the subject.
"What?" she asked him, being pulled out of her thoughts again. She had been doing that quite a lot today.
"Did you need Ernest to bring your laptop back down?" he asked her again.
"Oh, no. That's alright." She answered.
"I thought you wanted to finish up some loose ends for Mr. Dunne?" he ventured to ask, having a small feeling and hope that she didn't really want to work, but still he felt he should check in case her being here really was for work purposes rather than what he hoped it could be.
"I… I just told everybody else that." She looked down, blushing, another thing she had been doing far more often than usual today.
"Oh. Okay." He took a large gulp of his wine, Betty following suit.
"I don't really feel like working." She said matter of factly.
"I understand." Daniel replied, looking to the fire for a moment trying to hide his small smile of excitement, wondering if this would go the way he was silently hoping it would, or at the very least lend its way to a proper conversation with her. It sure had been one hell of a day, one hell of a weekend. Now that it was early in the week he thought over the past few days and felt so many mixed emotions. Betty was doing the same, wondering if what she wanted to say next would be as easy as she hoped it would. She took a deep breath, set her wine glass down on the table in front of her and looked over to him, resting her hand on his shoulder bringing his attention back to her. He set his glass down on the table and turned to her.
"No, I don't think you do." She looked into his eyes, searching them for something. She leaned in a little closer to him, and he subconsciously did the same.
"Betty?" He almost whispered, and he didn't know how the low gravel to his voice made goosebumps spread across her whole body making the hair on her arms and the back of her neck stand up. "Daniel?" she asked, whispering in return.
They leaned in closer to one another and he brought his hand up to brush some falling hair out her face and took the opportunity to cup her cheek once more. He searched her eyes and saw something in them he hadn't seen before, a wanting. He dared to examine the rest of her face, looking down to her supple lips. His thumb rubbed gentle circles, and he brought his hand down a little to brush it across the pink petals.
"Daniel." She said in such a small voice, he almost didn't hear her. He brought his lips down to hover just above hers. "Betty." he replied.
Their lips met, softly at first, testing the connection and as he heard her let out a small moan he deepened it, responding in kind. She brought her arms up around his neck and began to run her fingers through his hair, making him release sounds she hadn't heard before. He broke it off momentarily, looking into her eyes again. "Betty, wait, are you sure this is what you want?" he asked her, his voice gruff.
"Yes. Yes Daniel. Please, this is what I want." She brought their lips together again and this time she was the one who led the way, putting more of her weight into his body, sliding herself fully across the couch until she was fully pressed into him. He accommodated by turning so his back was against the arm of the sofa, and wrapped his arms around her more, bringing one up into her hair finding the back of her neck so he could bring her even closer if that was possible, making her moan louder than she let herself before. They broke apart once more, his voice came out breathy.
"I thought you didn't want this." he said to her, searching her eyes again. "That's why I stopped the other night. I was so stupid." His voice sounded like it might break.
"No, no I was stupid." She said, her voice low, causing him to have goosebumps now. He looked at her questioning her comment. "I shouldn't have let you stop."
"But we were drunk…" he said, his statement coming across more like a question. "It was wrong of me to kiss you then." He told her, a flash of shame crossing his features.
"No, Daniel, I was the one who kissed you." She told him. He smiled, realizing they both thought they had kissed the other when it fact they had kissed each other.
"Betty, are you sure?" he questioned having a slight joking manner.
"Pretty sure." She said, placing a kiss just to the side of his lips. He smiled again at the touch.
"I think we kissed each other." He said, placing a kiss on her in the same way she had done.
"Maybe we did." Betty leaned in again, placing a deeper emotion into the embrace.
They let their emotions take over and before long the two were splayed onto the sofa having sunk down and now Betty was laying completely on top of him. He was holding her balancing himself with one leg on the floor, allowing everything he had been feeling to wash over and through him. They explored one another's mouths tongues pressing into another and he couldn't believe that he was now doing the thing he had hoped for, for so long. Moans, groans, and breaths were released in unison and in response to each other's motions. The crackling fire, soft romantic music, and howling wind provided a soundtrack to their long awaited moment.
"Wait!" he suddenly shouted, stopping their movements and almost losing his balance completely Betty started to slide off but he caught her before she fell completely off of him. "Betty. Betty! Is this really what you want? I mean, I would be lying if I didn't say this is something I have wanted for a long time, but are you absolutely sure? I don't want to push you into anything or make you feel obligated or anything in any way. Please forgive me for asking this, but you've just been through so much, are you sure this isn't a response to all of the stress?" he looked into her eyes, pleading and hoping that she wouldn't hate him for asking.
She moved so that she could sit up and he allowed her the movement so that they were facing each other again, still close enough that a small motion from one would put them back into a suddenly new but familiar embrace.
"Daniel… I didn't know this is what I wanted for a long time. I had such a hard time when I left for London. I was really hurt that you didn't say goodbye to me, so I threw myself into my job, but I didn't know that the reason I was feeling so alone wasn't because my friend didn't say goodbye, it was because you didn't say goodbye. When you showed up, I was so happy. I thought it was because my friend had come to visit, but when you said you wanted to stick around, I knew that I never wanted you to leave again. We had been dancing around it for a very long time, and I secretly hoped that you had followed me there because you had feelings for me, but I never allowed myself to broach the subject because I didn't want to ruin what we have or chase you away." She looked at him and saw the look on his face, a smile creeping up at the corners of his lips. "But when we kissed the other night, I thought I had ruined everything. I thought you hated me…'
"I could never hate you." He interrupted unknowingly, and the smile his comment elicited made his heart strain, threatening to burst.
"And then all of this with Papi happened, and I got here and I realized that the only person I wanted, wasn't here. I needed you. I talked to Hilda, and I let it all out. I couldn't hold it in any longer. Then this morning, before I came in to the cafeteria Hilda came running out to tell me you were here and I freaked out. I ran to the bathroom to hide, but knew I couldn't stay in there so I ran to Papi, and he said some things that made me realize…" she stopped herself, debating if she should continue but she had come this far, she decided it was time to charge forth and admit everything. He looked at her, tension building up in his shoulders, he reached over and squeezed her hand.
"What did you realize?" he urged her to continue.
"I realized, Daniel, that I'm in love with you. I have been for a long time, I just didn't know it." He let out a small hoot of triumph which made her laugh. She didn't know it but she had begun crying again, but not out of grief or stress, these were joyful. He reached up and brushed the tears away, and as she looked at him she realized he was crying too.
"Oh Betty." He kissed her deeply once more. "You don't know how long I've waited to hear those words. Everything I have done, every decision was made so that I might be able to hear those words one day. I have been in love with you for far longer than I even know. When I found out you took this job, I lost it. I didn't know what to do, and well you know how that turned out." They both laughed a little remembering how he had almost burned down his office. "Betty, I didn't want you out of my life, and it hurt too much to say goodbye. I knew that if you really wanted it, I had to let you go. I was there, at your going away party. I saw you dancing and I just couldn't bring myself to talk to you because I was afraid I'd ruin everything by admitting to you how I felt. I didn't want to hold you back. I knew you needed to go. It was actually my mom who first made me realize that what I was feeling wasn't just about losing a friend. I realized I was in love with you then. Then I knew what I had to do, and I found you again."
"I love you Daniel." Betty said through an almost sobbing voice and looked at him with tear stained cheeks, reaching up to brush away some of her love's joyful tears.
"Betty, I don't think you'll ever know how much I love you." Daniel said, taking her hand in his and kissing her palm.
At this Betty leaned in again to kiss him more deeply than they had yet done. They found themselves laying in a position similar to what they had before, but this time Daniel had laid her back against the couch, gently pressing his weight into her. Seconds turned into minutes as they let themselves acclimate to the new sensations. They would go slow. Their hands began to roam each other, testing buttons and running them up and down, exploring each other's bodies in a manner they never had allowed themselves to before, except in daydreams. Her glasses had been placed gently on the table, next to the remaining wine. She had unbuttoned most of his shirt and was running her petite hands over his chest as he had begun to run his hand up her shirt, feeling the softness to the skin of her back just beneath the bra line, and before she knew it he had reached beneath and was searching for the clasp, undoing it as quickly as he found it. She gasped at the feeling, eyes going wide in wonder. She undid the remaining buttons of his shirt kissing him all the while, and started moving it off his shoulders. He smirked at her, encouraging her, and she smiled at his enthusiasm He removed the rest of the shirt suddenly, causing her to gasp again at the sight of him. He had definitely been taking care of himself, those morning and afternoon trips to the gym were paying off as his muscles were well defined, but not overly so. He looked so strong and she was proven correct as he picked her up, sitting her on top of him, her thighs straddling him finding her balance on the couch in this new position and he started to lift her shirt, pulling it off the rest of the way, raising her arms above her head.
Their shirts were thrown off onto the floor below, and her now loose bra was being removed slowly as she momentarily teased him, adding it to the small pile. He released a breath he didn't know he was holding at the sight of her, and gently reached out to explore her body, eliciting new moans from her that excited him. She shuddered at his soft but warm touch. Neither could believe this was happening, but it felt so right. He began to kiss her neck, moving to her chest and the hollow between her collar bones, moving downwards. She kissed him just below his ear and moved down which caused him to let out an almost animalistic growl in response. Hands roamed and entangled in their hair. There were no more words, only movements and touches. Before long they found themselves moving to the floor as he grabbed a blanket from the back of the sofa and laid it out on top of the rug, she had grabbed a couple pillows thinking they would help, and the rest of their clothing was removed almost as quickly as their decision to move had been. The warmth from the fire was almost too much as their bodies began to move in unison, joining in a way that neither expected after a long while of exploration and buildup. She had never felt so completely loved or whole. She had never experienced anything like it, and tried not to think of his years of experience under his belt. She knew he was skillful simply from the sheer volume of women that had passed through his bedroom, some with her own help, but in this moment she knew that none of them mattered. She could tell, this was an entirely different man whose heart and body were only made for her.
He had never felt this way before, not even with Molly. This was what he had been waiting for. By no means was everything exactly perfect, the usual amount of awkwardness and fidgeting had occurred as tends to when two bodies are meeting for the first time in such a way, and on a surface as hard as the one they found themselves splayed on top of, but none of it seemed to matter as they were completely wrapped up in one another, both giving and receiving the love that they harbored for one another. By the time the experience came to its natural and somehow (amazingly) in tandem conclusion, the two were so lost in one another that they didn't let go for quite some time, content to be, laying together, and neither were afraid to let their joyful tears fall, trailing kisses along their faces as the salty drops fell, showing just how much tenderness was behind their motions.
"Wow." She finally expressed her voice low, but breathing heavily.
"You can say that again." He agreed, his voice still stuck in a low gravel.
They kissed again, sealing the experience as if trying to burn it into memory, but there would be no concerns on that point, neither wanting to forget this moment for the rest of their lives. He took her hand and kissed her palm once more and held her hand to his chest. This had been so eerily similar to the dreams he had envisioned it was hard to believe that this was his reality, having begun the day in a manner he didn't care to remember running to catch a plane. He was so glad he had come to New York, and would never regret it even for a second. He smiled thinking of that dream on the plane, but opened his eyes to look at her and found her looking back at him smiling and brought his forehead to rest against hers, closing their eyes again breathing in the moment together. He knew that this was better than anything he could have ever imagined. This was so much better.