No Hope Left
Part Four:
-Post Mortem-
Chapter Two: Full Circle
Spring 2017
It was tense as hell for about a week. They walked around as if the other one might spontaneously combust at any moment. She kept her distance, he kept his, and they occupied different rooms with the vigilance of watchdogs waiting for an attack.
It got easier when they both finally stopped acting like the other might run for the hills or freak out.
He stopped avoiding her when she came around and he was with Kit. He let her sit on the floor while they played. Jill didn't play. She was trying. He knew she was trying. She wasn't maternal by nature, so having a kid was something that required her to work at it. She loved Kit, he could see that all over her, but she had to work to understand his needs.
He knew, even before her trauma, she'd have never been the type to have a child without it being an accident. Curious, he asked her one night, "...would you have kept him without me?"
She said nothing. He saw the hesitance and assured her, "...it's ok. I think I always knew the answer."
Jill looked broken and sad as she confessed, "...I wanted him...I just-I couldn't...not without you. I'm s-"
He shook his head and told her, "No reason for the sorry, Jill. No reason. I understand. I knew...even then we both knew it. I know who you are."
She lit with some kind of hope that scared him a little as she urged, "...you do. You know me. You're the only one who does, Leon...you have to forgive me."
He said nothing.
She laid a hand on his wrist and urged harder, "...please?"
He left her to finish the dishes alone.
It wasn't a yes, but it wasn't a no either. She had hope for the first real time in months. She went to bed and slept peacefully.
One night she sat beside him on the couch while he was watching television. He felt her inch across the cushions until their legs brushed on the side. He didn't move away. He let her align her body to his side.
Her breath caught. It felt a little scary to hope so hard. She watched him work in the yard one day and get sweaty mowing the grass. Her heart throbbed with want of him. She thought maybe it was time to test their limits.
It was so tense that day that Leon started to suspect something was brewing. She barely spoke. She stared at him and then away, flushing. He wanted to ask, but refused to be the first to break the silence.
He wasn't sure what it was that made her break first.
They had dinner and he went to his room to work on a report. He eight pages into a ten-page summary of a failed raid on a compound in Syria when the door to his room opened. He lifted his eyes over his glasses at her and asked, "You want something? Kit ok?"
Jill came into his room and closed the door.
She leaned on the door and whispered, "...I need you to-I need you to touch me."
He felt like someone punched him in the stomach. He said nothing. She cleared her throat and went on, "You can-it doesn't...you can pretend I'm Ada...if that helps. I just...I need to feel it."
He hated himself.
It was the first time he'd done so.
This was what he'd done to her. He'd driven her to a place where she felt like she had to beg him to fuck her and allow him to pretend she was the bitch who'd broken them apart. Just like the first time she'd touched him offered him the ability to think of someone else, she was here again, all but allowing him the freedom to treat her as a vessel for his seed.
He hated himself for it.
Gruffly, he shook his head. Jill, pale, pleaded, "Please? I know it's pathetic...I just-I'm lonely." Her voice broke and broke something in him to hear it, "I'm so lonely, Leon. Just once...just this one time...I won't ask again. Please?"
Jesus.
He shook his head again and finally told her, "I'm not-shit...I'm not saying no, Jill. I'm saying I don't want to picture anyone else. I don't-you don't have to do this. Not ever. I just-"
He gave up.
He was afraid he'd swallow his tongue and profess love like an idiot if he kept going.
So he simply...nodded. Like he'd done that first time. Like he'd done every time since...he just said yes to what she wanted, to what she needed, to what she'd offered. He nodded and Jill did too.
His alarm bells tolled until she reached for her sleeping shorts and tugged them down her legs. Her panties joined them as she crossed the room. She politely picked up all his papers and set them on his desk. He reached up to take off his glasses and she shook her head no.
Her hands unzipped him. They tugged down the zipper and eased them down his legs. He helped by lifting his legs as she tossed the denim to the floor. His mouth was dry like that first time as she climbed back on the bed and straddled him.
He was already shirtless so her hands smoothed over his chest and made goosebumps pop on his skin. She finally spoke, voice a little shaky, "...it doesn't have to mean anything."
She waited. He nodded. She reached under her and found his dick already up and ready. Her face flushed as she told him, "...you might hate me...but your dick doesn't."
Gruffly, he answered, "I don't hate you, Jill."
She tilted her head and whispered, "No? Then stop fucking other women."
Shit. He could confess that he hadn't, that he didn't want to, that he wasn't made to fuck anyone but her...but he didn't.
His stomach tightened with need. He slid his hands up the front of her thighs and over her hips under the shirt. She shivered, eyes dilating as he returned, "...done."
Jill whispered, eyes bright with emotion, "...I'll be gentle."
Jesus. This is how it was now. She thought he was wounded or something. She was treating him like she was...what? Using him? He told her, "...I don't want that either. What do you want from me, Jill?"
She shook her head and confessed, "...I want to be what you want. You want me to color my hair red like Claire for you?"
Fuck.
He hated himself.
Gruffly, he commanded, "...no. Ever. You hear me? Just be you...just be you, Jill...and just be...true."
Great. Now he was rhyming bad poetry. This is what she did to him. She made him yearn for her. She made him a poet without knowing it. She made him a mess. He wasn't sure what he'd been without her.
Leon's hand slid up her back and brought her forward. She went easily curling against his front to kiss him. Her hands kept on stroking, sliding his dick in her palms until he was throbbing and sticky with pre-cum. When they broke for air, he reached for the nightstand.
She shifted to let him slip the condom on before she angled him at her slick center and swallowed his dick into her waiting body.
She slapped his face when he surged. His hand came down on her butt. They both moaned in pleasure.
It was the first time he was ever grateful for the dysfunctional mess that was a woman.
It was easy after that.
They fell into a rhythm of work and family life.
They traded parenting responsibilities with ease. He was always there when she couldn't be, and she was never late for anything. They doubled up on doctors' appointments and play dates. They shopped and took care of the garden. They did dishes and laundry and watched television.
They put the baby and the cat to bed. She sat on the floor at his feet in the living room to watch television. He always pulled her up beside him without a word.
They fucked in the dark with Jill on top in her shirt. She held his hands against the headboard. She rode him. He let her. They never ever opened their eyes at the same time.
Leon started training new recruits. He brought Jill in to lecture and coordinate. They worked well together without a single hiccup.
Wherever she started the night, she always woke with him beside her. She didn't know anymore who was climbing into whose bed. It didn't matter. They didn't wake up alone.
He played for her. She listened. They never said a word about it. Their son was soft and cute and loving. They went to the zoo and the park and the carnival when it was in town.
Moira snuck away with Kit to buy him a corndog.
When she was gone, they stood in awkward silence before he hooked a hand into the belt of her skirt and tugged. They made out like horny teenagers behind the Tunnel of Love entrance. It wasn't lost on either of them.
She went home without any panties on.
In the car, he put his hand on the inside of her knee. If he'd thrown her over his lap to spank her pink again, it wouldn't have meant more.
During the warm night, she felt him against her back. He lifted her leg in the dark and simply sank inside of her. Jesus, she thought wildly, they'd become pros at fucking in the shadows. He could find her body like a homing beacon on a moonless night. When she cried out softly, his hand over her mouth kept her quiet since the room door was open and their son was down the hall sleeping his crib.
It was some level of trust that allowed him to hold her down while he fucked her. When she struggled a little like she'd roll over, he tested the limits of it. He caught her hands to pin them behind her back, he gently held her throat in his other hand to hold her face to him and kiss her. She submitted, wholly, without resisting.
He rolled her to the bed beneath him on her face and used her. He wasn't gentle. It was rough and hard, somehow quiet and punctuated by the wet sounds of surrender from her body, and her desperate gasps. He wondered if she knew what it meant to feel her completely put herself at his disposal. She trusted him. She'd come from a woman who wanted to kill herself to a woman who wanted to die in his arms.
It was incredible.
He knew why he couldn't let her go. She was so completely, entirely, and utterly his. He'd mounted her from behind and used her mercilessly and she simply opened, quivering in his grasp, and whimpering with capitulation. When she tightened in release, he rolled her to her back to pin her arms over her head and finish.
The condom stopped him from claiming her completely, but his hands caught hers and blended. They both swallowed their sounds of release with wet tongues. When it was over, he rolled away.
Jill lay in the dark, listening to him in the bathroom. She touched between her legs and shivered. She was still swollen and wet from him. The light from the bathroom spilled over her as he exited and she rolled to her side away from his gaze.
They slept facing away from each other that night.
Sex was their bond. It had once been the thing that drove them apart, but it was what bonded them now. Always at night, always desperate, like they were starving for the other person -it was sometimes the thing that kept her on the edge of her seat at dinner.
She'd crawl on the bed like a dog sometimes and wait for him. He'd flip her to her back and grunt with some kind of anger. She whispered, "You don't have to look at me."
And he snapped, "Shut up, Jill...and let me see you."
She was ok with it in the moonlight. She let him see everything but her scars. She hated the scars. She never slept naked. He never did either. They were careful to keep that one barrier between them.
Kit kept them on their toes. He grew too fast and learned too quickly. She joked, "...he's smart like his dad."
Kit made a sound like pfffft and babbled, "Dada...pew." He waved a hand like Leon was stinky and giggled.
Leon mused, "And a smart ass like his mama."
It was the first time he'd really tried out a joke on her in so long. She stiffened, felt her world melt for him, and returned, "...his dad likes a good ass licking though...from what I hear."
Leon chuckled and returned, "...you got us confused, Valentine...just sayin.."
He walked into the kitchen and made her heart soar. It was slow, but he was coming around. She'd earn him back. She was determined.
He was careful to sleep in his own room most nights. Her bed was where they fucked, his was where they slept. One night, she drank a little too much and went to sleep in his room.
She woke up with him behind her. He didn't hold her. He was just there. She rolled over and touched his mouth, missing him. It was hard to miss someone when they were right there, but she'd become a pro at it.
They never touched each other in the daylight.
He always came to bed with clothes on. This time he hadn't. Her belly tightened. She was simultaneously afraid and elated. Jill pressed a kiss to his sleeping mouth where he lay on his side. He murmured in his slumber and she slid a hand down under the sheets and stroked move brought him awake with a gasp. She claimed his mouth and kissed him.
When he was throbbing in her fist, she murmured, "You came to bed naked."
He never did that. She didn't ever see him drink. So he'd come to bed beside her...sober. His answer was a heavy influx of breath as Jill used both hands to work him. He finally caught her face to tilt it up for his answering kiss.
She didn't roll atop him, she let him roll her beneath him. Her thighs opened and let him in between. When angled his dick at her waiting slit, his hands caught the hem of her shirt and she halted, shaking her head.
He didn't take the no. He just tugged the shirt up. Her arms lifted and let him. Completely naked, they brushed warm bodies together as her breasts pressed to his chest and made her moan. He rubbed his dick against her wet body until he was as slick as she was.
When his hand reached for the nightstand, she told him, "...they're in your room, not mine."
Leon groaned in annoyance and started to lift off. Jill lay back on the pillows to wait for him. He volleyed his gaze over her face, but there was no judgment on her, no anger. She just looked...sad.
He gathered her hands over her head and gruffed, "What do you want, Jill?"
Urgently, desperately, she urged, "You. Just you. It's always you. I love you. I can't...I can't be me without you. I'm...trapped."
His voice shivered, "...you want free of me?"
She whimpered, "...no. No. Don't you get it? I'm your prisoner now...because I want to be. I want to be trapped with you forever, Leon. I love you."
It was so bad to crave that. It was so bad to want it like he did. She was so hateful to him in the beginning. She'd come full circle to a nearly mad love. He thrived on her devotion. It kept him...alive.
He wanted to feel like this forever.
He wanted to feel like this...inside of her.
He surged into her. Jill gasped in surprise, high and soft, hips lifting to take him. He seated himself inside of her, feeling oddly like he was coming home, and he felt the walls of her close around him. He leveraged himself up to watch her as they moved together.
Jill keened, "...I love you, Leon. I love you. Forgive me...just forgive me."
Jesus.
His heart.
He caught her right leg and lifted it until it was draped over his arm. Her left looped around his hips. They fucked together like dancers, a beautiful song they'd done so many times before, somehow the tone was different. It was filled with notes of regret and longing and betrayal.
She caught his face and he caught her throat gently as she begged, harder and higher, "...please. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
He just...his voice lashed out like a whip, "Shut up, Jill...shut up..."
She snapped her mouth closed, her eyes filled with tears, and he dropped his mouth to kiss her into silence. Jill whimpered, rising up to take him, and Leon avowed, among the sounds of their joining, "...I fucking love you too."
Maybe it wasn't a shout from the rooftops, but their love never had been anyway. It was one born out of something less storybook and more simple - a tempestuous mess of feelings in two people who'd almost given up on joy.
She clutched at him. He curled her tighter in against his groin. The dance turned wet with dewy sweat and desperation. Their eyes locked and held. She went first, bucking against his conquest of her from heart to loins. She tightened, mewling like a cat, and made his balls seize with preparation.
He laid claim to her so hard it hurt him. His body erupted in her sucking center while they watched each other. It felt warm and snug in her, like he somehow belonged there, comforting and complete. They gripped at each other as they both came down, panting and stuck to each other.
Minutes passed with him atop her and his mouth against her neck before he spoke, roughly, "...I would have eventually offered myself up as bait if you hadn't."
Jill froze and he conceded, "...I don't know how to do anything but risk myself, Jill. It's who I am...I can't promise you I won't die on you. You know that."
She nodded, holding on to his back as she answered, "I know that. I know. I can't promise you I won't do whatever it takes to protect you again. That's who I am too...you know that. I don't want to lie to you...but I love you. I will do everything I can to give you what you want here."
Softly, he inquired, "...what's that?"
"...family."
He put his face to her neck and shoulder and breathed her in. She stroked his head and whispered, "...I need you to promise me something."
Gruffly, he told her, "...anything."
"If there's a moment when you can jump out a window...remember you've got something worth living for now...and don't jump."
"...you want me to be a coward?"
"No...I want you to be mine...and Kit's...and put us first...over everybody else in the world."
They held gazes. He broke the silence by vowing, "...I'm gonna do the best I can to honor that, Jill...but I don't know if I can promise it completely and mean it."
She smiled softly, "I know that...and maybe you understand that I can't either...we're both too stubborn for our own good I think. Where does that leave us?"
He chuckled a little. He lifted his head to look at her. "Wherever we want to be. We make it work...and we just...hope."
Her eyes teared up. She bobbed her hand and cupped his face as she affirmed, "...I think hope is the only thing left."
"...and if there's no hope left?"
Leon gripped her chin and vowed, "...then we go out there and find it."
She held his eyes and remarked, "Do you really believe that?"
Her name was a misnomer, he thought with a flash of amusement, she wasn't the gooey softness of a valentine. She was a warrior. She just didn't know how to go down without a fight. Luckily for them both, she'd never been able to defeat him. He knew, what he said here mattered as much as what he'd failed to say that first night she'd touched him."...yeah, I do. Hope is everywhere, Jill...you just gotta go out a window to find it sometimes. You gotta decide if it's worth dying for."
Their son laughed in the other room and called to them. Both of their faces lit with something they'd both lost a long time ago and found somehow again in each other. When they might have died in the rain a hundred times, they'd found their way back to each other.
With their son laughing, Jill told him, "...it's the only thing that is."
Jill would always envy that wonderful optimism under such a hardened shell. She couldn't do anything but love him. He forced his way into her heart by forcing her into nothing. A man without any concern for himself, he just...couldn't stop saving her.
It didn't feel like her life at all. It felt like a story, or a dream, or a fantasy. She wasn't sure it would ever feel real, but it didn't matter. The fight was over, he'd won.
There was no hope left for it, she was the woman in love with the hero.