Spoilers: Through season 4.
xxx
Donna had a date. And she wouldn't tell him with who. Josh had been trying to find out all week, ever since he'd overheard her telling Ginger about it Monday morning. At first, he hadn't understood why she wouldn't tell him. He'd never known her to keep silent about her dates before. Or about anything else, for that matter.
He finally asked her why on Wednesday afternoon, and had been surprised by the answer.
"Because, Josh," she replied testily. "I don't want this guy to find any sudden insight into my exploits involving mailboxes, mince candles, and underwear."
"If this is about the thing with Jack, may I remind you that you asked me to talk to him? And he went out with you," Josh protested.
"All the same, I don't want you fanning any flames this time," she told him.
"He'd probably think the underwear story was a turn on," Josh said helpfully. "Are you sure you don't want me to– "
"No," Donna said forcefully, and effectively ended the conversation.
Josh hadn't given up, though. He continued to pester her for the next two days, and even tried rather sneakily to sound out Bonnie and Ginger in hopes of finding out who the mystery man was. Unfortunately for him, none of them were very forthcoming. Bonnie and Ginger didn't seem to know anything, and Donna flatly refused to tell him anything else even though he had promised not to interfere in any way.
That's how he found himself in the office alone on Friday night, eating cold French fries and drinking flat soda, not getting any work done because all he could think about was who Donna could possibly be with and why she refused to tell him about it. Finally, he decided he might as well just go ahead and call her and ask her. Sneakily, of course.
When she picked up her cell phone, he greeted her by asking, "Donna, where's the Murray file?"
"It's on your desk," she told him.
He glanced down at the open file he had been attempting to read for the past hour. "Oh. I see it now. So how's your date going?"
"Fine. Thanks for asking. Ow!" she exclaimed.
"What is it?" he asked.
"It's nothing. Listen, I'm going to go. I don't think Rob is too crazy about me spending time on the phone in the middle of our date. God, that really hurt!"
"What hurt?" Josh asked, but the line went dead. He dialed again, but couldn't get through. He tried her pager, but that didn't seem to be working either. He tried the cell one more time, but just got her voice mail.
He put the phone down with a frown. Okay, clearly she didn't want to talk to him. That was fine. He was a big boy, he could handle things here without her for one night. He bent over the Murray file, determined to get through it this time.
He made a valiant effort for the next twenty minutes, but Donna kept intruding on his thoughts. There had been something off about that conversation, and he couldn't put his finger on it. He couldn't figure out why she had ended the call so abruptly. Donna usually made herself available to him at all times. Why would she stop now?
He groaned. This was pathetic. It made sense that she wouldn't want to talk to her boss while she was out on a date. A normal person might well turn off her cell phone during a date.
Only, she never had before. What made this Rob guy different than her other dates? And what had hurt her so badly that she could not talk on the phone any more?
Josh sat up abruptly. She had really sounded like she was in pain. And she had mentioned that Rob didn't like that she was on the phone during their date. And then she had said again that she was in pain. Oh God, what if Rob had hurt her, and forced her to get off the phone? He grabbed the phone and called her cell again.
Nothing. He tried the pager, too, with no result. He jumped out of his chair and paced back and forth in his office. Okay. Think. Where could they be? Obviously, they had gone out, but he had no idea where. Plus, that had been ages ago. They could be anywhere by now. Donna could have taken him back to her apartment.
Wait. It had been pretty late when he had called. They might have been back at her apartment already when he interrupted things, and Rob had gotten upset. He might have been hurting her inside her apartment and then taken her phone away. Josh swore and lunged for the phone. He called Donna's apartment, but there was no answer.
Josh grabbed his keys and rushed out the door. He had to get to her. He hurried to his car, peeled out of the parking lot, and was doing seventy in downtown DC before he knew it. He reached her apartment in fifteen minutes flat. He ran up the front steps of her apartment building and stood in front of her door thirty seconds later.
He pounded on the door. "Donna!" he yelled. "Open the door!"
He lifted his hand to bang on the door again when Donna flung it open. He paused. He wasn't sure what he had been expecting to find, but he certainly wasn't expecting to find Donna barefoot, wearing a large gray Harvard t-shirt that looked vaguely familiar and a pair of extremely short cotton shorts, and looking, not relieved that he had come to save her, but rather annoyed. "What do you want, Josh?" she asked irritably.
Josh felt rather foolish now that she was standing here in front of him looking somewhat rumpled, but otherwise unharmed. He felt relief wash over him as he allowed his gaze to roam over her body, looking for bruises, and was extremely gratified to see that her impossibly long and intriguingly bare legs were smooth and unblemished. "I was worried about you," he admitted sheepishly.
"Why?" she asked, folding her arms beneath her breasts.
"You didn't answer your phone, your pager wasn't on. I tried here and you didn't pick up. We got cut off after you said you'd been hurt, and I was worried maybe you couldn't get to the phone," he told her.
Donna sighed. She pulled up the right sleeve of her t-shirt, exposing a mottled bruise on her arm.
Josh's breath hissed through his teeth as he exhaled sharply. He stepped close to her and took her arm gently. "Jesus. Did he do this to you? I'm going to kill that bastard. He's not here, is he?" he asked, his entire body tensing in readiness.
Donna put a hand up to forestall him. "Josh. I walked into a door."
He looked at her. "You what?"
"When we were leaving the restaurant. I walked into a door and bruised my arm," she explained.
"He didn't hurt you?" Josh asked disbelievingly.
"He didn't hurt me," Donna confirmed.
"Thank God." Josh put his arms around her and squeezed her tightly, burying his face in the place where her neck met her shoulder. She squeezed him back and patted him on the back.
When he released her, she looked amused. "So, are you all right?" she asked with a little smile.
He returned her smile half-heartedly. "Yeah."
"Well, come on in and sit down. All this running around saving damsels in distress must be pretty taxing, eh?"
He grinned. "Well, when you say it like that, it just sounds silly."
"If the shoe fits. Josh, you do know I keep pepper spray in my purse, don't you?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Good," he said, devoutly grateful. He sat down on the couch and turned so he could watch her as she rummaged around the kitchen.
"Do you want a beer?" she called.
"Sure."
She pulled two bottles out of the fridge and popped the tops off. He watched her appreciatively as she padded back into the living room and handed him his beer.
"So what would you have done if Rob had been here and I hadn't been in need of any, ah, assistance?" Donna asked with a smirk.
"Probably keeled over from the intensity of the relief and embarrassment," Josh replied ruefully.
"Lucky he wasn't here, then," Donna said, taking a swig of her beer.
"Yeah, what happened with that, anyway?" Josh wanted to know.
"Nothing. Good guy, no spark," she said with a shrug.
"That's too bad," Josh said, idly letting his gaze run up and down her legs. He couldn't believe that he had worked with this woman for so many years without realizing how utterly fantastic her legs were. Of course, he had never seen her in shorts this short before, so he could hardly be blamed. She usually had so much more of them covered.
"Gee, Josh, that statement was just oozing with sincerity. I can tell how truly sorry you are," Donna said sarcastically.
"Yeah," Josh said, watching as she crossed her legs.
She laughed. "Josh, you are the only person I know who could go from being terrified for my life to checking out my legs within the space of five minutes."
Busted. Josh jerked his eyes upward and attempted a weak laugh. "I'm resilient, what can I say?"
"Whatever," she rolled her eyes at him.
"So why didn't you pick up your phone?" Josh asked.
"I turned the ringer off. I wanted to go to bed early."
"Wow, you're a real live wire, you know that?"
"You're hardly one to talk," Donna pointed out.
"So are those your pj's?" Josh asked, indicating her shorts and t-shirt.
"Yeah."
Josh frowned. "Hey, isn't that my shirt?"
"Yes."
"Why do you have my shirt?" Josh asked curiously.
"It got mixed up with my stuff when I did our laundry in St. Louis and I accidentally packed it into my bag," she said matter-of-factly.
"Wasn't that two months ago?" Josh wanted to know.
"Yes."
"Why didn't you give it back to me?" he asked suspiciously.
"I meant to, I just kept forgetting about it," she said.
He raised an eyebrow. "You forgot about it, even though you've been wearing it to bed?"
"Yes."
Josh snorted incredulously.
Donna picked at the hem of the shirt. "Okay, when I said I accidentally packed it into my bag, I may have been overstating the case. And when I said I meant to give it back to you, that might have been a little bit of an exaggeration."
Josh pointed his finger at her chest. "You stole my shirt! To sleep in!" he exclaimed.
"Not every night!" Donna said defensively.
"Why did you steal my shirt?" Josh demanded.
Donna shrugged. "It smelled good."
"It smelled good? Does it still smell good? Let me smell it," he said, leaning forward and sniffing the shoulder of the shirt. Donna sat perfectly still, but he couldn't smell anything. He tried smelling her neck for a second. Damn. Now that smelled good. But the smell of Donna's neck was not the scent in question. He sniffed the shoulder of the shirt again. "I don't smell anything," he said, sitting back in disappointment.
"Of course you don't. It smells like you! You're inured to the scent!" Donna said.
He looked at her, his jaw dropping. "I smell good?" he said dazedly. "You like to sleep in my shirt because I smell good?"
"Oh for pity's sake! If you want the damn shirt back, just say so!" Donna snapped.
He gaped at her. "Now?" he asked, staring at the shirt.
Donna rolled her eyes. "No. Sometime. Do you want the shirt back sometime?"
Well, if she wasn't going to take it off and give it to him right now, there was really no point. "It's okay. You can keep it."
"Okay."
"Can I have something in return?" Josh asked.
"I don't know, Josh. I don't really think any of my shirts would look good on you," Donna smirked.
"Not a shirt, then. Something else," Josh shrugged.
She looked at him curiously. "Like what?"
Asking for the underwear Karen Cahill had sent him was probably not a good idea, he thought, so he said, "You decide."
She looked at him for a second, and then got up and left the room. Bring the underwear, he thought at her, bring the underwear. She returned a moment later and handed him something. It was a bottle of shampoo. He cautiously opened the lid and sniffed the contents. Mmm. It smelled like apples, just like Donna's hair. This was great. He wasn't even sad about the underwear. Well, not too sad, anyway. "Thanks."
Without really thinking about what he was doing, Josh leaned over and gave Donna a kiss. On the lips.
He hadn't planned to kiss her. In fact, he was surprised when he felt the smooth texture of her mouth under his. Pleasantly surprised, but surprised. It felt so natural, so right. As though he had suddenly found something that he had been meant to do all his life. He hoped Donna felt like that, too. He leaned back a bit to gauge her reaction.
She looked surprised. Not unpleasantly surprised, he noted with satisfaction. Maybe it would be okay if he did it again. He leaned back in and kissed her again, and felt extremely gratified when he felt her tentatively kiss him back. This was right.
"Donna," he said, meeting her eyes. "I didn't stop for red lights."