87's POV – Soul


A/N: Hi everybody. In this chapter there is another bit of graphic sex, but mostly you'll find a lot of romantic stuff. So just stop reading when you see the dividing line if you're not into smut, ok? Please follow, favourite and review!


20or21noideaRJUN17

Time had stopped. 87 had no fucking idea how long they had been there. How long it had lasted

Probably not that much

Or how long they went on kissing after sex. He lost himself in the succulence of her lips, in the languid playing of their tongues, in the loving way she stroked his cheeks with her fingers.

What he knew was that he didn't want to move but that, sooner or later, he would have to. They had stopped panting and their sweat was drying on their skin. It was time. He locked eyes with her and she nodded smilingly. He pulled out and rolled on his back.

Jo sat up, stretching her arm to grab a fresh towel folded on her nightstand and used it to clean herself then passed it to him. Their actions were performed in silence and 87 could already feel a cold air of unease waft between them. Jo put the towel back on the table, then re-joined him under the sheets, put his left arm around her neck and snuggled against him, laying her head on his shoulder. Next, she slid her hand on the nape of his neck and touched his barcode tattoo, tracing over it with her fingertips. He bent his neck slightly on the side to let her look at it more easily.

"When did you get it?"

"The barcode is given to us when we are born. The number when we become agents."

"And when is it?"

"Seventeen"

She hummed, "That's a very sensitive area, did it hurt?"

"Not particularly."

She rolled her eyes and, with a snort, she commented "Of course".

And that was it. If there had been awkwardness, it had just lasted an instant and it had evaporated more quickly than their sweat. Jo snaked her left leg between his, 87 brushed her scar with his thumb and asked:

"Does it hurt much when you run?"

"Not particularly" she mocked then added "Only when I overdo it".

She went on talking, she told him about her rehab process, about how she had feared she'd limp forever, and the first time she had gone running again. Then she spoke about her life when she was a child, why she had chosen to become a doctor and a soldier, her most embarrassing moments when on duty. She was cheerful, light and self-ironic, just like when she spoke with her friends on the phone, perfectly at ease. From time to time she asked him questions: "What was your training like?" "When was the first time you held a gun?" "Have you ever been on holiday?". He answered honestly but in his usual succinct way. Fortunately, it didn't seem to bother her.

And while she spoke, he lost himself again in the luxury of her silky skin and warm body. He tangled his fingers in her hair – it was smooth, thick, lavish. Exactly as he had expected. Her breasts were pressed on the side of his chest, soft and lush.

His skin was tingling, as if his nerves were surcharged. It was not the first time it happened, it was something he had already noticed in the past. A tiny error made by his makers. They had been so thorough in eliminating every possible source of emotions, the love for food, the ability to empathize with fiction or music… but they had forgotten their skin. Perhaps they couldn't remove pleasure without numbing the perception of pain – fundamental for survival – so they had had to leave it. Or they just didn't think it would be a problem. But it was.

Many other times he had noticed that same inexplicable inner tugging when he had a woman in his arms, as if a part of him was pressing to surrender to some sort of emotional involvement. But every time, until now, his rational part had quickly taken over, transforming those experiences in annoying disturbances. Hence his aversion to cuddling.

This time it was different. This time his mind was already there – had been there for weeks – just waiting for his body to join in. Jo was playing with his right hand, caressing his fingers, interlacing hers with his. He wasn't sure if this was happiness but he was certain that he was content. Full. Satisfied.

Complete?

Maybe. If he could, he would have made this moment last for long, for days.

Years?

But he knew they only had a few more hours. And they also needed to rest. Soon they will have to sleep.

Jo was still speaking, giggling a bit nervously from time to time as if slightly embarrassed:

"Ok, now I have a confession to make. There's a thing I didn't tell you. Another reason why I went with you at the police station…. I think …. Was because I fancied you from the first moment I saw you at the airport…"

At the airport?

"I don't like to believe that this might have influenced my rational – my very rational, though very fast – choice of the person to trust my life with ….but…. I can't help thinking that there was also something in my brain which, in a sort of way, wanted you to be the good one… Thank God, I was right!"

He couldn't stifle a groan thinking of all the time he had lost. He could have approached her almost a month ago, he could have taken her away before the Syndicate found her, he could have been with her for weeks instead of hours.

Minutes.

Now they should really sleep.

Shit

Jo replied to his groan with an uneasy smile, commenting: "A bit pathetic, I know…". She was silent for a few seconds, then she spoke once more, cheerful as before:

"Ok, now that I have embarrassed myself enough for two lifetimes, it's your turn. I want to know about your women. About your first time, the last time, or whatever happened in between that you feel like sharing with me."

But it was late, he really wanted her to rest for a few hours otherwise she'd be too tired in the morning, and he knew that if he started talking she'd have new questions…. so he said instead:

"We should get some sleep now" and turned off the lights.

Only in that moment did 87 realize that he had made a mistake. Jo tensed immediately and saying "Sure, right, I'm sorry" she moved away from him.

The loss of her touch was almost painful.

"Are you ok?" he asked

Her answer was forced "Sure, I'm fine" and she tried to smile but not very successfully.

Her eyes were searching his but couldn't find them in the dark: a thin light filtered from the window at his back, keeping his face in the shadow while he could still distinguish her expression quite clearly.

"You don't look fine" he replied.

"No, I'm ok, really… it's just that…..I've just realized that I've …. dragged you into this."

What?

She continued: "I'm so sorry, You've been trying to save my life for the last 4 days, and now maybe you just wanted to sleep and I've… I've seduced you…." And she waved her hand to indicate the bed and their bodies.

What?

She winced sadly: "I don't even know if you like me."

The things she was saying were the furthest from the truth – besides, he was well beyond liking her – so instinctively he replied:

"I don't".

And it was his second mistake. Jo reacted as if he'd slapped her in the face, then she turned away and moved as to get up from the bed. 87 knew that he had to speak now or he'd lose her forever so he finally told her:

"I don't like you. I love you."

Jo froze and turned her face towards him, eyes and mouth wide in surprise.

He knew that he'd have to explain himself, so he went on: "That day at the airport, I had gone there to kill you and I didn't do it. I didn't do it because I couldn't. I just couldn't. And it was not because you were involved with the Agency and Al-Bayati. I didn't even know it then. I found it out later, the next morning when I followed you to Baltimore. Only then I understood that you had had an Agent in your ward and that the explosion you were involved in had been provoked by a Syndicate operative that was trying to capture Al-Bayati. It was then that I understood that my client was actually the Agency itself and that…"

He trailed off – it was not like him to ramble that way, and Jo was still nodding but squinting at him, desperately trying to see his face, and with a somewhat perplexed expression on her face. As soon as he stopped speaking she asked, timidly:

"Could…. could you go back to what you said before?"

He smiled "That I love you?"

Jo gasped again as if it was the first time she heard it and 87 saw goose-bumps rise on her skin.

"I do. I love you", he repeated.

And this time he told her everything. How he had spent his days watching her, how he had dined listening to her voice, how she had filled the silence in his life. How he admired her courage and her competence. He told her how beautiful she was and how he loved that she didn't even realize it, that she was completely unaware of the power she had.

When he finished Jo was beaming, surprise and fondness in her eyes. She whispered:

"Well, this is even better than what I hoped" and she moved closer to kiss him.

But something rubbed him in the wrong way. He had never felt so exposed and vulnerable in his life and there was something just amiss in her light happiness. As if she didn't realize that it was an impossible situation.

And perhaps you were expecting something more from her?

So he reacted in the only way he knew, keeping the distance, answering an innate need

To fuck up

to protect himself.

He blocked her arms and held her away "No, Jo, this is not better, this is not good, this is just not possible." He snarled, and went on with anger "I'm an assassin, I kill people, I've been created and programmed not to have any feelings. You call me Andrew but I'm 87, that's who I am, I am a hitman. The only thing I can do is try to keep you alive till we end this, but that's all, there's nothing else, there is no future, for us, … this thing, you and me, … this is just not possible."

She nodded, sobered, and, trying to reach him again, she said with sweetness "Ok, let's just try to stay alive till we end this, and we'll worry about the future later".

But he was frustrated, again that wasn't what he had wanted her to say, so he spat "You're not listening" and tried to move away.

This time it was Jo who blocked him and, taking his face in her hands, she said with force, gravely, almost bitterly: "I've listened to every word 87. You're an assassin, you kill people, and yet you've saved my life. You've been created and programmed not to have any feelings, but you've just said that you love me. You're a hitman, but that's only what you were meant to be, not what you are. You are the choices you make." She paused to let it sink in and concluded "And this is not possible, and yet it's happening. I listen, 87."

His mouth was dry. There were so many things she's said that he needed to process and the only thing he could think of with clarity was that 87 did not sound so well, that Andrew had a much better sound, so he whispered:

"Andrew is ok".

She smiled and repeated, softly:

"Andrew, I listen."

As he pulled up his neck to kiss her, the air rushed from his lungs in a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. They kissed, passionately, almost desperately, their mouths consuming their lips, their arms squeezing their shoulders and buttocks as if in torment. It was an odd sensation to have a woman in his arms and to still be yearning for her, as if nothing would ever be enough.


After a while Jo ripped her mouth from his and asked, panting:

"Do you want to sleep?"

Are you kidding me?

But then 87 realized that she really meant it: after all, he had almost fucked it all up because he had said that they should sleep.

Fuck sleep!

"No", he snorted and she smiled.

She kissed his neck then slowly moved down, tracing a wet, searing path across his chest and further down. She brushed the length of his cock with her palm before wrapping him with her lips. He sighed, eyes shut, and felt himself grow bigger and stiffer inside her mouth – he had thought that he was already hard when she had first touched him but evidently he had been wrong…

Fuck

The feeling of her lips and her tongue over him was almost too much. He pulled back her hair from her face to look at her and she locked eyes with him for a few seconds before closing them, smiling against his cock. She must have read in his face that she was making him lose it. She licked his head with the tip of her tongue, then made her lips slide up all over his length before swallowing him with a moan, moving down until she could take no more. Then she started sucking while pumping the rest of his rod with her hand.

Fuck

The pressure, the heat, the rhythm were an agony. If he let her go on like that he was sure he would come in less than a minute. He wanted to move, he wanted to stop her, he wanted to fuck her, but it was as if he was glued to the bed, as if his body was tied down by invisible threads, his limbs obstinately refusing to move.

Fuck, fuck, fuck!