Ressler, Listen to Me

Part 3

Author's Note: Thank you to everyone following along. I have NO CLUE if this is even remotely possible in the upcoming story, but I'm having fun imagining.

This chapter is a little explicit and dark, but not so much so that I think the rating needs to change.

Please check out Agnes and The Long Game as well and leave a review.

VVVVVV

Don Ressler did not appreciate the lock on the door, the phone and keys in the safe, and Liz pretending like he was a free man. He spent the first couple of days that he was conscious pacing like a caged animal, asking her questions, getting fewer answers than he wanted, and exercising his shoulder. She was agitated by his behavior, he knew he wasn't helping the situation, but he didn't like being held against his will, whatever her reason.

She had tried to distract him, placate him, argue with him, and calm him to no avail. He was pissed. Pissed that she had made it look like he may have been involved in her escape, may have been working with her and Reddington all along, may have been a traitor to his country. And yes, he had to admit, he was being a prick. He couldn't help it.

On the third night, he had decided to take the bedroom and sleep, the hospital bed was just taking up space and there was a perfectly good bed and sofa. She wanted to keep an eye on the only exit, so she had taken the couch and he had gone to the bedroom and shut the door. His mind working overtime trying to figure out how he could get out of the tin can, tell Cooper the truth, and get his ass back home. He would never hurt Liz, he may not like her much at the moment, but he wasn't going to physically harm her. And, with his bum shoulder, she may easily take him down.

He heard her shuffling outside, probably getting the tea she always seemed to drink before bed. Don was just pulling down the covers when he heard a soft knock on the door, and it opened to reveal Liz standing in the door frame with two teas in her hands.

"I made you one as well," Liz said as she placed his down on the side table. "It relaxes me."

Don looked over his shoulder at her as he yanked down the covers.

"Not everyone wants to relax," Don said as he turned to face her.

"You know we are in this cargo container for another 2 days right?" Liz asked him. "It would be far more pleasant if…"

"If I wasn't held captive?!" Ressler snapped at her.

"I was going to say if you stopped snapping at me," Liz said, annoyed.

"I guess I'm not feeling like conversation right now," Don scoffed, his jaw tight as he looked at her. "You know Liz, I supported you through all of this, even when I didn't understand, but taking me? Letting everyone think something that isn't true about me? That's not what I expected."

"None of this is what I expected," Liz said harshly.

"Yeah, right, because it's all about you," Don said as he stalked toward her. "Not about the damage you may have done to my family, my career, my…"

"I thought you and I were family," Liz said as she met his eyes and tightened her jaw. "You said…"

"Yeah, I know what I said," Don said, backing down slightly.

Liz put down her tea and held out her arms wide like Jesus on a cross. "Say it."

Don met her eyes with a quick glance and then looked away.

"I know the reason you are pacing and biting my head off is because you haven't said what you really want to say to me," Liz said loudly. "Say it!"

"Go to bed Liz," Don said as he walked past her and took some loose cotton pants from off the side table where he's left them.

"Not until you say it," she said as she walked toward him and stopping several feet away, challenging him.

Don turned and faced her.

"I've got nothing to say to you, Liz," Don said, his jaw clicking with tension.

He reached for the edge of his shirt then he pulled his dark blue shirt over his head and looked at her, telling her to leave with his eyes. Liz stood her ground.

She remembered clearly him ignoring her in the SUV, him not even hardly looking at her when she held the assassin hostage, him clicking his jaw and gripping the wheel of the SUV as if it was the only thing grounding him and keeping him from killing her.

"You staying for the show?" Don asked her, his voice not as playful as his words.

"You do what you gotta do," Liz said as she placed her hands on her hips. "I'm not leaving until you say what you need to say."

Don threw the shirt on the bed and pounded toward her, his chest heaving, his jaw tight and his fists balled. He wished he was a different man in that moment, a calm cool, collected man like Tom Keen who seemed to be able to control his emotions, play the room, lie.

"Say it!" Liz screamed at him. "Say it!"

Don's chest heaved and he could feel the anger rising from his feet to the hair on his head. He wanted to punch something until his fists were bloodied. His eyes flicked to the wall covered in mahogany with steel behind it; it would do. He shifted the slightest bit, and she placed a hand on his arm stopping him. He flinched, his instinct to lash out at her, but his better judgement keeping him from doing it.

He looked toward Liz whose face was steely and ready for the impact of his words, as if she knew the ones that were coming before he even did. He didn't know until they flew out of his mouth what they would be, and was even surprised when he heard them with his own ears.

"You used me," he said tightly, his face intense and yet open. "Used my feelings for you."

He pulled back with his eyes after they came out, surprised by his own honesty and hurt. Surprised he had shared it. Surprised she seemed to know this about him when even he didn't.

"I wanted you," she said, her voice strong and without remorse. "I didn't use you, but, I shouldn't have allowed myself that…that moment of indulgence because it…"

Don kissed her, kissed her hard, and she was knocked back against the wall by the force of his lips and his body as if he had punched her. Her hands clamoured for his shoulders as he pushed her harder and harder into the wall, his mouth over-powering her and his larger, stronger, body closing in over hers. After the initial shock, she responded; she had not expected this. She had expected yelling, harsh words, things being said that he couldn't take back. She hadn't expected this intense physical reaction.

Liz pushed him back with her lips and her body, forcing him to take a step back and taking herself off the wall. She pushed him more, forcing him to take one, then two steps back, knowing he would never hurt her, never harm her, but that his emotions were raw and visceral. The kiss deepened and she reached around his back, pulling him tightly up against her, letting him know they were in this place of anger and upset together; that she was here with him.

Liz knew this was a different Don in this moment then the one who had made love to her that night. That night had been filled with unrequited passion, but tender and sweet at the same time. This…this was not tender. This was all of his pent-up emotions coming forward. This was the caged animal reacting. This was Don in his most raw form, with no control, no barriers, he was no boy scout in this moment. She needed to give him permission to be that, to be everything that would make him feel guilty in the morning. She needed to let him know she accepted all sides of him, even this one.

Liz reached for his belt and swiftly unfastened it causing his loose pants to buckle at his waist, she undid the one button and the top of the zipper and shoved them down over his bare hips. The kiss grew more intense, she felt his hands pulling at her hips, yanking them toward him so there wasn't a piece of paper that could fall between them. She felt herself being pushed back against the wall as his body again enveloped her and his lips moved from her mouth to her neck to her collar and lower and lower and lower. Clothes disappeared magically and were replaced by the heat of his body, the intensity of his kisses, the force of his hands and arms, and the wall of his emotions that slammed against her throughout the entire night. And when his emotions bubbled over, she absorbed them, took them as her own, shared her own raw desire and pent-up feelings of anger at the situation they were in, with her own heated kisses, a shove down onto the bed, the heat of her own body enveloping his, her own mouth finding every inch of his skin, her own desire leaving nothing behind.

Hours later, she lay collapsed on his chest, her body sore, his body bruised, and them both heaving. Liz and Don were trying to grasp not only their breath but what had just transpired between them. They were a mass of sore muscles, scratches, marks, and sweat. The room was stifling hot and felt as if their own passion had turned it into a make-shift sauna. Her head rose and fell with each large breath he took, and her body shuddered, she couldn't even assess which part of her was the most sore in that moment. She could see the scratches, some of them deep, that she had placed on his thighs and didn't want to think about the damage this may have done to his shoulder. Liz was coming back to herself when she heard Don's soft voice again.

"Are you okay?" He asked, concern edging his words as if he had just come upon the scene of an accident and she was laying on the ground and not on him.

Liz nodded, her words still not there quite yet.

She placed a hand on his stomach and could almost see and feel the knot forming in it as reality hit him, the reality of the last few hours.

"Don't," she said quietly.

She felt his stomach shake slightly and knew he was at battle with himself. Trying to take control back, to think of a way to make this right, to apologize.

She shifted and looked up at his face, knowing he needed to see that she was okay, that she was more than okay, that she accepted him and what had happened between them.

She smiled up at him and pulled herself up to kiss him, softly, and with acceptance of all that was him. She saw his watery eyes and knew that Don had just discovered something about himself that he may not have really known was there, or if he knew it was there, he didn't know how powerful it was. Don Ressler had probably never behaved like that before; he had always managed to quash those emotions, those desires, those needs.

"I see you," she said. "And nothing about what I feel for you has changed, except now, I see more of you."

Don swallowed hard and laid his head back looking at the ceiling and covering his eyes as soft tears fell.

Liz laid her head down next to his on the pillow and placed a hand on his cheek, comforting him. She knew what this felt like, to discover a part of yourself that you knew was there, but didn't know that well. An aspect of yourself that was was baser, was hidden, come out. The understanding that something akin to a genie that had come out of a bottle that you couldn't put back. How, now that you had allowed this darker, more visceral part of yourself to be seen, it couldn't ever be unseen.

To be continued….