Snow
By Midnight Caller
Rating: strong PG-13
Spoilers: none
Summary: It was one of those viciously cold February days…
A/n: Thank you, M, for all your patience and help, and thanks to D for the read-through and lovely comments. And to Mr. Baileys and DJ Tiesto, who both contributed in their own special ways.
Disclaimer: Ah, Hank, you know you own 'em, although I wouldn't mind owning just a bit. A tad? A tiny, itty-bitty piece? Dang. Well, in the meantime, I offer a disclaimer, but you think about it, okay?
*****
The sheets felt warm as she drew them over her body, which was now lightly coated in a thin layer of perspiration that caused her to shiver slightly. She wiggled her feet around, rubbing her toes against the linen, and then shifted her smooth leg so it fell lightly on top of his rougher one, eliciting a barely audible mumble from the man beside her. The sound made her smile against the pillow, and she rewrapped her arm around his torso, readjusting her head on his chest.
He was warm, so very warm... but the day hadn't always been warm, especially now that the sun had long since retired below the horizon.
It was one of those viciously cold February days, when no amount of sunlight could warm the air, and the wind seemed to be made up of tiny daggers that stabbed at your exposed skin whenever you attempted to move.
The individual memories of that morning and afternoon seemed to be frozen somewhere out on the icy stretches of the Hudson, and they were reduced to flashes of image and sound as Samantha tried to recall how she had gone from donning scarves and gloves to curling her fingers around the dark, disheveled locks of Jack Malone's hair as he lay in bed beside her.
The sidewalk leading into the Federal building was especially icy that morning, and she almost fell twice. Then she almost fell another time when her wet shoes betrayed her on the slippery linoleum of the office floor.
The office was overly warm, some weird form of overcompensation for the frigid air attempting to fight its way into the building, and she frantically fought to free herself from her scarf and gloves and overcoat before she fainted from heat stroke. She dumped the items on her desk, threw her coat over her chair, and then finally realized that no one else was there besides her.
Well, a few stragglers had managed to fight the delayed trains and inch upon inch of whiteness to get in, but the only other team member in the office besides her was huddled behind a mound of file folders on his desk, looking hopeless and lost. She stood there, smiling, before making her way toward him.
He echoed her grin as she moved across the carpet of her living room, peeling off her scarf in the process. When she was a few feet away he started to loosen his tie, never taking his eyes from hers.
She playfully batted his hands away to work on the tie herself, slowly slipping the silk out of its knot and pulling it from his shirt.
When she was done, her hands lingered on his neck, her nails lightly running along the top of his collar, eliciting a quiet gasp from its owner. She raised her eyebrow mischievously, and before he could determine what she could possibly be thinking, her hands suddenly fell to his waist, yanking the bottom of his shirt from his pants.
Jack's mouth fell open in surprise, but Sam quickly covered it with hers.
"Can you see me behind all that stuff?"
The sound of her voice made him jump slightly, and he looked up over the pile of folders to see her hovering in the doorway.
Removing his glasses, he rubbed his eyes. "I didn't think anyone was going to make it in today."
She stepped into the office, smiling. "No one else is here?"
"Actually, you're just the last one to arrive."
Her smile was replaced by a deep concern he found endearing. "Well, the train was late – it got delayed because of the snow – and then of course I almost broke my ass about five times on the way into the building, not to mention the hassle of actually getting a spot ON the train, because everyone was—"
The more she talked, the wider his smile got. Finally she stopped.
"What?"
"Relax, Sam." Off her look of confusion, he continued, "They only beat you by about ten minutes. It just means you're stuck with me."
She narrowed her eyes for a moment, and then came the unavoidable smile. "Oh, darn."
He met her smirk with his own and gestured to a nearby chair. "Take a seat. We get to do cold case spring cleaning."
"It's February."
"Yeah, well, the FBI is way ahead of schedule."
"Or... nine months late..." she added.
A file folder slapped down on the desk in front of her the second she sat down, and she shot Jack a smile.
The intensity coming from her eyes made him slightly self-conscious, especially since he was standing in her living room wearing just his boxers. Feeling the need to direct her attention elsewhere, he tossed his recently discarded dress shirt at her, and she had no choice but to move her eyes from him to the flying piece of clothing.
When she caught it, she merely held onto it while her other hand yanked her own shirt over her head. She returned her eyes to his body, and then slipped her arms into his shirt, giving him a grin as she let the material hang open over her body.
He wasn't prepared for her shirt as it flew at him, and he wasn't fast enough to catch it before it landed on his head. But he took the opportunity to inhale deeply, enjoying her scent, before gripping the silky material in his hands and shooting her a look of mock irritation. The expression only lasted a short moment, fading when he took in the sight of her in his shirt, of the material against her skin, his thoughts turning the corners of his mouth upward as he quietly sighed to himself.
Maybe it was boredom. Perhaps it was a total lack of interest for the stacks of folders on his desk. Whatever the reason, he couldn't help but gaze upon the ivory surface of her neck as she bent it one way and then the other, stretching muscles stiffened from being in one position too long.
Even with the desk separating them, he was drawn to the details of her body; the way a few stubborn strands of hair fell over her forehead, how her bottom lip protruded slightly as she mulled over a problem, how her fingers deftly worked through the stacks of paper, the way they gripped the pen when she signed her name...
"Jack."
He blinked, finding her eyes before wondering just how long he had been gaping at her before she had noticed.
He cleared his throat, gathering his thoughts. "Sorry, I was ..."
"Staring?" Her lips pursed as she tried to hide the smile.
"I wasn't sta–"
Jack's next words were stopped not by her look, or by something she said, but by the sudden onset of total darkness.
"Ummm..." he said quietly, hoping he hadn't just gone blind.
"Power outage?" her voice drifted over from only a few feet away.
"I... guess so... I thought we had a—"
He was cut off again as the overheads flickered before half of each set of tubes eventually turned on, dimly.
"...Generator," he said, finishing his thought, squinting at the sudden light. After a moment, he looked down at his paperwork and frowned. "Ugh... I think the flicker just gave me an instant headache."
Samantha's eyes dropped to her own pile of papers, and she quickly looked away, grimacing.
He looked at her, and then glanced at his watch, sighing when he saw the time. "C'mon, Sam, it's almost five. Let's call it a day." The keys jingled as he caught them in his hand.
Walking toward him across the carpet, she met his eyes, and his resolve melted like it always did when she looked at him that way. She closed the distance quickly and pressed herself against his body.
He swore the amount of heat coming off of them must have been producing some sort of glow, but he didn't have long to consider that possibility before he lost himself in her eyes again. She was just so close; how was he supposed to resist? But is that what he wanted – to resist her? When she took his bottom lip between hers and applied just the slightest bit of suction, he knew the easy answer to that question.
They stayed against the wall for what seemed like a long time, their hands and lips silently agreeing to play an odd game, allowing only feather-like kisses and caresses to be applied to the other body.
Their lips met, softly, tongues flicking out to touch just briefly. For the most part, their mouths hovered just close enough to touch, their breaths mingling in the tiny gap between them as they stood on the brink of a perpetual kiss. The contact, light as it was, seemed to heighten every nerve on his body, and his entire being quickly began to physically ache for her.
His hands in her hair sent shivers down her spine, increasing in sensation when he moved them down to her neck. His fingers hovered just above her skin, grazing her earlobe, brushing against the pulse under her jaw before drawing an outline of her chin, the lightness of his touch only making her want him more.
"Jack..." she whispered, her breath hot against his skin.
His eyes slipped shut.
"Jack." Louder this time.
He blinked, staring out the windshield as he avoided a pothole and steered the car down the snow-covered street, his line of vision occasionally broken up by the back and forth motion of the wiper blades.
Suddenly his brain reached its normal functioning ability, recognizing the location and the buildings lining the street. After a moment, he pulled into a spot in front of a tall, grey building with a green awning.
The wipers continued in their rhythmic dance across the glass, and they both watched as the skies seemed to dump and endless supply of snow onto their exact position.
"It's really coming down," she remarked, desperate to fill the air in the car that suddenly felt very stuffy.
"Yeah."
When she finally tore herself away from watching the snow, she caught him staring at her, a familiar yet always slightly intimidating look in his eyes. She was somehow comforted by his strong presence, the way his tenacity and temper wove themselves into the very fibers of his being no matter what he was doing.
But she felt lucky to see a secret side of Jack Malone, when he wasn't an FBI agent, when he wasn't her superior, when he didn't have to avoid gazing too deeply into her eyes for fear of losing himself forever. It was in the private moments that she truly saw him; his stubbornness turned to vitality and enthusiasm, and his temper morphed into a relentless passion that she found all but impossible to resist.
"Do you want to come in for some coffee?" she asked, so quiet she could barely hear it above the thumping of the wiper blades, back and forth, back and forth.
He didn't need to answer. She didn't even need to ask, though she always did.
He shut off the engine and let his eyes wander over her form.
The snow continued to fall, quickly covering every surface in a muted, white coldness.
He shifted next to her, the stubble on his chin tickling her forehead. She lifted her head and ran a hand across his chest, feeling his skin quiver as she did so. Jack's eyes opened, and watched as Sam turned onto her stomach, propping herself up on one elbow to look at him. Her other hand drew lazy circles around his collarbone, and one of his arms snaked around her back, his fingers gliding over the skin between her shoulder blades.
After their eyes met for a moment, her gaze fell to her hand on his skin.
"What are you thinking about?"
She smiled. "Nothing, really."
He raised an eyebrow in doubt, and she smiled again. She waited a moment, mulling over the words she wanted to choose, and then the corners of her mouth began tugging upward. Jack couldn't help but mirror her expression, and he rubbed a little firmer with his hand to draw her eyes back to his.
"What?"
She smiled. "I was just thinking about Gilbert Hughes."
He smiled faded for a moment, but it stopped receding when she made another circle on his collarbone with her finger.
"He lived next door to us, and... I think he took it upon himself to irritate me as much as possible."
Jack smiled and shifted, placing his free arm beneath his head, allowing him a better view of her as she spoke.
Her toes rubbed the smooth sheet again, and she licked her lips. "Once, when we were in kindergarten, Gilbert dug up some worms from his driveway and dropped them on my hair."
Her smile was contagious, and he felt his cheeks stretch to accommodate his. "Really?"
"Oh yes. And when we were seven, I helped him and his brother build a snowman out in their front yard. Of course that led to a snowball fight, during which he managed to pin me to the ground... and then he shoved a snowball down the front of my shirt."
Jack's laughter suddenly filled the room, and she felt him shake beneath her arm. She slapped his chest lightly. The hand beneath his head resurfaced to catch her arm mid-swing as she attempted to hit him again.
"He was just doing it because he liked you."
Her mouth fell open in mock alarm, and she leaned up on her arm. "How would you know?"
His hand let go of her arm, and he found her hair, running fingers through a few strands, marveling at the texture.
"Oh, because I stuffed snowballs down the shirts of all the girls I liked."
She paused for a moment, mid-thought, as some unnamable emotion passed over her face. He had missed the significance of his own words, and simply continued in his worship of her hair, his fingers running from her scalp all the way out to the ends of her blonde tresses.
After a moment, he noticed her silence, and then saw the look in her eyes as she stared back at him.
"What?"
His voice made her blink, and she finally looked away, casting her eyes somewhere in the vicinity of his upper chest. After a moment, she pressed her ear to that spot, resting her head in the familiar, comforting area.
"So did he get away with it?" he asked after a long pause.
He felt her chuckle. "What do you think?"
The arm around her back suddenly pulled her closer, and she could sense his smile. "What did you do?"
On their own volition, her eyes closed against the sensation of his hand spread wide across her shoulders.
Somehow she found her voice, and mumbled against his skin. "I stole his mittens and pushed him into a big drift. His hands turned bright red and he ran home screaming."
Jack chuckled. When his laughter died down, he inhaled deeply and readjusted his hand on her back.
As silence overtook the room, she let the memory tumble about in her mind, and she closed her eyes again, picturing the snowman... the drift... the stolen mittens in her hands... the slam of the porch door as Gilbert ran inside to his mother. She shut off the memory just as the image of her father appeared. He was angry, wanting to know what all the screaming was about, but she didn't let the thought continue, and opened her eyes to make it go away.
"So tell me about these girls," she said, her fingers continuing to make lethargic circles on his skin.
"Which girls?"
"The ones who had snowballs shoved down their shirts."
He laughed lightly. "Oh..." He inhaled again, as if that somehow drew the memory to the surface. "There was really only one... Christy Franks."
"I swear every boy's first crush is a girl named Christy."
"Well if they were like Christy Franks, I can understand why."
"Jack!" She scolded lightly, playfully pinching his skin.
"Ow! Okay, okay..." After she let go of his skin, he continued, "Christy lived down the street, and she was two years older than me."
"Ooooh..." She interjected, the sound vibrating across his chest.
"Yeah, well everyone had a crush on Christy Franks. I think it was required."
"See? I told you." She mumbled, closing her eyes again. Suddenly she felt his finger on her lips.
"Stop interrupting me..." he whispered.
"Sorry," she responded, just as quietly, mouthing the words against his finger. "Keep going..."
"Well, one day when I was fifteen, I decided that I was going to ask Christy to this dance our school was having... only there was a slight glitch..."
"Which was?"
He licked his lips and stared up at the ceiling, grimacing slightly. "Christy was sort of dating my brother at the time."
She shifted her head on her chest look at him, her mouth agape in a kind of half-smile. "Jack..."
He smirked. "Yeah, yeah, I was a brave one. Or stupid, I guess, considering Steve is four years older."
"So what happened?" she asked, raising herself up with one arm.
Jack shifted again, putting an arm behind his head. "Well... I remember the day really well... it was a week before my father came home from Saigon."
He blinked away that memory to make room for the one he wanted to remember.
"It was cold outside... it had snowed the day before, and it was just about ready to do it again... you could almost... smell it, you know? Christy was out walking the family dog, this kind of Husky/German Shepard mix – this very furry dog, that's about all I remember – and she passed right by my house. I had seen her leave earlier and I had stolen a flower from this vase my mother had in the kitchen. Then I sat out on the porch in my hat and my gloves and just ... waited for her to come back."
Without taking her eyes off of him, Sam laid her head back down onto his chest and brought her other hand around to rest on his shoulder, so she was almost laying the top half of her body over his.
"So I walked up, waved hello, and gave her the flower I'd taken. She smiled this kind of forced smile, but at the time, you know, I didn't really get it. Anyway, so I took this deep breath and gathered my courage..."
Samantha furrowed her brow. "And...?"
An odd wave of expression passed over Jack's face, a mixture of nostalgia and regret and something else she couldn't quite place, but it eventually left a grin in its wake, so she relaxed her brow.
"Right at that moment this cold sting hit my cheek, and before I know it, Steve tackled me to the ground and shoved two handfuls of snow down the front of my shirt."
Jack let loose a laugh that almost startled her, but it caught her more off-guard when he suddenly stopped and didn't continue talking. With a finger, she traced the outline of his shoulder and caught his eyes.
He twisted his lips and then took a deep breath. "The snow was ... freezing. Painful, almost, especially on my cheeks. I looked up from the ground, and there was Christy, holding her flower, giving me this look of ... pity. I'll never forget that."
She wasn't quite sure how to respond, and couldn't even catch his eyes to see what he was really thinking.
"I'm sorry, Jack."
As if her voice finally shook him free from the memory, he gazed down at her, and suddenly realized how concerned she was. He rubbed her back, and his lips turned upward. "Oh, don't be. Six months later Steve left for college, and I took Christy to her prom."
Her surprised eyes caught the twinkle in his amused ones, and realization washed over her features. She narrowed her eyes in mock anger, and pursed her lips to hide the smile.
When he only continued to smirk back, she crawled on top of him, holding herself up with an arm on each side of his torso.
"So did you really shove snow down the shirts of girls you liked?"
He waited a moment before replying. "Not really. I just said that to make you feel better."
Her glare couldn't suppress his smile.
A small but precise movement of her hips wiped the smirk from his lips, and he let out a soft groan as she ground against him. She smiled and raised her eyebrow in response to his groan, and then repeated the action.
His hands found her hips, stopping her movements.
When he was finally able to form words again, they could only come out as a whisper. "Is this your way of getting back at me?"
She looked down into his eyes, and then moved against him again.
"Yes."
"Yeah?" he breathed, his eyes struggling to stay open.
"Not really… I just said that to make you feel better…"
This time it was his eyes that narrowed, and his hands found both of hers to keep them from tickling his skin.
She opened her mouth to smile but ended up letting out a slightly squeal when he suddenly shifted his hips and flipped them over, pinning her beneath him.
"Jack!" she yelled through the laughter, squirming around in an attempt to get free.
He held both her hands in one of his, and lightly ran his other hand over her side. Her muscles quivered and she squirmed again, trying to suppress the laughter. "Is tickling me my punishment?" she managed to ask in-between gasps.
"For being a tease? Yes." He grinned down at her before lowering his head and his voice. "Plus you are beautiful when you laugh." She immediately stilled beneath him.
He had stunned her yet again, the laughter leaving her body as she exhaled. Despite their carnal knowledge of each other, they had rarely articulated their affection in a verbal capacity, and surely not in such an intimate way. She just never expected him to cross that line, to directly admit that this was more than just what it looked like, even though they both knew it was. When she inhaled, she just stared at him in a kind of amazement, and he basked in the glow of her expression.
"See? That's much better than stuffing snow down your shirt." He released her hands and ran his fingers through her hair.
Her eyes smiled at him, and her mouth quickly followed suit. With a smirk of his own, he watched her mouth turn up, and then leaned down to join his lips to hers.
Kissing her always seemed to bring the world into a kind of slow-motion, every movement its own focal point in the wonderful enclosed world of her bedroom. It had become second-nature to both of them, almost like carrying on a conversation, only it managed to stay as fresh and exciting as the very first time their lips ever touched. It was comfortable, yet erotic, urgent, yet devoid of worry or anxiety, almost somewhat calming, yet arousing far beyond compare.
Their mouths moved together, speaking to one another, breaking apart only to come back together again with just as much tenderness as before. Her fingers ran across his scalp, teasing the nerves already on edge, and she could sense his arousal just in the way he was breathing against her lips. He fingered her hair and settled his body on top of her, the weight of him an added comfort to the feel of his mouth on hers.
When they finally broke apart, he leaned his forehead against hers, trying to steady his breathing.
"Much…better… than snow…" she whispered.
He acknowledged her with a moan, which was all he could really manage.
She gripped his hair in her hands, keeping him close, and they began to move together again, slowly, and the snow continued to fall.
It had been one of those viciously cold February days, when no amount of sunlight could warm the air, and the wind seemed to be made up of tiny daggers that stabbed at your exposed skin whenever you attempted to move.
The individual memories of that morning and afternoon had been frozen somewhere out on the icy stretches of the Hudson, but now they were more solid memories as Samantha recalled how she had gone from donning scarves and gloves to curling her fingers around the dark, disheveled locks of Jack Malone's hair as he lay in bed beside her.
fin.