(As Seen) Through Her Eyes
Author: Lilian
Email: lilian413 at yahoo dot com
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Phoebe wants Cole to bare himself to her. All of him.
Disclaimer: Not mine. Although they'd much happier if they were.
AN: I've wanted to write this ever since I first learned Cole was half-demon. It has waited in the back of my mind forever, expecting the right moment to pounce on me and make me write it. After watching 'The Good, The Bad and The Cursed' again a few weeks ago, it decided it had waited enough. So this is set after that episode (sort of): it's just my favorite couple struggling to make sense of each other again, of Phoebe trying to let Cole know how she feels about him.
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"Phoebe, are you sure?"
His voice is low and tight, the only sign of the turmoil of emotions raging inside him. He looks at her intently, waiting for her response. He needs to know if she knows what she is asking of him, if she understands what this will mean.
Nothing but certainty swims in her chocolate eyes and he sighs in defeat. He understands why she needs to do this, but that does not mean he has to like it one bit. He does not want to do it, but knows it is something he has to do anyway. For the both of them, for the relationship they are trying to re-build.
Fear erupts within his chest and he contemplates the idea of fleeing from her. He squashes the thought quickly. Running away has been the cause of most of their problems so far, hasn't it? So instead, he suppresses his most basic instincts and remains where he is.
He stands a few feet away from her, the attic carpet a furry space between them. It feels strangely comforting to have it there, almost as if it can somehow smooth out the rough edges of their recently rediscovered love. He closes his eyes, takes a deep breath and morphs.
The world tingles and it's as if he has been struck by lightning. He winces, just a little, because the change is never without pain. He has just learned to deal with it, pretty much like with everything else in his life. He opens his eyes and he knows they are black.
He does not know what he expects Phoebe to do. So he just stands there, unsure as to what comes next, hisheart fluttering in his now massive chest and wondering if this will be the time when the woman he loves will break it forever. But she does no such thing.
She just looks at him, and even though there is a spark of fear in her eyes (she'd be incredibly foolish if she did not fear him. He is a demon, after all) she does not look away. Nor does she scream, which makes his heart slow down just a bit.
Belthazor and Phoebe have not interacted much, so he understood it when she began asking him question about his demonic form. It was simple human curiosity, he thought, wanting to know more about the things that lurk in the shadows. It wasn't such a small thing when she asked to see him. He haskept her from his darker half, mostly because he does not want her to see it. His demon side, the mercenary murderer Belthazor, has struck fear in the hearts of mortals ever since he can remember: he would die first rather than see that same horror in her eyes.
But she has asked this of him now, when he has only just been accepted back into her arms, and he cannot deny her what she wants. But it is more than that: he knows why he has to do it. If they are going to make this work, if they are truly willing to give their love another chance, it has to be for real. It has to be for everything. Including their dark pasts.
"I had forgotten you were so big", she said, speaking for the first time since his transformation. He is surprised to hear her voice: it is throaty, almost choked. His more sensitive nose catches the faint wisp of fear in the air and he makes a move to change back but she stops him before he can do it: "Don't."
She closes the distance between them and places a trembling hand on his bicep. Her hand is warm upon his red skin. He is surprised to notice howhe now towers above her: their height difference has never been an issue between them but now, looking down at her inquiring face, he realizes he grows as much in bulk as he does in height when he shifts.
He does not change back into his human form, letting Phoebe's eyes wander across his features and looking right back at her own. She looks so petite by his side it is almost painful, but his keener eyesight knows what to look for and can see the defined muscles in her arms and legs, and knows (firsthand) she packs a killer punch.
Phoebe's left hand rises between them, purple-colored fingernails shinning with that glitter she so loves to put on, and Cole's black eyes follow her fingers until she places them upon his cheek. She just rests them there, almost standing on her tiptoes, and Cole takes great care to avoid smiling. He knows the lines of teeth that lay behind his lips and now is not the time to scare her out of skin.
"It's—it's so warm", she muses, the whisper of her breath brushing against his face, and he nods. She moves a little to the right, trying to get a better angle. He does not understand what she wants to do until her fingers brush against the shell of his ear and caress the pointed end. He stiffens, forces himself to relax and lets her continue. He cannot remember himself allowing anyone this close to him while in his demonic form—he and Phoebe have touched while he was Belthazor before, but never this kind of intimate touch. And it awakens something in him, desires he has suppressed for a long, long time, and by the time she has moved on to the other ear, he is growling low in his throat.
She giggles and it is terribly endearing that she finds his predicament so amusing, but he does not speak. He does not trust his voice right now, because her exploring hands have now moved to his features and have began tracing familiar patterns upon his skin. The black tattoos carved upon his face are a reminder of his past, of things and events he wishes to forget—yet somehow to have her run her fingertips through them is strangely soothing and he unconsciously leans a little bit forward, bending down to allow her better access to his face.
Human skin feels strange against his own, he realizes, different than it does against his human half. It's almost as if his demonic skin is rougher, coarser—perhaps it is. Or perhaps it is only his perception, because he has never let himself be vulnerable while wearing this face.
Phoebe finishes her journey of his tattoos by tapping against the one on his chin, her hands cupping his face until each of her fingers rest upon one of the blood lines marring his features. She looks into his eyes and through the blackness of his irises, Cole sees something he never expected to see: acceptance.
His features soften, relief flooding through him like a tidal wave, erasing doubt and hesitation in its wake. She smiles, that rare smile of hers that he has so grown to love, and speaks: "Take off your shirt", she says, and her words are like a spear of lust running through him.
A low growl and two seconds later, he is sans a shirt and standing beside her bare chested, trying to keep his breathing in check. A grin dances upon her lips and she approaches him slowly, fully aware of the effect she is having on him.
It must be a female thing, he thinks while he watches her move like sin made flesh, to be able to drive men insane with just a look. He would die happy right now, because he has seen desire burning in her eyes. For him. For all of him.
She repeats the pattern she did upon his face: her right hand comes to rest atop his collarbone, nimble fingers curling against the thin skin there and warming his body with her heat. Her other hand begins to trace the tattoos that extend upon his upper body, angry black lines that cut the red expanse of his chest like wounds. Each of them a sign of victory, of a test completed and of blood spilt. The blood of those same innocents was imbedded deep into his skin, acting as ink to draw symbols that marked him as one of the Thorn. But her caresses are like tender butterflies, cleansing his body with her touch and softening the acrid reality of his past.
Phoebe moves in closer, rising on the tip of her toes to plant a kiss on his neck. His pulse jumps a beat as she does it and she presses herself against him, chest to chest from head to toe. Fire erupts within him and his clawed fingers raise forward, his massive hands big enough to encircle her waist almost in its entirety. They draw her against him and she melts against his chest like a living thing. Exploring hands move up and down the length of his torso until they find irregular skin and the scar that has never really healed.
He winces in response and they part, just a few inches, but enough for her to see the marring of the blood-red skin of his right side. An angry welt, the physical reminder of a time they both wish they could forget. Except they don't really, because it is also the time they met and that is something they both treasure more than life itself. So he wears that scar proudly, unlike those marking his face.
She looks at the leaf-shaped wound, the ragged edges of Leo's healing attempt standing out against the otherwise pristine red of his skin. She stares at it for a long time, and he watches her watch it, because it strikes something primal in him: his mate is admiring his body and it elicits the most basic of responses within him.
"Does it hurt?" she asks finally, breaking the silence that has blanketed them. He nods once, because she needs to know the truth, and hurries to clarify when her features contort in sympathy: "But it's a good kind of pain."
His voice is lower, much lower that his human half's, and it rumbles from within his chest. She shivers and it is not in fear, but Cole looks down and suddenly sees what is happening and is horrified. He takes a few steps back, letting his arms fall to his sides, appalled that she would let such evil touch her.
"We shouldn't be doing this", he begins, shaking his head, irrational fear clouding his mind, "you shouldn't be doing this, Phoebe."
She just looks at him, not understanding his sudden reaction to her proximity. How can she not see? How can she stand there before him and look at him and love him? He is a creature of the Underworld, for crying out loud, not an object of desire! Why should she love him when he cannot love himself?
He bends down, reaching for his discarded shirt, but she reaches him first. Her petite hands take his clawed ones and clasp them firmly, uncaring of the long talons that might rip her skin. "Phoebe, what—"is all he manages to say before she kisses him.
It is awkward and uncomfortable, because he is too tall in this form and she caught him by surprise. But that does not stop her, and soon his shirt is slipping from his grasp and landing with a soft thud on the attic carpet, forgotten in the wake of her assault. He does not know when he morphs back, and neither does she, busy as they were reacquainting themselves with each other's bodies after a long time apart.
But when they can look into each other's eyes again, it is Cole's blue irises that are filled with unshed tears, and Phoebe herself soon joins them. She discards her top and he marvels at her beauty, and for a moment wonders how did he survive before this; but then she is taking his hands, his human hands and placing them across her waist.
"I love you, Cole. All of you. You have to understand that if we're going to make this work."
He does not know what to say. What can you say when the woman you love has just opened the doorway to heaven itself? Maybe he will never be able to enter paradise – now matter how hard he tries to deny it, he will always remain a demon – but being here, with her, is the closest thing there is.
"Okay?" she asks him, making sure she got her point across. A lump in the back of his throat prevents him from answering her, but he nods, and she is satisfied with that response.
They make good use of that attic rug that night, so much so that there isn't much left of it by morning. But Phoebe keeps a small piece of it in a box under her bed, because it embodies everything they were and everything they are.
Forever and always, soul mates.
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The End.