THE CHOICES WE MAKE

Continued...

Emma awoke a few hours later in a cold sweat. Her dreams had been particularly unpleasant, mainly revolving around the man who had grabbed her in the club, except in these scenarios; Brennan hadn't appeared to play the hero. She felt like she needed another shower. Rolling over and glancing at the clock beside her bed, Emma realized it was barely 4 o'clock in the morning. Even so, she didn't particularly feel like trying to go back to sleep, lest the images of that creep reappear. Climbing out of bed, she didn't bother to put her robe on; no one would be about at this hour.

The kitchen area was deserted, so Emma poured herself a glass of juice- anything sweet to get rid of the horrible taste she had in her mouth.

Finding her way in the dark over to where the couch was, Emma was about to sit down when there was grunt from under her. She jumped up, giving a squeal of fright, this action causing the shape on the couch to give a yell and jump up also, knocking her to the floor.

"Hey!"

Emma recognized the voice. "Brennan?"

"Emma?"

"Yes!"

"What the hell are you doing"?

"What am I doing? What on earth were you doing sleeping on the couch?"

"I couldn't sleep," Brennan answered, still sounding slightly groggy, " I came in here, guess I must have drifted off." Realizing Emma was still on the floor her offered her his hand and helped her up. "Sorry I gave you a fright," he muttered, yawning and plonking himself back down on the couch. He moved over slightly to allow her to join him, but looking up realized that she hadn't moved. Noticing her staring at him with an odd, slightly shocked expression on her face, he looked down at himself. Like Emma, he hadn't expected anyone else to be about when he had gotten up to stretch his legs at 2 in the morning, consequently, he had neglected to realize that he was sitting there at that moment wearing only his boxer shorts. Emma looked away, embarrassed.

Brennan shrugged. "No need to blush, it's nothing you haven't seen before." He was right, Emma thought, they had all seen each other in nothing but their lycra black underwear when they were in the lab. Emma had always felt slightly self-conscious when she was being scanned, but it didn't seem to bother the others. Shalimar and Brennan particularly, seemed quite at home showing off their tall, toned bodies.

Feeling slightly silly at having been caught staring, Emma quickly moved to sit down next to him on the sofa. Brennan seemed to be considering her now, a slight smile on his face.

"What is it?" Emma was starting to feel self-conscious herself, dressed only in her slip.

"Nothing," Brennan grinned, "I was just thinking how innocent you still must be if you blush when you see a guy with no shirt on."

"I'm not that innocent!" Emma felt her cheeks redden even more. Great! Now she was feeling like the little sister again.

"You can't deny it, Em, you're clearly still uncomfortable around male bodies! You should have seen the look on your face when we busted in on that new mutant lying naked in his apartment last week. It was a picture!" To prove his point it seemed, he chose that moment to give a loud and obvious yawn, stretching backwards on the sofa and bringing one of his well muscled arms around Emma's shoulders, like a teenage boy in a movie theatre. Emma stiffened instantly on contact, causing Brennan to laugh, her reaction obviously being what he had hoped for. He didn't retract his arm, however, and Emma felt her pulse quickening as she found herself encased against Brennan's bare chest. She glared at him

"Hey, don't go getting all offended, I didn't mean it as an insult," the elemental assured her. Really, he thought it was nice that in this modern world they lived in she still had such a sense of purity about her. "It's like Shalimar said though, Em, you just need to loosen up a little, get rid of some of that tension."

"So what your saying is that I'm somehow lacking 'cause I don't go around taking my clothes off and getting physical with people I've known for 5 minutes and whose name I won't even remember in the morning?" Emma retorted, irritation quickly overtaking any other feelings she would rather not be experiencing right now.

"Was that a pointed comment?" Brennan asked, humour still lacing his voice. "I always remember the name of the girl the morning after getting physical with her!"

"Really!" Emma said, disbelievingly," So what was the name of that blonde woman you were with this evening?"

"Erm, it was Aimee... wait... no, Andie, it was definitely Andie, besides, this hardly counts as I didn't actually sleep with her."

Emma snorted. "That's only 'cause Adam happened to call us in early tonight! And for the record, I am not tense!" She tried to shrug his arm off her shoulders.

Brennan chuckled. "Sure you are," he said, moving the arm around her upwards so his hand rested now at her neck, "I can feel it, all this build up of pressure, making your muscles really tight right about here." As he spoke his fingers started rubbing small circles on her shoulders, making Emma shiver involuntarily.

"Stop it," Emma heard herself saying, her voice sounding forced, lacking in any real conviction. No, her body was saying, don't stop, don't you dare stop! His touch was intoxicating.

"Seriously Emma, friend to friend, this will help." she couldn't help it, regardless of the protests forming in her head, her body gave in and allowed him to turn her so she was facing the side of the couch, with her back towards him. His touch was light at first, gently rubbing from her neck, down across her shoulders and back up again. But soon it became firmer, his hands kneading deeply into her muscles. She could feel his thumbs pressing down along her spine and travelling right up the back of her neck and into her hair. Emma closed her eyes, basking in the feeling of his touch.

"So, are you starting to feel more relaxed" He must have leaned in because she could feel his breath against her ear as he spoke. The sensation caused her to draw a sharp breath. She reached up and stilled his hand, turning then to look at him.

"I bet you say that to all the girls," she quipped, trying to defuse the rising heat that the situation seemed to be creating.

He smiled. "What can I say," Brennan's face was now close to hers, his whole body was leaning towards her. She could feel the heat of his body radiating through her, causing her skin to tingle at the contact. He was looking right at her now, and she found herself staring right back, his dark eyes seemed to be drawing her into their depths. "I know what women like."

Emma felt a rush of emotions surge though her and she jumped up from the couch as if she'd been burned.

"I'm tired," she said quickly, "I'm going back to bed." And without another glance, she turned and practically ran from the room.

'What is wrong with you?' she asked herself angrily as she made her hasty retreat back to her bedroom. She had been so caught up in the pull of the moment that she had almost allowed herself to forget whom it was she was with. 'That's Brennan,' she scolded herself, 'He's your friend and is fully aware of the effect he has on women. He definitely doesn't feel the way you feel so stop getting so involved! You'll only end up feeling hurt and spoiling your friendship.' But how did she feel. As she lay there in the dark trying to make sense of her feelings she had to fight every temptation within herself not to look into Brennan's head; his emotions were private, she told herself, its none of your business. But she knew, deep down, that her sense of decency was not the primary reason she was holding herself in check; a little voice in her head was telling her that she might not like what she saw.

Brennan hadn't moved from the couch. A large part of him was now feeling guilty, realizing he had obviously scared her, of at the very least, made her extremely uncomfortable. He wondered for a moment if she had read some of the slightly inappropriate thoughts that had been going through his mind. No, he considered, she would no doubt have slapped him in disgust if she'd really seen the direction his thoughts had been taking. More likely she was simply dealing with her own issues rather than reacting to his. Even so, mixed within his inner tumult of guilt, there was that all too familiar feeling of desire.

When he had first laid eyes on her a year ago, he had thought her beautiful, desirable. He had been attracted to the soft and unassuming innocence she seemed to have about her, and those fathomless blue eyes. These thoughts had been slightly lost in the aftermath of the following events, he had fancied Shalimar for a while afterward, a part of him still did. His head, however, knew that this was purely physical. No man could not be attracted to the confident, feministic charms of the feral. He certainly wasn't going to mess up the team dynamic for one quick moment of satisfaction.

Emma was different, though. He couldn't work out the strange surge he felt when he thought about her. He had always felt very protective towards her, like an older brother, but his thoughts about her had hardly been strictly platonic. Every time he went out he found himself drawn towards any girl with blonde hair, any girl in fact that bore no resemblance to Emma. At first he had been trying to convince himself that she wasn't his type so he could forget about her, but now it was simply in an effort to get her out of his head. Brennan sighed deeply; it wasn't like him to get emotionally involved with people, though that had changed since he joined Mutant X. He felt emotionally connected to all of the team, so why was it only Emma that was causing him such turmoil.

He yawned, finally deciding he really had better get a few hours more sleep before going out tomorrow, he pushed himself up off the couch, and made his way back to his room. Sleep was a long time coming.

Continued in chapter 4... Thank you to those people who left reviews, i really appreciate the encouragement : )