There's a discreet knock on my door. "It's open," I grunt.
I'm not too surprised when Xu slips in. He's always desperate for distraction after a mission, and I'm the distraction. There's a coffee cup holder in his hand, though, and that's new. Two cups, smelling good.
Xu smiles. "Are you still cold?" he asks, so innocuously that I have to snort out a laugh.
"And what if I am, doc? What are you gonna do about it?"
He offers me the cup holder with a look that's just short of a smirk. He waits until I take a sip from the cup - it's hot, strong coffee, and not the cheap kind, either - before following it up with, "You know, they say the best way to warm up from hypothermia is skin to skin contact."
It's so unsubtle that I almost choke on the scalding drink. "Is that so," I say, wiping my mouth. "Sounds awfully convenient."
He shrugs. "I can hardly be faulted for the oddities of biology."
I chuckle and take another sip. Right. Guess the three of us huddling under a blanket on the jet wasn't energy-efficient enough.
"Better not make a habit of cuddling up to me on the job, doc," I tease him. "Thought we agreed on discretion."
"I don't think our colleague suspected anything. Desperate times, and all that." He takes the other cup and makes himself comfortable in the chair, like it's been his room all along. I sit down on the bed next to it.
"Yeah, I guess not," I mutter.
I still haven't told her, which gives me the odd bit of guilt sometimes. You don't work together with someone for eight years and then not feel like you owe them an update or two. I don't know why I haven't told her, but-
Well, no, I do know.
It's not serious, of course - not with the lives we lead. And there's no danger that it's gonna become serious, or I'd probably think twice about letting him invite himself in for 'coffee'. But that's not the real reason.
That real reason is that she'd be nauseatingly supportive, that's what. I got into this to make my life more difficult, not less. I don't want to have to deal with Red making encouraging eyes at me and tentatively asking about 'how things are going', or giving Xu the number of the local rehab center.
(No danger that it's gonna end well, either. But nothing ever does.)
I remember the look Xu gave me on the jet, and decide to needle him a little further. It's more fun than contemplating my bad decisions, and I deserve a little fun if it kills me. Which it might. "Y'know, if it happens again, next time she might not brush it off as heat of the moment." I tell him. "Wasn't part of the plan, was it? Didn't take you for the jealous sort, poindexter."
Xu huffs. "I can assure you, I am not." Then he pauses and his eyes light up mischievously. "But... well... if I do ever happen to electrify the wrong door..."
I stare him down. "You had better be joking."
"Of course I am." He gives me his most innocent, harmless, most 'woe is me, I'm just a helpless professor in a house of spies and assassins' smile. I scowl back at him, because I honestly can't tell if he is joking or not. I'm not sure he can tell, and if he is, he might still change his mind later. I've learned not to expect consistency from him. It's not an encouraging thought.
"Good," I mutter. "Nice work with it on the mission, by the way. The shock trap, I mean. Would have been a bigger mess without it." I decide not to mention the part where he also got spotted by being distracted and sloppy, landing me in hotter water than I'd be in otherwise. There's a time and a place for mission eval, and the bedroom, it ain't. Besides, we already got chewed out by Central.
Xu doesn't answer, but the way he's drumming his fingers on the table changes ever so slightly. He seems more agitated now that I've brought up the job.
(It bothers me that I can tell.)
I could ask him why, but I won't. We do our best to avoid 'real' conversation by mutual unspoken agreement. Keep things simple. I already wish I hadn't brought it up. Not sure what got into me.
And besides, I can guess. New corps floating up from out of the deep. New security. Everyone's a little jittery. Feels like times are changing, which is never a good thing. I ask myself how much longer we can keep this up.
"How's the coffee?" Xu asks faux-causally, instead, but really he's asking me if I'm done yet. I snort softly at him - impatient bastard. If he didn't want me to spend time on the pretext, he should have brought me a smaller cup.
I give him a look and toast him with the cup I am clearly still drinking from, glad for the distraction. (Hey, it's good coffee.) He hums to himself and sets his own cup down on the small dresser, then casually removes his headphones and cap and places them beside it. I force down the smirk at that. Gee, I wonder what he could be up to.
He doesn't really wait for an answer, but moves to stand in front of me and pulls me up from the bed, pulls me to my feet, and turns his face up to kiss me. His ulterior motive becomes clear pretty quick; his hands are busy, warm on my skin and already peeling off my clothes with the precise efficiency of someone disarming a bomb, or maybe dismantling a hostile drone that's seconds from rebooting. He even manages to fold them before setting them down, which, yeah. First time it happened, I took him for a neat freak, but then Xu took off his own prized silk vest and just kinda threw it at a chair without looking. God knows what's going on in that head half the time, but he's willing to dedicate an entire compartment of unadulterated focus to me, every once in a while.
And okay, that's kinda flattering, and I guess it won me over at some point. I thought to myself, well, shit, if he treats me with the same kind of care as he does my precious coat, then I could do a lot worse.
God help me when I can no longer keep his interest. But like I said, I didn't get into this to make my life easier.
I've still got my hands around the coffee and it burns my fingers through the plastic as I stand there and let him kiss me. I set it down at some point, though, I guess. Without spilling it on the bed.
I wasn't cold, not really, not anymore.
But I'm not complaining.