PART 3

Sube y Baja

Literally, to go up and down: A milonga step in which the couple dance forward-together and back-together in outside right position with a pendulum action of the hips.

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She sat cross-legged on the floor by the sofa. Bill lay half-reclining on the cushions, his back against the armrest.

He hadn't batted an eye when she came out of the bedroom in her white silk two-piece pajamas and long robe. It was modest loungewear, after all. She did notice that, at first, his gaze seemed to skid across her and settle on a distant point somewhere above her right shoulder. She had an idea that the floor lamp in the corner had never felt so admired.

But that was most of a bottle of good Burgundy ago. Now it was nearing 3:00 am on Christmas morning. She was feeling pleasantly loosened up, and she had caught Bill staring at her chest more than once. Time was running out and she was ready to make her move.

"Chivalry's got nothin' to do with it," Bill was saying. "I gave you the gun because I trusted you with it."

He took another long sip from his wine glass.

"Chivalry's great and all," he said. "I wouldn't knock it. But when the rubber meets the road and the bullets start flying, I'll take a buddy who can handle themselves over a female you can't be sure won't faint or shoot you by accident."

"Well, to be fair, Bill," she said, "I have fainted before."

"Yeah, well," he waved his glass dismissively, "You was probably just hungry or something. Anyway, it hasn't happened lately."

"Case in point," he said grandly, "Didn't happen tonight. Last night. Whatever."

He stared at her and she felt a warm flush start in her chest.

"You handled yourself like a real pro, Davidson," he said more softly. He raised his glass in her direction.

"Here's to you," he said. "A buddy and a female in one."

She raised her glass and leaned forward to clink it against his. She felt her pajama top fall away from her skin and hated herself for using the ancient ploy, but she had to admit, such tactics had survived from time immemorial for one simple reason: they worked.

She took her time settling back on the floor and was pleased to see the flutter back in Bill's throat as he swallowed. She was glad she'd simply brushed out her hair and washed her face, resisting the urge to shower and apply fresh makeup. She had an idea that the unadorned look was more appealing after the previous night.

"Let's go outside for a minute," she said, uncurling from the floor. "Before the sun comes up."

He looked down uncertainly.

He looked comfortable, stretched out on the sofa. She had found him a big navy blue t-shirt to wear in place of his bloodstained shirt and jacket.

And he had actually let her help him into it, which she thought was promising. She had tried to be clinical when he sat on the edge of her bed to let her undo his shirt buttons.

"How do you do this by yourself?" she asked, trying to distract herself from the well-muscled chest appearing under the shirt. "When you've only got one hand to work with?"

She had the feeling he was glad for the distraction, too. He wasn't usually as outspoken about his injuries.

"That's the easy part," he said. "It just takes a little longer. The tough stuff is tying shoelaces and ties. Ties are a real bear one-handed."

She smiled as she slid the shirt carefully off his shoulders and worked it down his arms.

"So they just gave you the sling to keep you from moving your arm too much? " she said. "Not because it was injured?"

"Nah," he said. "Typical waste of material. I'm just lucky I've got insurance to cover that garbage. I must have fifteen of those damn slings in my closet at home."

"Kinda hate to throw 'em away," he said as she undid his cuff buttons. "I keep thinking, 'Well, maybe I'll bust a wing a block from home sometime. Then I can just run back and grab a sling outta the closet.' "

"Every little bit to keep the premiums down," he said. "Carlisle says I'm single-handedly wrecking the percentages. But he also thinks I caused the oil crisis and killed disco, so what're you gonna do."

She set the bloody shirt aside and paused. He glanced up from toeing off his shoes and gave her a quizzical look.

"What?" he said, looking down at the bandage around his chest. "Is it bleeding? I told 'em they could wrap it tighter. It's a lot easier when you get an EMT who's old enough to be a combat vet. They know what the real thing looks like."

"It's not bleeding," she said. "Not that I can see. I was just-"

She bit her lip.

"Does it hurt to touch?" she said.

"Not if you don't punch me there," he said. "I mean it's a little sore…"

She cocked an eyebrow at him.

"Okay," he said, "It hurts like hell. You get used to it after a while."

She hesitated, then held up her hand, palm out toward his chest.

"Can I touch it?" she said.

He blinked.

"Uh, yeah, sure," he said. "If you want."

He seemed as fascinated by her interest as she was by the contours of the bandage. He watched as she knelt beside the bed and carefully touched her palm to the raised outline of the gauze pad that covered the wound in the front.

"It went in here?" she said.

"Yeah," he said, and she noticed his voice was suddenly hoarse.

She slid her hand around the side of the bandage to the next raised area.

"And it hit your rib here," she said, "And broke it."

"Cracked it," he said.

She looked up.

He inclined his head.

"Okay, it's the same thing," he said.

She slid her hand further around his side.

"And it came out… here," she said.

"Two holes for the price of one," he said flashing a crooked grin.

"It's lucky it hit your rib," she said, still holding her hand against his side.

"I guess," he said. "Lucky is relative. It is better than taking one in the lung. That lays you up for a while."

She sat back on her heels and brushed her long hair back off her shoulders. She waited until she saw his shifting glance meet her eyes.

"Bill, when I saw blood all over your chest, I thought you were going to die," she said.

He cleared his throat.

"Yeah, well," he said. "Just as a tip for the future, it's good you didn't mention it. Nobody likes to hear that when they're lying in an alley bleeding."

"Hey," he said, looking away. "Where's that t-shirt, huh? I think you gotta draft in here."

She let it go at that. The next several minutes were spent trying to find the best way to get the t-shirt over his head without having him raise his arms.

Pam finally came up with the strategy of having him lean forward and hang his arms down while she worked the shirt up and over his head.

Inching the shirt up his arms and down his back created an opportunity for several minutes of close contact. When he finally sat back, she only hesitated a moment before reaching up and gently brushing the graying hair back from his forehead.

His only response was to take a deep breath. The next instant, he winced at the flare of pain and she felt guilty. Cursing herself for a calculating female she took his hand and led him into the living room. After getting him settled on the couch, she cracked the seal on a new bottle of wine and settled in to the next phase of her campaign to get Bill into her bed by dawn.

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She sat nestled against his side on the wooden bench glider on her balcony. Her feet were tucked up and she had tugged the heavy comforter from her bed up around their necks.

He noticed he was sitting a little stiffly and she wasn't sure if it was because of their proximity, the cold or his wound. She hoped it was only the first two.

"It's a great view, Davidson," he said, looking out toward the winking lights on the ocean. "You're gonna miss this place when you move in with Ralph."

She rested her cheek against his shoulder. Here comes the guilt again, she thought, he was making it almost too easy. But it was interesting that the guilt was about manipulating Bill, not about what should be the more obvious source.

"I'm going to miss having my own space," she agreed. "I know Ralph is going to have trouble giving up his privacy, too."

"Ralph?"

Bill laughed.

"Davidson, Ralph would give his left arm for you, much less his privacy," he said. "You're the moon and stars to that guy. I think you're the only thing that keeps him together most of the time."

She felt him shift, settling into a more comfortable position. She shifted too, using the movement to lean her head against the front of his shoulder and pulling her knees up until they rested on his thigh. When that didn't cause him to leap to his feet, she decided to push her luck. She brought her hand up to rest it against his chest.

She felt his breathing change beneath her hand. He was trying to breath normally, but it wasn't working.

"Yeah," he said. "Uh, that guy's really nuts about you, honey. It just about killed him that time you called it quits."

"Bill, I've been meaning to ask you. That stuff you said yesterday," she said slowly. "On the way to the airport. About me being jealous about Ralph and Alicia."

He shifted again. She shifted with him, not lessening the light pressure against his chest.

"Oh, that, yeah," he said. "I didn't mean nothin' by that. I was just, you know, thinking about Abrazo and letting my mouth run away without my brain for company."

"Oh," she said carefully. "So you weren't talking about that time he slept with her last year."

He stopped breathing. His chest went completely rigid under her hand. She was starting to get worried when he let out a little cough and shifted again.

"Uh, what're you talking about?" he said. "Ralph wouldn't- well, he didn't- I mean, uh, that's just crazy. Where'd you get an idea like that anyway?"

"You don't have to cover for him, Bill," she said. "I just wondered if you knew about it, too."

When he didn't say anything, she sighed and went on.

"Last November, when she came to LA to do the tam-" she hesitated.

"To do the feminine hygiene commercial," she went on. "I was spending a lot of time at the office. I wasn't around much for a few months and I wasn't paying attention like I should've. Ralph was lonesome and Alicia was the manipulative bitch that she is. It wasn't too hard for her to get into his bed."

"I blamed myself for a while," she said. "Then I blamed her. But mostly I blamed Ralph."

She shrugged. "And then I got over it. I know Ralph knows it was a mistake. And I know he loves me. It was a thing that happened then, under those circumstances. It wouldn't happen today. And it's not happening in Miami."

She waited for him to formulate a response. His, words, when they came, were not the ones she expected.

"He doesn't know you know," he said quietly.

"No," she agreed. "By the time I found out, it was history. We'd been through the whole Wilde-Classical Gas Concert thing. I knew how much Ralph cared about me. I understood the circumstances. It would have hurt his relationship with Kevin if he felt like he could never see Alicia again. If he worried that I would always be suspicious. So I let it go."

"How did you find out?" he said. "Oh. Alicia told you, didn't she?"

She smirked.

"In a way," she said. "She left her panties where I would find them. The one thing I really enjoyed about the whole nightmare was imagining her sitting there expecting the other shoe to drop. It must've driven her crazy waiting to hear that I'd dumped Ralph in a jealous rage. I liked to think about her sitting up nights getting bags under her eyes. But I doubt she really cared that much."

She glanced at him.

"How did you find out?" she said.

"He told me," Bill said.

She shifted to look up at his face. He was staring out over the water.

"Really?" she said.

"Yeah, he was pretty torn up about it," he said. "He really wanted to tell you. Clear his conscience."

She thought for a moment.

"You talked him out of it," she said.

"I told him he was an idiot, which he knew, and that if he ever did it again I would personally tear off his head and stuff it down his neck for him," he said.

"Then I told him, if he could swear on his grave, that he would never do it again and mean it, he shouldn't tell you."

"After a while you figure out there's the truth and there's the lies you need to keep the truth going," he said. "The truth is, he loves you. The other is just a thing that happened, like you said."

He hesitated.

"I guess neither of us gave you enough credit, Davidson," he said.

"No," she said. "That was good advice. If he'd told me before I had time to work it out for myself, Alicia would've had a merrier Christmas last year."

He gave a short laugh.

"I really hate that woman," he said.

"Yeah," she answered, grinning. "Me, too."

The sat in silence for a moment, then Bill cleared his throat.

"There's just one thing, Davidson," he said quietly. "It's good you're okay with what happened with Ralph and Alicia. And I'm glad you're not mad that I gave him that advice. But…"

"Well, the thing is," he said, "Basically, I can't figure out what you're doing here, unless it's about revenge."

It was her turn to go rigid.

After a long moment, she leaned back so she could look into his face. He was still staring out over the water.

"I mean, 'cause," he said. "I get that. It's just, you know, you're better than that. And I- I'd really like to not be having this conversation, but here we are."

She exhaled a long sigh, then turned on the bench to sit cross-legged facing him. His face was half in shadow, half-lit by the dimmed lights in the living room. His solid jaw was set in a hard line. She could see his mouth pursed in a tight bow.

"No," she said. "It's not about revenge, Bill."

She touched her hand to his cheek and gently turned his head until he was looking in her eyes.

"It's about me," she said. "It's-"

She hesitated and dropped her hand back to his chest.

"It's complicated," she said at last. "It seems like it gets more complicated every few minutes."

She took a deep breath.

"All right," she said. "Here's the thing. No more games. I'm just going to lay it on the table. But hear me out before you say anything."

He blinked and she took it for assent.

"I've got a crush on you," she said.

He snorted and rolled his eyes.

"Stop it," she said, batting him lightly on the chest. "You're supposed to be quiet and listen."

"Like I said, a crush," she went on. "I- Well, now I think it was always there, but recently… It's been really there. All the time. It's been driving me crazy. I keep thinking it will go away. I thought for sure after spending all evening with you, being impossible and annoying and full of yourself-"

He cocked an eyebrow at her.

"Oh, you know it's true," she said.

He almost grinned, she noticed, but instead composed his face into the carefully blank look of attention that she'd seen drive Carlisle crazy.

"Anyway, instead of getting better," she said and took a deep breath. "Well, instead of making it better, you were pretty terrific tonight."

His mouth opened and she held up her hand.

"I know," she said. "I was pretty terrific, too. You can tell me all about it later."

This time, she saw, he couldn't hide the grin, but he made an effort to compose himself again.

"So tonight," she said, "Apart from the fact that you're an incredible dancer, and all the women are crazy about you, and you gave me the gun, and you shot at the guy who was shooting at me instead of the one that was shooting at you, which was really stupid by the way…"

"Apart from all that," she said softly, "I thought you were going to die and all I could think was, I never did this."

She leaned forward and pressed her lips to his.

He took so long to respond, she was already sorting through possible ways to pass it off as a drunken mistake. When his mouth finally moved under hers, she almost laughed with relief.

Instead, she slid her hands up his chest and pressed forward. She felt his arms fold around her and it was as if a dam burst.

All the pent up longing and desire she'd been feeling for weeks, exploded in the kiss. She stroked her tongue across his upper lip and when his lips parted she thrust it inside.

She pushed up on her knees and pressed down against his open mouth, raking his lips, his teeth, his tongue with her own.

Everything fell away but the wine-sweet taste, and the warm, moist pressure of his lips. Then she heard and felt him moan under her and she almost cried out from the swell of desire that gripped her.

Over the roaring of blood in her ears, she heard a high, thin pulsing noise and didn't recognize it as coming from her own throat until he moaned again and she felt her shuddering response.

When she could no longer ignore the need for breath, she reluctantly broke the contact, releasing his mouth. Her skin felt feverish as she looked down into his dazed eyes and wondered how she had gotten so far above him.

She realized with a shock of surprise she was sitting half on his lap, gripping the fabric of his t-shirt in her fisted hands.

Her eyes widened.

"Oh," she said sliding off his lap and pressing her hands against the bandages she could feel under his shirt, "Oh, Bill, I'm so sorry. Did I hurt you? Are you okay?"

He blinked several times as his mouth moved wordlessly.

"Um, no, uh," he broke off and stared at her.

"What did you just ask me?" he said blankly.

She laughed and let her head fall forward. She pressed her forehead against his shoulder and breathed deeply.

"Oh," she said. "I really, really wish I hadn't enjoyed that so much. You have no idea how much I was hoping it would be terrible."

She realized his arms were still around her when his hand slid down to her waist an rested on her hip. She felt his shoulder relax as he bent his head and rested his cheek against her hair.

"Yeah," he said. "I know what you mean."

She took a long, shuddering breath and leaned back, sitting up to face him.

"Bill," she said. "Tell me honestly."

She inclined her head toward the living room.

"Do you want this, too?" she said.

His mouth opened and she rushed on.

"No wait," she said. "Before you give me a lot of 'ifs' and 'buts' and reasons why it's a bad idea, let me lay it out first."

He didn't interrupt, so she went on.

"Just for tonight. What's left of it," she said inclining her head toward the dimming stars. "Because in a few weeks I'll be a Mrs. Hinkley and it could never happen then. Because, I really want to have the memory to look back on. And, ok, just a little, because I've been really good all this time and I think I deserve to be a little bit bad."

She sat quietly waiting for his reaction.

"Are you done?" he said at last. "Can I talk now?"

She nodded. He stared back over the water.

"Yes," he said. "I do. Want it, I mean. I have, probably, since I first saw you in that stupid, little toy car looking like... Well, never mind. Anyway. I do. There's no point lyin' about it. So that's that settled. But-"

He pursed his lips.

"I'm gonna say something you're not gonna like, but that don't make it not true."

"Women are different," he went on.

She opened her mouth, but he held up a hand.

"My turn," he said.

"You can deny it all you want," he went on, "Women are just different. With a guy, it's-"

He shot her a look, then stared resolutely out at the water.

"I'm just gonna say it. With a guy, it's like we're walking around with a lightening rod in our pants."

She struggled not to smile.

"No, you can laugh," he said, shooting her another look. "It's pretty funny except when it happens to you. See this lightening rod is always getting shocked. Pretty girl – shock. Beautiful Counselor – shock. Most of the time, these shocks get, well, grounded. You know, that's it. But every once in a while, kapow, one shorts out the circuit board in the old beezer and you wake up next day staring at an unfamiliar pair of feet and you've got a new tattoo and a tongue that's doing a good impression of a cat box."

"Now you get to be my age," he said. "And it happens a lot less, but it still happens. The point is, because it happens a lot to most guys when they're just starting to get these short circuits, they have to learn to get used to it. They deal with the strange feet and the tattoo, have a gargle, and get on to the next thing. Girls ain't like that. They say they are, but they ain't."

"And, frankly, Counselor," he said giving her a long look. "I can't help but notice, you're a girl."

"Do you have any tattoos, Bill?" she said, grinning.

He rolled his eyes.

"Davidson," he said. "That's got to be the single worst pick up line I ever heard."

She laughed and he gave her a wry smile.

"Yes," he said, "Since you asked, I do."

He heaved a sigh.

"Look, beautiful," he said, "I'm trying to say, I may kick myself for the rest of my life, I know I will, but I'm trying like hell to be chivalrous here. And let me tell you, it ain't easy."

"Bill," she said slowly, "I'm going to lay on it the line for you. A wise man once said, 'chivalry's got nothing to do with it'. You trusted me not to be a female a few hours ago. Why can't you trust me now?"

He sat perfectly still, staring into her eyes. And then the mask fell away. For the first time, he consciously showed his clear and honest and completely open face.

"Let's go inside," he said quietly.

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AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Chapter 7 is rated M for Mature Situations and is stored as a gap filler story under the M Rating.

To find Chapter 7, go to the Main GAH Story List and sort for "M Rating" using the drop-down menu at the upper right.

The story continues in Chapter 8.

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- continued -

el Tango de Los Angeles

(Tango of the Angels)