Emma's Reason Why Not.

Author's note: Yes the title is a spin off 'Emily's Reasons Why Not', but I promise you that this story will not have a reason like Emily's.

Summary:Why would Emma never date Jesse even though she knew exactly how he felt about her? Set near the end of season 2.

Warning! This one is going to get a bit dark, and many of you are not going to like the way that I've written this! I promise that I'll get back to my happy go lucky work soon, but this one was just in my head and insisted on being written and presented!

Pg-13.

Emma's pale gray eyes sparkled as she watched Jesse at work on his computer. She had, over the last two years, become used to the hours that he spent working at his computer, and had eventually learned to enjoy watching him at work. It was the only time that she could really enjoy watching him with out him catching her.

She realized that he was closing out the program that he was working on and quickly went back to folding the clothes that had just come out of the dryer. Even though they alternated weeks it always seemed that she ended up doing laundry on the week the team had gotten the most clothes soiled during their missions. It had taken this load of laundry three runs through the washing machine before the stains managed to dissolve away. She carefully separated out everyone's clothes and set them up in neat stacks for delivery to everyone's rooms.

"Looks like you finished the laundry just in time." Shalimar said as she walked into the room. "Jess, Bren, and I have to go out on a bit of a mission. It's no big deal so Adam is just going to let you stay here and finish up the laundry. Jesse says to go a head and put up his clothes if you don't mind."

"Anyone else want me to put up their clothes for them?" the red head asked as she added the last piece of clothing to one stack.

"You can put my stuff up if you have time, but I don't think it is a real big deal. Jess just doesn't want to come home dead tired and have to clean up his bed before he can get in it and fall asleep. He's got quite a bit of a job ahead of him today."

"Tomorrow will be another long day of laundry then."

"Don't worry. Day after tomorrow I'll be taking the laundry over for a while, and you'll have a month before you have to handle it again, and if you get a landslide like this again I'll give you some help."

"Thanks." Emma smiled softly. "I guess that you'd better get going. I know that you don't want to be late."

Shalimar smiled as she left the room. "I'll see you when we get back! Maybe tomorrow we can have some girl time between loads of laundry!"

Emma quickly picked up the stack of Brennan's clothes and took them to his room, neatly setting them on the empty chair. Shalimar's clothing and her own clothing, with the exception of their lingerie, was kept in one of the spare rooms since the girls so often shared clothes and could never quite keep straight whose was whose. She carefully put the lingerie into the right drawers of the right rooms and then hung up or put away the clothes in their 'walk-in-closet' room.

When she got back to the common room where she had been folding clothes she found that Adam had already picked up his clothes and left a note for her saying that he was going to accompany the rest of the team out on the mission. She quickly gathered up Jesse's clothes and took them into his room so she could put them away.

After digging around in the closet for a few minutes she managed to find hangers for Jesse's slacks and nicer shirts. She quickly put the hanging clothes up into the closet and turned to the folded clothes that went in his dresser. She put everything away, and was opening the drawer where he kept his t-shirts when she saw the shirt that she liked best on him. Glancing around the room, mostly out of habit, she picked up the shirt and held it to her nose, deeply breathing in his scent. For a moment she was able to imagine him holding her, his arms tightly wrapped around her small form as they kissed passionately. Her eyes closed as she let her imagination take her further. The deep kiss that she was imagining escalated as he gently led her over to the bed, not breaking the kiss, and started to pull her clothes off of her body. Even daydreaming she could feel every touch that she could imagine him using, the way that he would caress her body, the places that he would softly kiss, but her body would harshly react to. She managed to visualize every detail of them making love for the first time.

She snapped out of the day dream just as she could mentally hear herself calling out his name when the first orgasm ripped through her body. Even though she was alone in the room and all of Sanctuary she blushed deeply. She carefully re-folded the t-shirt and was ready to put it back in the drawer when something caught her eye. Putting the t-shirt aside she picked up a stack of photographs, each and everyone of them showing Jesse with a different girl. Underneath the stack of pictures was a notebook that looked to be filled with complex, detailed notes. Her curiosity got the better of her and she picked up the notebook as well. She stepped over to the bed and sat down, putting the photographs beside her as she got ready to read.

"November 27. 'Date' with Jessica and Diane. Twins, both working at the same strip-joint for around 200 a night each plus tips. Jessica manages to pull in around 500 a night in tips while Diane pulls in nearly 1000. Jessica is flexible, possibly too flexible, and works far too fast. Diane is slower and seems to have more patience for the job. Diane also seems to have more tolerance for the kinkier things. Possibly useful for threesomes, but Jessica is useless on her own.

"December 2. 'Date' with Meghan. Just fired from a strip club in the slums of town. Made around 250 a night, and got too keep only 10 of her tips. Before her manager took his 90 she made around 2000 a night. Specializes in bondage, and especially S&M. Perfect for the more exclusive lounge, but will only work if she gets to keep at least 70 of her tips.

"December 27. Property for club obtained. All girls interviewed, tested, and hired. Contracts for the decorators are made out. Club is due to open in mid-February, just in time for Valentines day. "

Emma quickly dropped the notebook and ran back over to the dresser. She pulled out more and more papers and documents, finding the evidence that she had hoped was non existent. With in a few minutes her mind was spinning with new information. 'He owns a strip club.' her thoughts raced through her mind. 'He owns a strip club, and not one of us knows about it. How many times has he watched me and Shal dance at the clubs and thought about how we would fit in at his little club? How many times has he thought about asking one or both of us to come work there?' She jumped, startled as she heard the team coming down the hall. She quickly shoved the papers back into the drawer and then put the stack of t-shirts in over it before she ran out of the room, trying to make it to her room.

"Hey, Em!" Jesse called as he walked down the hall. "Thanks for putting up the clothes for me."

Emma forced herself to smile and turn around to face him. "No problem." she answered, his cocky, smirking smile making her feel sick to her stomach. That was another thing that she had never noticed, his smile was not all that warm and inviting; it was cold and cruel, filled with the knowledge that he had a whole harem of girls at his call.

"Look, I was wondering something." He said as he leaned back against the wall. "Do you want to go out tonight? The whole wine and dine bit at a nice place."

She nearly gagged at his proposition. "No, I think that I'm just going to stay home. I'm not your type."

"Just think about it. I know some great places that I could take you."

Emma smiled weakly as he stepped into his room. It was all she could do to not be sick at the thought of how many times she had imagined him with her, and how much they had flirted. Now that she new the truth she could never let it happen again. Now that she knew what Jesse was really like, she had a reason why she could never date him.