GAH! Lookie-lookie! The penultimate chapter and my favourite out of them by far!
Thanks all for your continuing lovely, gorgeous reviews, I do love them so and they make me smile (like this ---> XD )
I really hope you enjoy this chapter as much as I enjoyed writing it...though to be fair, I had the most part of it penned out months ago!
I'll be quiet now and let you get reading. You get both parts in one posting today so no waiting like I usually make you do!
Enjoy!
Chapter 20.
"Damn it, Aladdin, what the hell you been eatin'!" Sawyer hissed and groaned beneath his companion's weight. His hands cupped together to create a makeshift stirrup for Sayid to step into and lever himself up to the small trapdoor in the tunnel ceiling above them.
"Maybe if you concentrate less on talking and inventing new nicknames for me then you wouldn't be having such a problem!" Sayid snarled in return, his voice contorted with the effort it was taking to open the damn thing. He thumped it once, twice, three times sending a dull pounding ricocheting through the tunnel around them and grit and dirt from the roof down showering them both in filth.
Sawyer gritted his teeth, grinding them together against the strain.
"I hope you're right about this bein' the place…" he countered through his locked jaw but Sayid either did not hear him through his absorption in his task, or chose diplomatically to ignore the Southerner.
Exhaustion from their frantic dash through the night was obvious in both of their short tempers and ragged breathing but eventually, just as Sawyer's arms began to shake, threatening to give way underneath the pressure and send Sayid crashing down on top of him, a metallic groaning noise sounded from somewhere that Sawyer couldn't see over his head and Sayid hefted himself up into the hatch that they were supposedly right beneath.
Sawyer found himself hoping beyond all hope that they were in the right place, that Sayid's maps had come through for them, leading where they wanted to go and not into enemy territory as he had feared throughout most of the night.
Despite his trepidation, relief was coursing through his aching limbs at the weight removed and he paused for a split second to bask in it…until the urgency of their mission pounded back into his mind, forcing it's way there and he reached up to find Sayid's hand outstretched and waiting to pull him up.
Stunned faces ringed them both, peering down at them with wide, startled eyes and whispering between themselves. A nervous electricity ran through the room, that suddenly Sawyer recognised as the living area of their hatch, the swan, once he'd gained his bearings and stood dusting his hands on the seat of his pants. He'd have to remember to thank Sayid after all this was over…and perhaps give him another new nickname as a 'thank you'.
Hope swelled up again in his chest suddenly followed swiftly by a sense of liberation. They were there. The other survivors from the beach. Ana had gotten them there safely. She'd obviously seen the visions that Walt and the other two kids had talked about back in the Hawk. He'd always known she was a smart-ass, but now she'd gone and proved it!
"Sayid!" the familiar voice, calling out desperately disturbed Sawyer's thoughts and the smirk that had been growing upon his lips, curling them upwards towards his returning dimples.
"Shannon!" Sayid replied, the relief audible in his tone as he whipped his head around, searching for her face amidst the crowd, ignoring the thousands of questions being hurled their way.
What were they doing there?
Where were the others from the rescue party?
Where the Others really coming?
Shannon shoved her way, a little less than politely, through the congregation until she slammed into Sayid's waiting arms and wound her long, slim, tanned arms around his neck as if she thought he might disappear back down the hole they'd come through at any minute.
"I'm so glad you're alright!" she breathed, closing her amber eyes against the tears of jubilation that welled there. "I'm so glad you're back!"
Sayid returned her fervent embrace just as fiercely and the gathering of people around the trio slowly and reluctantly dispersed seeing that they were not likely to be getting any answers anytime soon.
Sawyer smothered a smile at the couple's reunion and instead sent his gaze around the packed room, hoping to find the face of the survivor that he knew the best, that he was the most hungry to see again. His eyes scanned around, over heads and at faces that he knew well but was not seeking. His blue eyes searched faster and faster, the panic again rising clawingly in his chest, his heart sinking.
He couldn't see her. He couldn't find her.
She wasn't there. Again. Was this just a repeat performance of the day that he had disappeared on the rescue mission, leaving her behind? Was she really still angry at him? She couldn't be…could she?
"Sawyer…" Shannon's voice, slightly muffled by Sayid's embrace, interrupted his disappointment. The heartbroken quaver in her tone making his stomach almost plunge down to his feet.
Oh no…oh god, no, please!
"Where is she?" he demanded gruffly, spinning to glare at the young woman. "Where!" his demand rose in volume as apprehension and anger and horror mingled there. He paced closer to her, covering the few steps that separated them, searching her face and wide, tear-filled eyes for the truth that he didn't want to see, didn't want to know…and yet had to.
Was he too late after all? Had she really been stolen from him before he could make it right between them again?
Shannon's eyes held his until the anguish and intensity of his dark blue stare made her turn her face down to the bare concrete of the floor. She cleared her throat, clogged with upset and took a deep, wavering breath, readying herself to speak.
"I wanted to go with her…" she murmured, eyebrows quirking upwards as guilty tears threatened to fall. "She wouldn't let me…She and Kate went back to et the last group of people at the beach…" she fell silent for an agonisingly long moment as Sayid kissed the top of her head comfortingly, holding her close, no doubt relieved that Ana had made her stay in the safety of the hatch. "They haven't come back…"
He stood staring at the blonde woman before him for all of a split second, a heartbeat, mouth gaping as his muddled and terrified mind ran over her words and all of the worst case scenarios that could have befallen Ana-Lucia.
Sayid was speaking to him, but he couldn't understand or hear even. The Iraqi was gripping Sawyer firmly by the shoulder but the Southern Conman wasn't aware at all.
And then, though the haze of devastation and sickness coiling like a cold snake in his stomach, Sawyer remembered the words of the little girl they'd rescued. Emma.
'Ana's okay…she's strong.'
And he believed it.
Clenching his jaw tight, dropping everything, even his weapons, Sawyer took off at a furious, pelting run again, mindless of his tired, protesting limbs and burning lungs desperate for oxygen and the need to breathe. Past the still bewildered stares of his fellow survivors. Ignoring the shouts and calls of Sayid and Jack who had been pacing anxiously at the hatch's entrance like a cages tiger.
He broke through into the jungle, not caring if anyone followed him or if the Others were still out there. It was better for him if they were, that way he could kill them all easier.
He had to find her. She was strong and she was the smartest person he knew, had ever known. She'd want to protect the group in her custody. She'd lead them somewhere that she could keep them safe.
The caves.
-oOo-
He ran and he ran for what seemed forever. For days, weeks, months, years…or maybe just the ten minutes that it took him to reach the caves in the slowly brightening light of dawn.
No one was there in the jungle surrounding his destination. No whispers seeping out towards him in warning that the Others were there or coming. Perhaps they hadn't got there yet…perhaps they hadn't been coming at all and Nora Hewmot had just been one crazy, deranged bitch that liked to be the centre of everyone's attention.
Sawyer slowed from his run into a jog and then a walk as he glanced about, searching for any signs of ambush as he broke through finally and slowly into the clearing about the mouth of the cave entrance.
And then he saw her and relief bloomed in his chest, swelling there and growing to curl his lips into a smile, any thoughts of the Others and danger long since forgotten…until his eyes truly took in the scene before him.
Her gun was grasped deathly tight in her force white fists, as if it was the very thing that was keeping her alive, kept the breath in her lungs and the beat in her heart. She turned back and forth, frantically, terrified. He could see the body of someone, was that Scott or Steve, several paces to her left, bullet between his eyes, no doubt dead and perhaps the better for it judging from the fear that tainted the air. He could see the slick crimson coating her left shoulder, the one nearest to him and the dark stain seeping down from her left thigh as well. She was hit and she was hurt and the thought of both of those notions combined made him grit his teeth in anger and possessive fury. No one but no one was permitted to touch her, let alone bring harm to her in any way. No one was allowed to do such things and if they did, as they had, he was going to hunt them down and hurt them in ways that they couldn't even imagine, in ways that he himself couldn't even imagine just yet, he was too fury-stricken.
Slowly, as the red haze of anger receded from his veins just enough so that he could think straight, he forced his body into a stunted step forwards, rustling the bush about him, twigs snapping beneath his feet, intent on reaching her and making sure that she was alright.
And she spun directly to face him, locking her eyes onto his, wide with both fear and surprise and recognition, even as her finger compressed the trigger of her gun, firing it before she had a chance to halt her reflex actions.
Sawyer's stride faltered and he glanced down at his own belly, hands splayed and pressed there in his own reaction to her aim and shot.
He laughed lightly, braving a dimpled grin flashed up at her before he glanced back down again, peeling his hands from where they were putting pressure, finger by finger. Agonisingly slow.
"Sawyer-I-" her throat constricted, cutting her words short from the torrent of emotions suddenly raging through her like the blood thundering in her ears. Her hands began to shake and she hurled the gun away from her as if it had scalded her, stumbling her own way towards him until she could reach out and touch him if she wanted. If the desire took a hold of her.
Sawyer loosed another bark of laughter suddenly and Ana felt tears sting at the corners of her eyes. She felt sick and cold and it started in her gut, squirming it's way up into her throat as the taste of bile and acid and guilt and horror.
She'd shot him! She just shot the man she lo-
-oOo-
Her dreams were fitful and dark. She tossed and turned, every part of her body on fire with pain. Every inch of her skin drenched in sweat from the sheer exertion it took to keep her in the land of the living, even if she was not conscious any more.
Her sleep was not restful, instead troubled and plagued by nightmares that terrified her more than anything in her life ever had. Striking her deep, to her very core.
Nightmares of the darkness about her, and noises and screams as the Others, their faces blank and unseen by her, charged at her, tried to kill her, and she gunned them down in return to save her friends, the people, innocent people who didn't deserve any of this. The people she had sworn to protect.
And then, out of the shadows came his face. Familiar and beautiful to her then in that brief split second of surreal-ness…
…And she woke with a start.
She knew what had happened!
-oOo-
"Sawyer!" his name left her parched throat in the form of an anguished sob, even before her eyes had forced themselves open and free from the hazy veil of sleep that had covered her and made her negligent of her surroundings.
She fought the pain that flared throughout her entire body, struggling to sit upright and take stock of her whereabouts, blinking blearily.
Where the hell was she? Surely not still in the jungle, before the caves? Had the Others taken her? Was she their captive now?...Was she dead?
Unable to force her body upright as the agony overwhelmed her, Ana-Lucia lay back down, finding her resting place soft and clean and not the jungle floor where she had fallen defending the caves and the survivors huddled together inside for safety.
Her fingers smoothed against the blankets, beneath her and covering her. She blinked a little harder, swallowing the pain and tears that had risen chokingly in her throat. Threatening to force their way past her lips and defences.
She tried to sit up again suddenly. Desperation driving her now as she called out again, as loud as she could with her hoarse throat/
"Sawyer!"
Silence met her in reply once more and the stinging of upset grew more fierce in the corners of her eyes.
She'd shot him! She pulled the trigger and shot him exactly the same way that she had Shannon. Without a second thought she'd spun and aimed and fired directly, thinking he was one of Them. Consumed by her fear and her need, her desire to save them all.
Where was he? Was he injured badly…? Was he…dead?
The first sob that clawed it's way from her strangled throat fell out into the dark air around her indistinctly. Pain flaring from her injuries, one in her shoulder and one further down her body, her leg she presumed, up her nerves to her muzzy brain.
The second sob broke the surface with a little more volume, claiming Sawyer's name as it ripped itself from her tongue.
And the following cried only increased until they reached a fevered pitch, the hurt in her limbs drowned by that burning through her chest, searing her heart almost in two. She almost didn't notice the door swing open and light stream in, forcing her eyes closed once more against her will.
"It's alright, Ana. Shhhh. Calm down. You need to stay calm."
Jack. That was his voice, somewhere above her and cold fingers pressed themselves upon her forehead.
"Keep still or you're going to rip the stitches I made to close your wounds." He continued, hands moving again as he spoke. "Kate!" he bellowed over his shoulder, the noise making Ana's head throb again. "Kate, I need you in here!"
Ana tried, attempting to open her eyes and ignore the pain stabbing into them from the sudden light, fending Jack's hands from their inspection. Trying to regain his attention.
"Where…where is he? Where's Sawyer?" she croaked up at him, the panic making her chest tight and her breathing fast and unsteady. "Is he dead?" she stammered, squinting up into his blurred face and she managed to catch a hold of one of his wrists with her hands. "He can't be dead. Tell me he isn't!"
"Dead, Chica?" the Southern drawl from the doorway served to halt them both in the conflicting movements abruptly. Turning their faces away from each other and to the silhouette of a man stood leant against the doorframe, lit from behind by the dim light of the hatch living area. "Not by a long shot. You can't get rid of me that easy, Puddin'. Don't you remember what happened?" he paused, waiting for a response from her but she was too stunned, too disbelieving and so he continued. "Look at you!" he growled playfully. "I'm gone two minutes to go take a leak an' you go an' wake up when I'm gone. Nice, Sugar, real nice!"
Ana struggled to sit upright again, fighting away both Jack's restricting hands that were trying to keep her down and his verbal protests at her moving too much. Eventually, with the doctor's reluctant assistance, she managed to prop her head up enough to see him properly, though her head swam, a little woozy at the sudden movements and it exhausted her so.
And Sawyer crossed the distance between them in three long, purposeful strides, causing Jack to mutter something about his check up being disturbed and shift backwards out of the blonde man's way.
Ana blinked harder, forcing her tears of relief and confusion into submission, still semi disbelieving of what she was seeing before her. Of who.
Sawyer's face, grinning with his own relief came into focus suddenly as he took occupation of the chair by her bedside, sitting as near as was physically possible without him actually climbing onto the bed next to her. His hand moved up to cup her face, smoothing tangled, sweat-drenched ebony locks from where they clung to her forehead and neck and cheeks, betraying the fever that her body was fighting to break.
"I…I…shot you…" she coughed, swallowing hard again and taking deep breaths to keep her emotions in check. "I turned and I aimed and I-" her treacherous throat constricted suddenly, halting any and all sound coming from her and she reach out to him with the hand of her uninjured arm, still wincing in pain at the motion, to touch his face, testing reality.
And finally, her fragmented memory came back to her as the last vestiges of grogginess trickled from her.
-oOo-
(Flashback)
"Hoo boy!" Sawyer shouted out to the jungle canopy above, waggling the fingers of his now raised hands before her and she frowned in confusion at the lack of blood there. She'd just fired a gun at him point blank. Her aim was perfect. She never missed. "Someone up there still loves me!" he continued and before she could ask what he meant, before her hands could reach his middle and inspect for bullet wounds herself, his large, blood-free palms settled either side of her face, fingers curling about the sides of her face, into her matted hair, thumbs smoothing their pads across her cheeks as if he couldn't quite believe he was touching her again. Eyes scoured her face, the curve of her cheeks, the sweep of her brow, her bruised and bloodied chin, back to her eyes. His hand moved again, brushing back hair from her forehead, wiping blood from her chin and tears that she hadn't realised had been falling, from her cheeks and then his mouth was upon hers. In an instant. A mere heartbeat. A breath. Kissing her as if she were the very air he needed to live, pulling her to him, holding her so tight it hurt and she could taste the relief on his tongue.
She was alive and so was he, apparently.
Her gun had been empty. It hadn't been a gunshot they'd heard. It had been the click of an unoccupied chamber. The hammer hitting air instead of the metal of a bullet jacket.
"You an' that itchy trigger finger of yours…" he growled between desperate kisses that she suddenly found the strength to return herself.
Relief exploded deep in her chest, dissolving the ache of upset and guilt that had begun there and she raised her uninjured arm, curling it about his neck and holding her to him with the same fierceness that consumed him, closing her eyes so tightly that brilliant white dots sparkled there in the black. Her ears began to ring with the threat of passing out and she wobbled slightly in his arms, now encircling her waist so that he could better hold her to him, so that he could feel more of her pressed against him which somehow made the whole thing feel more real. Her knees buckled again as the dots not only continued to flash but grew and danced in her sight even with her eyes open and blinking.
"Easy, sweetheart. I got ya now." She heard him soothe and yet his voice sounded a million miles away. Echoing slightly as her vision blurred and her grip upon him slackened and finally unconsciousness overtook her.
(End Flashback)/
-oOo-
When she woke again her head had not ceased it's throbbing, but she felt more rested, more coherent than she had been the first time. She didn't remember falling unconscious the second time, but that was of little matter when it was obvious that she had.
She shifted, attempting to move the hand of her uninjured arm up to rub at the pain in her temples but failed. Something held it down, preventing it from moving. Something hot and sweaty was tangled there together with her fingers, anchoring her hand down by her side. Ana that something tightened it's grip as soon as her movement was detected.
"Easy, Sweetheart, where's the fire?" he stated with a sleepy drawl from beside her, accent tinged with an audible sigh of relief, and a hint of delight that she had re-awoken. "Just lie still for a damn minute, huh?"
His fingers released hers from captivity for the briefest of moments and Ana listened as he shuffled across the room ad opened the door with a soft click, announcing to whoever it was outside, she guessed Jack, that she was awake again.
A murmur and hurrying footsteps responded to him as he resumed his place beside her and she hazily made out his features hovering above her own.
"How you feelin', Rambo?" his breath and kiss were hot on her temple, her hand recaptured and secured back between both of his. "You lost a lotta blood out there…what the hell were you thinkin'!" his voice changed from concern to annoyance in the space of a second, before her sleep smothered brain could properly keep up with his moods, drawing a half hearted frown across her brow.
She squirmed, attempting to sit up, only to be prevented by Sawyer's palm to her wound free shoulder.
"Don't even think 'bout tryin' to talk your way outta this one, Kamikaze! You coulda died out there! You almost did! The Others-"
"Are gone now, Sawyer…" Jack's voice broke in, soothingly and Ana watched as the tall doctor cam into her peripheral view, patting the Southerner's shoulder. "Take it easy on her, alright?" he raised his eyebrows until Sawyer nodded his consent, jaw clenching a little even so at the reprimand. "Ana saved us all. If she hadn't started moving everyone from the beach when she had, we'd all be dead or taken right now."
Ana managed a strangled sounding snort from where she lay at Jack's speech, cutting off any sarcastic retort Sawyer had been about to shoot at the doctor, and fending his hand away from where it still lay restricting upon her shoulder.
She tried to sit up again, spurring both men into motion that time, scrambling to help her and prop her upright in the bed of the hatch.
"I did what anyone would have done." She brushed it away, wincing at the twinges of pain in her leg and shoulder as she straightened herself out and permitted Sawyer's hand to retake hers yet again. He seemed almost as desperate to touch her as she had been when she'd thought she shot him.
After a few long moments pause and deep breaths, steeling herself against the wave of fatigue that washed over her despite having just woken, she locked her eyes onto Jack's.
"How many made it?"
Jack's eyes turned sombre at her query and Sawyer's free hand moved up to cup the back of her head, smoothing across her hair comfortingly.
"Ana, maybe now's not the best time to-" Jack began.
"How many!" she repeated, louder and stronger than she had felt in a long time. Her dark brown eyes held Jack's fiercely until he glanced away and shook his head.
"Three people died…" he replied and Ana took a deep breath, holding it in for a long moment before exhaling. "Scott died before we got there. Gary and Mark were injured seriously. I did everything I could to help them…they died yesterday morning…"
Ana nodded and a heavy-hearted silence fell across the three of them in remembrance of the ones who had fallen at the hands of the Others. Ana just thanked God that they hadn't been able to take anyone else. No matter how many of them there had been, they'd not been able to get close enough to the cave entrance to be able to get a hold of anyone.
"What about Kate…?" she queried in a low voice, wondering how her comrade had fared and Jack's eyebrows raised suddenly as he and Sawyer shared a confused, slightly bemused glance.
"She's okay. Nothing more than a scraped knee…" he responded warily and Ana chuckled, lying her head back against her pillows and closing her eyes.
"That girl's got a luck horseshoe up her ass!" she snorted, chuckling until the pain it caused in her limbs made her stop and sigh. She always had been an impatient healer.
"Sooooo," Sawyer drawled out, clearing his throat finally, breaking the silence and shooting a glance up at Jack's face. "How's my girl here doin'?" he queried with a smirk curling his lips up at the corner. He gave her hand a teasing tug, drawing her eyes back open in irritation. "She ready to go back down to the beach again yet? I got my heart set on some good, old-fashioned make-up sex in the near future." he waggled his eyebrows at her, ignoring the uncomfortable flush that spread across the doctor's features and Ana managed a rather harmless thump against Sawyer's shoulder with her good arm's hand as he tried to lower his mouth down towards hers.
"You're gonna be waiting a long time, Cowboy." She growled with narrowed eyes and scowl alike, though a smile tugged at her own mouth. "I feel like I've been hit by a truck!"
But Sawyer merely chuckled at her, standing from his seat and moving from Jack's way as the other man set about replacing Ana's bandages.
"People are back on the beach?" she queried, changing the subject and refusing to give Sawyer the pleasure of seeing her unable to keep her eyes from his form. Three nights really had been too long for them to be apart it seemed. She coughed, focusing pointedly upon Jack's concentration filled face as he took the seat at her side and he nodded absently, not glancing up from his task at hand.
"They are." He confirmed verbally. "From what Sawyer said they did to their laboratory, they've got enough problems of their own to be concerned-"
"Had us a bonfire!" Sawyer injected, cutting the doctor off much to Jack's disgruntlement. "Toasted some marshmallows…Sang a few songs…Male bonding!" he trailed off with a wave of his hand and Jack rolled his eyes, shaking his head.
"We still have armed watches set up around the campsite…just in-"
"Besides!" Sawyer interrupted again, grinning widely at the deathly glare being aimed at him by the other man. "How many o' them unfortunate sonsabitches got caught in your crosshairs, huh, Hotlips?"
Ana shrugged, mentally shuddering at the memories, not entirely whole and remembered fully from the attack at the caves fluttered through her mind.
"Six, maybe seven…" she hazarded a guess, murmuring in confusion and Sawyer looked triumphant.
"Baby, there's only twenty of 'em all put together and dear old Scott, Gary and Mark took a fair ol' count of three out between 'em, before they…" he trailed off, not wishing to remind them all that while they were happy and joking, three men were dead and buried. "And Freckles got a rather respectable count of four as well." He continued, though less jokingly than when he'd started.
Ana frowned at him suddenly, cocking one eyebrow dubiously and folding her arms.
"How d'you know how many of them there are?" she demanded and Sawyer grinned from where he'd taken up residence at the foot of her bed while Jack worked.
"'Cause, Smarty-pants, Captain Falafell got a hold of some more of their maps back in their little club house, sneaky little bstard he is…" he shook his head and snorted before continuing. "And on those maps, Darlin', they kept a track of how many employees they had workin' in each of their little hatches." He finished looking altogether too smug for his own good, folding his own arms across his chest and grinning down at her.
"I think it's not too optimistic to say that we're pretty safe from them now, thanks to you and the rescue party." Jack concluded and with those words he finished retying her fresh bandages and gave her knee a gently reassuring squeeze before standing and stepping away, changing the subject once more and diplomatically. "Give it another day or so before you let this Red Neck drag you back down to the beach caveman style." He smirked, hitching his thumb at Sawyer who considered him through wary, slitted eyes. "He's on button duty anyway and I thought you two might have some…catching up to do before you rejoin the community." The doctor offered her a rather out of character wink and grin, causing her own smile to spread fully across her lips as he headed for the door. "Don't forget about that computer, Sawyer…" he warned the conman who had taken the seat at Ana's side the very moment that it had been vacated and Sawyer grumbled a 'yeah, yeah' after him as the door closed, leaving them alone for the first time since she'd woken.
The blonde haired man kept his stare upon the edge of her blankets, fidgeting slightly with the seam, picking at it with his fingernails.
"So…how you feelin'?" he queried low and sincere after a long, slightly nervous pause and Ana took pity on him in his never before shown to her tenseness. She covered his fiddling hand with the good one of her own, drawing his eyes up to meet hers. Blue, just like she remembered them.
"I'm sorry," she stated, ignoring his question and shifting a little in discomfort, gaze lancing sideways and away from his suddenly to where their hands lay together. "About not telling you 'goodbye' before you left…" she paused to cough again, her throat as dry as a desert after so long without use. "And what happened the night before that…" she trailed off again and Sawyer turned his hand suddenly beneath hers, in reply, locking their fingers together, giving a reassuring squeeze of comfort in reciprocation of her words. A gesture so unlike the cocky Sawyer she knew.
"I know y'all didn't mean it, Darlin'," he replied finally, running his free hand back through his lengthening blonde hair to rest at the back of his neck, his gaze flitting away from hers as if he was somehow embarrassed. Definitely not the Sawyer she knew. "And for what it's worth, it was all my fault anyways. I made that mess…I'm the sorry one."
A less awkward paused followed their admittance to one another, one in which Ana released a sigh of relief and settled back against her pillows, a little more at ease. A little more relaxed. A little more believing that they were both actually out of danger and that they were together again. Reunited and reconciled.
"So…" his voice broke the silence, drawing open her eyes that that she hadn't realised that she had closed. He shifted beneath her watch nervously again, scrubbing at the back of his neck this time and almost wincing at what he was about to ask her. "Did…did Freckles get that…ah, book back to you alright?" his down turned eyes dared a glance up at her to see her reaction to his words, to see if any recognition sparked there in her eyes, but Ana had been well trained on the police force to mask her emotions when the need arose.
"Yeah," she responded calmly, though her heart suddenly raced in her chest.
The pair of them lapsed into another silence until it was her turn to break it with a query, seeing as Sawyer had suddenly lost his tongue.
"Did you mean it?"
Sawyer looked at her properly then for the first time in long moments, searching her face and that time Ana permitted a smile to creep onto her features. Ever so slightly.
"Did I mean what exactly, Precious?" he countered, his own sly teasing appearing in his smug grin and narrowed eyes.
He knew what she meant but he was going to make her say it and spell it out for him. He was going to make her him properly about the letter he had sent back to her in the safety of Watership Down and Kate's hands. That was fine by her. Just fine. She was too tired to play his games at the moment anyway. Or perhaps it was her relief at being with him again after they had both cheated death and the odds out of two more bodies for the count.
"Did you mean what you wrote about having actually found someone you love more than yourself?" she queried, smile gone now, serious again. She had to know straight, one way or the other. Had it been the heat of the moment talking? When had thought he'd never see her again? Had he changed his mind and verdict now that they were sitting face-to-face once more?
But Sawyer's grin lost it's cockiness, becoming smaller and somewhat shy as he focused upon their clasped hands focal point yet again.
"Whadda you think?" he answered with his own enquiry and Ana-Lucia could tell by the tint in his southern accent, from the light in his sapphire eyes that he had meant every word that he had written to her.
"I think," she began, tugging her hand from his only so she could raise his chin, and gaze to meet hers again, by laying it against his cheek. "That I love you too, James."
-oOo-