Author's Note: I had no intention of doing a continuation (hey, it seems that for a lot of things, I never plan on anything), but I read the reviews I got for chapter one. Firstly, odeepblue, you are my first official fanclub member (he!), and also a big 'hey' to some new people I've seen reviewing me - welcome to the strange world of my stories; secondly, due to some valid comments from Hayley, I felt that the story should be resolved in a proper manner, one that is more in-character than OOC.
All the same disclaimers and rating guidance applies.
Sara was down to her underwear, waiting for Grissom to finish disrobing. Seeing him slump on the bed in his boxers shorts, she approached him and cooed in his ear. "Everything okay?" she whispered, her tongue flicking out and touching the outer shell of his ear.
He closed his eyes, as though in a combination of extreme pain and exquisite pleasure. "Don't," he croaked, his throat dry enough for a spark to ignite a fire down there.
Sara straightened back up. "What's the problem?" She rubbed his back and risked sneaking a look at the area covered by his boxer shorts. "Is everything ... in order ... down there?"
"The hydraulics are fine," Grissom sighed. His head lifted, and those flawless indigo eyes froze her body to the spot. "This isn't right," he whispered, his voice catching in his throat.
Sara's eyes and speech faltered. "What do you mean? Do you want me to go?"
At her words, Grissom bolted up. That was the last thing he wanted. Oh, he wanted her, all right, he wanted to be deep inside her, wanted her legs sqeezing his waist. But not now. Not this soon. He had made a mistake in anticipating such an enormous, momentous step so early. This was the first day of a new life for him, and he would have already made love to her before the day was out. He wanted anticipation. He wanted to take things slowly.
"Damnit, Gil, talk to me," she hissed, tears welling in her eyes, her jaw clamping with the fervour reserved usually only for tetanus.
Grissom came to his feet shakily and reached for her, holding her at arms' length. "You are so beautiful," he intoned, like some priest who has been allowed to stand before the goddess whom he worships. "So beautiful, so precious." He took a breath, his chest swelling painfully. "I don't mean that this, per se, is wrong. What I mean is ...". He thought for a moment. What did he mean? "All the times I've gone over this in my head, all the times I imagined us to be in a relationship ... it doesn't happen like this."
"Don't be so fucking oblique," Sara spat, trying to sound angry. But being pushed up against his chest, her words were subdued against his powerful muscles.
"This isn't how it's supposed to happen, darling," he informed her. He pulled away from her slightly, and led her back over to the bed, sitting her down. He took her hands in his and stared openly into her eyes.
Sara just gazed back helpless, struggling for air as she immersed herself in his azure depths. Never before had she seen such naked emotions especially not in his eyes - fear, love, lust, tenderness, justice - he was trying to communicate without words, but the language his eyes were feeding was untranslatable.
"I'm not supposed to take you back to my house and push you onto a bed without any explanation for what I'm doing. I'm supposed to woo you. Take you out to dinner, take you to concerts, buy you presents, walk around the Strip at night when we're not on call, holding your hand. I'm supposed to let you know how special you are to me before I have the right to take you deep and hard." He blinked, smiled somberly at her, his thumbs caressing her hands.
"Oh, Gil," she breathed, fighting against the salty drops that were threatening to leave tracks on her cheeks. Her russet orbs glinted and she smiled sadly. "You want to do all that for me?" He nodded, and she bit her lip. "This is better than if we made love right now," she said. "Are you serious?"
Grissom nodded. "Every day, for seven days, starting tomorrow, we are going to do something either after shift, or on the day off. I'll take you to dinner, I'll take you to the opera, I'll take you to a jazz bar, I'll buy you a present, I'll take you on some rollercoasters ... shit, I'll even take you to the body farm. In short, I'll do everything in my power to show you how special you are to me. Is that okay?" His raised an eyebrow, not in question, not in scrutiny, not as a wry comment - that lone eyebrow simply asked for understanding of what he was doing.
Sara put a hand up to his beard, and her long fingers gently stroked his jaw-line. "All my life, I've longed for a person who would do that for me. I'm more than willing for you to do that." Her smile morphed, becoming less sad. "But what about now?"
"I'm still not letting you drive home. We can just go to bed and sleep off the scotch." Seeing her sceptical look, he fought hard to convince her. "I promise, I won't do anything. I've managed to keep my hormones in check for the past decade or so, another seven days won't kill me." He stood up, helping Sara up from the bed, and pulled the duvet back, assisting her between the sheets.
"It's not your hormones I'm worried about," Sara told him as he joined her, slipping an arm across her stomach. "I never have very good composure when I'm around you," she confessed, snuggling into his arms. "I'm afraid I might jump."
"I'm not."
Sara looked up to his face, her hands tracing languid patterns over the bare skin on his back. "Did you mean what you said before?"
"Which part?" he teased, receiving a swatted arm in return.
"About ...". She swallowed, somewhat discomfitted by what she would have to bring up. "About taking me deep and hard. Did you mean that? Is that what you want to do?"
He smiled tenderly and put his lips to her ear. "That, and so much more, sweetheart," he whispered. The vibrations of his words ran through Sara's body, sending shivers up and down her spine. "But I think that maybe we should go into that in two or three days' time. After all, what sort of paramour would I be if I didn't make my intentions crystal clear." He tilted her chin and kissed her softly, relishing the silk-like touch of her mouth.
Sara smiled against him. "You know what I like then," she mused, closing her eyes and resting against his body for warmth.
This chapter is fairly short, as it's more of a link between the first chapter and the other ones (no s, I hear you say) - what I mean is, I want to go more into more depth about each of the dates they have, rather than just state in the latter half of this chapter - 'they did this, they went someplace, and then at the end of the week, they came back and got jiggy with it.' I'd like to develop the story a bit more than that.