Summary: My first happy Jack/Kate fic.
Spoilers: None
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Notes: Please review so I'll know if I'm good with writing happy Jate instead of angst ridden, broken Jack/Kate.
Title: Feel It Comin' On
"Mango?"
A female voice hovered above him and Jack looked up to find Kate blocking the late afternoon sun, a fruit in one hand. A hesitant smile swallowed her face, and she looked at him with hopeful eyes. "You look like you could use something to eat."
He flipped a page in the book he was reading. "No thanks," he responded distractedly.
Kate settled in the sand beside him anyway, dropping the fruit by her side. When he didn't acknowledge her presence, she nudged him with her shoulder, recalling a conversation by the waves. "This is a first, you sitting here, doing nothing."
Jack squinted in her direction, marking his place with an index finger. He wasn't really in the mood for company, but this was Kate. Most of the time, he just couldn't deny her. He lifted the book for her to see. "I'm reading."
She fiddled with a hole in her jeans, raising an eyebrow. "Did you steal it from Sawyer?" she teased.
"Nah. I've had it stashed in my backpack since the crash. Never felt like reading it until now." He pinched the bridge of his nose with his other hand, wrinkling his face as he did so. "But it's hard to concentrate with a headache the size of Niagara Falls."
"I'm sorry." She glanced at the book again. "I'm not a doctor or anything, but it seems to me, reading isn't going to help you."
He sighed, amusement dancing in his pain filled eyes. "I was trying to distract myself, hoping it would go away by itself."
"You haven't taken any aspirin?"
He paused before answering, not actually wanting to admit anything. "No."
She rolled her eyes in concern. "Jack . . ."
He held up a hand to stop her. "You don't have to say anything." He started to stand up, but a tug on his hand stopped him.
"I have an idea."
"What?"
She gently pulled him back down next to her, taking the book from his hand. "I need you to trust me."
Somehow, he knew she wasn't just talking about the current situation. To add to that equation, he was all too aware of her hand still in his. How it curved into his like it was meant to be there. He rolled his eyes mentally, laughing at the cheesiness of his thoughts. He squeezed her hand gently, his eyes showing a tenderness that hadn't been there in quite a while. For her anyway. "You know I do."
Kate swallowed passed the lump in her throat, her own eyes skittering down to their entwined hands. Very good. She felt a nervousness slip into her voice, something that didn't go unnoticed by him. "Okay, then."
"Okay, then," he repeated. Her being nervous made him nervous. "What do I need to do?"
"I want you to lean back, putting all your body weight against the tree. Eyes closed."
He did as he was told, cushioning his back against the bark. A flirtation passed his lips before he could stop it. He really needed to stop hanging around Sawyer. "You're not trying to seduce me, are you?" His voice held a teasing laughter, but his relaxed features told her how serious he was being.
Kate found that her nervousness had slipped away, to be replaced by determination and desire. That's what I'm trying to do. "Trust me," she responded. "If I was trying to seduce you . . . you would know it."
He nodded. "Good to know."
She didn't say anything in response, but her actions spoke louder than any words she could muster. She slowly lowered herself on top of him, straddling him on the legs. Her knees pressed into the sand on both sides.
Surprised would be the understatement of the year. Jack inhaled sharply at the contact, quickly covering it up with a cough. His eyes slide open an inch, chocolate meeting emerald. "What are you . . .?" Before he could finish the sentence, she shushed him with a look, pressing a finger to his lips.
A tight-lipped smile encased her face. "Keep your eyes closed."
He shut his eyes, but not without a hint of confusion and temptation twinkling within. And then her hands were massaging his forehead, and everything vanished from his mind, except for the fact that a woman he cared about deeply was touching him. And although it was just his face, he found it oddly arousing. Not that other parts of his body didn't have the same idea. But he kept those thoughts away, knowing that wouldn't be a smart idea right now.
After a moment of silence in which the only thing that was talking was the electricity between them, Kate spoke, trying to ween her mind away from the closeness she now shared with Jack, her heart hammering foolishly in her chest. "What book are you reading?"
He was so relaxed in her ministrations that it took a second for him to realize that she was talking. Jack opened his eyes to ask her what she had said, but found he couldn't speak. Beautiful. She was so close he could count the freckles on her nose. A smile trembled over her lips, and she looked away from his gaze in embarrassment. "I told you to keep your eyes closed."
He shrugged sheepishly, shooting her a smile not unlike her own. "Sorry." He let his eye lids fall shut for a third time, but he kept the smile on his face for a moment longer. "What was your question?"
"What book are you reading?" she repeated, keeping her face calm. But inside her stomach was trembling with excitement. Maybe this was going to work after all.
"Gone With the Wind."
"Never took you for the southern belle in distress, kinda man."
"Mmm," he murmured. "It's a classic," he finished. "Haven't you ever read it?"
"High school," she answered, placing her fingers at his temples. She slowly began to rub in circles, applying a slight pressure that made him want to role his head back in sweet agony.
"What did you think about it?"
"A woman willing to do anything and everything to keep something that means everything to her." She shrugged non-noncommittally. "What's not to like?"
He was silent a moment before answering her. He knew he was probably traveling in "dangerous" territory, but he found he didn't care as much about that now that he had her undivided attention. This was too good to pass up. "She sounds like you."
Kate hadn't realized how fast the topic of conversation could change. Both hands fell away from his face. "The plane," she whispered, lowering her eyes to his chest. And immediately the teasing and easy going tension was gone to be replaced by an incredible pain and sadness.
This time when he opened his eyes she didn't chastise him. "The plane," he whispered back to her. He put his hand on her shoulder, squeezing it in comfort. "You know . . ."
"I don't want to talk about it," she interrupted, harsher than she had intended. But it didn't have the impact she wanted. And she couldn't figure out if that was a good thing or a bad thing. She shook his hand off, attempting to stand up when his arms came fully around her waist, hands locking against her spine. Suddenly he knew what he needed to do.
Her first instinct to run was kicking in. Twisting in his arms and arching her body, she sought to get free. Her eyes started to fill with tears she hadn't known were there. "Jack, please. Let me go."
"No," he answered firmly, shaking his head. Her felt her body go slack as he tightened his grip. An unspoken apology glittered in the depths of his eyes. "I'm not."
Her stomach clenched in panic and fear, and she dropped her head to his shoulder, accepting what he was doing, although she didn't want to. "I don't want to talk about it."
"I'm not going to make you," he answered gently. "That isn't what this is about now."
Her voice was muffled against his shoulder, and he could feel her body tense in confusion. "Then why won't you let me go?"
A slight hesitation, but then it was gone. "I want you to know something."
Raising her head, she assumed all the dignity she could muster. She looked at him uneasily, her cheeks stained with tears. "What?"
He released her waist with one hand, confident that she wouldn't try to escape. His thumb tenderly traced the outline of her cheekbone, and he hoped he was doing the right thing. "I think you already know, but in case you don't, I care about you. It's something so deep that I don't know where it ends."
He couldn't be saying what she thought. Memories of the plane disappeared from their recent conversation. Kate reached up and clutched his hand in hers, bringing it down between them. Her eyes hungrily searched his. "Please don't be saying this just to distract me. Because I couldn't take that."
He looked slightly offended at the statement, widening his eyes in surprise. "This isn't something I take lightly, Kate. You should know that about me by now."
"Just making sure," she answered, her anxiety dissolving, reassuring him of her knowledge. "So, since we're confessing things, you should know something too."
His mind was a crazy mixture of hope and fear. This was it. "What's that?"
She teased his fingers with her own, lacing and unlacing them. A rush of pink stained her cheeks. "I . . . my feelings for you run deep too. I couldn't imagine you not being here. With me."
He let out a sigh of relief he hadn't realized he'd been holding, giving her a devastating smile. The word sounded lame before it had even passed his lips "Okay."
"Okay," she teased, feeling the tension being lifted. They were back to were they had first begun, only they weren't, and she basked in the knowledge that it held for her. For him. And for their relationship that was changing bit by bit. Day by day into something she had only ever dreamed about.
An expression of satisfaction sprung into his eyes, and he felt that they had come full circle. "You made my headache go away," he realized, though now it didn't seem that important. He let go of her hand, slipping his calloused one back around her waist. His fingers trailed across the skin her shirt refused to cover. He felt her shiver involuntarily at the sudden contact, and he smiled at the power he held over her. Or course, he knew that she held the same power over him, but that was for another time.
Kate's free hand now came to rest on his chest, feeling the thud of his heart as it sped up at her touch. She gazed innocently into his eyes. "So what are we going to do about it?" She'd never been this bold before, and it frightened and thrilled her at the same time.
"I don't know about you, but I'm going to do this," and he pulled her closer than she thought possible, inches away from his inviting eyes. He brushed his lips against hers before pulling back for the permission he didn't need. She pressed her lips more firmly against his, settling against his chest as her arms wrapped around his neck.
The push and pull of the kiss made her dizzy. Demanding and intense one second, then gentle and tender the next. Everything she thought it would be. And more. Much more than possible. They both pulled back at the same time, gasping for breathe.
"That was . . ."
"Amazing," she finished between gasps. They left the air with silence for a minute looking at each other with wonder and desire in their faces. But then Kate shifted so that she was sitting next to him again, an expression of caution in her voice. "We have company," she whispered, checking back over her shoulder.
Jack whisked his head in the direction acknowledged, making out the shapes of two people in the distance. He turned back to her, a question of curiosity in his eyes.
"I've never been a fan of PDA's," she explained.
He nodded in understanding, standing up, welcoming the sun on his skin, though he would rather have had Kate against it again. "Me neither." He reached down to help her up, but she was already climbing to her feet.
She swept the sand from her jeans. "I believe it's time for us to part."
He wanted to tell her no, but he couldn't find the word in his vocabulary at that moment. "Okay." That was becoming his favorite word for some odd reason.
"Okay," she repeated back to him, and maybe it was becoming her favorite word too. "I would kiss you good-bye, but . . . " She gestured in the general direction of the other castaways.
"No problem." But it was a problem and he would have to remedy that sooner or later. "I'll see you tonight." A statement more than the question it should be.
"Sure." She started to walk away, but turned at the last second, an enchanted smile on her swollen lips. "Hey, Jack?"
"Yeah?" He turned from the direction he was going, a restless energy surrounding him.
"I was trying to seduce you."
He laughed. A slow, deep laugh that would send her over the edge if she let it. "I know."
THE END