Falling Like Rain

by Redlance-ck

Dani only just gets the door closed before she finds herself pinned against the other side of it, Jamie's lips finding hers in a messy kiss that has too much teeth because neither one of them can stop smiling. Or: What happened after that moonflower monologue... (It's just 15k of smut.)

A/N: I've been working on this one for a few weeks now (I am a very slow writer and tend to obsess over small things I should maybe let go, but I digress) and I think I'm about 94.5% happy with how it turned out. That lingering 5.5% is something I can't put my finger on, so I can't fix it, but hopefully the story as it is will be something you enjoy. I really wanted to write a first time story that would be funny and moving, and also hot, lol. And this is what I ended up with. All 15k of it. So please enjoy! And, if you're so inclined, I'd love to hear what you think. :)

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That night in the greenhouse, a bottle of wine and a couple of blankets between them, Dani had done two things that terrified her. Two things that Dani had resigned herself to never sharing with anyone.

Which then became two things she felt safe doing in Jamie's company.

First, she'd told her about Eddie, everything about Eddie, and Jamie had sat quietly and listened like she was paying attention. Never once questioned the truth of it, the unbelievable reality of what Dani had said. Claiming to see her dead fiance was definitely something she assumed would be met with skepticism and perhaps it would have been, had she told anyone else.

Only, she wouldn't have told anyone else and she already knew Jamie would, at the very least, react to finding out the Wingrave's new au pair was crazy with kindness.

It's still a bit of a shock when she tells Dani she thinks she's, "Surprisingly sane, considering." And it's then that Dani decides to do it. The second thing. Decides she can't spend another minute not doing it.

She'd just become so tired of being scared, of running, of fighting. Jamie's gentle words and easy humour had worked on Dani like a balm, smoothing over her wounds to make them bearable. Taking away the sting so that she could feel something different.

And so Dani had kissed her.

Kissed her because she felt seen for the first time in her life. Kissed her because she felt safe with Jamie. Kissed her because she couldn't go another second without kissing her and felt her body come alive when Jamie kissed her back.

A rush of adrenaline swept through her as she registered how good it felt, how right it seemed. It was easy, too. There was no nausea or nervousness, not like there had been with Eddie, and while kissing Eddie had never really been a chore, kissing Jamie was like breathing. Easy and now necessary for living, it seemed. Something Dani knew she needed to keep doing.

Alas, that night had ended abruptly, with Jamie feeling foolish and hurt, and Dani left alone with a bottle in her hand and a bonfire between her and her demons. Her ghost. She had decided then, decided what she wanted - to live without shame and have the chance to love whomever she pleased - and banished her guilt, her spectre, by doing exactly what Jamie had spoken about earlier that evening.

She'd tossed in some old bones to burn away the shadows.

Watching his glasses fizzle and melt had been more than just cathartic, it had been freeing. It meant letting go of the past, not just the things that had happened but the person she'd been then, too. It meant finally accepting herself, all of her, everything.

Like Jamie had.

After that, there'd been bad coffee and an attempt to mend something before it was irrevocably broken, which had started terribly but ended close to promising. However, the day turned to shit before the glue had a chance to set and then darkness had fallen and Jamie had left.

Except she'd come back. Gotten half way home and turned around. And she'd taken Dani's hand and led her from the house, into the trees and beyond the shrubbery. To her secret spot.

And here Dani sits, rain lightly drizzling around them, listening with rapt attention as Jamie spills her own demons into the soil, leaving herself vulnerable in a way Dani knows she never allows herself to be. Cracks open her ribs and exposes everything, even though she's scared, terrified something vital might end up pierced. Broken. She allows Dani to see her, really see her. Trusts her enough to share the truth of who she is and let Dani decide if that's someone she still wants to be around.

Then she tells her that sometimes, someone - and she turns her body towards Dani slightly at that - comes along who might be worth the effort. She accepts that Dani is struggling and tells her things that Dani's told herself a thousand times, but never believed.

She believes Jamie, though.

"We leave more life behind to take our place." Her words tug the strings of Dani's heart, playing a tune that's equal measures alien and familiar, and Dani lets the melody unfurl and wrap itself around her. "Like this moonflower." Lets it guide her like a siren's song until she's standing beside Jamie. "It's where all its beauty lies, you know. In the mortality of the thing."

She grasps at Jamie's jacket and looks at her like she's seeing her for the first time. There's an imperceptible shake of Dani's head, pure wonder overtaking her, and then she's kissing Jamie.

This kiss is different, more sure, and when Dani breaks away, Jamie looks at her like she's surprised Dani is still there. Smiles like she can't believe Dani is staying. Like Dani has hung the moon and all of the stars, just for her. Happiness settles itself inside Dani's chest. Curls up like a cat and lies there, purring, as she bumps her nose against Jamie's and kisses her again.

The rain and the cold slip away, along with the sky and the earth beneath their feet, leaving just the two of them and the moonflowers. All she can feel is Jamie. Jamie's mouth slanting against hers, Jamie's hands grabbing at her coat, Jamie's jacket clutched in her own grasp. She kisses Jamie, lets Jamie kiss her, until a need for oxygen separates them.

"We should get you back inside." The words slip out from between reddened lips that Dani can't stop staring at. Jamie chuckles, noticing, and strokes the pad of her thumb across Dani's cheekbone to bring her attention up. It works, mostly. "Really starting to come down. Don't want you catching a cold 'cause of me."

And Jamie's right, part of Dani's brain knows this, but there's another, larger part that wants to spend the rest of her life standing in this very spot, kissing Jamie until there's no more breath left in her body. It's indescribably exhilarating, she thinks, giving in. It had been that night in the greenhouse, where the aching longing she'd been feeling finally bubbled over and knocked the mask that Dani had kept so meticulously in place for years askew. It was like a dam breaking, powerful and hectic. A crashing, thunderous wave that threatened to sweep her away and oh, how she'd wanted to let it.

She can feel the raindrops on her skin, through her clothes, and she knows they should head back, but she's rooted to the spot. She tightens her hold on Jamie's jacket and tugs her back in, this time bringing their foreheads together as she takes in one deep breath after another.

"You okay?" she hears Jamie ask, feels her hand squeezing her elbow, and Dani nods, moving their heads with the motion.

"Yeah. Yeah, I just," she pauses to swallow and then lets out a shaky, shy giggle. "I don't want to stop."

Jamie's laughter is like sunshine; warm and bright, something Dani could spend all day basking in.

"I reckon we can manage both."

Confused, Dani's eyes pop open and she pulls back to frown at Jamie, but Jamie just grins and takes Dani by the hand, leading her away from the moonflowers.

They've taken about ten steps when Dani decides she can't wait any longer.

"What did you mean-"

And then Jamie is turning back to her, dropping her grip on Dani's hand and instead bringing both of hers to Dani's cheeks. She draws her into a kiss that's deep but quick and it leaves Dani speechless and dazed as she lets herself be pulled along behind Jamie once more.

It goes like that for a while, with Dani counting every pace between their kisses in anticipation of the next. They do eventually make it to the treeline, but Jamie presses her up against rough bark just before they cross it. The kisses here are quick too, lips skipping from Dani's mouth to her jaw, to her neck. She tips her head back and feels the wood bite into her scalp, then lets out a gasp when Jamie's teeth do the same at her neck. The sound seems to pull at Jamie and she inches closer to Dani, until there's no space between them and Dani can feel the bark through the material of her coat, and kisses her again.

When Jamie pulls away, Dani's legs feel shaky and weak.

"I'm gonna need a minute," she says, breathless, when Jamie tries to continue their journey towards the house and Dani's stomach flutters at the way Jamie grins at her. All smug and proud, eyes crinkling at the corners.

Once she's comfortably stable on her feet, Jamie reaches for her hand, lacing their fingers together and they cross the sprawling lawn at a leisurely pace, their already damp clothes defeating the purpose of rushing to avoid the rain. Jamie rubs her thumb along the side of Dani's index finger and Dani can't help but look down to where their hands are joined.

It's different. Feels different, looks different. Her hand doesn't feel too small in Jamie's. There are calluses on the gardener's palm, rough and lovely, and her fingers slip between Dani's so easily. Like they belong there. Jamie gives her hand a squeeze, drawing Dani's attention up, and Dani finds she's being smiled at. She wonders what her own face looks like, if it's betraying the sense of awe she's currently feeling, and thinks that it must be by the way Jamie is looking at her.

They walk across the wet grass and the closer they get to the main doors, the more anxious Dani becomes. So much so that by the time they're standing there in the entryway she almost feels like she might pass out. Because she doesn't want this night to be over. Not now, not yet. There's a tightness winding around her torso, like a spring, making it hard to breathe and she knows, she knows, that the only thing that will loosen that binding is the woman standing in front of her.

They sway to a stop and Jamie loosens her grip, shoving her hands into the pockets of her jacket and looking down at her feet for a second before meeting Dani's eyes.

"S'pose this is your stop, then." Raindrops litter dark curls, glinting like diamonds, waiting to be tucked aside. "I, uh, hope that was boring enough for you." There's something in her voice, in her posture, behind her smile even, that tells Dani there's something Jamie isn't saying. That she's holding back.

"Dreadfully," Dani hears herself say, the word sounding odd beneath her accent, and Jamie's smile widens. Then Jamie is stepping closer, hands still in her pockets, and she's kissing her so softly this time that it makes Dani's whole chest ache. And she's so momentarily lost in it that she doesn't quite realise it's over until she hears Jamie chuckling.

"Goodnight, Dani." And Jamie is stepping back, away from her, about to leave, and Dani panics. Quicker than she thinks she's ever moved in her life, her hands shoot out and grab hold of Jamie's jacket, one on either side of the opening, and she holds fast, actually jerking Jamie to a stop. Eyes turn dark in the dim light widen in surprise and Dani feels her anxiety spike, but she doesn't let go.

"You-you could come up. In. You…" Flushing, she bites her lip and then swipes her tongue across the same spot, a nervous smile curving the shape of her mouth. "You could come in? If you want?" For one heart-stopping second, Jamie looks hesitant, and Dani's mind goes into overdrive, wondering with no small amount of ridiculousness if she's read all those heated kisses wrong. Maybe Jamie didn't really want-

"Okay." That one word, murmured across the space between them, disintegrates Dani's worries for the time being and her nervous smile turns into a giddy grin as she takes a few steps backwards, pulling a willing Jamie towards the doors of the house. One of which Dani's back hits when Jamie walks her into it, lips descending like a gift from above. Distracted, Dani's hand fumbles around behind her, searching for the doorknob. Once found, her hand grips it, ready to twist, but Jamie's teeth graze her lower lip and Dani's fingers tighten around the brass until her knuckles turn white.

When they do stumble over the threshold, it's with too-loud laughter and hands they can't keep to themselves. Dani only just gets the door closed before she finds herself pinned against the other side of it, Jamie's lips finding hers in a messy kiss that has too much teeth because neither one of them can stop smiling. Dani's hands slip under the collar of Jamie's jacket and squeeze the muscles of her shoulders through the Blondie shirt she's wearing. Just to give her hands something to do, so that they're touching Jamie, somewhere, anywhere. Dani feels too much like she might float away and, even though Jamie is the one causing that - and so much more - touching her is the only thing that seems to ground Dani. Keeps her on the same plane of existence.

After a series of kisses that land somewhere between frantic and needy, Jamie breaks the contact, pulling a huff of disappointment from Dani, who tightens her hold on Jamie's shoulders, afraid she'll try and leave again. But Jamie doesn't. Jamie remains close, chest heaving, eyes fixed on Dani's. There's a silent question in them that passes effortlessly between them and all Dani has to do is squeeze Jamie's shoulders a second time. It's taken for the confirmation that it is and in one smooth motion, Jamie pushes herself away from the door and trails a hand down Dani's arm until she can intertwine their fingers like she had while they were crossing the lawn. Then, with a deep, shaking breath and a visible effort to tear her eyes from Dani's, Jamie turns and leads them towards the stairs.

Once they're at the top, Jamie pauses, glancing sidelong at her like she's checking, and Dani's laughter resumes and she's switching things around so that she's the one pulling Jamie now. Down the dark hallway and into her equally dark room.

And it's funny how used to being pressed up against doors Dani is becoming in such a short amount of time.

Her laughter dies on her lips as she's swept into another kiss and she sinks her fingers into Jamie's damp hair and holds her close, exhaling noisily through her nose when Jamie slowly licks her way into Dani's mouth. And despite the fact that they've just been out in the rain, warmth spreads through Dani like a steadily growing wildfire.

The fingers of Jamie's right hand have curled themselves around the back of Dani's neck and she can feel Jamie's left seeking purchase on her hip, but the puffy material of her coat is getting in the way. She drags her hands down the column of Jamie's throat, feels her stomach roll pleasantly at the noise that leaves Jamie as she does, and then presses her hands to strong shoulders. Jamie backs off at the first hint of resistance, clearly worried she's done something wrong, and Dani feels bad right up until she starts popping open the buttons of her coat.

Then, Jamie's smiling again. More of a smirk, really; one side of her mouth rising as she returns to her previous spot and reaches out. Her hands grasp Dani's jacket by the shoulders and ease it away from her body, but it gets trapped between Dani and the door. Breaths coming short and shallow, Dani takes a single step forward, putting them painfully close together and allowing the coat to fall to the floor. Jamie regards Dani's second jacket with an amusedly raised eyebrow.

"What?" Dani asks, breath stuttering, indignant. "It's cold outside." Just because Jamie can walk around in two light layers, well, clearly she isn't built the same when it comes to British weather. Jamie hums, thoughtful, both brows lifted now.

"Best get you warmed up, then." Jamie makes quick work of the zipper and there's a quip about taking off layers being counter productive to warming up sitting right on the tip of Dani's tongue, but it's stolen away before she can get it out. Taken by the way Jamie removes this second article of clothing, wiped away by Jamie's hands, one warming the back of Dani's neck and the other squeezing her hip. Kissed away by lips that had turned out to be softer than Dani imagined.

Dani is the one to deepen the kiss this time, her tongue moving against Jamie's like they've been doing this for years already. She slips her hands inside Jamie's jacket, bracketing a slender waist, and Dani lets out an involuntary squeak when she feels the heat of Jamie's body through the thin material of her t-shirt. Suddenly discontent, Dani's hands clumsily tug and pull, eventually making their way under the shirt where they resume their position, only now it's skin on skin.

She groans low in the back of her throat and her fingers clench reflexively, dully digging into flesh. She hears Jamie's answering sounds of satisfaction and Dani wonders if it's supposed to be like this. If such a small, simple contact, single sound, should be able to make her head swim. Pull a cord of desire through her so tightly, it vibrates out to every last inch of her body.

The weight of Jamie's hands vanishes and Dani hears her huff in annoyance after a few seconds, feels it in the kiss and so she breaks it. She opens her eyes to find Jamie struggling with her coat, now inside out and inexplicably dangling from Jamie's wrists.

Dani can't help it; she lets out a burst of laughter.

"Think this is funny, do you?" Jamie asks, halting her flailing for the moment in favour of shooting Dani a look of wry, faux-annoyance. "Can't warm you up if I'm trapped in my own coat now, can I?" she points out and Dani bites her lip around a smile before moving to help. She wriggles the sleeves over Jamie's hands, her fingers skimming the gardener's palms, and manages to free her from her trappings.

Dani drapes the jacket over the back of a chair, picking her own up off the floor to do the same with it, and when she turns back around, Jamie is standing there. Just standing, with her fingers tucked into the tight pockets of her jeans, her bright, wide eyes looking a little unsure.

"You know," Jamie starts and her tone makes Dani anxiously wring her fingers together. "We don't have to…" she trails off, gesturing at nothing with her elbow, and Dani's stomach drops.

"Do you, um," she needlessly swipes a few wisps of hair away from her face, "not want to?"

"No," Jamie is quick to reply, pulling her hands free of her pockets and closing the distance that had grown between them. Then, seeming to realise how her exclamation had sounded, makes a rapid amendment. "I mean, yes." She reaches towards Dani, who's arms lift automatically to meet her halfway, and Jamie's hands run along her forearms until they can curve snugly around Dani's elbows. Dani sways into her. "I do." Her gaze is fixed, making careful, calculated eye contact that Dani feels in her bones. "I do," she repeats, soothing but firm, and Dani believes her without further question. "I just meant that, if you're having second thoughts or anything, then that's fine. We don't have to do anything you're not comfortable with." Then, with a quiet emphasis, "I want you to be comfortable."

And Dani swallows hard, her fingertips tapping a rhythmless tune onto Jamie's arms. It's overwhelming, almost, the way Jamie is looking at her. All fierce sincerity and gentle care; an altruistic consideration. It pulls at something inside Dani's chest.

"I am," she tells Jamie, an assuredness she's never in her life felt before rising up from within. "With you, I am." Filling her until there's nowhere else for it to go and then it's spilling out, pouring from her mouth in the form of hot kisses, trying to cover Jamie's skin by way of her hands. She wants Jamie to know, to understand that Dani means what she says, and so she tries to tell her without words. Wants to show Jamie what she's feeling, how much she's feeling. How much she wants.

She pulls restlessly at Jamie as they continue to kiss. At her arms, her neck, her clothes, and she doesn't even register what she's doing until Jamie leans back and Dani opens her eyes. Her thumbs are tucked under the hem of Jamie's t-shirt and Dani's managed to push the garment up as far as it'll go. It's held aloft bunched across her breasts and when Dani's fingers twitch they graze the band of Jamie's bra. She snares her lower lip between her teeth and worries it for a long three seconds before squeezing her hands around Jamie's ribs. Without hesitation, Jamie lifts her arms and Dani pulls the t-shirt the rest of the way off.

The action musses Jamie's already tousled curls but she doesn't bother to try and fix any wayward strands. She just stands there in front of Dani, arms hanging by her sides, chest and neck turning a pretty pink colour as Dani looks at her. And looks, and looks.

Jamie's all smooth plains and wiry muscles, toned from years of toiling in gardens, hucking soil and digging up things in need of replanting.

And that's kind of how Dani feels in that moment, fully aware that she's staring but utterly unable to look away; like a plant rapidly outgrowing its pot. Roots in need of stretching, watering, being broken apart so they can grow so much better.

Dani's hand has almost reached Jamie before she realises it's moving at all and she yanks it back like the tips of her fingers have been singed, eyes darting around a room that suddenly feels stifling. They skip over every object in the room before ultimately returning to Jamie. Jamie, who hasn't moved an inch and is looking at her with such tenderness that Dani very nearly has to look away again.

"S'alright," Jamie tells her, "we'll go as slow as you want." And there's a wealth of patience and understanding in her voice. "I'm not gonna bite," the corners of Jamie's mouth twitch up towards a smile and she ducks her head, looking at Dani through her lashes. "Unless you want me to."

It's teasing and playful, and so damn cheesy, but it has the desired effect and Dani purses her lips to one side before she lets Jamie's words work their magic, and she smiles.

The thing is, Dani doesn't really want to go slow. She's been moving at a snail's pace her whole life, always at the back of the line waiting to catch up, and now that she has, now that she knows exactly what she wants and has accepted that, going slow is most definitely not on her list of things she wants to do to make up for lost time.

But she's nervous, a little bit scared, and even though she wants, well, everything from Jamie, her anxious nature is still a force to be battled.

Dani has always been stronger than people think, though. She spent years fighting herself, still fights her insecurities every day and probably always will, but the point is that she does fight. She isn't about to stop now.

And, luckily for her, she's got Jamie in her corner.

Jamie, who very slowly reaches out to lightly grasp Dani's wrist, her blue-green eyes never straying from Dani's face as she watches for any signs of reluctance or uncertainty. There must not be a trace of either because she guides the hand that Dani had just retracted to her torso without hesitation, leads Dani's movements until her fingertips brush Jamie's skin and then Jamie's grip is gone. She lets Dani finish the journey herself.

"See? Not so scary, ri-" Jamie sucks in a sharp breath, cutting herself off, when Dani's palm lies flat against Jamie's stomach, thumb glancing over the muscles there. The reaction tows desire through Dani, leaving it to pool between her thighs as her heart rate skyrockets and a small, breathy, "Oh," passes her lips.

It's immediate, the feeling of satisfaction, of pleasure, of rightness. It floods her, floors her, and then both of Dani's hands are on Jamie. Her fingertips dance a line above her belly button and Dani smiles, shy but happy, at the way the muscles twitch and jump beneath them. Her hands lounge at Jamie's waist, mapping the dips and curves, and when Dani guides them up over Jamie's rib cage she swears she feels the other woman shiver.

Transfixed is, perhaps, the best word to use to describe how Dani feels. Maybe mesmerized. Enthralled. Her hands wander around to Jamie's back and she lets her fingers trace every line, every subtle arch, until she gets to Jamie's shoulders.

And then she pauses.

The texture of the skin beneath her left hand is different and it takes Dani a moment to understand why that is. When she does, her forehead creases ever so slightly and her eyes dart to Jamie's who's still watching her. But there's something like defensiveness, at least the echo of it, shadowing them now. Like she's waiting for Dani to pull away.

Dani doesn't.

She moves her fingers over the scarred skin and then, bravery surging, she drops a kiss to the top of Jamie's shoulder. It's featherlight, but the shaky exhale that exits Jamie is heavy in Dani's ears and so she repeats it, pressing more firmly with her lips, allows them to loiter. Something bumps her leg, a quick twitch of movement, and Dani glances down to see that Jamie's hands are clenched into fists at her sides. And she's holding so, so still, Dani notices. Keeping herself restrained so that Dani can take her time.

Maybe it's the sweetness of the gesture, of Jamie. Maybe it's the thrill that runs through Dani at the thought of Jamie wanting to touch her bad enough that she has to restrain herself at all. Maybe it's because of how badly she wants Jamie to touch her.

Whatever the kindling, it sparks a fire. Burns hesitation away and chases off shadows of doubt.

Dragging her hands back down to lie at Jamie's waist, Dani turns her head to press a kiss to the gardener's neck, dragging a whimper from her that makes Dani's stomach clench.

"Dani…." And oh, Jamie's never said her name like that before. Rough and husky, breathing it into the darkness like a prayer and turning it into a catalyst.

Dani's hands take hold of Jamie's, urging her to touch as Jamie had done for her, and she doesn't need any further direction. Her fingers dip beneath the hem of Dani's sweater just as Dani brings her head up to catch her lips, sliding her hands over Jamie's bare arms and pulling her close.

The room around them fills with the whispers of kisses and heavy breaths, making Dani feel heady and drunk. Their lips part and come back together with a fierceness that borders on desperation, and Dani gasps into Jamie's mouth when she feels blunt nails rake along her back. She arches into Jamie, whose arms wind themselves around Dani's middle, under her sweater, holding her like she has zero intention of ever letting Dani go.

It's dizzying, Dani somehow has the mental fortitude to think, being wanted by someone who you actually desire in return. Dani's never felt this before. It's what has her chasing Jamie's lips when the gardener breaks for air, pulling in one ragged lungful after another.

"Christ, Dani," Jamie chuckles against Dani's persistent mouth and Dani delights in the feeling, the sound, the way she's close enough to breathe it in. "Gimme a second, yeah?"

"No," Dani counters, laughing before she snags Jamie's bottom lip between her teeth and tugs. Jamie grunts, hands moving to grope Dani's hips, and she lets her head loll forward and a little to the side so that her temple is pressed to Dani's cheek. After a short silence, she hears Jamie clear her throat and feels a slight shudder trickle down her spine as Jamie tilts her head and speaks lowly into Dani's ear.

"Can you," an audible swallow, "take this off?" Jamie punctuates the question by tugging lightly on the hem of Dani's sweater and Dani feels that tug all the way through her. "I want…" Jamie pauses, pulling in a steadying breath and moving just enough so that she can look at Dani. "I'd like to see you," she says. "If that's okay."

It's more than okay, Dani thinks. With Jamie's thumbs rubbing small circles just above the waistband of her jeans, Dani feels like she might accidentally rip the sweater from her body in her haste.

"Yes," Dani's voice is strange in her own ears. "Yeah, I- yes." There's a flurry of movement from her then, uncoordinated and rushed, but she manages to pull the garment over her head without elbowing Jamie in the face. Once her vision is no longer obscured by purple fabric, she finds Jamie regarding her with a fond smile that shakes something loose inside Dani. Then Jamie is giggling lightly and reaching out to smooth down strands of Dani's hair that must be sticking up at all angles. Dani might feel embarrassed if Jamie weren't looking at her like she is. With kind eyes, biting the very edge of her lower lip as she takes hold of the scrunchie that's keeping Dani's hair up and slowly removes it. Dani's hair falls without shape and, tossing the scrunchie onto the nearby desk without breaking eye contact, Jamie's fingers work themselves into blonde locks, combing through them over and over, rearranging until she's satisfied and Dani feels like she might fall to the floor, boneless. Jamie's hands travel to her cheeks and she places a kiss to Dani's lips before inhaling deeply.

She takes a step backward, running her hands down Dani's arms until they catch her fingers and hold tight.

And then she's looking at Dani. She's looking at Dani with an expression that Dani can't read, because she doesn't think she's ever been looked at quite like this before.

That's when she realises that the breath Jamie had taken just before pulling back had been to steel herself.

And Dani's heart skips, stops, then starts beating anew.

"Dani-" whatever Jamie is about to say is cut short, snapped out of existence by Dani's inability to stop kissing Jamie, stop touching her, wanting her, for even a second. She feels a little out of control, like someone else is pulling her strings, especially when her hands fumble for Jamie's belt, one going to the metal of the buckle while the other yanks the tail out of the loop holding it in place. Looking down, Dani wraps her fingers around the leather and pulls it tight in the opposite direction so that she can pop the clasp free. She hesitates, just for a second, her eyes flicking up to make sure Jamie is okay with this.

Jamie's watching her. Watching Dani's hands work from beneath a hooded gaze and beyond blown pupils, dazed.

And Dani aches for her. The sight rips the rug right out from under Dani, flips her stomach and sends her careening head first into what feels like an ocean of desire. Vast, almost endless, filled with so many things that she doesn't entirely understand, but god, she wants to. She wants to explore, map terrain, sink down into the depths of this and stay there as long as her lungs will let her.

The belt comes undone under her hands and Dani doesn't bother removing it, she just lets either end dangle there as she works on the button of Jamie's jeans. It loosens and Dani makes quick work of the zipper. Jamie's forehead drops to press against hers and Dani brings her hands up so that she can hook her fingers over the waistband of Jamie's pants. Letting them just hang there as they stand close enough to breathe one anothers air.

Something like static crackles between them, loud and electric, and feeling it buzz across her skin Dani begins, "Can-"

"Yes." The word is hardly above a whisper but Dani hears it like it's been spoken through a loudspeaker. She tilts her head up to kiss Jamie as her hands start a frantic push and pull, knuckles bumping Jamie's bare thighs as Dani wrestles the jeans down as far as she can. Jamie helps, though she doesn't break the kiss, and eventually Dani hears something being kicked across the floor out of the way.

Her hands don't wait; they palm over the soft skin of Jamie's thighs, skim the material of her underwear, and Dani swallows the small moan that Jamie releases into the kiss.

And just like that, Jamie's moving her. Walking her backwards until there's nowhere else for Dani to go except onto the bed. And she does, breaking from Jamie only so that she can situate herself as comfortably as she cares to in the moment. Then, burning inside her own skin, she watches as Jamie presses a knee into the mattress on one side of Dani, then lifts herself so that the other is resting on the opposite side. Everything slows down, she even stops breathing, as Jamie crawls up her body until she's hovering above Dani, unruly curls framing her face.

Dani doesn't think she's ever seen anything so beautiful. She almost says it, too, but then Jamie is reaching around herself and fiddling with the clasp of her bra, staring at Dani with such open intensity, and the mere ability to form words flies from Dani. Maybe only for a minute, maybe forever. She would gladly remain mute for the rest of her life if it meant more of this.

More of Jamie holding the brassiere to her chest as she sits back on her haunches. More of Jamie looking at her like she isn't quite real or like she might disappear if Jamie closes her eyes. There's something so heartachingly tender in Jamie's gaze and it makes Dani feel as if she might break her if she isn't careful. But it also makes her feel safe, makes her feel wanted. Nervously sucking her lip between her teeth, Dani reaches out to move Jamie's hands away and then curls her index and middle finger under the white material still covering her. And she tugs.

Jamie straightens her arms and the bra drops, ending up clutched in Dani's hand as she stares, unashamedly, up at the gardener.

It strikes Dani again, how different this all is. With Eddie, she'd only ever felt nervous. She thought maybe that was normal for the first few times and waited for the excitement to kick in, the desire that all her friends talked about, but it just... didn't. Being with him never felt bad but it hadn't ever felt quite right, and as much as she liked being close to him, as much comfort as she'd found in his arms over the years, that nervous anxiety never went away and it was never really supplemented by anything else.

Here with Jamie, Dani's still nervous, still anxious, but god, she's excited too. She recalls how her friends had spoken of their boyfriends, how they hadn't been able to keep their hands off each other, and Dani hadn't really understood.

She understands now. Feels like she'll simply expire if she goes too long without some form of physical contact. There's a constant itching beneath the skin of her fingertips, driving her mad, and the only time it settles is when Dani's hands are on the other woman. She wonders if that's what desire is, what lust is. The insatiable need to caress and kiss until her limbs seize up from overuse and stop working altogether.

It feels so strange, so foreign, to not recognise her own body and its reactions, while at the same time understanding that this is always the way it should have been. That pieces of her have been lying dormant until now, locked away and awaiting the arrival of the key that would unlatch the doors they were hidden behind.

And now, here's Jamie, with a whole ring of keys cut specifically for Dani it seems. Each one turning inside a different lock and releasing something that's been buried for far too long.

It's different, the lighter heaviness of Jamie kneeling above her. The shape of Jamie kneeling above her. The way just looking at her makes Dani feel like she can't breathe, but also like she can breathe easily for the very first time. Like a boulder has been removed from her chest and it can finally fully expand.

It's different, the yearning; a strong word but a fitting one for how she feels. Arousal courses through her body as if it's replaced the blood in her veins and there's an ache between her legs that's exquisite and excruciating, though not entirely unfamiliar.

Coming back to herself, Dani discards the bra she's still holding, blindly dropping it onto the bed beside her, or maybe onto the floor, she isn't sure. Doesn't care. No, all she cares about is getting her hands on Jamie before she erupts into flames, and so she brings them back to Jamie's hips.

But Jamie is eager and as much as that thrills and delights Dani, she isn't done yet. So, when Jamie tries to lie her back down, Dani stops her with a hand against her stomach.

"Wait, I just…" Dani's eyes flick to Jamie's and sees her own desire mirrored in them. "Just let me…" Words failing and head foggy with want, Dani wriggles towards the head of the bed so that she can sit up, bringing them close together while Jamie still straddles her. She stares down between their bodies, watching her own hands as they move, her thumb drifting over lightly defined stomach muscles and up towards Jamie's chest. "I've never," Dani swallows, breath stuttering, "I mean, I haven't-"

"Hey." The interruption is quiet, delicate, like a feather landing on a pillow, and Jamie's eyes are gentle and filled with understanding when Dani's meet them. "It's okay." Jamie's hands are at Dani's back, rhythmically smoothing their way across her skin. "No pressure, no rush," she reminds Dani. "We go as slow as you want and you tell me if you need to stop." Her hands are in her hair then, guiding Dani's mouth to hers in a brief, reassuring kiss. "I'm not going anywhere." Foreheads together once more - something that's quickly becoming commonplace between them in a way that makes Dani's heartbeat flutter - Jamie's hands remain where they are while Dani's dance around where they want to be.

"I-I've never wanted to…" Dani's voice shakes a little as she speaks, a small, thin line appearing between her eyebrows, "to touch anyone as much as I want to touch you." She hears Jamie mutter something unintelligible at her words, watches her chest heave as she takes in a long breath.

Her attention once more on Jamie's body, Dani moves trembling hands up along her sides before stilling at her ribs. And Dani can't help but feel like this is a big moment, bigger than she really expected it to be, perhaps bigger than it would be for someone else. It's why she hesitates, why she bites her lip and takes the second or two to pull everything together. To make sure every cell, every atom is focused.

Then it's just an easy, minute twist of her wrists and the pads of her thumbs glide across the underside of Jamie's breasts.

She hears Jamie gasp and feels the hands in her hair go still, like they've been frozen in stone. Dani wets suddenly dry lips and repeats the action, putting a little more pressure behind it. Jamie doesn't move. Dani twists the wrist of her right hand again, turning it so that her fingers drift down over the side of Jamie's left breast, and she marvels at the softness. She traces small, nonsense patterns around the area that's clearly straining for attention, partly to buy herself time and partly because she likes the way Jamie's breathing has become uneven.

When she finally does drag her thumb over a stiffened peak, pulling taut flesh downward before her thumb continues on, Jamie lets out a muttered, clearly restrained, "Fuck," and something inside Dani just snaps.

Maybe it's some lingering barrier of denial, the last remnants of who she was before. Before tonight, before Jamie walked into the kitchen that day, before Bly. Maybe it's the very last of her own restraint cracking, like a sheet of ice breaking off of the iceberg it's been attached to for as long as it can remember and simply floating away.

She cups Jamie's breast, feels dizzy with the weight of it in her palm, and then moves to cover it with her hand. It fits, Dani thinks, fits like it's meant to, and she squeezes lightly at full flesh, struck by how malleable it is under her ministrations.

She has, on occasion, touched herself but this, like everything else up to this point, is so very different.

And for all of Dani's worry, her anxious nature, she's never failed to dive into something head first, with all the gusto of someone who knows exactly what she's doing, when she really doesn't. Escaping the only place she'd ever known as home and fleeing to Europe, interviewing for and then accepting an au pair job that wasn't completely within her wheelhouse, taking Jamie's hand, kissing Jamie in the greenhouse. Dani puts her all into everything she does.

Now is no different.

Moving her hand so that Jamie's breast is cradled in it again, Dani lets instinct drive her and she dips her head, breathing warm air over the nipple before she takes it into her mouth.

"Jesus, fuck, Dani." Jamie arches into her and Dani's free hand paws at her lower back, trying to hold her close, as the fingers in her hair curl into fists, pulling tight enough to hurt but in a way that's not unpleasant. It sends bolts of lightning through Dani as she uses her tongue and teeth against Jamie. She doesn't know how long she stays there, only knows that she could have stayed longer, when she feels her head being tugged away. She lets go with a wet pop that should sound obscene but doesn't and allows her head to be tipped back by firm hands until she's looking up at Jamie, breaths coming heavy and shallow from between parted lips.

There's so much spoken in the silence that follows, brief as it is. Then Jamie's tongue is snaking its way into Dani's mouth and she's kissing her with a slow thoroughness that makes Dani's toes curl. She's never felt so absorbed by a kiss, like she could sink into it forever. Jamie teases a breathy moan from her, pulls it out like a loose thread hanging at the end of a sweater in danger of unravelling.

"You've uh," Jamie's panting when they finally part, her smile so wide and bright that it lights the whole room, dazzles Dani, "got me at a bit of a disadvantage here."

It takes Dani a moment to understand what Jamie is driving at. Well, it takes her a moment and the addition of Jamie's fingers just barely grazing the sides of Dani's breasts through her bra.

"Yeah," Dani grins, showing teeth, "I guess I do, don't I?" Jamie hums her agreement and slowly reaches around Dani, tracing a line back and forth across the band of the bra, idling. Waiting. "You can." Dani hopes her conviction shines through past the sudden tremor in her voice and holds onto Jamie's hips as the other woman undoes the clasp.

Dani doesn't give Jamie a chance to remove it before she's pulling it off herself and discarding it. Then her hands reclaim their position and she ducks her head under an abrupt rush of nervousness. She wants this, but what if-

"Can hear the gears turning from here," Jamie says, tapping the crown of Dani's head before stroking over her hair. "Penny for your thoughts, Poppins?"

Feeling a little silly, Dani looks up again and Jamie brings her hand down to cradle her cheek.

"What if," Dani's eyelids flutter at the contact, "what if I'm not-"

"You are," Jamie cuts in, easy and simple, and with no room for argument as she tilts Dani's head so that she can make sure the roots of the words take hold. "Dani, you are."

And just like that, Dani's worries melt away.

Jamie carefully eases her down onto the mattress, holds herself up over her and presses a kiss to Dani's lips. Then her cheek and the line of her jaw, over to the spot below her ear and along her neck. The press of her mouth is gone after that and, without seeing, Dani knows Jamie is looking at her.

Really looking at her.

Dani knows because her skin is practically humming under the attention.

"Can I touch you?" Jamie asks, quietly. Dani opens her eyes long enough to catch Jamie's and see the hunger in them, before she nods and lets heavy lids shutter them once more. It feels like minutes pass before Jamie's hand finally makes contact and when it does, her fingertips at Dani's sternum, Dani jumps. "Sorry." Jamie's pulling her hand away but Dani catches her by the wrist, halting her retreat.

"Just startled me," she reassures her, staring up at Jamie's face as nerves tumble around in her belly and tussle with the rest of her emotions. It's a bit of a mess. A big, messy ball of yarn made up of all different kinds of colours, but there's a sureness about it.

There's no resistance when she pulls at a slim wrist, guiding it as Jamie had done hers earlier, and it only takes a second for a warm palm to land against Dani's left breast. When it does, she moves her own hand down to cover Jamie's, holding it to her, and watches the way Jamie parts her lips and moistens them with a swipe of her tongue. Watches the muscles in her jaw flex as she clenches it. Watches Jamie as she watches her.

Then Jamie's hand is moving, palming Dani's breast experimentally a few times, dragging a thumb over her nipple and pulling a low whine from somewhere deep inside Dani.

Things blur.

Jamie pitches forward, sweeps her tongue into Dani's mouth with enough fire to take the oxygen out of the room and curls her fingers until she's groping the flesh beneath it. Dani's hips jerk, or they try to, and her hands fly to muscled forearms, gripping tight, and now Jamie is kissing her harder. Dani lets herself be taken by the kiss, lets her hands roam without thought as Jamie's mouth continues bringing her to life. She strokes them over Jamie's chest and feels a sharp stab of desire when Jamie rocks her hips down into Dani.

So, Dani does it again, this time taking a risk and using her thumb and forefinger to pinch. She's rewarded with the same movement and a noise that's probably too loud for their current location. It's like pouring gasoline onto a bonfire and Dani is made abruptly aware that she's still wearing jeans when the temperature in the room becomes nearly unbearable.

Reaching down between them, she manages to get the button of her pants undone and works open the teeth of the zipper before Jamie notices anything is happening. When she does, she leaves Dani's kiss-swollen lips and shuffles backwards off the bed. Standing at the foot of it in nothing but her underwear, she's a vision. One Dani could never have possibly imagined, never allowed herself to, and one she's so very glad she gets to witness.

Jamie's fingers snare the bottom of Dani's trouser legs and gives them a testing tug. Dani lifts her hips without further prompting and Jamie doesn't waste any time in removing the final major article of clothing separating them. She lets the jeans fall to the floor, out of sight, and Dani tries not to suffocate in the air that seems to have thickened around them.

"All right?" Jamie asks and Dani blinks to find the woman suddenly at her side, a hand settled around the curve of her ribs acting as a pleasant, grounding force that Dani mentally clings to. She can feel the length of the gardener's body pressed against her own, the softness of her form shifting against Dani as Jamie props herself up on one arm so that she can look down at her, eyes searching.

And Dani wants to use her words, wants to ensure Jamie knows she's okay, that this is okay, more than okay. But the longer she spends trying to find them, the deeper she can feel her frown becoming, and Jamie's expression starts to change.

Dani wants to scream at how careful Jamie is being with her. Not because she doesn't like it, not even because she does, it just feels like so much and Dani feels so safe.

Jamie's cheek is soft beneath her hand and Dani holds her in a way that presses her thumb to the shell of Jamie's ear and lets her fingers tickle the fine hairs at the base of Jamie's neck as she pulls her down into a kiss that Dani hopes says even more than words could.

It's during this kiss, as she's letting her tongue move languidly against Jamie's that she notices. The hand that Jamie is touching her with, the one she's allowing to cruise lazily over as much of Dani's body as she can reach, scattering goosebumps across her skin, isn't moving smoothly. It twitches, skips, like a hiccup, and Dani realises that's because it's shaking. Even as Jamie surges up into the kiss and slides her leg over Dani's, moving until she's stretched out over her, leg nestled between Dani's thighs.

The shaking doesn't stop her, though. Dani releases a small moan against Jamie's lips when nimble fingers land once more at her chest, lingering now, teasing one breast before moving to the other. Then Jamie's mouth is gone and Dani opens her own to protest, only to be cut off by the feeling of warm, slick velvet surrounding her nipple. Sucking, teeth grazing; Dani's fingers disappear into Jamie's curls at the burning press of a tongue and her hips cant upward. Jamie's close enough that there's the thinnest amount of contact, of friction, possible, but it's enough to disconnect Dani's brain from the rest of her body.

She gasps out what she thinks was meant to be a word, maybe a name, and rocks her hips forward again with a mewling desperation that she'll likely be mortified by later. It doesn't seem to embarrass Jamie, though. Quite the opposite. It brings Jamie's mouth back to hers in a firm kiss as the knee between her legs pushes into her.

It's instantaneous; Dani's fingers turn into talons amongst Jamie's hair and she pushes her hips down hard onto Jamie's leg, breaking away from the gardener's lips to let out a long, broken moan that only seems to pull Jamie closer into her. Jamie's hand is gripping her hip and the next time Dani tries to seek friction, Jamie presses her hip down into the mattress, holding Dani still. She shoots Jamie a confused glance, fingers releasing dark, curly hair and dropping to Jamie's shoulders.

Her eyes are scorching, boring into Dani as she trails her hand from Dani's hip to her abdomen, still watching carefully even through the wanting emanating from her. Dani can feel it, hot and heavy, right where Jamie's hand is, and she bites down on her bottom lip when work-calloused fingers brush the front of her underwear. Bites harder when Jamie eases her leg back just enough to slip her hand into the newly opened space and stroke Dani through damp material.

Dani screws her eyes shut and presses the back of her right hand against her mouth to stifle the noises trying to escape. Her left scrambles over Jamie's shoulder and neck, a brief burst of mad motion before they curve around the base of Jamie's neck and stay there. Clinging, squeezing, thumb rubbing the skin in a way she isn't paying attention to.

Jamie moves slowly, pressing into Dani and drawing the same patient circles against her again and again. Dani's hips are gently rocking long before she realises they're moving at all and once she does she can't find it in her to be any version of embarrassed. Not when Jamie is looking at Dani like she's starving.

Swallowing down swelling emotions that she can't even begin to give names to, Dani lets the need to have Jamie closer take over and she tugs at the neck of the woman above her with a groan. Jamie follows and Dani kisses her like they're running out of time, quick and deep, one after another. She shudders when Jamie takes her hand away, jerks her hips when that hand uncurls against the flat of her stomach, and feels like her heart is going to break clean through her ribs when Jamie slips a sliver of her pinky finger under the elastic of Dani's underwear.

Jamie stills, breaking the kiss but remaining close enough for their noses to touch, and Dani takes the time to stare at Jamie.

Her head is bowed down and away, so Dani can only sort of make out one side of her face, but she can see that Jamie's eyes are closed. Can see the slope of her nose and the pretty line of her jaw.

With the exception of their heaving breaths, there's nothing to disturb the air in the room, not until Dani, voice wavering and feeling that same unparalleled certainty from earlier, whispers a single word against Jamie's lips.

"Please."

The breath Jamie has been holding explodes from her and she pushes her hand beneath the final barrier. Her fingers glide slowly over Dani in a long, downward stroke, and Dani's mouth falls open, leg lifting and bending, heel digging into the mattress.

"Jamie," Dani sighs her name into the darkness without purpose, simply because she needs to. Because she can.

"Jesus, Dani, you're so…" Jamie trails off, tilting her head so that their lips are almost touching. Almost. Her voice sounds like it's being dragged across loose gravel, leaving it shredded and raw.

Dani doesn't need Jamie to finish the sentence. She can feel her own arousal, how wet she is against Jamie's fingers, doesn't need to be told. Doesn't need anything except for Jamie to keep touching her.

And Jamie does, keeping her strokes long and broad until Dani's hips are moving in time with the rhythm being set and she feels like she's going mad. Then Jamie's fingertips are narrowing their trajectory, changing it just so, and when they slip against that hidden bundle of nerves, Dani thinks she might die. She's going to die, right here on this bed, with Jamie touching her so tenderly, and Dani thinks that would be a fine way to go.

Only, she's not ready for this to be over yet.

Jamie's fingers draw small circles against her and Dani's going to crawl out of her own skin. So, she holds onto Jamie, one hand at the base of her neck, the other splayed out against her back and tries to keep herself together. Tries to stop herself from falling to pieces so soon. Any attempts to keep her breathing even fall dramatically flat the longer Jamie touches her, teasing her closer to an edge Dani is both aching to fly off of and not ready to jump from.

She can feel Jamie's body pressed against the length of hers, skin on skin, leaving Dani feeling like she's sitting too close to a campfire on that side, the flames licking over her ribs and hip. Jamie hikes her leg so it's draped over Dani's like a weighted blanket and they're touching everywhere, but it still doesn't feel like enough. Dani wants to be closer, wants more, wants to be able to voice that. All that comes out when she tries is another whimper and Jamie leaves a kiss at the side of Dani's mouth, at her jaw, nuzzles her nose against her cheek before leaving one there too. And Dani isn't sure but she thinks she can feel Jamie's heartbeat thumping against where her chest sits flush against Dani's arm.

Jamie's lips find hers in another too-brief kiss and Dani lets out a whine that manages to sound surprised as well as disappointed when Jamie takes her hand back, letting the elastic of Dani's underwear snap back down as she does.

"Not going anywhere," Jamie tells her, repeating the words from earlier, though there's a scratchiness to them now. Dani blinks open heavy lids and Jamie's face is so close, eyes sparkling with a galaxy of possibilities.

"You're perfect," Dani says before she can think to stop herself, the hand that had been clinging to the back of Jamie's neck now stroking her cheek. There's an instant where Dani wants to take it back, not because she doesn't mean it, but because she's afraid it'll scare Jamie and, while Jamie freezes in place for a second or two, she's melting under Dani's gaze and flashing a cocky smile.

"You don't need to keep flattering me, you know. Already got me in your bed." Jamie pauses long enough for Dani's smile to grow. "You can keep going though, if you like. Won't catch me complaining." Dani rolls her eyes and pushes her fingertips against Jamie's cheek, playfully shoving her head away. She hears Jamie chuckling and feels a little lightheaded when she turns to her again. She's got that look on her face, the one that tells her Jamie is about to say something she already knows will make Dani's stomach flip and her palms sweat. "I reckon you'd rather it be me that keeps going though, yeah?"

And, like a switch being flipped, the humour that had been permeating the air is snuffed out and a sense of serious excitement filters back in.

Jamie slips her fingers under the side of Dani's underwear and she doesn't pull, just lets her hand rest there, her knuckles against Dani's thigh. The unspoken question is obvious, though. It's written in the moonlight that dances across Jamie's face and it's there as a handful of burning embers in the heat of her gaze. Dani doesn't feel the need to say anything, to confirm suspicions that are so blatantly correct, and so she hooks her thumb under the elastic on the opposite side and raises her hips.

There's a small struggle, an uncoordinated dance that ultimately ends with Dani once more on her back, bravely motioning for Jamie to follow suit with her own underwear. Jamie does with a shy half smile that makes Dani's stomach feel like it's trying to somersault its way out of her throat and then Jamie is back in exactly the same position she'd been in before, only now there's nothing left separating them.

Jamie takes her time, fingers flowing like strands of silk over Dani's neck, down to her chest and along her sides. They paint invisible patterns across her stomach and by the time they're just about where Dani needs them to be, she's trembling.

Her hips jerk, quite of their own volition, when Jamie starts with her slow circles again, and Dani, heel once more pressing into the mattress, lets her eyes close. Lets her lips part and lets Jamie pull all manner of noises from her, though she tries to keep the volume low on those.

There's a pressure building inside of Dani, white-hot and seering, coiling tighter with every circle, every puff of warm breath that hits her skin when Jamie exhales. And this is it, she thinks. This is how it's supposed to be, supposed to feel. This is everything she's been missing and something she already knows she doesn't want to let go of.

Jamie dips a finger lower, stroking the length of Dani a few times until she pauses and Dani can feel Jamie's chest still against her arm as she holds her breath. Something inside Dani clenches, hard, as Jamie makes her intentions clear, and Dani digs her nails into the skin above the gardener's hip, tangles her hand in Jamie's hair and holds tight. Then Jamie is sliding inside, methodical in her languidness, and Dani's curse of pleasure is echoed by Jamie's guttural moan, jagged and wild. Slowly, slowly, until there's nowhere left to go and then Jamie stills her hand, holding herself over Dani so that they're doing little more than gasping into each other's mouths.

Dani wants to stay right here in this moment forever. Head filled with a happy fog, body buzzing, and with Jamie inside her. But all moments end and when this one does, it melds seamlessly into another that Dani doesn't want to leave, then another, and another.

Jamie eases out with a laziness that makes Dani wonder if she's similarly overcome by all of this. If she's as absorbed by every fleeting kiss of contact between them, committing the tiniest of touches to memory. If she's as overwhelmed as Dani feels; swathed in Jamie and running over with the tangible feeling of being wanted, needed, almost, and feeling those same things inside her, reflecting back.

Jamie pushes back inside and Dani forgets how to breathe. Dies a hundred times in the interim before Jamie starts a slow rhythm and slides her tongue into Dani's mouth at the same time. She kisses Dani like this means something, means everything. And it does. There are words that Dani wants to put to this but knows it's far too soon to do so. That doesn't stop them from looming, though, like they're tethered to this regardless of whether or not they should be.

She knows it means something to Jamie, too. Knows that this unnamed thing between them, the connection, the easy company, had hit so fast and so hard, it had to mean something.

Dani doesn't know if she believes in Fate, but she knows, deep in her soul, that she's meant to be here. That she was always going to end up here one way or another. Here, with Jamie.

"Dani…" Nothing follows the sound of her name, Dani doesn't think there's anything else to say, wonders if Jamie says it simply to remind herself that Dani is there. Real and moving underneath her. That the hands gripping her too hard belong to Dani and that it's Dani asking, begging, for more.

Jamie adds a second finger and a flash bomb explodes behind Dani's eyes. Bright and blinding, and Jamie is doing something different, moving in a new way and honing in on something inside Dani that rips a keening cry from her. It's loud, it's too loud and Dani knows it is, but a second one leaves her regardless and it's hard to remember that they aren't the only ones in the house with Jamie moving inside her like this. With Jamie pressing soft, gasping, groaning sounds into Dani's neck as if she's the one being steadily driven towards something earth shattering.

With her leg thrown over Dani's like it is, Jamie's unconscious slight rocking of her hips leaves evidence of her own arousal on Dani's skin and, once Dani registers that, what it is and what it means, the pressure that has been building inside Dani surges like a tidal wave. Sudden, though not entirely unexpected, it climbs higher as Dani wraps a hand around Jamie's upper arm and squeezes.

Jamie lifts her head then and Dani is able to look at her for all of two seconds, but it's a soul-shattering two seconds. The way Jamie looks at her makes Dani want to scream and swear until her vocal cords stop working. She doesn't, though, choosing instead to hold on with her other hand as well, gripping Jamie's shoulder as she angles her hips a little more towards her.

There's an edge of franticness to Dani's movements now, the way she bucks harder against Jamie's hand as it works between her thighs.

"Jamie." Dani's voice breaks, cutting the name down the middle, and she doesn't know why she's even saying it, but she can't seem to stop. "Jamie." She tightens her hold even though she's afraid she'll leave bruises, her body and brain disconnected for the time being. It's as if she's worried she's going to fall and is grasping at Jamie to steady herself, only to find she's being pushed. She still feels safe, like a novice skydiver securely strapped to a professional, but she's definitely falling.

Jamie's fingers curl as her thumb brushes against Dani and that tidal wave crests. Peaks, high above the water, and Dani's hand flies to her mouth again as her legs start to shake. She bites down on the back of it but when that doesn't muffle the moans Jamie is dragging from her, she clamps her palm over her mouth instead. She winds her other arm around Jamie's neck and can't help but pull down as the wave tips forward and rolls in on itself. Crashing, roaring in her ears.

Dani comes undone slowly and then all at once. Rides the wave until it curves and tumbles down with it. Jamie is strong and solid above her, unmoving against the urging of Dani's arm and so rather than bring her down, Dani's shoulders leave the bed. She pulls herself into Jamie as she starts to unravel, her breathing reduced to erratic gasps that don't fill her lungs. Her hips still and her body stiffens, and right as her orgasm hits, she rips her hand from her mouth and buries it in thick curls, holding on.

Jamie's name falls from her lips, graceless and naked, as pleasure swarms her. Covers her. Carries her away. But Jamie's there to bring her back, fingers still moving inside Dani, but slower now. Drawing it out.

Dani's chest starts to hurt and she realises it's because she isn't breathing. Hips still twitching, she tries to unlock her arm from around Jamie and falls back bonelessly, rib cage heaving. And when Jamie starts to ease out, Dani feels an odd sense of panic start to claw at her and lets out a small noise which seems to convey that, because Jamie holds still. Stays.

The panic abates and Dani's eyelids droop, all tension leaving her body.

"You," Jamie begins, her voice acid-washed with desire, "are so…." she doesn't finish, but Dani's mind supplies a variety of possible endings for the sentence. She swallows thickly.

As Dani lies there, rhapsodic and sated, with Jamie's sweat-slicked body half on top of her, fingers inside her, the heat from her gaze warming Dani's face, something unexpected happens. It bubbles up inside her, turning into uneven tremors that spread out and snake bone-smooth fingers around her ribcage and shoulders, shaking her. Her breathing stutters and her throat feels tight.

She's still coming down from her high when the first tear falls, making its escape from the corner of her eye. It's followed by another as her inhales turn quick and rapid, catching at their highest point before starting over, and she tries to choke back the wet sobs that accompany every hitch, but she can't.

Jamie slowly removes her fingers and Dani wants to protest, but her tears are scalding and she feels like she's suffocating under a blanket of embarrassment. Heat floods her cheeks and she screws her eyes shut, throwing an arm across them in some futile attempt to hide.

"I'm sorry," she manages, eventually. "I feel… I don't know why-"

"Hey…" Jamie's fingers close around Dani's wrist and she pulls, gently levering Dani's arm up and away. "Dani, look at me." Hesitantly, Dani does as she's asked. Jamie is staring down at her, a small crease between her brows. "You don't ever have to apologise for feeling something." She swipes her thumb across Dani's cheek, catching a tear. "Okay?" Tucks a few strands of blonde hair behind her ear.

Dani doesn't know how to respond, doesn't know how to exist feeling what she's feeling without the shame and guilt that's usually attached to it. Not that she's ever felt quite like this before. She wants to say something, thinks she should say something, but Jamie is looking at her like she's some precious, fragile treasure that's just been unearthed, and all Dani can do is wind her fingers back into messy curls and bring Jamie down against her lips.

Jamie kisses her, slow and deep, and Dani's tears begin to dry under the warmth of her mouth. Panic abating, dissolving under Jamie, Dani calms.

Her embarrassment fades, quickly replaced by something else that makes her flush when her teeth graze Jamie's lower lip and Dani feels her groan into the kiss. She tugs on Jamie's curls, pulling their mouths apart and leans up to press a wet kiss to the side of Jamie's neck. She nips at the skin there and Jamie's hips jerk against her.

That. She wants more of that. More of the sounds Jamie makes, too.

She drags her hands along Jamie's body, stopping here and there to tease or trace the jut of a hipbone with her thumb.

"Dani," Jamie says, just as Dani's fingers skip across her pelvis. "You don't have to, you-"

"Want to." God, does she want to. She pushes her hand down until she can feel the heat between Jamie's legs. Until either side of her hand grazes the insides of Jamie's thighs and she feels a dampness that makes Dani clench hard around nothing, before she covers Jamie with her palm.

The noise that leaves Jamie is strangled but not displeased.

And when Dani dips her fingers in to drag them along Jamie's length, her inhale is so sharp she almost chokes on it. It's not like touching herself, that's the first thing she thinks. The second is that she's never felt so much just touching someone else before. Third, that she needs to reign herself in; she wants to take her time.

She presses lightly with her hand, exploring, circling but not where Jamie needs it. To Jamie's credit, she allows Dani to take her time, right up until she realises she's being toyed with, and then her eyes flick open and Dani's hand stills at the look in them. Irises so big they've almost taken all the colour away.

"Jesus, Dani, please."

It's the begging that does it. No one has ever begged her before. She's never felt this needed, this wanted. No one has ever looked at her like they might die if she doesn't do something. Anything.

She presses inside Jamie with two fingers and lets her eyes roll into the back of her head at the feeling of being drawn in. At the impossibly smooth slickness that surrounds her. At the way Jamie's hand clutches tightly at the pillow beside her head, as the surprise of Dani's boldness pulls a string of thickly accented expletives from the woman above her.

Dani takes her time, sinking in slow and marvelling at how exquisit it feels. At how wet Jamie is.

"Are-are you, is this," Dani asks once she finds her voice, moving her fingers just slightly and curving the corner of her mouth into a small smile when Jamie gasps, shudders, "all because of…."

"Yeah," Jamie says, letting her head loll forward to press her forehead to the side of Dani's face. Her breath is hot where it flows down over Dani's neck. "S'all you." There's a certain cadance to Jamie's voice that makes her sound drunk and Dani shivers at her next words. "You drive me crazy." Digs the nails of her free hand into the flesh at Jamie's hip when she moves her leg to straddle Dani's thigh, opening herself up and allowing Dani to slide in deeper. Their groans mingle, Jamie's punctuated with a curse that sets Dani's skin ablaze, and Dani's head is spinning. "Been driving me crazy for ages." Jamie is out of breath, panting practically, and when Dani starts to move, starts to ease out, she gives chase. Rolls her hips, rocking herself down onto Dani's fingers, and growls a strained, "Fuck," into Dani's ear when Dani pushes back inside.

She has just enough presence of mind to be amazed by how much it excites her, hearing Jamie curse like this. Feeling Jamie tight around her as she slides her fingers out and back in with a building rhythm. The way Jamie's body moves overtop of her, muttering a litany of profanities that would have made Dani blush from the roots of her hair to the tips of her toes in a different life. Now, it lights her up, a fuse attached to a stick of dynamite.

It's sensory overload. Touching Jamie, hearing Jamie, craning her neck to kiss Jamie's shoulder and tasting the sweat on her skin.

Dani wants more.

Wants everything.

The arm Jamie is using to hold herself up has started to shake and there's a cocktail of undiluted lust and a hunger that's been starved for far too long swirling inside Dani, potent enough to cause a fight between desire and fear, kicked off by a single thought. A fight that desire was destined to win the very second the idea occurred to her.

Because her fear doesn't really stand a chance with Jamie around. Not now.

With her unoccupied hand, Dani urges Jamie to lift her head so she can look at her. She isn't ready for the sight, doesn't think there's anything that could have possibly prepared her for it in all honesty.

Jamie looks like she's been soaked in arousal. Dunked down into it and held there for as long as she could stand. Hair plastered to her forehead, eyes now void of colour, blackness swallowing it up, and breathing at such an uneven pace it briefly worries Dani. She's distracted from that when she sees that it isn't just Jamie's arm that's shaking, but her whole body, and then she's distracted by Jamie's mouth on hers. Sloppy and uncoordinated in a way that has Dani grabbing Jamie's upper arm and pulling her to the side.

Dani reluctantly slips her fingers free, trying to ignore the whine of protest that Jamie makes when she does, and curls them, sticky and shining, around Jamie's other arm. Hint taken, Jamie lets herself be pushed onto her back and pressed down into the mattress by Dani's kisses.

And this is new, Dani thinks, as she leaves Jamie's lips and settles with her knees between the gardener's thighs, one hand either side of her head. Not being the one looking up, staring at the ceiling waiting to feel something. Here, holding herself above Jamie, Dani feels more than she ever thought she could. Wants more than she ever thought she would and it's that which drives her down.

She kisses her way along Jamie's neck and over her unmarked shoulder. Stops there to give in to temptation, to bite and suck at the skin until Jamie claws at her back and squeezes bent legs to Dani's sides. Until there's a reddish-purple patch blooming overtop a light tan that Dani can soothe with a kiss before moving on.

She trails her mouth down between Jamie's breasts, lingers there to further her exploration from earlier and count the different kinds of noises Jamie makes depending on what part of Dani's mouth she uses and how.

It's only when Dani's kisses pepper toned, twitching stomach muscles that the fog seems to clear and Jamie can see well enough to catch a clue. She catches Dani's hand where it's resting at her hip.

"Dani, what-" her voice cracks and Dani glances up without lifting her head, "what are you…?" The sentence hangs beneath a banner of laboured breaths and desire streaks through Dani once more when she sees Jamie lying against the pillows, wide-eyed with one arm thrown back and her own fingers twisting into her hair. Chest rising and falling in a manner that is mesmerising.

If she hadn't wanted this before…

"Is it," she sucks her lip between her teeth, then rolls her lips together, feeling brave again under the weight of Jamie's stare. "Is it okay if…" she shifts back, kisses below Jamie's navel, eyes still fixed on Jamie's face as she waits for some version of yes or no.

"You don't have to," Jamie swallows thickly, moving her hand from her hair to grip the pillow behind her. She looks a little wild around the edges. Dani smiles her next kiss into the dip below her hip, teasing the top of a quivering thigh. She raises her head a little then, resting her cheek against Jamie's knee.

She's spent the entire night being so careful with Dani, always making sure things were still okay, and Dani knows that if she asked, this would all stop right now and there would be no negative repercussions. Jamie would just get dressed and leave if that's what Dani wanted.

It is not what Dani wants.

She slips her hand free from Jamie's and dances her fingertips across her inner thigh. Jamie squirms.

"If I want to?" Dani asks, heartbeat flitting about like a hummingbird as she continues to keep Jamie's gaze. "If I really want to?"

Jamie's eyelids flutter and she closes them for a second, muttering something under her breath that Dani doesn't quite catch. But then she's looking at Dani again, face and neck blushed a faint, fetching red, and she nods. Nods in a way that Dani thinks is meant to be short and quick, but the momentum of Jamie's eagerness keeps her head bobbing far longer than is necessary.

Finally tearing her attention away from Jamie's pretty face, Dani shifts, dropping kisses along the inside of her left thigh while she curls her right arm around Jamie's leg and tries to situate herself somewhat comfortably without throwing one of them off the bed. With her bicep pressed into the underside of Jamie's thigh, Dani has just enough reach to splay her hand out on the other woman's stomach. And the last thing Dani sees before she dips her head is Jamie's hand balling the sheet beside her into a fist.

Then all Dani can hear is Jamie's breathing and the excited pounding of her own heart, the rest of her senses focused on what's right in front of her. And Dani doesn't know what the hell she's doing but she very quickly realises that she also doesn't care. Jamie wants her, enough that her hips keep leaving the bed whenever Dani's breath ghosts across her. Enough that she's whimpering almost continuously as Dani hovers close, savouring the moment and wishing she could see better. Enough that her presence, so close but too far, has Jamie letting out a gravelly, "Please," that releases the tightly wound but steadily held windup mechanism keeping Dani in place and sends her flying.

She flattens her tongue against wet heat and drags it up through slick folds, tasting Jamie for the first time.

"Fuck." That gravelly quality to Jamie's voice remains. "Fuck, Dani." Her hand scrambles to find Dani's where it lies against her stomach, wiggles fingers into the spaces between Dani's until she's gripping her hand from above, squeezing.

Dani presses in and swipes her tongue again, closing her eyes as Jamie bites back a moan and tugs Dani's hand hard enough to pull it away from her body, torso curling forward. Dani holds fast, not letting Jamie take her hand too far, as her mind goes blank and for once she's grateful, happy to have instinct take over so she doesn't get caught overthinking.

She doesn't want to think, just wants to experience. Wants to live the moment as it happens; to hear Jamie gasping and feel her hips cant upwards unsteadily, like she wants to move so badly but doesn't want to hurt or startle Dani. Jamie's fingers squeeze hers tight enough that it might hurt if Dani's brain was capable of processing such minor things, which it isn't at the moment. She's aware of Jamie's grip, the solid certainty of it, but that's all. No pain, just the sounds of Jamie's pleasure ringing in Dani's ears in a way that she knows has already caused long-lasting damage.

"You-you can move," Dani tells her, pulling back just enough to glance along the length of Jamie's body to meet her eyes. Sees something flash behind them when they find hers. "I want you to." She almost doesn't recognise the sound of her own voice, the way the words leave her mouth, all confident and sure. Jamie whines, drives her head back into the pillow beneath it as if looking at Dani is too much right now, and Dani lets the insistent tugging she's feeling lead her down again.

She takes her time, experimenting, alternating between firm pressure and lighter sweeps. Pressing in with her tongue as far as she can. Enjoys the slow rocking of Jamie's hips and the way they jerk erratically when Dani closes her lips around the swollen bundle of nerves begging for her attention.

"Dani…" Jamie's tone is different, close to warning maybe, and Dani's body thrums at the thought of what that might mean. Grips Jamie's thigh with the hand not currently ensnared and holds tight as Jamie bucks harder. The feeling of Jamie's fingers threading through her hair sends a shock along Dani's spine and then she's mouthing hungrily at Jamie, licking, sucking, unconcerned with the stinging of her scalp as those fingers tighten but don't pull.

Jamie's breath hitches, three times in rapid succession, and her legs shake on either side of Dani's head.

And with the amount of cursing Jamie has done up to this point, Dani expects her to be loud. But when her muscles tense and she goes rigid, Dani opens her eyes in time to watch Jamie come apart with a silent cry that stretches her neck muscles and arches her back.

There's nothing to describe what the sight does to her. No way to explain how it makes her feel, behind her ribs and then deep in her bones. And she's groaning against Jamie, unable to control the sound, as the orgasm washes over her. Watching, tasting, taking in each and every aspect of this moment, as much as her mind will allow. She slows her ministrations but doesn't stop until Jamie sags back onto the mattress and tugs gently on Dani's hair. Only then does Dani move away, taking the time to maneuver herself so that she's kneeling, and absently licking her lips as she watches the rise and fall of Jamie's chest.

She's still staring when Jamie reaches for her, hard working hands breaking Dani's line of sight as well as the trance she'd been lost in, and she looks up only to fall right back down into hooded eyes.

"Dani…" And Jamie has said her name so many different ways over the course of the night; this one is new. "C'mere," Jamie mumbles, drowsy and adorable, and Dani can't do anything but go to her.

She's surprised when she's pulled into a kiss, acutely aware of how she must still taste like the woman kissing her, but Jamie only exhales noisily and strokes her tongue into Dani's mouth. Keeps her there, suspended, head swimming, until she's out of air.

Dani crawls around to lie beside Jamie, but finds her wrist being taken in a loose grasp and Dani allows her movements to be choreographed. She ends up lying with her cheek resting on Jamie's chest, the top of her head tucked under her chin, and her arm is left draped around a slim waist. Then Jamie's hand is brushing its way back up Dani's forearm, coming to a stop at the ditch of her elbow and staying there while her other arm wraps itself around Dani's back, holding her close.

Jamie sighs. It sounds happy.

Dani has never felt so content.

They lie like that for what could be hours but probably isn't, sweat cooling on their skin, Jamie's heartbeat under her ear, and Dani wonders if it was always going to be like this. If her first experience with a woman would have been as intense with someone else. Her world has been undone, broken down and remoulded into something new by considerate hands and attentive affection. With the patience of someone who cares enough to take her time, to encourage without insisting, and want without demands.

No, she knows this isn't solely because Jamie is a woman and Dani has been denying herself so long. It's also because it's Jamie and Dani had felt a strange sense of knowing the first moment she'd seen her, dressed in overalls and streaked with dirt. Something had been set to simmer that morning and now here they are, cooling down in the afterglow.

Drawing circles along Jamie's side, Dani cautiously breaks the sweet silence that has settled over them.

"Was I…" but she doesn't quite know how to phrase what she wants to ask, wants to know. "Was it okay?"

After a long pause, Jamie's chest begins to rumble and shake beneath Dani's head, and Dani hoists herself up to squint down at the gardener. She looks amused, sleepy. Dani's heart gives an extra exuberant thump.

"I know they say there's no such thing as a silly question," Jamie teases, with an arched eyebrow and a wry smile that warms Dani from the inside out, "but seriously, Poppins?"

Dani purses her lips but can't stop the grin that twists free. It spreads, bashfully proud, until she giggles and buries her face in the crook of Jamie's neck.

"You sure you've never done that before?" Jamie asks, rolling a little onto her side so that she can wrap both arms around Dani, who snuggles closer, throws her arm over Jamie's hip and entangles their legs.

"Mm," Dani inhales deeply, breathing the other woman in. "Pretty sure I'd remember if I had."

"Might have a point there." Jamie runs her hands back and forth along the plains of Dani's back, shoulder blade to tailbone, and drops a kiss onto blonde hair. "I know I won't be forgetting any time soon."

Dani can't stop smiling, giddy and exhausted. She's so comfortable with Jamie and maybe that should surprise her, but it doesn't. It just feels easy, amazingly normal. And maybe that's because she's finally herself. The last remnants of who she used to be shucked off like snakeskin, a ghostly reminder of what once was that would soon disappear completely.

"Good." She brushes her fingertips blindly across the spot on Jamie's shoulder where she'd spent time working the skin until it bruised. "Glad I seem to have, um, left a mark."

A beat of silence.

"Oh, Poppins, no," Jamie sighs, all dramatic like Dani's just told her she's accidentally destroyed half her greenhouse. "You are spending far too much time with Owen." She tickles her way across Dani's lower back and up her side, light and playful, and Dani squeals, arching into Jamie in a futile attempt to try and escape. There's low laughter in her ear and bare breasts pressed to her front, and Dani is breathless with happiness.

Later, once the need for sleep has settled into their muscles, Dani pulls the covers over them and wiggles close. Front flush with Jamie's back, Dani's stomach flips when Jamie reaches and takes hold of her hand, pulling Dani's arm over and around so that it's tucked tightly about Jamie's stomach. Then she slides her fingers between Dani's from above, like she'd done earlier, and Dani curls her own over Jamie's, turning their two hands into one fist.

They don't say goodnight, just lie together as slumber creeps towards them. It's peaceful and Dani thinks, dangerously, that she'd happily spend the rest of her days like this. Wrapped up in Jamie. Had she wanted this the whole time? From the instant the gardener had walked into the kitchen? Yes, she thinks, probably yes.

"I felt like I knew you already," Dani murmurs, whispering the confession into Jamie's bare shoulder from behind and ending it with a soft kiss to the same spot.

"Hmm?" Jamie sounds close to sleep and Dani revels in it, in that she gets to hear it.

"That first day, in the kitchen." Her lips glide against Jamie's skin, the rest of her unwilling to move any further away. "The first time I saw you, I felt like we'd already met." Jamie squeezes her hand and Dani closes her eyes. "Is that crazy? Is that a crazy thing to think?" Some days, Dani believes it is. "To feel?" Most of the time, she knows it isn't.

"I don't think there's anything crazy about you," Jamie replies, without hesitation. Then, hushed, softened, sounding as though she's a little unsure if she should say what she's about to. "Except maybe me."

Everything stops. Dani's breathing, her heart, time. Everything freezes, the air around them becomes thick and heavy, and for one endless moment, Dani is back teetering on the brink of tears. Feeling too much. It won't all fit.

But then Jamie says, "And maybe your delusion about being able to make tea," and time resumes.

"It tastes fine!" Dani protests, but it's weak and a little tearful sounding, and she doesn't trust herself to say more right now. Thankfully, Jamie seems to sense that and leaves further teasing, no doubt, for the future.

"S'okay, Poppins," another squeeze of her hand, "it's the scintillating conversation I'm after, not your tea." There's a pause and then, "Well, that and your body, 'course. Now I know what's underneath all that pastel…." Jamie trails off with a low whistle and Dani giggles, nipping Jamie's shoulder in playful warning. "You tell that mouth of yours to behave." Jamie's smile is right there in her voice. "Until morning anyway."

And Dani falls asleep wearing one of her own, wrapped around Jamie for the first time, but nowhere near the last.