And now what, Sakura asked herself as she got out of the tub, dried and brushed her hair and put on her favourite yukata (green, tiny embroidered rosebuds on the collar, a little frayed), then opened all the windows of her tiny apartment so that the rooms could be aired properly. Now what? This whole day was so strange, nothing progressing like she would have expected it. It was dizzying and frightening, this... this intensity of things she felt with Shikamaru.

But, of course, it shouldn't have been so surprising. As her mother used to say, there are two kinds of water where you can't see the bottom – one where the water is too troubled, the other where it is too deep. Or something like that.

Shikamaru was the deep kind. Just like Kakashi. They hid their thoughts, their feelings, but under the smooth, expressionless masks the current ran deep.

I must remember that, Sakura thought. I mustn't forget. It wasn't only love and loyalty and friendship that people like them felt strongly. There was hate and grief and jealousy, too.

There was a lot of gentleness in Shikamaru, gentleness and love and care and understanding. But no forgiveness. None. He remembered everything, never forgave, never forgot.

She shook her head and started on the next item on the to-do list – choose a suitable dress to wear. It wasn't every day that a girl got invited to the Golden Dragon and Sakura intended to look fabulous and enjoy every single second of it. Ino would scream with envy, once she heard about it!

She had nothing to wear, that was the sad truth. First she took all her dresses out of the closet – there weren't many -, then all the civilian clothes, finally the shinobi clothes and the nurse outfits, just to make sure that there wasn't a beautiful, exotic, sexy, totally forgotten outfit somewhere in the back of the closet. How it would have gotten there, Sakura couldn't imagine, but as she was desperately wishing for a miracle (maybe Ino left something in her closet... or Hinata took an evening dress to the cleaners where it unexplicably shrunk to Sakura's size... or whatever...) she just had to make it sure that the sordid reality was that she still had to find a dress to wear.

There was the red silk evening dress... no, that was too fancy for the occasion. She didn't want to look overdressed. The little black dress – Shikamaru must have seen that a thousand times. The peach silk. Too summery. The white one with blue flowers – too little-girlish but it will have to do – oh hell, she forgot that stain on the side. The dark pink cotton dress – Ino praised that on her once, and Sakura knew that she looked good in it. It was a funny thing because usually any kind of pink clashed so much with her hair that it was a complete disaster, but this was a deep, warm, rose-coloured pink that accentuated the paler pink of her hair and her lips and made her skin look less pale because it reflected a warm light on her face. Oh, but it was cotton and it looked best in daylight, in artificial light it would look cheap and threadbare. Maybe a skirt and a blouse?

Sakura looked around. The clothes were scattered in a random pattern all around her small flat as she carried them with her, tried some of them on then discarded them all. And there was the problem of shoes and jewellery and... where was her evening purse? Where? Even if she found an outfit she wouldn't be able to wear a weapons' pouch with it, for God's sake!

She sat down on her couch in despair. Why was it so goddamn important what she was going to wear? Shikamaru would probably arrive in his usual jounin outfit anyway and wouldn't even know, much less care about how much time she spent with this just to show him...

To show him what?

All this time, Sakura thought, she was sure she knew this man. But she didn't. She had no idea what he was really like. Now she was watching him from a different perspective, as if yesterday she'd boarded a fast train and left behind all that she was sure of. Or as if the river she was dreaming about this morning carried her far, far away, and now she was looking at a different shore, a different country, one where exotic flowers grew by the riverside and strange beasts were lurking behind the trees. This has never happened to her before. This power to change, to transform life...

She read something like that once in one of the romances. The heroine said something like that when she met her man... or when she left him?

Sakura jumped up and took one of the paperback volumes off her bookshelf. No, this was about a businessman and his secretary, she wouldn't say something like that. It must have been a cloak-and-dagger type of story, or...

She threw the book down on the floor impatiently, then the next one, too. No, not this one either. Suddenly this was more important than the dress, she wanted to know what was happening to her, she felt so unsure, so vulnerable, this feeling must have a name, a definition. She was always so sure of her feelings before, even when she was later proved wrong. This feeling of nagging uncertainty, the waves of fear and happiness, following each other in a dizzying pattern... The books were piling on the floor, some of them fell on the clothes, but this was important, this was...

A sudden noise woke her from her reverie. She only saw a blur, a flash of the green and black of the chuunin vest and the pants, and then it was Shikamaru, a kunai in each hand, his face stern.

"What happened?" he asked. "What's wrong?"

He came in the open window, she realized, and as she looked around, she understood what it must look like to him – a crime scene.

"I'm... I'm all right," Sakura said. "I just couldn't find a dress..."

"Thank God," Shikamaru said, his voice unsure. He pocketed both kunais slowly, carefully. "I felt this sudden instinctive urge to come back and then I saw this... For a moment I thought..."

They both started moving at the same time and met in the middle of the room and held on to each other, then just as suddenly they both took a step back.

It would have been funny if it wasn't strange. Awkward. Breathtaking. Frightening.

"Would you like some tea?" Sakura asked. She desperately needed everything to go back to normal.

She went to the kitchen, Shikamaru following her silently as a shadow. She put the kettle on the cooker and turned the power on. She was wondering if he answered anything and she just didn't hear it when his hand turned the cooker off.

"You know, making tea is usually easier if you boil some water first," he said.

Sakura shook the kettle and realized that it was empty.

Now he thinks I'm a complete idiot, she thought bitterly, then she felt Shikamaru stepping closer to her, his chest almost touching her back.

"What's the matter?" he asked quietly. When she didn't answer, didn't turn back, he carried on hesitantly. "I'm still your friend, you know... I hope. So... what happened here, really?"

Sakura took a deep, shaky sigh.

It was impossible to explain this in normal terms.

Maybe she could do what Shikamaru did last night – make-believe that this was a movie and she would only have to write the dialogue.

No. This wasn't a movie, least of all a porn movie. That was one of the problems.

This was a fairytale.

When she and Lee broke up, she turned to books for consolation. She couldn't read romances without bitterness instantly welling up in her, so she re-read all the favourite books of her childhood.

When she read the big volume of fairytales again that she used to read almost every day when she was a little girl, she was shocked.

Fairytale world was grim and evil when she looked at it closely, even compared to the world of shinobi.

There were a thousand ways of being killed, all described with a malicious pleasure. People were cheated and ridiculed and hurt on every page.

If a hero or a heroine wanted to succeed, they had to risk everything they had, everything they were, each and every time, without exception.

Yes, this was exactly like a fairytale.

"There's this... this guy I know," she whispered. "I thought I knew him. And I don't. And suddenly... suddenly it's important like hell that he... that I could impress him and show him that I can look quite pretty sometimes... and then I can't find a damn dress that would look good on me."

Shikamaru didn't say anything but Sakura felt that desperate, lurking fear again, all the what ifs and maybes and impossibles and she wanted it to end, one way or another.

"The problem is, I don't think he really cares about me. Not the way I want him to, anyway," she said. "It's not his fault – I have no right to... But... Sasuke never really cared about me and I don't want to make the same mistake again. I know he likes me, he told me... but that's not enough. We are friends, yes. That's not enough either. Not now. Not anymore. But I'll never know if he feels the same way..."

His voice was just a whisper.

"He does. If this is... this is the guy I think you're talking about... he does. He feels the same way."

"How do you know?" Sakura asked.

Shikamaru gave a dry little chuckle. "I know him very well, you know."

"Not that, idiot," Sakura said, frowning. "The other thing... How do you know it's like that? Maybe it's just... just sex. Just lust."

"No," Shikamaru whispered and his arms were around Sakura, holding her, protecting her. "It's much more than that. It's just... he's a coward, Sakura. He's not like you. You decide what you want to do and then it's take it or leave it, it's an open attack with a battle cry on your lips. There's so much life in you, so much fire..."

Sakura wanted to turn around but Shikamaru wouldn't let her. She felt him burying his face in her hair.

"I think I'm in love," Sakura said gravely. "I love you. I don't even care if you don't. But I do."

"And there goes your proof," Shikamaru said in a raspy voice. "I should have been the first one to say it."

"Very true, oh, master of shadows," Sakura said. "So do it now."

"I love you."

Sakura turned around in his arms to look into his eyes.

"I love you, Shikamaru," she said again, enjoying the sound of it.

"And I love you, Sakura," he said. Sakura's eyes were blurring but she saw that Shikamaru's eyes were full of tears, too, and then he was kissing her and it had nothing to do with sex, and the elusive sentence was there – "a soul that hasn't been warmed by the fire of love is lifeless, like a useless ball of corn flour."

Sakura had no idea how long they'd kissed or what exactly they said to each other when their mouths weren't touching. She only knew for sure that it was a good thing that Shikamaru turned the cooker off when he did, otherwise her flat might have gone up in flames now.

She kissed Shikamaru's eyes again. He was sweet, so sweet, taking this all so seriously. She never thought she would ever see him cry.

Shikamaru kissed her neck and then cleared his throat.

"You still haven't answered me. What's this mess? Do you always do this when you're getting ready for a date?"

"Well, actually I do," Sakura answered angrily. "I used to empty all the drawers, too, and break the furniture, but I managed to give that habit up almost completely."

Shikamaru chuckled.

"Stop avoiding my question."

"It's true," Sakura said. She felt dizzy again, but this was not sick-dizzy, this was rollercoaster-ride-dizzy, drank-too-much-champagne-dizzy, I'm-crazy-about-this-guy-dizzy. "What I said before, I mean. I was looking for a dress that would make you see how sexy, irresistible and wonderful I was, and..."

"I could see that without any clothing on, Sakura," Shikamaru said.

"Well, for some obscure reason I thought that it wouldn't be a good idea to go to a restaurant naked."

"Pity. And what about the books? When silk, velvet and cotton all failed to hold your interest, you decided to pin a dress together from your favourite pages or what?"

Sakura looked up and instantly got lost in those deep brown eyes. Does he use his charm consciously, or is this just natural? Does he know that he has little green and light brown spots in his irises when he's happy?

"I realized I was falling in love and I was looking for a sentence that would sum it up," she said grumpily in the end.

Shikamaru only said, 'oh, you,' and kissed her again.

One kiss led to another and each time Shikamaru kissed her, there was this almost terrifying depth of emotions that made her want to laugh and cry and shout and dance. Like an abyss, crisscrossed with thin planks over it, and she was the only one who could cross over the depth without fear.

Because she could fly any time she wanted to.

IlovehimIlovehimIlovehim.

And he loves me, too.

At one point Shikamaru must have got bored with standing in the kitchen because he picked Sakura up and took her to the sofa, sat down and pulled her on his lap.

Just like last night in his bedroom, Sakura thought and blushed deeply.

"What are you thinking about, sweetheart? You went tomato red in a second," Shikamaru drawled.

"Last night," Sakura mumbled. "I can't believe where I got the courage to ask you to... to... you know. I have no idea what you must have thought. And... it's just unbelievable how things changed in one day, don't you think?"

She looked up into Shikamaru's face. He frowned, looked at Sakura, then looked away again.

"Did I say something wrong?" Sakura asked. She decided not to fret this time. All day she was driving herself mad with theories and questions... but no, she couldn't say in good conscience that she could have spared the effort.

With both Lee and Sasuke she took some things for granted and she couldn't say that things worked out that well in the end. If she couldn't be honest with Shikamaru, and that meant sharing her doubts, too, then this relationship would not work out, either.

"So you never thought of me before that way?" Shikamaru asked hesitantly. "Last night was the first time that you looked at me as a man, a potential partner?"

"A potential partner in what sense?" Sakura asked slowly. "Look, this isn't leading anywhere. I always knew that you were a man. If I ever thought about you, I thought of you as an attractive man. But mostly I didn't. By the time I realized that being with Sasuke was a daydream at the best and a dangerous notion with a high chance of being killed as a side effect at the worst and started looking around for a boyfriend, you were already off the market, so to speak. You went around in Konoha with Temari a lot, don't forget that. You were practically the first of the rookie nine who got a steady girlfriend."

It was true. Now that Sakura thought back, she remembered Shikamaru coming to meetings and briefings and listening to mission reports years and years ago, wearing the same smug expression on his face as he did this morning. These were the mornings after Temari arrived from Sand and spent the night in Konoha...

"So because I was not available, you didn't consider me as a possible boyfriend at all," Shikamaru said. "Fair enough. But wasn't there ever... you know... something more? Something that made you... wonder?"

Sakura shrugged. She may as well tell him, she thought. It wasn't as if it was a secret. She looked at Shikamaru.

"There were quite a few times when I thought you would ask me out," she said. "But you never did. The last time was after the summer festival. Then I was almost sure. But when you didn't, I just thought that maybe I was wrong all the time. That you thought of me as Ino's girlfriend and you were just nice to me in your way, and somehow I thought more about your behaviour than it ever really was. It's an easy mistake to make, nobody's fault. It happens to me all the time at the hospital. I smile at a male patient, I tell him I'm glad he's feeling better, and the next thing I know, he's waiting for me in front of the nurses' room, asking for a date. Sasuke used to be annoyed no end."

Shikamaru was watching her seriously. Sakura suddenly felt annoyed, too.

"I always give you an answer when you ask me something," she pointed out. "Even if it's none of your business. It's like I'm a specimen under your microscope. Well, I'm not. And I want to know things, too."

"Like what?" Shikamaru asked in a deceptively light tone.

"Like what really happened when you were with ANBU that made you clam up so. I mean, you were never exactly transparent, but with people you knew well you were more open."

"That's a pretty big question."

"I also want to know what happened to Temari and why you two broke up. Somehow I have this feeling that there's a lot more to that than what you told me. And... and... and... I want to know when and how you fell in love with me. Really, when did you fall in love with me?"

"That's a pretty difficult question. Both of them, in fact."

"Seems to me the questions I want you to answer are either too big or too difficult," Sakura said pointedly. "Okay, then let's begin with a simple one. When did you start to like me?"

She was watching Shikamaru suspiciously, ready to erupt in a fit of rage if he smiled again and said another smoothing and utterly uninformative platitude, but when she saw Shikamaru blush a deep red, she was more than surprised.

"Hell," she said. "You tell me what's happening here right now, this very minute, or I'll... I'll..."

She raised one of her fists.

"Fine, fine," Shikamaru mumbled. "I'll explain. Troublesome woman. Where should I begin?"

He fidgeted, then looked at Sakura.

"But you do love me?"

His voice was so miserable that Sakura's heart softened at once. Seeing this usually stoic, reserved, proud man like this...

"You stupid idiot!" she said loudly, just short of shouting. "Of course I love you! Why would I want to say something like that if it wasn't true?"

Shikamaru's answer to that was to kiss her so forcefully that she had to hold on to his vest to keep her balance.

What's going on here?

Inner giggled. You're thinking too much, babe. You should concentrate more on his lips. He's a real good kisser, don't you think?

Sakura wanted Shikamaru to keep on kissing her but she wanted her answers, too. Damn, but Inner was right... Each time she moved her lips to feel his lips more, he responded so gently, so lovingly, it felt as if they were dancing. Sakura could almost see herself and Shikamaru in a ballroom with crystal chandeliers and a shining parquet floor – they were elegantly dressed and spinning, spinning around, the music gently flowing and billowing around them like a silk scarf.

When he stopped, she cuddled closer to him and forgot anything else for a moment.

She came back to her senses slowly and realized that the music was pouring in the open window and the song about that eternal flame was not in her imagination. Just the dance. Only the dance.

I wonder if he can dance. He's an ace at everything he tries. I'll ask him to...

Then he kissed her again and that was all the dance she needed.

After a while Shikamaru said, "I think I'd better answer at least some of your questions. It's not like you wouldn't be insisting anyway. Bother."

"So this was an attempt to confuse me?" Sakura asked.

"No," Shikamaru said. "I wanted to kiss you so much, you can't even imagine. But... well, I don't mind winning a little time either. This is... this is really hard for me, Sakura. Usually I don't share my feelings with anyone and I'm... I'm not sure if it will make sense to you. But you have to let me explain things to you in my own way."

Sakura nodded.

"So... uh... yes, I've liked you for a while."

"I knew it! I knew it!" Sakura shrieked. "Yes, yes, yes!"

Shikamaru was still holding her waist with one hand but he held his other hand close to his head, with his pinky in one ear. And he was wincing.

"Oh sorry," Sakura said. She gave a guilty grin and Shikamaru rolled his eyes.

"Women," he said.

"So how long have you been madly in love with me?"

"Oh, it was nothing that serious," Shikamaru mumbled. "Not then. Not at first. Just... something like Kiba."

"Kiba?" Sakura asked, her face one big question mark.

Shikamaru gave a short bark of a laugh. "No, not like that. I don't do men, remember?"

Sakura still watched him, completely clueless

Shikamaru raised an eyebrow and laughed again.

"Kiba? Kiba, with the nice abs and rock-hard bottom?"

Sakura burst out laughing. Now she remembered.

It happened years ago, on a short trip to Tea. Shikamaru was team captain, and Ino, Chouji and Sakura were his team. It wasn't a dangerous mission, the only reason the Hokage wanted two medic nins on the team was that they were supposed to check the quality of a shipment of medicine in a port village and Tsunade thought that the simplest way would be to do that right there in the harbour. Sakura suspected that Tsunade also thought that each member of their team could do with a few days of peace and rest.

It happened just like that. On the way there they were all tired and not very talkative, but a week of good food and sunshine and easy work and swimming in the sea restored them all to health and on the trip back they were all full of life and fire and mischief. Sakura remembered it well. They slept in tents, the boys in one, the girls in another, and every night they made a campfire and there were jokes and stories and laughter. It was a bonus, and they all knew that. They were all friends and happy together and wanted to enjoy it as much as they could.

One night Chouji was already asleep, Shikamaru on guard, and it was so hot in the girls' tent that it was impossible to sleep. Ino started telling about some date of hers, and then talk turned to guys and their looks and assets, and Ino was whispering something about Kiba, how he had such a rock-hard bottom that she wanted to bite it, and Sakura giggled and said something about his abs, when they heard Shikamaru's soft drawl next to the tent, "That's all well and nice, girls, but shouldn't you get some sleep now? We'll have a long day tomorrow," and then she and Ino just looked at each other and started laughing so loudly that Chouji woke up with a snort. They had forgotten for a while that the walls of a tent were no obstacle to sound at all, and a shinobi could hear whispers in the night without any problem.

The next day Shikamaru smirked practically all day and when they waded through a small brook and Ino complained of the stones under the water, Shikamaru just said, "yeah, it's got a rock-hard bottom," and Ino laughed so hard, she sat down in the water, and then Shikamaru said, "and now it's got you all wet," and then Ino pushed him into the water, too. In a minute they were all engaged in an all-around waterfight, throwing water at each other and shouting nonsense attack names invented for the occasion.

"I know," Sakura said. "I remember now. But I still don't understand. What has anything got to do with Kiba in our case?"

"I'm just saying that I heard a lot about hot guys and especially Kiba's body that night, but I don't think either you or Ino had a crush on him or ever wanted him to ask you out or something. It's just... he was there, he looked good, you took notice. You would have needed something else to consider him a potential partner. A spark. A little push."

Sakura nodded. It was like looking at the sculpted male bodies in magazines. She would think, "nice chest" or "nice arms," and think no more about it.

"That was the way you and I both felt for a long time, I think," Shikamaru said. "I looked at you and what I saw, well, that depended on the circumstances. Mostly I saw a friend, or a valuable member of my team, and sometimes a pretty girl. Sometimes I would find myself looking at you and thinking that I wouldn't kick you out of my bed, but nothing more. And, as much as I can see, it was the same with you. You liked me as a friend, a team leader, whatever, and appreciated my good qualities, but never in a... personal way."

Sakura asked, "But you wanted me? You thought I was... sexy? Attractive?"

"Yes. That's a definite yes. For quite a long time now."

"So it wasn't just weeks or something?"

Shikamaru shook his head.

"No. It began a lot sooner. I always thought you pretty. I also knew you were intelligent. From time to time it occurred to me that... well, that we should give each other a chance. It's just… somehow the timing was always off. When Temari and I had our first serious argument and we just cooled it for a while you were already dating Lee. When you and Lee broke up, I was already dating Aoi. And when she broke up with me, Temari and I got together again, and when we broke up for good, I was already in ANBU, and then Sasuke came back and everybody knew that no one else had a chance in hell with you… So I didn't even try and I kept telling myself that was that. But there was no hurry. It wasn't a desperate kind of situation. It wasn't the tragic love affair of the century, see what I mean? I just thought we could be good together. You never annoy me like Ino does. You never bore me like lots of other people do. We worked together a few times and I could tell that we were compatible in a lot of ways – ways of thinking, tastes and such. And then... well, when we were in Tea I couldn't help but notice how good you looked in that tiny red bikini of yours."

Sakura blushed a little. On that trip, she and Ino were both flirting quite shamelessly with the boys. Ino probably had her eyes on Chouji by that time, as they were joking and fooling around a lot, but they weren't dating yet. They were all friends, with a little pleasant sexual frisson in the air.

"You looked good in shorts, too," Sakura admitted. She remembered how she and Ino watched Chouji and Shikamaru coming toward them after a swim – Chouji, his childhood fat now all muscle, arms and legs like trunks, a frighteningly big man, and Shikamaru, lean and tall, long legs, narrow hips, broad shoulders, moving like a dancer, swift and graceful.

Shikamaru was smirking.

"I had a few nice fantasies about that red bikini," he whispered into Sakura's ear. "How I'd untie the strings of the top, then the panties and take them off and then I'd just pull you down on the sand... and then..."

His hand sneaked under Sakura's yukata and started to caress her thighs.

"What a pervert you are," Sakura said in a shaky voice. "I'd never thought..."

"What, that guys have sex fantasies about pretty girls they've just seen in a bikini? You surprise me. Didn't your mother tell you how guys want only one thing from girls?" Shikamaru teased her. Then his voice changed, became deeper, rougher, more dangerous. "Oh baby, you're wet for me, you're so wet..."

His fingers sneaked near her pussy, stroking and caressing her till she opened her legs and then Shikamaru was playing with her and kissing her at the same time. He was hard under her, so hard. She wanted all that hardness in her.

"Please," she whispered, "oh please, please..."

Somehow they found themselves in her bedroom. Shikamaru looked at her, and now she knew this face, the dreamy look of lust, the lazy half-smile, and when he drawled, "well, well, look at that – a bed we haven't used yet," she whimpered. Shikamaru's hands were again under her yukata, caressing her while she was struggling with the chuunin vest and then the shirt.

In her dazed state she couldn't quite unbutton his pants and Shikamaru smirked. "Not a lot of practice there, huh?"

She wanted to say something about his usual type of girls who would have practiced on all the available flies till they were perfect at it, but he laughed and she knew that he was just teasing her, and he got rid of his sandals and his pants in a minute and her yukata fell on the floor and he was carrying her in his arms to the bed.

The secret part of fairytales, Sakura thought. She closed her eyes. This is it. This is what I've been waiting for.

He put her on top of the bed, then she felt him near her. Sakura opened her eyes. He was lying next to her on one elbow and watched her in such a way that made hunger knot in her stomach. His eyes were dark, almost black, his pupils so dilated she couldn't tell where they ended and where the irises began.

He wants me.

She felt... no, not beautiful. Strong. Powerful. Almost invincible.

He's in my power.

"Can I still ask for things?" she said.

Shikamaru smiled, a gentle, loving smile.

"And you still think you have to ask that question, sweetheart," he said. "Yes. You can ask for anything you want."

"I want to be on top."

After a second she added, "If you please."

Shikamaru's eyebrows shot up and then he grinned in his usual lopsided way. "I thought it would be something more risqué."

"This is risqué enough for me," Sakura said. She wanted to add something, then decided not to, then thought that maybe she'd better anyway... and then Shikamaru ended her struggle.

"It seems to me that either most guys of the new shinobi generation train too much and only have time for the very basics in bed before they fall asleep, or else my reputation as a male chauvinist pig is completely undeserved," he said.

"What?" Sakura asked, not very graciously.

Shikamaru kissed her instead of an answer, then said, "I'm only saying that it looks to me that your previous boyfriends weren't very... adventurous in bed, so to speak. What's more, they didn't exactly encourage you to try new things, did they?"

Sakura shook her head, blushing.

Shikamaru kissed her again. It was a soft, inviting kiss, and Sakura was hardly aware that they were slowly changing their position, Shikamaru pulling her with him until he was lying on his back and she was on top of him.

She could feel all his body, hot and hard and full of dangerous skills. Funny that his deer weren't afraid of him. He was nothing docile or weak. He was a beast that could tear her limb from limb if she wasn't careful.

She shivered and opened her legs a little to feel him under her. Shikamaru was stroking her back, his big hands moving slowly on her skin.

"What would you like me to do?" she asked.

"What would I like?" he asked and smiled again. "Give yourself as much pleasure as you can, sweetheart. Trust me, I'm not completely unselfish in this."

"I don't understand," Sakura said.

"When sex feels very good for a woman, it means a lot more pleasure to her man, and I don't mean on a spiritual level. It's a simple fact."

He put his hands on her bottom and slowly slid them toward her opening. Sakura felt the blood rush to her face again... and not only to her face. It felt very good, lying on top of him, her body wet and sensitive and as he grabbed her butt on both sides and pulled her cheeks apart, she felt every sensation at least twice as strongly. When he started to push and pull her gently over him, with very slow, tiny movements, she felt her wetness pour over him and then she was gliding over his cock.

"When it feels good for you, your pussy starts to squeeze me as if you wanted to drink all of me, as if you wanted to suck me in fully," Shikamaru whispered. "And you smell so sweet to me, better than my meadow in springtime. So move as you want, honey, and it will be perfect for me any way."

She instinctively started to move her hips to her own rhythm. Shikamaru groaned.

It made her so proud that she could please him so much.

She moved a little more. Now it felt even better. Her skin felt hot and her whole body started trembling. It was unbearable, this heat that was melting her, scorching her inside and out.

She looked in Shikamaru's eyes. He stared back, unsmiling, his face grave, almost tragic with the intensity of desire, then he held her hips with both hands and raised her and she guided him inside her and slowly sank down.

"You fit inside me so perfectly," she said. Her voice wasn't her own, it was raspy, unsure, as if she were speaking another language.

"Yes, we're a perfect fit together," Shikamaru replied in his deep voice. His hands were still holding her hips, guiding her slowly, trying to find her rhythm.

He was so gentle with her, always gentle, always polite. Sakura hated those men who supposed that just because she was strong on the battlefield, she was insensitive and masculine in the bedroom, too – men who thought that she wouldn't care if they treated her roughly or carelessly or if they offered sex in the bluntest or rudest way.

Those men often found they suddenly acquired a broken nose or some broken fingers, but usually that did not make them understand what the problem was.

Funny how Shikamaru with all his old-fashioned male chauvinist views always treated women like ladies. Or maybe it was logical to Shikamaru? That women deserved respect not because they could do the same things that men could but because they were different?

"You never did this with anyone?" Shikamaru asked softly.

Sakura shook her head.

"Move your hips slowly," he said. "It's like geometry. It's all a question of angles. If you find the right angle, it's bliss. If it's just a bit off, you feel very little. You have to do it slowly at first to find out what works best for you."

Sakura nodded. Shikamaru was again doing things his own way, giving her what she wanted, giving her control over his body to use as she wished, but it wasn't because she could take this for herself. It was just courtesy, a temporary surrender of all his strength and skill and power for her sake.

It felt like a gift.

Her treacherous mind threw a picture at her – a big silk bow on Shikamaru's... hmmm... most private part.

A big bow, she thought and giggled aloud.

She was moving slowly, just like he said, and it felt strange and good and exciting. How stupid she had been, not insisting before to try this.

No, it wouldn't have felt the same. Not with someone else.

"What's so funny?" he asked in his usual lazy voice.

"I'm not telling," Sakura said happily. She leant forward and gave him a hard kiss. As she sat up again, one of her hands slipped a bit and she sat back a little more forcefully than she intended.

Oh God.

It was raw heat, pleasure so strong that her eyes crossed. Her mouth opened and she cried out aloud.

His hands clamped on her hips and pulled her down.

She cried out again.

Everything happened so fast after that. All that heat was pouring through her and he was ruthless, raising his hips again and again and pulling her down at the same time. She scratched his chest with her nails and he hissed and hit her buttock. It wasn't very painful but it stung, or rather she knew it should sting because instead it only added to the heat and made her completely crazy.

She opened her eyes and looked at him, moving under her. She somehow expected him to be just as dazed as she was, but there was a knowing smile on his face, a smirk.

Bastard.

Before she had time to think it through, she knew what she wanted to do.

Let's see how you react to this, big boy.

She concentrated and felt her chakra circling in her body. It was easy, like listening to her own breathing or feeling her own pulse, except that she had full control over it.

Perfect control.

She felt an evil smile forming on her face as she started to pull this energy into the centre just below her navel.

Just a little. Just a tiny bit.

She was very careful – healing chakra usually felt great when it was applied to a wound; it felt soothing and calming and good, but this would be different. This would be a landslide. She always knew she could use her chakra any way she wanted, she could gather it into her hands, into her mouth, into her toes, if she wanted to, but like this...

His eyes opened wide. "What...?"

She felt the muscles of her pussy tense and then her chakra was surging through her and pushing into him, and then she let it go.

His back arched, his hands fell off her hips and clawed at her sheets and the tendons in his neck stood out like whipcords as his head fell back. Now he was trembling.

"Oh fuuuuck," he hissed.

Sakura smirked.

"Does it feel good?" she asked sweetly and moved her hips.

Shikamaru opened his mouth but no sound came out, then his hands were back on her hips and his eyes were blazing and he looked so sexy and dangerous that she felt as if her whole heart turned in her chest.

"You little minx," he whispered. "I'm gonna fuck you so hard, you won't be able to walk for a week."

Sakura let her chakra flow again and he groaned.

"We'll see about that," she said and giggled again. Her giggles turned into a helpless moan when his hands cupped her breasts and his thumbs started circling her nipples.

She had to grasp the headboard to steady herself and then he put one of his hands between them and started to caress her pearl.

It was amazing, it was more than amazing, this was... this was...

She was moving faster, and he was talking to her, encouraging her, telling her to ride him hard, as hard as she could, and she could feel all this bliss and all her chakra and their strength entwine with each other and turn into a spiral, going up to the sky. She knew that it was dangerous, losing herself so much was dangerous, but she wasn't herself anymore and didn't care, this was something so beautiful it made her want to cry and when she felt him shake uncontrollably and spill his seed inside her, the only thing that still made sense and tied her here, to this room, to this body was his name.

"Shikamaru!"

Time slowed down, stopped, started again, then there was a strange noise, like tearing paper, and then she was falling and landed on his body.

It took her a few seconds to regain her senses.

"What?" she asked feebly.

"I said, are you all right?"

"Of course I'm all right," she mumbled. "That was amazing."

"Yeah, amazing is one word for it," he said, his voice full of laughter. "Did you faint or something?"

"What? No!"

She opened her eyes and things didn't make sense. The whole room was tilted and shown from a strange perspective.

"What the hell...?"

She looked around and realized that Shikamaru was lying on the floor and she was still on top of him, the duvet was in a heap next to them and the bed...

"What on earth happened here?" she asked, so completely surprised that she couldn't even find words for it.

"Well," Shikamaru said slowly in his usual the-devil-may-care way, "when I came back you said you no longer broke your furniture to pieces before dates. It seems to me you were lying through your teeth."

Sakura raised her eyes. Shikamaru was grinning like mad.

The bed was a mess. The headboard was in two pieces, with a zigzagging tear in the middle, and the nearer half of the bed was tilted to one side, the mattress dangling in the air, one corner touching the floor.

"There must have been some inner tension in the wood," Sakura murmured.

"No, I don't think so," Shikamaru said peacefully. "It's just... once you ripped the headboard in two, the bed frame lost its stability and the mattress couldn't hold up our weight and that made some of the bed slats break, too, and then the whole thing collapsed."

Sakura tried to rewind her memory to the part where the bed was still in one piece.

It was incredible how sex got better and better. Yesterday she thought that was the top, and it was just the beginning. Oh, the healing chakra! Then Shikamaru went wild, and then... oh, yes! She was trying to be very careful, because genitals were sensitive, but when she came, it was so unbelievably good that the collected chakra somehow found its way into her hands and she made a mistake, a rookie mistake, and let it go unconsciously.

"Are you hurt, Shikamaru?" she asked, scared. "Did I hurt you?"

"No, darling. No, you didn't. Are you hurt?"

Sakura didn't know what to say. He took her hands, turned them around, examined her palms.

"No splinters. Did you hit your knees?"

Another piece of the puzzle. She remembered turning in the air but then she wasn't thinking, it was just one more sensation among so many.

He rolled from the bed when it collapsed and turned in the air so that she would fall on top of him. She hardly felt the impact, he was sheltering her with his own body.

"Aren't you bruised? How is your back?" she asked worriedly.

Shikamaru laughed. "I'm a shinobi, sweetheart, have you forgotten? The last time I was seriously bruised was when I was training with Chouji and he fell on me."

Sakura kissed him. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"Whatever for? That was amazing, just like you said. I guess we'll just have to practice this. We got a bit carried away. Looks like you'll spend the next few nights at my place, too. If you want to sleep in a bed, I mean. Not that I'm complaining."

He was watching her, his eyes full of love and warmth and pride.

Sakura blushed.

"Okay. But you'll still have to answer all my questions. And you'll have to tell me when you fell in love with me. Up to now the only thing you told me was that you wanted to have sex with me pretty badly for a while, and I know I'm slow in these things, but I think I already got that," she finished grumpily.

"I wonder why," Shikamaru said. "Can I have just one more question?"

"Yes?"

"Do you still have that red bikini?"

"Pervert."

"I spend too much time with Kakashi. He's a bad influence."

Sakura opened her mouth, then closed it again. Her brain was empty. She wanted to respond with something witty but she was still high and all she could manage was a not very convincing 'whatever.'

Shikamaru shook his head. "You've stolen my heart, my soul, my sanity, and now you're starting on my favourite expressions. What's next, my shirts? Troublesome."

"What? No," Sakura murmured. She closed her eyes and smiled. This felt better than falling asleep on the beach. The only thing she missed was those funny drinks with tiny umbrellas in them.

Shikamaru chuckled and stroked her back.

"Why is it that you always remember something funny after we had sex?" Sakura asked, yawning.

"I was just thinking about how ANBU instructors always think they know everything and they are so, so wrong. It's not the first time I realized that. They don't know shit."

"Stop cursing, it's a very ugly habit," Sakura mumbled. "What are you talking about, anyway?"

She opened her eyes and looked at Shikamaru. He looked like the dictionary definition of self-satisfied.

Not like the cat that ate the canary, Sakura thought. Rather the cat who ate the Christmas turkey and got the dog punished for it.

Shikamaru looked at her and licked his lips. There was a wicked glint in his eyes.

"I had an instructor once who told us that some women would rip the sheets if they have a mind-blowing orgasm," he drawled. "He never said a fucking thing about tearing up the bed."

Author's note: The sentence quoted in this chapter is from Laura Esquivel's novel, Like Water for Chocolate.