"Come on, sleepyhead. Time to get up. You're gonna be late."
Red groaned and tried to burrow further under the covers. "My god, Lizzy. Surely I can squeeze in five more minutes of sleep before the world comes to an end."
"Nope. You gotta go. You can't just blow them off; we've got a cover story to maintain."
Red opened one eye to find Lizzy leaning over him and his line of sight was immediately drawn down to her chest; she had on one of his soft cotton undershirts and it hung off of her body loosely, showing far more skin on her than it ever did on him. Her newest scar was still angry and red, but it would continue healing nicely. They were both very well-versed in scar care at this point.
"It's hard to see any perks of getting up from where I'm sitting," Red said, both eyes open now in order to properly enjoy the view.
"Well, what if these 'perks' got up and left you here all alone? Besides, you're the one who set the meeting time. It's not their fault you're a whiny little baby when something dares to interfere with your ability to sleep in, even if that something is your own doing."
"Fine. If you insist, I'll get up," he relented. "But I want it on record that I think this whole charade is asinine."
"It was your idea!" Lizzy said. "You started this crazy scheme when you turned yourself in; now if you don't finish it, you're stuck between a rock and a hard place."
"Mmm. Persuade me."
Lizzy rolled her eyes. "You know if you disappear off the face of the earth right now, everyone will absolutely assume you're dead, task force included, which would most likely create a dangerous power vacuum, or if you have to reassert your position to avoid that but you still abandon the task force, the higher-ups might decide it's better for them to hunt you down rather than let you roam free."
"Lizzy, words cannot describe how little I want to set foot in that horrible place. Go back to subjecting myself to silly things like bureaucracy and proper procedure and due process? Pfft. I don't want to leave your side. Hell, I don't want to leave this bed."
Red traced his hand down Lizzy's body, slipping beneath the covers to find that she wasn't wearing anything but his undershirt. He took a moment to knead the curve of her bare ass before allowing his hand to wander further.
Lizzy shifted so she could throw a leg over his thighs to straddle him and propped herself up with her forearms on either side of his head. She waited a few seconds for his attention to return to her, rather than the sensation of her naked lower half trapping his growing arousal between their bodies.
"I understand not wanting to go, believe me I do. If I had the same options available to me that you have right now, I'd want to stay here, too. But I don't, not if we don't want to blow this advantage we have. The thing is, the sooner this is over, the sooner you can come back. Permanently," she said, so close her lips brushed against his mouth while she spoke. "And then we can stay in bed all day long if we want, whenever we want."
"That is an excellent point," he said, and then met her mouth, quickly parting his lips to allow her curious tongue to explore. And Lizzy's tongue was curious—every time they kissed, it felt as if she was trying to make up for all the time they had lost. She wanted to know him, inside and out, the way she would have if they hadn't been at war with their emotions, and with each other.
The thought of Lizzy wanting him so badly made Red's stomach flutter with butterflies. He never allowed himself to admit how much he wanted her to want him before, never acknowledged just how… profoundly moving it would be to let himself believe it.
There were always too many barriers, too many secrets, between them. But there weren't too many secrets anymore. Lizzy knew so much more about who they both were now, Red could finally allow himself to bask in her affection, secure in the knowledge that she knew enough to make an informed decision to be with him.
And here she was, fully informed, kissing him like her life depended on it. Red had never felt so deeply in love. Surely there was nothing in life more fulfilling than to be so cared for and accepted by Elizabeth Keen. His second chance. His home.
After a few heated moments, Red rolled them over and slotted himself between Lizzy's thighs as they continued to kiss. Her fingers dug into the flesh at his waist when he slid inside her body, her moan reverberating into his mouth. She was so slick, the sensation stole every ounce of his focus and it took all of his concentration to try to pace himself lest this end far too quickly for his liking.
A few long, grinding, glacially slow thrusts later and Lizzy broke their kiss with a gasp. She scrabbled around for an extra pillow while Red suckled at her throat. She tapped him to get his attention and he moved to help her shove the pillow under her body for a better angle. When he pressed inside again, she hissed and held her own legs back as far as she could, until Red got the hint and hooked them over his elbows.
Red was thankful the walls in this old building were thick enough to muffle the sounds they were making, because he couldn't control the deep, guttural groans that escaped him every time her muscles gripped him tightly, wringing an unrelenting pleasure from him.
Lizzy jammed a desperate hand between their bodies and her urgent, near never-ending moan was punctuated only by the force of his movements and her need to fill her lungs. Soon enough, she clenched around him, bucking up wildly into his thrusts as her fingers dug into his flesh to hold him flush against her.
It was too much. Red tipped over the edge, too, and buried his face in her neck, panting as his hips gave a few more involuntary spasms before slowing to a halt. He released his hold on her legs and she lowered them to the mattress.
There was a clock ticking somewhere in the distance. Red could think of nothing but the rhythm of the movement of the hands, the beating of his heart in his chest, of Lizzy's pulse under the hand that clutched her neck against his cheek.
"Red."
He wasn't sure how much time had passed before she spoke. It could have been mere minutes, but for all he knew, it could have been hours. It probably hadn't been, though. He still needed to be at the Post Office soon and Lizzy wouldn't let him shirk his duties, even if she wanted to. This was their best chance; Red couldn't afford to squander it.
He pushed himself up on his hands to look down at Lizzy; she grabbed him by the sides of his sweaty neck, gazing up at him with a roiling sea of emotions storming behind her eyes.
"I'm going to miss this," she said.
He leaned down for a kiss. "Me, too, sweetheart. Me, too."
