A/N Once again, thank you to the lovely RelaxedReady for being a wonderful beta :D. Thanks also for the review and favorites/follows! Keep em coming!
An awkward tension was almost palpable in the air when Leo and April were in the same room together. Leo still resumed his power trip, not seeming to have found the balance in his position as leader and brother but also using it to channel his frustration with his confusing feelings toward their human friend. April couldn't help but feel a sense of disappointment towards the blue-banded turtle, but chose not to say anything, realizing her own delicate balance in this situation. She loved this family, felt nourished by their friendship, and hated that she kept herself distanced from them for a whole week the last time she and Leo had their little issue.
Leo… She found her thoughts traveling toward the eldest brother more often than not. She recognized this had been happening for quite some time, but after that moment in her apartment, when time stood still when she touched his arm, and he touched hers… She sighed heavily at the memory, a stirring sensation flaring up inside of her as she recalled that other-worldly electricity. She couldn't get him out of her head.
"Hey, Angelcakes…" The quiet voice of the youngest brother broke her from her trance. Shit, she thought, realizing she had been obviously staring at the object of her thoughts for who knows how long. She snapped her head quickly to meet his eyes, feigning innocence. He smiled softly at her. "Maybe try talking to him?" he suggested with a shrug.
She stared at him with wide eyes. This kid was eerily perceptive. She opened her mouth to object, to say she didn't know what he was talking about, to deny that talking to his brother would be necessary, why would she need to do that? Nothing was going on, nothing at all!
But the look in his eye told her that all her arguments would be useless. He knew better. Might as well just surrender and face it.
She nodded. "Okay," she replied simply, sounding much braver than she felt, and Mikey grinned encouragingly at her as she stood and walked toward his brother.
"...we wouldn't have had that problem if you were focused on the task in front of you!" Leo hollered at his usually more hot-tempered brother, who looked like his own anger was about to boil over. "When are you going to fucking pay attention?! I can't lead this team if-"
His arguments came to a screeching halt upon a soft hand landing on his bicep, plunging the lair into a deafening silence.
April wasn't even sure what he was yelling about, as he spat out his angry assaults at his larger brother, who glared angrily at him from behind his red mask. However, she felt a sense of warm satisfaction at her presence bringing him to a stop. Raphael suppressed a smirk as he folded his arms across his plastron and watched as April tamed the beast that was his brother.
Leo spun to face April, the sight of her bringing his heart to a dead stop. "Come with me, I want to talk to you," she spoke, her voice making it clear she was not to be argued with.
Terror flickered across Leo's face, which he covered immediately with a look of annoyance, but he didn't protest. "Fine," he huffed, and followed her out of the lair.
They walked in silence through a tunnel for a stretch before finally Leo spoke, "What's this about?"
April stopped. She turned to face him, meeting her eyes, her lovely face illuminated in the dim glow of the lights spaced evenly throughout the tunnel walls. "What's going on?" she asked sternly.
Leo swallowed. With what? Us? My brothers? My temper? He didn't know how to answer that question. What was safe?
Upon seeing the internal battle going on inside of him, she clarified. "You've turned into more of an asshole than usual. And you're avoiding me like the plague. I thought you said we were okay?"
He pursed his lips at the insult, narrowing his eyes. He raised a finger to her. "How dare you call me an asshole," he retorted. "Do you have any idea the pressure I'm under leading this-"
She stopped him in his tracks as she angrily brought the palm of her hand to his finger, forcefully sweeping it down and away from her face as she spat back, "How dare you talk to me that way." Her eyes flashed with an angry fire that said she was not a force to be reckoned with. He had half a mind to realize she had grasped his finger in her small hand as she swept it down from its angry stance, and hadn't let it go as it hung between them. There's that electricity again, he became painfully aware as his chest constricted. "I told you they are your brothers, and you have got to find some sense of balance!"
"Who gave you the authority to tell me what to do?" he growled, anger rising in him and extinguishing the fire that had ignited from her hold on his finger.
"I did when I saved your life!" she screamed in response, her face inches from his.
"Get over yourself, April!" he shouted back, leaning forward toward her face and causing her to step back slightly. Her expression didn't change - if anything it only flared angrier. He gave his hand a toss, releasing her hand from its hold on her finger. "So you saved us! Thanks! But a lot more happened to create us that has nothing to do with you! And these are the cards the Universe handed us, and I'm the one who has to sort them out!"
April's face contorted into a furious grimace. This was not going anywhere she had hoped it would go. She raised her palms and shoved them forcefully against his plastron. She barely even caused him to teeter in his position, but the emotion behind her retaliation had enough force to have been able to throw him into the wall. His eyes widened in a mixture of shock and anger. "You are not the only one living this life, Leo!" she shouted, her angry voice echoing through the tunnels. "It is not up to you alone to sort out these so-called 'cards' you've been handed! So, no, you get over yourself." This time she pressed her own finger up to his chest, which he did not take kindly to, and quickly gripped it in his hand in an attempt to remove it, but he immediately froze. Something akin to fear flashed in her eyes, though she held strong. What happened here? What was wrong with him?
He stood frozen with her finger in his hand, his eyes softening as he stared into hers, and watched as her own gaze softened, too, into what looked like sadness.
Perhaps his out-of-control emotions stemmed from something else, or were escalated by something deeper… Perhaps…?
"You never answered my other question," she said, her voice considerably softer, her eyes matching her tone.
Leo felt himself grow slightly nervous as the air shifted around them. "What was that," he asked.
"Why have you been avoiding me?"
They held each other's gaze silently, fear and uncertainty growing in his eyes, and pain surfacing in hers. He looked as though he couldn't answer her, as though he was struggling with an array of unfamiliar, frightening emotions.
She knew that look. She was certain it matched how she felt herself. She bravely took a step closer to him, sensing his body tense, confirming further what she suspected. Upon realizing he wasn't going to speak, couldn't speak, she decided to help him. "Is something going on?" she asked gently. "Something causing you to lash out at your brothers like you have been? Something we should talk about?" Her last sentence had a hint of sultry smoothness to it that ignited fireworks inside of him. His throat went dry as his heart hammered with abandon.
"I…" he stammered, averting his eyes. "I don't know what you're talking about…"
A smile began to form at the corners of her lips as she leaned in closer. He inhaled her scent again. God, he couldn't take it. He felt his grasp on everything slip. He met her eyes again, and realized there was no sense in trying to hide it any longer. He was a leader, he was an authority. Perhaps he needed to take control of his own feelings, too. He sighed heavily, and relief washed through her upon seeing his surrender. Her heart picked up speed as he dipped his head slowly toward hers. Her breath hitched, wondering if he was going to… But no, he only leaned his forehead against hers. She closed her eyes, soaking in the moment, the electric current resuming its powerful hum in the contact between skin and scales. He was still holding her finger, and they mutually changed the positions of their hands so that he clasped hers in his, their fingers lacing, as he drew her hand toward his plastron, over his heart. A warmth flooded through her, and through him as well, making them both forget they were ever even angry as the electricity hummed stronger. "What are you doing to me, April?" he whispered, his voice husky.
That was it. She wanted him. Needed him. "No worse than what you're doing to me," she responded in a whisper that matched his own, and without warning, brought her free hand up to grasp around his thick neck, and pulled herself up to press her lips hungrily against his.
Time stood still as the electricity intensified between them, so strongly that he was half surprised the lights didn't start flickering in the dim tunnels. He could feel her desire in her impossibly soft lips, as she took his in them, and he felt all his walls and barriers crumble around him as he began to surrender into her. She unlocked her fingers from his and slid her hand up his rough plastron to meet the other at the back of his neck. Sparks ignited in him under her touch, leaving a hot trail up his neck. God, he wanted her, he could feel his entire body responding to her touch, and he automatically wrapped his hands around her thin waist to draw her closer to him, pressing her hips against his. She shuddered at the contact as she tilted her head to deepen the kiss. Her tongue ghosted across his lower lip, and he felt his knees grow weak as an eager desire churned in the pit of his stomach. He found her tongue with his own, and together they danced passionately between their yearning lips, his hands tightening around her waist to pull her even closer.
All sense of time and space and awareness was lost as their lips and tongues explored each other's, passion burning intensely between them in the darkness of the tunnel. His hand bravely made its way down the curve of her hips, cupping just below her taut buttock and causing her to growl hungrily against him as she pressed herself even closer against his body. She felt so perfect in his hand, he brought the other hand down to grasp the other side, eliciting a moan of approval and lust from deep in her throat. She snaked her arms around his neck as she continued to devour his lips, loving the perfect combination of leathery roughness and yielding softness. It was heaven. She fit perfectly against him, better than she ever imagined, and she suddenly wondered how much more perfectly they could fit together. She grew heated at the thought, a moistness flooding her womanhood as she realized that if they continued on this way, she'd let him take her right there in the dark, dank New York underground.
The scent of her arousal immediately flooded his senses, but rather than causing him to plummet deeper into his burning hunger for this woman, reality instead violently snapped him back into its clutches.
Holy shit…
She had taken hold of him, how did that happen so easily? One moment they were arguing - his senses, like always, tuned into their surroundings, alert to any possibility of impending danger in the dimly lit tunnel; then the next moment she had him, and he was lost to her, completely transported from that tunnel and into a world of need and desire and sexual energy, shutting down all other senses, both ninja and otherwise.
And that was not okay.
He broke the kiss abruptly as he removed his hands from her backside and brought them to her hips to pull her slightly away from him, leaving her reeling and off-balance, unsure of what just happened until finally her eyes fluttered open to meet his, her chest heaving as she caught her breath from the intensity of their passion. The fear she detected in those blue irises quickly sobered her and brought her back into reality.
"Leo," she whispered, concern in her eyes as she tried to decipher the fear she was certain she saw in his. She brought a hand up to cup his cheek, her thumb brushing just below his eye.
He drew a steadying breath. "We can't do this, April."
His words crushed her so heavily she was almost surprised at the effect they had, making her all the more aware at how much she wanted him. "Why?" she whispered, her voice choked.
He shook his head and closed his eyes, taking her hand in his and removing it from his cheek. He swallowed against the lump forming in his throat and opened his eyes to meet hers, which were now wide and glistening. "I can't afford to be distracted," he replied.
Her face fell, her brows knit together over hurt eyes. "Is that all I am to you? A distraction?" The pain in her voice was almost palpable.
He didn't mean it like that. He tried to search for the words to explain. "No, April, you're - you're so much more than that," he stammered. "It's just… I can't let my emotions get in the way of my job as a leader, of keeping this team together-"
"No," she interrupted, her voice frighteningly low and her eyes now flashing angrily. She shook her head and stepped away from him. "You're right, we can't do this." His eyes widened, taken aback, but he remained silent. She continued. "You clearly can't get your head out of your ass, or your ego. I don't want to be with someone who can't straighten their shit out and balance their goddamn emotions, much less handle them."
"April-"
"No. Sorry to have distracted you," she spat, and after one last angry glare, she turned on her heel and left him standing numbly in a daze, as confusion and pain and need and fear eddied in his heart and mind.
