Part Two

It seemed like only a moment later that his voice was in her ear. "Joss, wake up."

She groaned unhappily, turning her face into his chest. "It's too early to get up." She wasn't about to complain about the visit, but the man had interrupted the precious little sleep she usually got.

"Joss, Taylor's awake." The slow heartbeat that had lulled her to sleep was much faster, revealing his fear.

"He won't come in here. Go back to sleep."

"How can you be sure?"

"He has a chemistry test today. He gets up early to study." Although, she thought, if the boy wanted to understand chemistry, he need only open the door. But John was still tense and concern over his upset would keep her from falling back to sleep. "What are you so worried about? He's seventeen, not seven."

Propping herself up, she was momentarily distracted both by how comfortable she felt and by the intimacy of their positions. "He likes you. You're the badass that saved his life, remember?"

"I'm in bed with his mother. Good will for saving his life will only go so far." His eyes darted toward the door as though Taylor was a three-year-old who might charge in unannounced at any second.

"Even if he did come in, John, we're still dressed." She took a moment to look at him, his anxiety unhidden by his normal blank mask, and involuntarily started to smile. He was really worried that her son might lose respect for him over it. He was really worried about her son's opinion of him. If she hadn't already realized how much John loved her, this behavior would have told her.

"What are you laughing at?" His worry over Taylor was replaced with suspicion.

"I'm not laughing, I'm smiling." Since the man had suddenly become an open book to her, she thought it was only fair that she reveal a little bit of herself as well. "And I'm smiling at you."

Try as he might to fight it, a grin steadily made its way across his face. "Why?"

"Because you actually give a damn about what my teenaged son thinks of you. It's adorable."

He looked thoroughly confused, as though he really didn't know what to make of her comment. "I don't think anyone has ever called me adorable before." But his eyes darted away from hers toward the door again, the confusion fading behind the worry once again.

"Maybe not to your face." With a sigh and the realization that John wasn't going to let it go, she shook her head. "Do you want me to run interference?"

He nodded eagerly. "Keep him busy for a minute and I'll be out of your hair." He tried to sit up, but Joss put her hand flat on his chest.

"No, you're not going anywhere. I'll keep him from coming in here, but then I'm coming back and we're going to back sleep, got it?"

It was hard for her to identify just what was going thought his mind, considering there were about a hundred emotions vying for prominence on his face. Eventually he settled on hopeful, but wary, letting her see that the idea she wanted to snuggle with him seemed too good to be true.

But, as usual, the cocky smirk replaced any vulnerability. Not that she could blame him, she had insisted he stay in her bed and wait for her. Opportunities like this didn't come around that often and she wasn't going to let it slip away without a fight. She could see the myriad of responses that flitted through his mind, but he said nothing, and though she tried to tell herself there were a million reasons he might have chosen not to speak, Joss decided it was because he didn't want to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Even knowing he was staying, however, she still didn't want to get up.

And, as usual, the moment he noticed her hesitance, he couldn't resist. "Weren't you going somewhere?"

"I'll have you know I'm really quite comfortable right now and I'm only considering getting up as a favor to you. A big favor. I expect you to repay me handsomely for this."

"Oh, I will." He grinned as his hand played along her back. "If you ever actually do me the favor."

His annoying smirk finally outweighed both the endearing way he'd sought her out for comfort and her incredible level of contentment she'd found snuggled into his side and she sat up. She wanted to pull self-consciously at her shorts to fix the way they'd ridden up during the night but she refused to give in. She didn't want to reveal anything that might make him think she was the slightest bit uncomfortable around him, not even if it were something as silly as attempting to hide her cellulite from him. God forbid the man misread it and think she didn't want him looking. She wanted him to look. And touch.

But first things first. She'd offered to make sure Taylor had no idea someone was in her bed, despite knowing her son would never come into her room unannounced, and she agreed with the premise. Whatever was happening, which might be happening only in her imagination, it was best that Taylor not know anything about it until she actually figured it out herself. Climbing to her feet, she shivered at the loss of heat from John's body.

She paused at the door, looking over at the sight of John lying half-dressed on her bed. "You're not going to sneak out the fire escape when I leave the room, are you?"

He looked at her, thoroughly looked at her, his eyes slowly drifting over her body from head to toe and back up. "I promise I'm not going anywhere."

Though she tried to hide it from John, there was no chance Taylor would miss the self-satisfied grin on her face. Especially since she couldn't quite find the energy to care that she couldn't stop grinning.

She knocked on Taylor's door and waited for him to respond before she opened it, the very same way she'd taught him. "Hey, baby, I know you have that big test today. Want me to make you some breakfast?"

"Sounds good." He glanced up from his textbook to check the clock on his desk. "I've got fifteen more minutes to study, then I'll be ready."

Shaking her head, she chuckled. "I think I need a DNA test. No way you got that bookworm thing from me or your dad."

"I have to study if you want me to go to Harvard."

"I don't want, I expect, and a full scholarship too. Get back to work." She closed the door behind herself. Though she still joked about it with him, college was looming on the horizon and she dreaded the day her baby would leave. She wasn't about to limit his dreams and thus, despite an infinite preference that he choose a college in New York, she would support any decision he made. Besides, Harvard was definitely closer than somewhere on the west coast.

She got to work in the kitchen, scrambling eggs and frying bacon and making coffee. On a normal day, she would have just poured some cereal in a bowl, but on a normal day, she would have been running too late to make anything substantial. Bright as he was, Taylor raised an eyebrow at the meal when he emerged from his room, offering her a smirk as he dug in.

"What?" She had a death grip on her coffee mug and her immovable grin firmly entrenched on her face, but besides that she thought she was doing an admirable job of appearing perfectly normal.

"You going to tell me about him?"

She narrowed her eyes. There was no way he knew. None. He had to be bluffing, so she had to call him on it. "Tell you about who?"

"Your new boyfriend.

"I don't have a boyfriend." There, that was perfectly accurate.

"Tell me or I'll go in your bedroom and introduce myself."

He knew. How the fuck he knew was beyond her, but he did. And suddenly she wasn't all that certain he wouldn't barge right into her room and threaten to beat the crap out of John if his intentions weren't honorable. Of course, if Taylor found John in her bed, she was pretty sure she wouldn't be the only Carter with an irrepressible grin. Taylor's brief time with John had left an impression. Hero worship was the term she'd use if pressed.

Shaking her head, she stopped trying to fight the grin. "It's not like that, T."

"Mom, I'm a big boy. Don't lie." He dropped his fork, much more interested in what she had to say than his breakfast.

"I'm not lying, it's really not like that." She took a deep breath and set her mug down. "He had a really bad day at work and he was upset, so he came here and he slept in my bed, but I'm telling you, it's not what you're thinking." She really didn't want to get into a discussion of her sex life, or lack thereof, with her son, but she knew if she didn't address it, Taylor would get all sorts of other ideas in his head which would be so much worse.

"Please, mom? Just be honest. If he's that important to you, I think I should know about him."

The grin was totally gone, her good mood erased by the implication that she was lying. "Taylor, I'm a grown ass woman who is actually having this conversation with her son. Why wouldn't I be telling you the truth?"

Taylor shrugged and pushed his eggs around on the plate for a moment before he took a breath and met her eyes. "Because he left his pants in the bathroom."

She wanted to bury her face in her hands and groan. Instead, she didn't blink. "And I told you, it's not like that."

With a grimace, Taylor looked toward the hall. "Do I need to Lysol the bathroom before I go in there? I mean, that's shared space, mom."

"Taylor!" She took a moment to tamp down her desire to yell at the boy, realizing that he was upset at having been left out of something he believed to be a big development in her life. "He's a friend, Taylor, and like I said, he was upset. He took a shower and I gave him Josh's sweatpants to wear to bed."

Taylor's eyes immediately went to the spot next to the front door where Josh's duffel had been, finding visual confirmation that Josh's bag was opened. "So he's tall, what else?"

Joss squeezed her eyes closed. The conversation had already gone from bad to worse and she really didn't want to bother having it since there was no new boyfriend. "Maybe you should worry about your test and less about my nonexistent boyfriend."

Taylor glanced back and forth between her and his plate before he finally shrugged and stood up, hefting his backpack over his shoulder. He met her eyes again and a wide grin broke out on his face. "Looks like he exists to me."

Balling her hands into fists, she took a deep breath and promised herself she wasn't going to kill either one of the two most important men in her life. Of course John had snuck up behind her while she was too engrossed with her son to notice. "I swear, John, after all that bullshit about worrying about Taylor's opinion, you have the nerve to come out here-"

"It didn't sound like it was going all that well." He moved just as silently as he had appeared in the kitchen, grabbing a mug out of the cabinet and pouring himself a cup of coffee like he'd been there a million times.

"We'll discuss this later, Taylor." She called to the boy who seemed quite pleased with the turn of events.

"I'll call before I come home. Or you can just leave a sock on the door or something."

She didn't know who to glare at, still irritated with both of them despite the happy expression on Taylor's face as he left for school. "John, you promised."

He had the sense to look sheepish. "I smelled coffee."

Not sure if she was more upset over Taylor thinking he'd found something out that wasn't true or by the fact that there would be no more cuddling, Joss folded her arms over her chest and frowned. She'd really been looking forward to crawling back into bed with the man, but she didn't want to reveal how disappointed she was, certainly not to the man who'd given up the comfortable bed in favor of a mediocre cup of coffee.

Reaching for Taylor's abandoned plate, she started to scrape the food into the garbage disposal but John's hands moved around her, took the plate, and dropped it in the sink. "Dishes can wait."

She remained perfectly still, trying to figure out what to do. Yes, she'd fully intended to climb back into bed with the man and go back to sleep when she'd left the room. Maybe she would have done so. No, she wasn't honestly the least bit surprised that he had backed out of a potentially uncomfortable situation before it had the opportunity to actually be awkward.

But now they were wide awake, standing in her kitchen, and John's hands were resting on the counter on either side of her. She turned her head slightly to the side, her eyes tracing the lines of his arm up to his shoulder when she promptly remembered he wasn't wearing a shirt. Her head snapped back to face forward and she mentally tried to prepare a list of pros and cons regarding every possibility for what he was planning.

Except that his voice at her ear rendered her brain senseless.

"I'm sorry I broke my promise, Joss. Let me make it up to you."

She was fairly certain her heart stopped. She'd known the man for years, had flirted with him at every meeting. Was it possible that he was finally willing to take it somewhere? He'd spent the night holding her. He'd walked into the kitchen knowing exactly what Taylor would think. He'd moved his hands from the counter to her hips. He'd obviously made his decision. It was clearly more than possible. It was happening.

She had to make her decision quickly – to let this move forward or to gently reign it back into the friendship they'd shared for years. She'd already put so much on the line for John and now he was asking for more. He wanted her to trust him completely, with her heart and her family and whatever tiny pieces of her life she hadn't yet turned over to him.

And though he was asking, there really was no point. She'd already given her heart to him, long before she even realized it.

She turned around to face him, recognizing his distress in the way his hands dropped to his sides as he backed up. He thought he was being rebuffed and she hated the hurt that flashed across his face. Stepping forward, she backed him against the opposite counter and put her hands on his bare chest. Rather than his typical blank mask, his face was open, revealing, vulnerable. He was unsure of himself for possibly the first time since they'd met and, for once, she understood him. He loved her and a change in their relationship had the potential to destabilize his whole world. He didn't do anything halfway; he always jumped in with both feet. But he wanted this, wanted her, and he was willing to open himself up to getting hurt in order to try. He was taking a chance on her, a chance he rarely took, just like when they'd met. And this time, she was going to reward him.

Leaning against him, she felt the moment he relaxed into it, his hands finding her hips again. She grinned at him, loving that she was the reason for the happy, playful look in his eyes.

"So how exactly were you planning on making it up to me?"

The smirk reappeared as his hands slowly slid up her sides, eventually finding their way to her cheeks. "I have a few ideas."

"Then maybe you should tell me about them." Despite the sudden change in their relationship and the ramifications it would have on every aspect of her life, she wasn't the least bit nervous or scared or uncertain. She was perfectly relaxed as John leaned down.

"I'd rather show you." His eyes were twinkling with happiness as his breath fell against her lips. His mouth was gentle, but determined, his kiss so thorough she couldn't help but shiver at the thought of how thorough he'd be with everything else. It came with the intensity, she imagined, and John was an all-in kind of guy. She was out of breath when he let her up and she fell heavily against his chest, inhaling the scent of him so close.

"Why do I suspect I'm going to be late for work today?"

"Late?" He reached for her chin, turning her to face him so he could kiss her again. "You're calling out sick."

"Oh, really?" The butterflies in her stomach started dancing in anticipation.

His voice was a low rumble that she felt as much as heard. "We can't stay in bed all day if you go to work, Joss."

Suddenly the idea of finding her phone to call out seemed like too much work. "Fusco will cover for me."

He grinned at her for a moment, evidently quite pleased with the way she hadn't bothered to resist. And a second later, she squealed with delight when he threw her over his shoulder and carried her back to the bedroom.

Epilogue

It was late that afternoon when the slamming of the front door roused Joss from a well-earned nap in John's protective arms. Her eyes darted to the clock, shocked to realize that it was after four, even more shocked to realize that she and John really had stayed in bed all day.

"John?" She leaned up, loving the relaxed way he looked. "Taylor's home."

"You said he wouldn't come in here and after this morning, I believe you." He didn't seem the slightest bit concerned now.

Hearing the refrigerator door open and close, Joss knew her son's next stop. "Did you ever get your pants out of the bathroom?"

His wide eyes told her he hadn't.

Shaking her head, she laughed. "Did you skip the CIA training on covert?"

"I didn't realize we were trying to be covert." His hand moved up to stroke her cheek. "Besides, someone distracted me."

"So I'm a distraction now?"

"You always have been, Joss."

She couldn't talk around the stubborn smile that formed at his words, a smile she suspected was going to be there for a very long time.

And a moment later, when Taylor discovered John's pants with a loud groan, she could only laugh.