Defeat


Stay away.

Claire told herself that every day.

Stay away.

Every hour.

Stay away.

She had made a terrible mistake. She had thought she was adding a little spark to the working day. Then she had realised she was playing with fire. Then she realised she was playing with fire in a powder keg.

Now she felt like Wylie E Coyote, standing around with a lit stick of dynamite in her hand and a puzzled expression on her face.

Stay away.

She knew she couldn't keep it up forever. She was being pulled towards Jack with a force that was positively geological. Tectonic plates being crashed together by the movement of the Earth's core couldn't feel more helpless than Claire. Then she shared a fifty-four second elevator ride with Jack and decided that geological wasn't a big enough metaphor. Astronomical was more fitting. We're moons. Planets. We're suns – twin suns in a shrinking orbit around each other.

Destined to go nova from the moment they came close enough to get caught in each other's gravity well.

But she was not a helpless ball of gas. She was Claire Kincaid, A student (except for art), smart, sassy, in control. She could decide.

Maybe she'd leave the job – then she wouldn't be sleeping with her boss.

Again.

Maybe she'd just say no to office affairs and wait for it all to die down. Maybe she'd tell him she didn't believe in sex before marriage and watch him run for the hills. In the meantime -

Stay away.

Jack – to her relief, to her disappointment – was respecting the boundaries she set. Maybe he was relieved that she was setting them. Maybe he was as astounded as she was that a harmless office flirtation had turned into a conflagration fierce enough to burn them both to the ground.

Stay away.

Claire avoided being alone with him too much, especially after hours. She kept a certain physical distance. She even tried not to look at him too much.

It wasn't a viable long term solution. It didn't, for example, do anything about the dreams – dreams that woke her gasping, drenched in sweat, hands fisted in the bedclothes, every inch of her skin burning.

It didn't do anything about the fact that her job involved a certain amount of unavoidable interaction with him – case conferences, time in court – prosaic, matter of fact interactions that left her heart racing and her breath unsteady, that sometimes sent her into the ladies afterwards to lock herself in a stall and pull up her skirt and pull down her panties and do what she had just spent half an hour wishing Jack would do …

It doesn't do anything about the fact that here I am at seven at night standing at his office door watching him looking for something on his bookshelf.

Claire knocked on the open door and he turned, glass in hand.

"Hey," she said. "Got one of those for me?"

"Sure." Jack dug a glass out of the mess on his desk and poured her a slug. He held it out, and then put it on the desk and stepped back to put the bottle away. He knows as well as I do, Claire thought, that we need a minimum safe distance.

Bad things happen when we get too close.

Only they weren't exactly bad, were they?

"Rough day?" Jack asked.

Claire sipped her drink, leaning against his desk. She would have liked to sit down, her feet ached, but that would involve a choice between the visitor's chair by his desk, where he'd be able to look straight up her skirt, or the couch, which was far too relaxed and suggestive. She turned a little to hitch herself on the corner of the desk, an acceptable compromise.

"I lost," she said glumly.

"I heard. Not the first time," Jack said. "Won't be the last. Saddle up again tomorrow and get back in the game."

"Is that a mixed metaphor?" Claire asked, smiling despite herself, the way Jack could always make her smile no matter how determined she was to be sorry for herself, just as he could always, no matter how determined she was to be cool and professional, short-circuit her brain with the slightest touch of his fingertip on her arm.

"Not if you're playing polo!" Jack said triumphantly. He leaned against the desk beside her, not too close, not close enough for her to feel the heat of his body through her clothes, just close enough to be companionable, in a shoulder-to-shoulder ADAs-united-against-the-world kind of way.

Claire raised her nearly empty glass, conceding the point. Conceding – as she'd had to concede defeat today. She tried to keep the smile on her face but she could feel it draining away.

She bowed her head and Jack put a companionable hand on her shoulder. It was a neutral, friendly gesture. Claire knew that if she leaned just a little way towards him, it would stop being platonic.

Stay away.

She didn't want to. She felt terrible. If she leaned a little way towards Jack McCoy and turned her head to meet his lips with her own, glass falling forgotten to the floor as her mouth opened beneath his and his tongue –

Well. Leaning a little way towards Jack McCoy would lead somewhere that would end with her feeling a hell of a lot better, of that Claire was quite certain.

But she knew she was not up to making good decisions, feeling lousy with self-pity as she was.

Besides, the part of her that wasn't wondering whether she should throw him down on the floor or drag him to the couch knew that if she made this decision it should be for a better reason than feeling sorry for herself. When she kissed Jack McCoy, when she slept with Jack McCoy, she didn't want it to be for any reason other than because she wanted to.

Or can't help myself, whichever comes first.

What she needed right now, more than mind-blowing sex, was a friend.

She leaned a little bit away from him, and Jack let his hand drop from her shoulder with one final squeeze. "What's the Manhattan DA approved way to get over a loss in court?" she asked.

"I believe that would be too much Chinese food and too much alcohol." Jack said.

"Sounds good," Claire said. "You're buying."

Jack laughed. "I've seen you eat," he said. "No deal." He cuffed her shoulder gently and reached for his coat. "Come on, Olivia Wendell Holmes. Let's get you fed and drunk."

His kindness warms her through and through, making her think not only of Jack bending me back over the desk, parting my legs and - but also Resting my head on Jack's shoulder, feeling his arms strong around me, hearing him tell me it will be alright -

Stay away.

It was good advice, from her wiser second thoughts. Wiser second thoughts that didn't understand the realities of her job. Wiser second thoughts that didn't understand –

That there's no choice.

Claire followed Jack out of his office, turning off the light behind her.

Stay away.

I can't.

Liar.

All right, Claire told the cautious voice within her defiantly. All right. You want the truth? Stay away?

I don't want to.