A/N: Happy New Year, everyone! I hope you all had a great time last night and feel 'bright eyed and bushy tailed' today.
Me? Well, I'm just going to have to waste away on this sofa. Who else is with me on that one?
I also have to confess that I'm not too happy with this chapter. I wrote it a long time ago and then rewrote it so many times, it's just a choppy mess now, but let me know what you think.
Anyway, don't let me keep you. On to the next chapter.
Brightening Stars
She handed the pad back to the officer and nodded at him while he greedily studied the list. No doubt he was baffled by the wine but Brenda couldn't care less - Sharon would appreciate it...if Sharon was awake.
On the way to the hotel she picked up a pizza because, frankly, she was starving. All it took to acquire Sharon's room number was a flash of the badge and a honey-dripping smile, then she was going up on the elevator.
Balancing the pizza - which, technically wasn't allowed to take up to the room - the overnight bag and her purse, the blonde proceeded down the hallway.
Room 326.
As she stood in front of the door, Brenda wondered what the heck she thought she was doing there, exactly. Sharon could be asleep, maybe she didn't want to see anyone, least of all Brenda and, if she had given some thought to this, Brenda would have perhaps realized that it was just a bad idea in general. She had nearly talked herself out of all this when someone cleared their throat on the other side of the door.
"Who is this?"
She startled at the tentative voice, nearly dropping the pizza. "It's-it's Brenda."
After a small eternity, the lock turned and the door opened slowly.
There she was, what was left of Sharon Raydor, wrapped in a white hotel robe and her glasses perched low on her nose.
"May I come in?" Brenda asked after a moment.
Sharon inhaled sharply then swung the door open fully, stepping aside. The blonde swept in, feeling the tension radiating off the other woman. She smelled different, her warm scent altered by the hotel's shampoo.
Brenda looked around the room and then dropped the overnight bag onto the bed, followed by her purse. "I got us some pizza. Have you eaten?"
Sharon barely glanced at it. "I'm not particularly hungry, but thank you."
Brenda smacked her lips; this wasn't going as planned, at all. "I brought wine as well..." She opened her purse and pulled out the bottle she had kidnapped from Sharon's house.
"It's the one that you like."
"It's the one I had in my wine rack."
"I signed it out," the blonde argued.
"It was $40."
"Well," Brenda handed the bottle over. "I'm sure it's as tarty a thang as ever."
She watched Sharon look the bottle over then place it on a cabinet with an indifference that dropped to room temperature close to freezing. "There's only screw tops in the fridge, no cork screw. They're probably worried people might stab themselves in the eye with it."
The blonde felt immensely pleased with herself as she pulled a cork screw out of her bag and presented it with gleaming eyes but the brunette merely pulled the robe tighter around herself and crossed her arms.
"I have a headache," she said and took her glasses off, just to make a point, of course.
Alright, Brenda thought, and tossed the cork screw back into her bag, narrowly avoiding her cell phone - patience, she knew, wasn't her strongest suit.
Brenda bit her lip, her eyes narrowing in on her Captain whose nails danced across the wooden top of the cabinet. She was being intentionally moody, and Brenda had no idea why but she decided to be an understanding friend...which was what she had come here for in the first place.
Obviously all this wasn't about her or the fact that she had wanted to see Sharon was okay with her own two eyes. But Sharon didn't look okay at all and that realization left her with a bad feeling in her tummy and a helplessness that Brenda was sadly very familiar with.
She just wasn't good at comforting anybody. She had always had a hard time with it.
Yet Sharon was being intentionally cold and indifferent, a not very original, and frankly not very effective plan to get rid of her.
Brenda decided to fight ice with fire - if there was anything they were good at, it was fighting.
"Why on earth do you have to be so mean to me when I've been nothin' but nice?"
"This is you being nice?" As the brunette glared at her, Brenda made the effort to look at least affronted. Sharon slumped and sighed, "Fine. What's on the pizza?"
Brenda smiled. "All the things you like!"
"And since when do you know what I like?"
"I'm just very observant. Now, hand over that bottle."
Sharon picked up the bottle and looked at it with a nonchalant shrug, "Oh, what the heck...open it."
Brenda took the bottle and opened it with the cork screw. The aroma immediately wafted into the air, saturating it with deep darkness and berries and all sorts of flowers.
"...it needs to breathe," Sharon commented off-handedly, one last attempt.
But Brenda just smiled and picked up the two somewhat cheap wine glasses sitting on the mini bar. She poured the dark red liquid slowly, catching its scent while Sharon crossed the room, inspecting the pizza with a critical eye. The blonde heard her sigh, an odd sound in the quiet of the room.
"What else did you bring?" She had finally noticed the overnight bag.
"Just some things I thought you might want," Brenda explained vaguely, carrying the two wine glasses.
"Look at the size of it," Sharon said, "I could go on a two week vacation."
Brenda huffed, "There." She thrust the glass at the woman. "Have some of that, maybe that'll make you more agreeable."
Sharon lifted her eyebrows, a nonchalant expression crossing her features. "Have I ever been known to be agreeable?"
"Point taken," Brenda said and deposited her wine on the bedside table. "I just thought you'd maybe want some company-"
"Because I've had a terrible night?"
"Nooo," the blonde drawled while she pulled the sweater and jeans out of the bag. "Because I was tryin' to be your friend." She decided to put them in the closet and went back for the suit and blouse. "Because I felt horrible and wanted to see you."
She hung up the jacket and pants, and fiddled with the subtle material of the blouse, trying to get it onto a hanger. As she turned back to go and attack the underwear next, Brenda nearly tripped over her own feet. Sharon stood next to the bed, naked, robe pooled at her feet.
She turned a little, glanced at Brenda who tried to work her mouth around a word that made sense, and pulled the charcoal grey night slip out of the bag.
Which she dropped onto the bed.
"Thanks for the robe," she then said and Brenda nodded while the woman slipped the silken robe over her form.
Well. The blonde cleared her throat and came closer, weary of what the woman might do next in her ploy to get rid of her.
But then, rather unexpectedly, whilst looking at Sharon as the brunette tied the sash around her small waist, Brenda felt the overwhelming desire to wrap her arms around her.
Sharon made a noise in the back of her throat as their bodies met but Brenda couldn't care less. Perhaps she was being selfish and perhaps Sharon hurt in all sorts of places after that awful man had flung her around like a doll but Brenda just couldn't help herself.
"I was so worried about you!"
"...Brenda."
Sighing, Sharon hugged her back but the blonde knew she was merely being humored.
"How about that pizza?"
Brenda stared at her then nodded. "Pizza." The blonde made a somewhat mad dash for the box containing it, fighting the blush coloring her cheeks - she was behaving like a complete simpleton. "You wanna watch some TV?"
Sharon waved her hand dismissively as she joined the blonde on the bed. "It's very unsettling to see your own house on the news...there's even helicopters, can you believe that?"
Brenda nibbled on her lip and glanced at the TV - perhaps not, then. "Here," she said and opened the box. "I know you don't like eatin' with your hands but I'm afraid you just might have to."
"That's okay, just for tonight..."
She sounded weary, Brenda thought but was pleased to see Sharon draw her legs up onto the bed. The silken robe slipped, exposing quite a bit of thigh but the brunette didn't seem to notice. How she couldn't, Brenda didn't know and tore her eyes away instead - not that she hadn't seen it all before.
"Dig in," the blonde said perhaps a bit too cheerily.
The brunette picked up a slice, balancing it delicately, and took a tentative bite. "Hmmm," she hummed.
Hmm, Brenda swallowed and picked up a slice for herself. "Good?"
"When is pizza ever not good?"
"When Flynn orders it," Brenda said evenly.
Sharon snorted, a small smile playing around her lips and leaned back. "Don't forget your wine," she said and emptied her own glass in a rather uncouth manner. "Here," Sharon poured more, "It goes perfectly with the pizza, don't you think?"
Brenda nodded and drank - if that was Sharon's desire, to get drunk, then that was what they were going to do. She took the liberty to watch while the brunette devoured the pizza and Brenda suddenly wasn't very hungry anymore. She had been sick with worry and Sharon's scraped knees didn't help.
The cut above her eye, taped up, was beginning to bruise and swell a little. Brenda stared at the marks around her neck, too. She could clearly see the outlines of the hands that had been wrapped around Sharon's throat.
Brenda wanted to punch someone.
The brunette had seemed far too composed at the scene, recounting the horrible events that had led to this with a calmness that seemed natural to everyone who didn't know her. But Brenda did know her, and she knew that, whenever Sharon didn't know what to do or how to be, she resorted to precise diction and a voice so measured, no one would even suspect her uncertainty.
"Thank you," Sharon said quietly. "For this." She leaned back against the headboard and drew her legs up, the robe slipping even further, almost obscenely low. "How is the investigation going?"
"You know I can't talk about that."
"I'm not asking for details, Brenda."
"Well," the blonde finished off her slice. "It's goin'."
Sharon nearly rolled her eyes and went for another slice of pizza, leaning over a little.
Really, Brenda thought, that robe covered next to nothing. And Sharon knew that - she had pulled it down over her legs and across her chest so many times, Brenda had a hard time counting.
And then she seemed to have a light-bulb moment.
"Sharon..."
The brunette looked at her, one of those rare, warm smiles shining in her eyes. "Hm?"
If Brenda didn't know any better, she could've sworn that Sharon was trying to seduce her. But that smile, the blonde always felt her insides melt when confronted with it, that smile made her feel utterly ridiculous.
What a silly notion. "I'm glad you're alright."
Sharon patted her knee affectionately and picked up her glass of wine. "Didn't even harm a hair on my head, honey."
"You and I both know that's not true," Brenda countered.
The brunette sighed a little and removed her hand that had rested on Brenda's knee and nodded, "Nothing that won't heal...I mean, you've seen the other guy, right?"
Green eyes clouded over and the brunette ripped the glasses from the bridge of her nose. She dropped them onto the bed, the slice of pizza falling from her hand and onto the box, then she rubbed her temple.
"Sharon...I'm so sorry."
"Well," she nearly laughed, "The worst part is, I can't stop thinking 'better him than me'. That's awful."
"No, it isn't!"
"Yes, it is. And you know it."
"Sharon," Brenda had forgotten all about the pizza and reached for Sharon instead. The palm of her hand slid along the woman's knee, to her thigh and then the brunette grabbed her wrist.
The blonde stared at it for a moment, her pale fingers against Sharon's mildly tanned skin. She didn't understand, she couldn't. Brenda swallowed and slowly looked up; Sharon's green eyes were darting over her face and then, after a moment of eye-contact, her gaze dropped to her lips.
Brenda snatched her hand away.
"What do you want from me?" She asked, her voice thick.
Sharon inhaled sharply, "You know what I want."
Brenda did know, the brunette's intentions were crystal clear. "I can't give you that..."
"You said you'd never say no to me."
Brenda swallowed. "I said that...but just this once I have to. You're not thinking straight-"
"Don't tell me what I'm thinking!"
"I'm not! But Sharon-"
"I feel awful and I don't know what to do! And is it too much to ask? Because every time you have a meltdown, who do you go to?"
The blonde was taken aback - was that really how Sharon perceived it?
"That is not true."
"Oh, come on, Brenda!"
Brenda shut her eyes tightly, hiding somewhere else, in a distant memory of desire and succumbing, of racing hearts. "Sharon..." For a moment Brenda felt trapped in this memory, almost a sense of deja-vu overcoming her as Sharon's breath ghosted over her lips.
"Don't make me ask for it," the brunette whispered, kissing Brenda's jaw and then her lips softly, a mere brush and almost not a kiss.
The blonde felt a flutter in her belly; it wasn't arousal, it wasn't fear, it merely sat beneath her heart, startling her with its intensity. "Oh..." She sighed against those familiar lips. "Oh..." Her eyes slowly fluttered shut as Sharon's fingertips danced over her breast.
Oh, but they weren't supposed to do this because Sharon would hate her for it afterwards.
"Sharon..." Brenda ended the kiss, the flutter in her stomach however remained. She stared at her own hands for a moment, breathing in slowly, composing herself, and then looked at the woman, intending to make this right, the words on the very tip of her tongue, but then she saw that look.
A glint in Sharon's eyes, the soft, vulnerable expression on her face, hopeful, almost naive. The brain was a funny thing, she had always thought so, how it remembered, memorized, replayed. Brenda had seen that look more times than she could count. It startled her and she was afraid of what it meant.
Sharon's eyes narrowed; she looked hurt, somehow, and then that softness in her eyes vanished.
Brenda was certain that it was her fault it had gone.
And then Sharon said, "I want to fuck. Now."
The blonde swallowed, that tingle turning her tummy upside down; suddenly, she felt quite ill with it, overwhelmingly so. "No," she said and scooted off the bed, "I'm not doin' this, Sharon, 'cause I just know you'll regret it later."
"Wait!"
She made it to the door then Sharon had her by the wrist, her mouth descending upon Brenda's and then a hot mess of a kiss, no desire, just desperation.
"Stop!" The blonde said fiercely.
A moment went by in utter silence, Brenda forgot to breathe and then Sharon just went, she stormed off, her silken robe fluttering as she slammed the door to the bathroom.
"Fffff...shoot!" Brenda really wasn't one for swearing but at that very moment she wished she just could. Rubbing her temples, the blonde contemplated her next move.