Show Me the Ropes

by LexusGrey

Starts out with Catherine/Lady Heather. But it is a Catherine/Sara story. WARNINGS: lots and lots of kink, varying degrees of intensity.

3. Chapter 3

--

"I've got prints, on the drawer handle, and the top of the desk," Sara announced, lifting each one carefully and preserving them according to standard protocol.

"Guess what I've got?" Catherine replied, an extremely comedic expression tinting her face as she looked over at Sara.

"No idea," Sara gave up without guessing, slowly getting to her feet. She was done processing the desk and was deciding between interviewing the neighbors or helping Catherine with the kitchen.

"Seminal fluid. On the kitchen table." You could just *hear* the amusement in her voice.

Sara nearly choked, on nothing, and then busted out with one of her full-fledged Sidle grins. "That's awesome."

"Isn't it? Gotta love the couple that still gets it on all over the house after what, fifty years of marriage?"

"Unless... suspect got a little too excited?"

Catherine snorted, swabbing the fluid and capping it. "You think the suspect masturbated in the kitchen after stealing five hundred thousand dollars in cash? You know how many bills that is? He would've had his hands full."

"Not if he bagged the money."

"Why would he stop to do something so stupid?"

"Oh, because criminals are always the brightest crayons in the box?" Sara countered, raising an eyebrow at Catherine.

"It doesn't matter anyway, until we get the swab to DNA. No use speculating, it won't get us anywhere."

"You want it to be Mr. Ziegler's, because you desperately want to believe that there's sex after seventy," Sara said with a self-satisfied smirk.

"Go interview the neighbors, Sidle," Catherine sighed with a roll of her eyes.

Sara patronizingly blew her a kiss and slipped out the door, heading for one set of neighbors.

--

"Okay, thank you, you've been very helpful," Sara intoned with a smile to Mrs. Kaplan, who was rather attractive and had noticed a black van lurking around before the burglary.

"I have? Are you sure? I wish I'd gotten the plates, but I didn't think much of it at the time," the redhead said wistfully.

"No, you did great," Sara assured her, flashing a dazzling grin. "You've given us something to pursue. Thanks again Mrs. Kaplan, if you think of anything else, give us a call."

"Of course," Mrs. K nodded eagerly, returning Sara's smile before stepping back and closing the door.

Sara heard the deadbolt click, and she turned around to see Catherine standing a few feet away, arms crossed sternly over her chest. "What?"

Catherine frowned, waiting for Sara to reach her before she spoke. "Go wait in the car."

"Why?" Sara had no idea what the hell that was all about.

"What do you mean why? Because I fucking told you to, that's why. You were flirting with the Zieglers' neighbor. Now go get in the car."

Sara's jaw dropped. "Are you serious? You think I was-- Catherine, she's married."

"I don't think you want to argue with me, now get in the car. I'll handle the last interview and deal with you when I'm through."

"Catherine--"

"Sara, get your little ass into that car right now. Do not make me say it again."

Sara growled and stomped petulantly to the car, yanking open the door and practically jumping into the passenger's seat, then slamming the door shut and kicking the dash with her boots. She rolled down the window to get some air, and Catherine threatened her on her way to the other neighbor's house.

"Watch it, Sidle. Deploy the airbag and you buy me a whole new car."

The interview was entirely unhelpful, seeing as how the neighbors had just returned from vacation and therefore had not seen anything suspicious the few previous days. When Catherine returned to the car, Sara was still sulking.

Cat got in and shut the door, then turned to the brunette. "When we are together, you are mine, and I don't want you flirting with anyone else," she announced hotly.

Sara took a moment to digest that, trying not to flip out at the ownership Catherine was not only implying but expressly claiming over her. A small part of her, a very hidden, underdeveloped part, found it thrilling, but the rest of her found it terrifying and objectifying. She got out of the car and slammed the door, yelling at Catherine through the open window. "I never agreed to be yours! I'm not anybody's, I'm not even my own!" she said frantically. "Send someone else back to pick me up!"

Catherine's jaw dropped and she jerked the car into reverse, backing out of the cul-de-sac without a word, making a two-point turn and racing toward the lab.

Sara sat down on the curb and pulled her knees up to her chest, resting her cheek on them, to wait for a ride.

--

"Greg, go get Sara. Catherine, you did *what*?" Gil asked in disbelief as Greg hurried off.

"She said to send someone else back to pick her up," Catherine defended herself with a shrug. "She's outside, not inside."

"So what?" Gil countered. "You left a fellow CSI alone at a B and E, Catherine. What were you thinking?"

"Oh she's a big girl, she can handle herself," Catherine spat bitterly. "Are we done here? I've got work to do."

"No, we're not done here," Gil said, his incredulity growing by the second. "Need I remind you what happened to Holly Gribbs?"

"Give me a break, Gil. She was a rookie, inside the house with her back to the door. Sara's outside on the curb and she's been doing this for a long time."

"I don't care if she's down the street having a hamburger. You don't leave anyone alone at the scene."

"Gil,"Catherine started, leaning over his desk with that *look* on her face. "She's a vegetarian." And she left his office before he could lecture any further.

Gil, however, was not amused in the least, and he stood quickly, following her into the hall. "It's an official warning, Catherine," he said seriously.

Catherine spun on her heels and stared at him, her jaw slack. "What?" she finally said, her cheeks burning with indignation.

"You and Sara need to keep your personal relationship issues away from the job," Gil pressed. "I don't care what you do on your own time, but on my time, I want my team to work together. I want everyone safe." He gave Catherine a few minutes to calm down, and then switched gears, feeling he had adequately made his point. "What happened?"

Catherine sighed, rubbing her hands over her face. "I said something I shouldn't have."

"And Sara reacted badly."

"You could say that."

"As a friend..." Gil started, looking distinctly out of his element but pressing on anyway, "how are you going to fix it?"

"I don't know," Catherine said slowly, shaking her head.

"Perhaps if I knew what was said, I might be able to offer a solution."

Catherine couldn't help but smile at that. Sometimes Gil really was too sweet for his own good. "I said she was mine, and I didn't want her flirting with anyone else, at least not when I'm around."

The look on Gil's face clearly stated how ill-advised he thought the comment to have been.

Catherine returned the look. "Yeah. I know."

Gil thought for a minute, then waved his hand in the air in suggestion. "Flowers?"

"We're not even technically dating."

"A plant?"

"No, Gil! She'll know that came from you."

"Well how about a good old-fashioned apology?"

Catherine appeared to think it over. "You know you may just have a point there."

Gil grinned, starting to walk away, and turned back halfway down the hall. "And if that doesn't work... you could always try giving her the power."

"I did that once, and my ass will never be the same."

"Did what once?" Warrick asked, walking past Catherine, but at the look on Gil's face he decided to retract the question. "Nevermind." And he kept walking.

"So this is the second time you've made her angry?" Gil asked, processing the new information.

"Unfortunately, yes," Catherine nodded.

"I've got it!" Gil suddenly announced, much more animated than Catherine had ever seen him. "Do a dance thing for her."

Catherine stared at him. And stared. And stared. "Do a what?"

"A dance thing. You used to be a dancer, do a dance thing."

"It is not a *thing*, Grissom, it requires skill and stamin--"

Grissom waved his hand dismissively. "Irrelevant. Why are you wasting time arguing semantics with me when you should be thinking about what to wear?" And he walked away.

"What to wear for what?" Warrick asked on his way back down the hallway, but at the look on Catherine's face, he again muttered "nevermind" and continued on to the DNA lab.

--

When Sara got back to the lab with Greg, she avoided Catherine like the plague. Finally the blonde had to stand in the doorway of the break room and say what she wanted to say to the room at large. "Sometimes, saying sorry doesn't mean anything," she started, and both Sara and Greg looked up from their lunches.

"I'm outta here," Greg decided on the spot, and he zipped out the door faster than Sara had ever seen him move.

Sara stared at her hands in her lap, refusing to look at Catherine. She didn't know what to do or say, she'd never been in this situation before.

Catherine stepped further into the room and closed the door, moving to stand beside Sara's chair, resting one hand on the table and leaning her hip against it. "So I'd like to do something for you instead. If afterward, you're still upset, I'll back off completely."

Sara liked the way Catherine was making her feel. Excited, a little nervous, but mostly, important. Wanted. She couldn't bring herself to speak just yet, or look at her colleague, but she gave a slight nod of her head to indicate that she'd accept the offer.

Catherine beamed, trying to keep a lid on it, and had to force herself not to start barking out orders. "Great. So if you'd please wait for me outside after shift?"

Again, Sara just nodded, staring at her hands, until she heard Catherine leave the room, and then she exhaled the breath she'd been holding for the past two minutes.

Catherine should have been nervous, but she wasn't. She knew she could dance, and she knew Sara would like it. Now she had a few phone calls to make.

--

Sara still didn't say anything for the entire limousine ride to the French Palace. Of course, she might have, if she'd known where they were headed. When the limo stopped in front of Catherine's old haunt, brown eyes went wide and she finally looked at her colleague. "You think I want to see a bunch of naked women dance?" she asked, a little incredulous despite her resolve to remain indifferent.

Catherine leaned in close and whispered into Sara's ear. "No..." And she got out of the limo, waiting for Sara before giving instructions to the chauffeur. "Take her inside and get her the VIP seat right in front of the stage, and whatever she wants to drink." And with that she strode off around the back of the club.

Sara turned to the driver. "She's not gonna..." But she let the question trail off at the impassive look on the man's face. She'd just have to trust her co-worker and wait and see.

--

Sara had been sitting for about twenty minutes, nursing a beer, wondering where the hell Catherine was, when the lights dimmed and the emcee made an announcement over the microphone. "This next dance, and dancer, are dedicated to Sara Sidle, from Miss Catherine Willows. Catherine would also like to say, 'let me show you how sorry I am, baby.'"

Soft, slow music began to pulse from the club's speakers, and Sara gripped the neck of her beer bottle like a vice when Catherine emerged on stage. She was sure her face was bright red, she could feel her cheeks burning from the emcee's announcement, or rather Catherine's dictated announcement, and felt like everyone knew who she was and was watching her. But when Catherine started to move, she forgot all about being embarrassed. The song had no words, but Sara could almost hear them anyway, and Catherine's bright blue eyes were fixed on her with an intensity that burned.

Watching Cat move across the stage like a lioness stalking her prey, Sara started to feel the heat in places other than her face. She stared, transfixed as Catherine's hands wandered up beneath her shimmering, sheer top. The outline of hard nipples was visible until Catherine's fingers closed over them, pulling and tugging with Sara's name rolling off her glossy lips in silence.

The brunette's chest was heaving by the time Catherine's top came off and was dropped provocatively into her lap. The dancer had no bra, and Sara gasped at the realization that Cat was up there, half naked, gyrating and hugging that silver pole, for her. Just for her. That blue gaze had never strayed from her, not for a second, and Sara knew it wouldn't.

Catherine didn't care who else was looking; she could feel Sara's stare like a physical caress. It sent shivers up and down her spine in rhythmic pulses, and she strolled to the front of the stage again, hooking her thumbs into the waistband of her skimpy skirt and inching the garment down over her hips, thighs, knees, to pool at the floor. She spread her legs slightly, just for Sara, and touched herself. With a heady groan, she dropped to her knees, rolling her hips and leaning forward into the brunette's personal space. "I'm wet for you," she whispered, her tongue bathing the tip of Sara's earlobe. "I want your hands on me so badly it hurts..."

Sara could barely breathe, her lungs inflating to full capacity and emptying rapidly several times in a row, her nostrils flaring slightly at Catherine's scent and her nakedness. She shifted uncomfortably in her seat in an attempt to relieve some of the pressure building between her legs, but she knew there was only one way to make it go away. When she spoke, her voice was harsh and scratchy and demanding. "I want a private dance."

Still clutching her beer bottle like a life preserver, Sara allowed herself to be led behind the curtains and into a private room, where she was gently pushed onto the sofa and Catherine released her hand. Before the blonde could back out of reach, Sara thrust a hand between her legs, grabbing hold of her and dragging her close again.

Catherine gasped, her knees buckling at the unexpected gesture, and she fell to straddle her prey on the couch, groaning and pushing her hips into Sara's demanding palm.

Two fingers slipped easily inside the soaking wet, writhing blonde, and the hand still holding the beer brought the rim to her lips where she drained the rest of the bottle in one long swallow. "Lay down," she growled, the blood pumping through her veins with renewed vigor at the feel of Catherine's pussy clenched around her fingers. She removed her hand as Catherine complied.

Sara looked positively ravenous, and Catherine couldn't lay down fast enough. The low, rumbling growl that commanded her was just... divine. She knew she whimpered when Sara's fingers withdrew, but her pulse was so loud in her ears that she barely heard herself make the noise.

Sara gripped Catherine's thighs hard and pried them apart, kneeling between them and leaning over her on all fours. Keeping her left hand braced beside Cat's chest, she snagged the empty beer bottle with her right and licked the rim, then eased it between her lover's legs and pushed.

The penetration was smooth and seamless, but the bottle was cold, and before Catherine could even register what she was being fucked with, Sara pinched her clit and she came with a string of curses.

Sara liked the way Catherine responded to her, and she liked the way it felt to make Catherine respond that way. "I'm not ready to belong to you, Cat," she whispered, slowly pulling the bottle from between her panting lover's legs and letting it roll off the sofa and land with a clink on the floor. "Not yet, okay?"

"Okay," Catherine gasped, nodding her head, immediately missing the sensation of being filled. When her brain fully realized what Sara had just said, she wanted to explode with the possibilities her lover's words alluded to. She hadn't expected to hear 'not yet'. She'd expected to hear 'not ever.' When she calmed down a little more, she lifted her head to search for evidence. "Was that your beer bottle?"

"Yeah."

"Can I have your fingers now?"

"Yeah." She rubbed two fingers around in circles before gently pressing into the woman beneath her. "Cat?"

Catherine purred quietly, rocking her hips in appreciative bliss. "Yeah?"

"I don't mind if you're possessive of me. Like at the geek-fest, when you threatened the bug lady and then took me into the bathroom and spanked me? That was hot."

Now Catherine was confused. "What's the difference between that and what I did today?"

Sara stilled her fingers for a moment so she could explain with Catherine's full attention on her words. "If you had told Mrs. Kaplan that I was yours? Told her not to flirt with me? I would have been okay with that. Maybe even fingered you in the car on the way back to the lab. But it's different when you said it to *me*."

"Okay," Catherine panted lightly. "Duly noted. Next time I'll stare down the neighbor and paddle your ass afterward. Now please... your fingers are driving me crazy, Sidle... start moving them!"

Sara leaned down, her position hiding her broad grin from Catherine. "Yes Ma'am," she whispered in a sultry voice, rubbing her fingers gently over Catherine's g-spot.

Cat closed her eyes and groaned, arching her back off the sofa and crossing her ankles behind Sara's back. "Harder," she demanded.

Sara pushed harder, adding a third finger, softly scraping with her nails every so often, until Catherine was a squirming mess beneath her. Blonde hair was splayed everywhere, sweat dripping into it from Catherine's forehead, and she was making the most delicious mewling noises, clawing at Sara's back through her shirt. It was feminine and animalistic at the same time, and Sara was so wet she was going to need a change of clothes.

Catherine was loving every minute of it, driven to distraction by the raw talent of the fingers working inside her. It wasn't long before Sara made her cum, again, and she yelled loud enough to warrant a pounding on the wall, which was the standard sign to keep it down. She tried to catch her breath, ending up with tears streaming down her cheeks from the intensity of her climax. But Sara was there, holding her, talking to her, helping her calm down enough to breathe.

"I've got you Cat, I'm right here," Sara promised, kissing away the tears. Her lips soon found Catherine's and they kissed, long and slow and sweet.

After a long while of just laying there together, Catherine yawned and stretched, giving Sara a peck on the cheek. "You ready to go home?"

"Yeah, can you drop me at the lab? My car's there."

"Oh," Catherine said, unable to hide her frown quick enough for Sara not to notice. "Yeah, of course."

"Catherine," Sara said slowly, taking Cat's face in her hands and brushing her thumbs back and forth across her lover's cheeks. "I stayed at your place yesterday, and I couldn't sleep. I need to go home, to my own place..."

"I know," Catherine tried to play it off with a shrug and a smile. "Now get off of me so I can go find my clothes."

Sara chuckled, but she had seen the disappointment in Catherine's eyes and hated being the one to put it there. It wasn't that she didn't want to spend more time with her colleague, it was that she needed her own space, too. She wasn't used to being social for such a long stretch of time without a break. Plus she needed a shower and a change of clothes, and she really did need to sleep in her own bed. But when she climbed off of Catherine and stared down at her beautiful naked body, and looked into those shining blue eyes, seeing the masked hurt that her lover was trying to hide, she faltered. "Do you want to come over?"

Catherine sat up slowly, then ran her fingers through Sara's hair. "Don't you need your space?"

Sara purred into the touch, nodding regretfully. "Yeah, I really do."

"I understand, I promise," Catherine smiled, giving the brunette a quick kiss and then hurrying off to find her clothes.

--

When Sara got home, there were no messages on her answering machine, she had no new mail, and no food in the house. With a groan, she closed the refrigerator and kicked off her shoes, flopping onto the couch face first and snagging the cordless phone. She ordered a pizza and then dozed off, waking with a start at the sound of the doorbell ringing in her ears.

She got out her wallet and opened the door, but it wasn't the pizza man. It was the bug lady from the underground entomological society... the one Catherine had threatened to stay away from her. "Uh, you're not the pizza."

"No, but you can still eat me," the lady offered with a little chuckle.

"What can I do for you Miss?" Sara asked, hoping that this was a business call. And how the hell had this woman gotten her address?

"The blonde woman. Is she your girlfriend?"

Sara faltered for a minute, not sure how to answer. "Uhh... yeah, actually, she is. Why?"

"Liar."

"I'm not lying," Sara said cautiously. "And I think she warned you to stay away from me, if memory serves..." She did not like this woman showing up at her apartment door. Had she followed them around all day and then back here? For now, she would try to let the bug lady down easy to avoid confrontation. "You're gonna get me in a lot of trouble showing up here... I, I already got one spanking," she blushed, embarrassed at telling a stranger about something so intimate, but if she wanted the woman to back off, and didn't want to just say so, then she'd have to make a few sacrifices. Although, really, why didn't she just tell her to back the fuck off? Well... because deep down the thought of belonging to Catherine made her very excited.

"Let me see," the lady offered. "I could--"

"If I showed you, I would get another spanking," Sara whispered, feeling her cheeks flush hot even as a thrill shot up her spine at the thought of Catherine punishing her again.

"It's okay honey, no one would have to know..."

Now Sara was getting pissed, and she dropped the act. "Look, lady. I'm not interested. I'm taken. Now fucking beat it." And she slammed the door.

A few minutes later the doorbell rang again, and this time she looked out the peephole before she opened the door, confirming that it was indeed the pizza. Then she called Catherine.

"Hlo?" a sleepy voice slurred into the phone.

"Cat?"

"Sara?" She was wide awake now, sitting up in bed. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing, I'm fine, something weird just happened."

"What, what is it?"

"That bug lady just showed up at my house."

"What?!"

"Yeah, that's pretty much what I said."

"Are you okay? She didn't touch you, did she? Do you want me to come over?"

Sara grinned into the phone, picturing Catherine fretting on the other end of the line. "No, really, I'm fine. I just... wanted to tell you that I didn't flirt with her. I, I told her to get lost." She chewed her bottom lip waiting for Cat's response.

Catherine froze, and slowly stopped fussing, laying back down with a slow grin spreading over her features. She had to be very careful what she said here... she knew that much. "Sara?" she said softly, unable to keep the smile out of her voice. "I really like that."

"Yeah?" Sara asked, and Cat could hear the hesitant pride in her voice.

"Yeah," she assured her lover, a warm, fuzzy feeling migrating through her entire body. "You just made me wet. Good night."

"Night."

After she hung up the phone, Catherine laid staring at the ceiling with a goofy smile on her face. She was going to have to do something special for Sara for that one.

--

Sara opened her locker at the start of shift that night to see a jar of red fingerprint powder staring back at her. Jaw dropped, she spoke to the small jar. "Where did you come from?"

"Sanders in your locker again?" Catherine smirked, daintily closing her own and exiting the room before Sara had a chance to reply.

With a slight frown, Sara picked up the jar to read the note underneath it. A gorgeous scripted handwriting showcased the words,

Sara,

Thanks for the call.

XO, Cat

Watery-eyed and smiling softly, Sara took the print powder to her kit and tucked it safely away inside. She folded the note and put it in her pocket, then headed off in search of Catherine. She couldn't have gotten far yet.

When Sara caught up to her, Catherine expected playful banter, but instead she found herself pushed against the wall in the hallway being kissed. The kiss ended much too soon for her liking, and she tilted her head to the side a little, wondering what Sara was thinking. She wondered that a lot these days... "What was that for?" she finally asked with a grin. "Not that I'm complaining."

Sara stared at her, trying to find the words to express how she felt. She couldn't. So she went for the next best thing. "You bought me red print powder."

"Yeah," Catherine started slowly, giving Sara a funny look. "If that's all it takes to get you kissing me in the lab hallways, I don't know what I was waiting for," she teased. Sara's slightly choked up voice in response was confusing.

"You know I love red print powder?"

Catherine laughed, though her laugh was rather cautious. "Of course. Why would I bother giving you something you didn't like?"

"Why would you bother remembering what I do like?" Sara asked, her eyes filled with tears.

Catherine was a bit astounded, and she waited a few seconds before responding. "Look, I'm sorry if I upset you with the gift. I just wanted to make you smile... I can take it back if you--"

"No," Sara interrupted her quickly, swiping at her traitorous tears in a valiant attempt to pretend they weren't there. "I know it doesn't look like it, but I love it. Thank you," she forced before turning into the closest room and closing the door behind her. When she felt the knob turning, she called out loudly, "Cat, give me some time!"

Catherine let go of the door handle, hearing it snap back into place, and now she really, really wanted to know what Sara was thinking. Why was the gift such a big deal? It was a jar of fingerprint powder, what was emotional about that? It was one of those 'grab on the way in' type of things, not a long, thought-out, romantic gesture. Sara was acting like it was practically a proposal of marriage for God's sake. Sometimes she could be so baffling it drove Catherine crazy!

With a grunt of irritation, Catherine stalked off down the hall to the break room to wait for assignments.

When Gil stepped into the room, she looked up and started talking before he could get a word in edgewise. "Greg still wants field experience, right? Put him on whatever case I pulled."

Grissom glanced over the assignment slips, chewing on the cap of his pen, and then handed one over to Catherine. "Okay. Homicide at the Palms."

Catherine handed it back. "No, something that requires less focus."

Gil blinked at her, staring for a minute, and then decided to just not even ask. He took the slip and gave her another. "Four nineteen?"

"Gil, give me a hooker roll or something," Catherine said impatiently.

"I don't have a hooker roll, Catherine," Gil said calmly. "Would you like the night off? Am I interfering with your plans?"

Catherine pursed her lips in irritation and snatched the 419 slip out of Gil's hand. "Greg!" she barked when the eager young man stepped foot through the door. "You're with me. Get your Goddamn coat and meet me at the truck."

"Coat?" Greg asked, both he and Grissom slowly turning their heads to watch Catherine stalk out of the room. Once she was gone, he turned to his supervisor with an incredulous look. "Coat?" he asked again. "In the middle of a heat wave?"

Grissom shrugged, his patented half-smirk making an appearance. "She felt pretty chilly to me, Greg."

"SO funny," Greg smiled, his tone indicating that it was not. Sometimes Grissom said the corniest things...

--

Sara pouted her way into the break room when she saw Catherine stalk out of the building with Greg trailing behind a few seconds later. "Is she avoiding me?" she asked Grissom, pointing her thumb back over her shoulder in the direction Catherine and Greg had left. Nevermind that she was the one who'd told Catherine to give her some space.

"I really have no idea," Gil answered honestly. "She turned down the homicide case I offered her. Do you want it?"

"Am I lead on it?"

"You are if you take it..."

Sara plucked the slip from his fingers with a grin. "Mine. I can use my new print powder."

"New print powder?" Grissom asked, his interest piqued. "I wasn't aware of any new shipments."

Sara fought her grin down to a manageable level as she tried to stop beaming. "The red stuff. Catherine gave it to me. You know, like a present."

Grissom's jaw dropped and he turned and fled the break room, making a beeline for his office. He went straight for his private stash, rifling through it until he was satisfied that Catherine hadn't shoplifted any of his precious cargo.

Stunned, Sara could only stand there until he returned. "What the hell was that?" she asked.

"What was what?" Grissom asked as if he hadn't just flipped his lid. "Don't you have a case to lead?"

Sara frowned, that concentrated look of hers. "Grissom, you just ran to your office. Ran."

"So what?" Grissom asked with his 'what's your point' shrug.

"So... wow. Nevermind," Sara said, scratching the back of her neck and finally just grinning at him, shaking her head. "Can I have Warrick?"

"Warrick's out on a solo. Take Nick."

Aw fuck. "Yeah, sure." Fuck fuck fuck. She really didn't want to work with Nick tonight. Not after the way they'd been bickering like a married couple the past few shifts. Oh well, she'd just focus on the case and leave no room for chit-chat.

--

"Where'd you get that?" Nick asked as he swabbed blood from the bathroom floor, watching Sara take a jar of red powder from her kit.

"It was a gift," Sara answered vaguely, dipping the tip of her brush into the jar and swirling the bristles lightly over the bathroom counter.

"From who?" Nick pressed, capping his swab and tucking it away in his vest.

"Does it matter?" Sara asked, almost mesmerized by the way the bright red powder illuminated several sets of prints on the marble counter. This shit really was awesome.

"Catherine give it to you?"

"What if she did?"

"Did she?" Nick stood up, staring at Sara's back, watching her lift the prints she'd found.

"Yeah, she did, Nick. Why do you care?" Sara snapped, turning around once she'd finished with the tape and safely stored her evidence. "Are you jealous of something? What is your problem with me lately?" She really did not want to have this conversation right here, but it wasn't looking like Nick would back off.

"Jealous of something? Jealous of what?" Nick shot back, trying not to raise his voice. "Jealous that you got your ass pounded on?"

"Yeah, Nick. Jealous that I got my ass pounded on," Sara didn't relent. He wanted this confrontation, he got it.

"No, I'm not jealous of that," Nick said, his face twisted slightly in disgust, but Sara wasn't buying.

She went to step forward, completely forgetting about the pool of blood on the floor, but Nick grabbed her and picked her up, swinging her out of the way before her boot hit the ground.

"Watch it there," he said quietly, setting Sara down a few feet away from the blood pool.

Sara sucked in a breath, letting it out slowly, finally catching a glimpse of the Nick she knew. "Thanks," she mumbled, realizing how close she'd been to compromising her own damn crime scene.

Nick nodded, then ran a hand over his face and sighed. "Sara, I'm sorry," he said after a minute. "Maybe I am a little jealous. But not over what you said."

Relief flooded through her as she accepted Nick's apology with a nod. "It's okay." And a thought occurred to her... a thought she really didn't like. "Are you... in love with Catherine or something?"

"No," Nick said, but not defensively. "It's not even that."

"Well I know you're not in love with me, so what is it?" Sara asked with a grin.

Nick finally grinned as well, shaking his head. "I'm not sure exactly," he admitted. "I keep asking myself that same question, and all I can come up with is that I'm a little jealous you can just flaunt yourselves like you do. You and Catherine, you know?"

"Not really," Sara offered.

"Like... there are things I'm into that I'd never admit, and it pisses me off that I'm such a chicken shit about it. And that's before you two come parading in spouting off about your kinks without a second thought. Makes me feel like a pussy."

"So tell me then. What are you into?"

"No way man, I just said I'd never admit it."

"You into guys?"

"Nope."

"Spanking, whips and chains?"

"Nope. And I won't tell you even if you guess."

Sara narrowed her eyes at him, folding her arms across her chest. "Spill it, Stokes."

"Not gonna happen."

--

"You know Sara pretty well, right?"

Greg stopped mid-step on his way to the body and turned to face Catherine. "Is this one of those conversations where you try to get me to reveal intimate details about Sara and then she ends up killing me when she finds out?"

"Yes."

"Then I don't know her well at all," Greg said with a decisive nod.

"Look, either you tell me what I want to know and Sara kills you, or you don't tell me and I kill you here and now. Slowly and painfully. *Agonizingly* slowly and painfully."

"I knew there was a reason you dragged me out here other than my value as a field CSI," Greg said, pointing at Catherine with that 'aha!' look on his face. "But like I said. I don't know her well at all."

"Uh huh," Catherine nodded, clearly not convinced. "So tell me Greg... why would Sara freak out over a little present?"

"No clue."

Catherine gave him the *look*.

"Really. No idea," Greg said, rubbing his hands together and starting to walk again. "So... how about that body..."

"There's gonna be two bodies here in a minute," Catherine warned, balling her hands into fists at her sides and stalking after him.

"HELP!" Greg screamed into the empty field, and at Catherine's horrified expression, he chuckled. "Don't make me squeal like a bitch."

"You just did," Catherine informed him dryly, crossing her arms and following him to the body. "I gave her a jar of red fingerprint powder, and she practically started crying."

"Really? Hmm. Okay look at the angle of this guy's head--"

"Greg!"

"You should be asking her these questions, not me!" Greg protested defensively.

Catherine growled, but Greg refused to speculate on Sara's reasons for anything.

--

Catherine didn't see Sara anywhere when she and Greg got back to the lab, but as she was putting her purse in her locker she noticed a note.

Catherine,

Thank you for the gift. Maybe someday I can explain my reaction to you, but for now I hope it's enough to tell you I love it. I used it today at my scene and it got me four sets of perfect prints.

If you're not angry, text me when you get this.

XO, Sara

A grin tugged at the corners of her lips as she read the note, and she slipped it into her purse before closing her locker. She pulled her phone out of her pocket and flipped it open, sending Sara a message.

I'm not angry.

A few seconds later her phone buzzed and she cocked an eyebrow at the return message.

Good. Come to the back lab, just walk in.

"All righty then," she said to herself, flipping her phone shut and putting it back in her pocket. She headed for the back lab, pausing at the door when she realized all the blinds were drawn. Oh boy... what exactly did Sara think she was doing?

Shaking the grin off her face, Catherine slowly opened the door and stepped into the lab, closing the door behind her. When she turned back around, her jaw dropped and her stomach clenched convulsively at the sight before her. Sara was in the middle of the room, on her knees with her head bowed and her hands behind her back. Catherine couldn't help but let out a soft gasp as she walked closer, her entire body feeling the effect of Sara's position. "Oh my God," she breathed, reaching her hands out to stroke Sara's hair, pulling her lover's head against her belly.

Sara said nothing, though she desperately wanted to say about a million things. Her nostrils flared with the effort to control her breathing, and she willingly leaned into Catherine's touch, allowing her lover to take the lead if she wanted to. She hoped that's what she was conveying with her body language.

Catherine wasn't sure what Sara's intentions were with this, but she had some idea, and with a voice that cracked, she issued a quiet, gentle command. "Take off your blouse, please." When Sara moved to comply, she thought her knees might give out on her.

Sara was breathing heavily by now, making no attempt to hide it. She kept her head down, finding it hard to think about looking at Catherine while she offered this side of herself. Shaking fingers worked the buttons of her shirt until she could open it and peel it from her body. The cool air rushing over her exposed arms made her shiver, but she removed the shirt completely and laid it on the floor next to her, glad she was wearing a tank top underneath.

Catherine bent down until she could reach Sara's hands, then took them in her own and straightened back up. "Stand up."

Sara got to her feet, hoping her legs would hold her.

"Look at me."

That one was hard to do, but somehow Sara managed to force herself to look up. The desire she saw in those baby blues was enough to reassure her that Catherine did want her. This was okay, she could do this. She liked having Catherine in charge. And she knew that Catherine liked being in charge of her. God, it was exciting.

Catherine released Sara's hands, giving her a reassuring smile before issuing her next command. "Take off your pants and put your hands on the back of your head."

Oh wow. That was just... wow. She removed her boots and socks without incident. Her hands trembled as she brought them to the button of her pants and freed it, then slid down the zipper and pushed her pants to the floor, stepping out of them and nudging them over to join her shirt. She felt exposed, even though she was wearing a tank top and panties. At the last second she remembered Catherine's other instruction and clasped her hands behind her head, blushing at the way the position made her back arch slightly.

"Fuck," Catherine whispered, pulling Sara lightly against her, squeezing her lover's hips. "Good girl."

Sara couldn't resist a snarky comment, the tension was getting too hard for her to take. "Glad you approve."

Catherine laughed, recognizing the fact that smart-ass Sara was surfacing to protect submissive Sara, and she just hugged the brunette to her, hands running up and down Sara's back. "Not bad for your first try," she teased into a blushing ear.

Sara grinned, enjoying the touch, dropping her head to Catherine's shoulder and trailing kisses across her neck. "Who said I was done yet?"

"Oh yeah?" Cat challenged, her eyes darkening a shade as she pulled Sara's head away from her neck. "Underwear off."

"Uh..." Sara started, but Catherine interrupted her hesitation with a quiet demand.

"Now, Sara."

"Yeah, I think I was getting a little ahead of myself there," Sara replied with a sheepish grin.

Catherine squeezed Sara's hair lightly and brought her lips very close to her lover's ear. "I know you want to obey me, but you're scared," she whispered in a low, husky voice. "Take. Your underwear. Off." She took hold of Sara's wrists and brought them to the waistband of her sexy black panties, curling her fingers in for her before letting go. "Now."

Oh fuck. The half-naked brunette's knees nearly buckled. She was almost hyperventilating. She was so wet. How hard could it be to do what Catherine told her? She'd even gotten the process started for her. "Oh," she said with a nod, as if she were just now realizing that Catherine was serious, even though she'd known it from the start and they were both aware of that.

Catherine waited. She saw Sara's fingers twitching, starting to pull down the underwear, but her lover stopped before she got anywhere. Cat was about to comment, but at the last second she gave Sara a little more time, and oh was she glad she did. Sara pushed those panties down over her hips, letting them fall to the floor where she stepped out of them, her face bright red. Catherine could hear her labored breathing, see the rapid rise and fall of her chest, and it was indescribable. "Oh Sara," she whispered reverently, trailing her fingertips up and down her lover's sides, "you're so beautiful... you look so fucking sexy right now I could eat you."

"Please," Sara whimpered, glancing at her discarded underwear. "Let me put them back on, Cath..."

"Shhh," Catherine soothed, lightly tapping Sara's lips with one finger. "I want you to keep them off for me for sixty more seconds."

Another whimper escaped and she started counting the seconds in her head. One, two, three, f-- She lost count when Catherine spoke again.

"I can't believe we haven't been fucking for longer than we have."

Sara really couldn't contemplate anything other than being without her underwear. "Please, Cat, can I put them on yet?" she nearly whined.

Catherine smothered a grin, kissing the tip of Sara's earlobe and whispering sweetly into her ear, "just thirty more seconds, baby. You're making me *so*... wet."

Now Sara did whine, but it was wordless and pleading. Thirty seconds had never seemed so long in her life. Even when Catherine's palms slid over her belly, she couldn't get past the feeling of vulnerability to enjoy the touch. But the fact that she was doing this for Catherine, *just* for Catherine, *just* because Catherine told her to, made her shiver. And she was turning Cat on. She wasn't even doing anything, she was just standing there. Knowing that her compliance was enough to turn Catherine on was an incredible feeling. Mind-blowing. Even as she trembled, she was soaked.

Catherine groaned and lifted her eyes to the ceiling, then dropped her forehead onto Sara's shoulder and pinched her nipples through her tank top and bra. She felt them harden instantly - or rather, harden more than they already were. "Okay," she breathed. "Lean over, pick them up, and you may put them back on."

Sara exhaled with relief and bent down, snagging her underwear and pulling them on. The elastic settling around her waist had never felt so good.

Catherine waited, but when Sara didn't speak, she raised an eyebrow at her lover. "Sara, what do you say to me for allowing you to put your panties on?"

Sara's breath left her in a rush of air, her brown eyes going a bit wide at that. "Thanks?" she tried.

"Come on now, you're smarter than that," Catherine chuckled softly, shaking her head.

"Okay, yeah," Sara reluctantly admitted, a nervous chuckle escaping her as well. "Uh... thank you, Cat."

"For?"

"For letting--"

"Allowing," Catherine corrected her.

"For allowing me to put my panties on." Oh, my God, her cheeks were flaming at having to say that. She squirmed around, unable to look at Catherine.

"Hold still and look at me, and say it right," Catherine admonished, her tone mostly gentle but with a bit of an edge.

Sara took a breath, straightened up and looked at Catherine. The swirling desire in those bright blue eyes gave her confidence she wasn't sure she felt, and she said what Catherine wanted to hear. "Thank you, Cat, for allowing me to put my panties on." She took it a step further, wanting to unhinge the blonde as much as she was becoming unhinged. Her voice dropped low. "Thank you for making me stand in front of you for sixty seconds without them. Thank you for making me take them off in the first place. I'm so wet, Cat. So wet for you it hurts. Just you, Cat. Nobody else. Nobody else gets a drop and I'm dripping, Cat. Thank you for letting me put my panties on because I would have left evidence all over the floor."

"Jesus, Sidle," Catherine rasped breathlessly, her chest heaving with the effort to control herself. She needed an outlet, because clenching her thighs wasn't working. Without another thought about evidence left on the floor, her hand was in Sara's panties, her fingers working quickly inside the surprised brunette.

"Anybody could walk in!" Sara gasped in protest, trying to squeeze her legs together, but Catherine's hiss changed her mind.

"Spread your legs," the blonde demanded, coaxing Sara's clit out of hiding with smooth strokes of her thumb.

Sara didn't want to be found by any of their co-workers like this, but Catherine's fingers felt so damn good, and the strokes across her clit were too hard to resist. She spread her legs.

Unfortunately, Sara's fear turned out to be justified, because the door swung open and she saw Gil over Catherine's shoulder. He shrieked like a girl and dropped his clipboard and a vial full of something, which shattered all over the floor.

Sara was mortified, and even Catherine had the good grace to blush as she pulled her hand out of her lover's panties. Sara grabbed her pants and put them on faster than she could ever remember moving in her life.

"Whose sperm is that?" Catherine asked, raising an eyebrow as she watched Gil scuffle around trying to clean up.

"No one's. What the hell do you think you're doing in here?" Grissom asked angrily, frantically trying to rip enough papertowels off the roll to clean up the mess.

Catherine started to move away, quite suspicious of that answer, and when she reached the supply cabinet she snagged a swab and discretely swabbed the floor when Gil's head was turned.

Sara's eyes nearly bugged out of her head as she watched Catherine swipe Grissom's evidence, and she had to admit, this was going better than it could have. Cat seemed to be good at deflecting the scandal back onto Gil with his inexplicable sperm. She herself had nothing to say, and was contemplating her chances of getting to the door undetected while the other two bickered.

Catherine was having none of that, though, and just as Sara reached the door, her voice rang out through the room. "Where the hell do you think you're going?"

"Besides into a hole and never coming out?" Sara asked, her heart pounding in her chest. "I don't know. Anywhere but here."

"Grissom, what the hell are you doing?" Catherine asked irritably, watching her supervisor get out a bottle of bleach.

"Nothing," Grissom barked, pouring bleach over the cleaned-up area. "Get out of here, both of you, and don't let me catch you having sex in any of the labs again."

Catherine stared at him. "That's it? Don't have sex in the labs again?"

"What would you like me to say, Catherine?" Gil asked, finally stopping his cleaning crusade to look up at her.

"Nothing," Cat said slowly, shaking her head. She followed Sara out the door, and once they were out of earshot of Gil, she pulled out the swab she'd taken. "I have *got* to know who that sperm came from," she said with a grin.

--

Catherine grabbed an apple from the break room and munched on her way to answer Greg's page. "You rang?"

"Yeah. Results are printing out now on the mystery sperm." Greg was standing by the printer. He grabbed the sheet and looked it over.

Cat took a bite of her apple and mumbled around a mouthful, "well?"

Greg stared at the paper, then up at Catherine. "It's Grissom's."

Apple flecks spewed from Cat's mouth as she choked. "WHAT?"

"Yeah. What are you doing with the boss man's little swimmers?" Greg asked, ducking to avoid the flying apple bits, then again as Catherine threw the core at his head.

Cat snatched the paper from him, she had to see this for herself. True enough. No wonder Grissom didn't want to push the 'sex in the lab' issue - he was doing something against company policy himself! She couldn't help a little victory dance, and when she noticed Greg's raised eyebrow, she effectively knocked him down a peg or two by kissing him on the cheek.

--

Sara was brooding, standing in front of her locker at the end of shift. She didn't even know what she was brooding about, she just couldn't focus, staring into the mirror on the back of her locker door. Finally she smirked at herself, shaking her head and tapping the mirror knowingly. "People always told me to get a life outside of work..." She got her purse and closed the locker, but just as she was about to turn and leave, Catherine's silky voice rang out from the doorway.

"Drop your purse and put your hands flat on the lockers."

Without thinking twice, Sara set her purse on the floor and placed her hands in front of her, shoulder-width apart, her palms pressed into the cool metal.

Catherine shuddered discretely as she walked toward Sara, a sway in her hips. When she reached her lover, she pressed her body flush against the lithe brunette, pinning her to the lockers. "I didn't get to finish what I started."

Sara moaned, the metal cold against her flushed cheek. "Shift's over, you can take me home."

"I want you here."

"Cat," the brunette groaned, squeezing her eyes shut tight. "We already got caught once today, and the locker room is ten times more likely to get us caught than the back lab."

"I want you here," Catherine repeated, not moving an inch.

"You can't always have what you want," Sara growled, managing to spin around and grab Catherine's wrists, wrenching them behind her back. "Stop being so spoiled."

Cat yelped at the forceful move, her blue eyes going wide with surprise - she hadn't expected that from Sara. "I can't fuck you at home right now," she explained. "Lindsey's there." She tried to kiss Sara, but the brunette held her back.

"You should go home to her. How long has it been since you got to spend time with her?"

"Don't start, Sidle," Catherine warned, trying to break Sara's grasp on her wrists unsuccessfully.

"Why not? You get to press all my buttons, now it's your turn under the microscope for once. You are not going to blow off your daughter to have sex with me!"

"It's none of your business who I do or don't blow off!" Catherine escalated quickly.

So did Sara. She shoved Catherine away from her, hard. "Don't do this to Lindsey!"

"Goddamnit I am the boss in this relationship and I told you to back off!" Catherine shouted angrily, her eyes wild as she stared Sara down, breathing heavily.

Sara opened her mouth to retort and was suddenly struck with a sad, empty feeling, and she deflated as quickly as she'd puffed up, sinking down to sit on the bench behind her. "My mother never had a minute for me," she whispered. "I'm not going to be the one that takes your time from Lindsey."

Catherine felt like she had been slugged in the stomach, and everything went into slow motion for a few long seconds as she stumbled over her shoes and quickly sat down on the end of the bench. Why could Sara make her feel so much, so fast, so intensely, with just a few sentences? Her anger drained away and she slid toward Sara on the bench once she'd regained her balance, reaching her hands up to cup Sara's face. A strong maternal urge overcame her and she gave Sara a soft smile. "How about I take both my girls out to lunch?"

Sara's throat went dry and tried to close up on her. The walls tried to close in on her, too. She pushed her hands out to the sides to make sure she was just imagining it, which she found she was, but that didn't keep her heart from trying to pound right out of her chest. Not that this was a bad thing... just a weird, unexpected thing. Apparently she had been silent too long, because Catherine spoke again.

"Baby?" the blonde questioned, stroking Sara's cheeks with her thumbs. "Baby I'm sorry I yelled at you, and I'm sorry I was even thinking of making Lindsey wait. Come on, come to lunch, I'll be the perfect mommy to both of you, I promise."

"I-- I'm not good with kids," Sara stammered, leaning into Catherine's touch.

Catherine winked at her. "Then just be one."

--

"Eat your salad."

"I don't want it."

"Eat it, it's good for you."

"No, I don't want it."

"Young lady, eat your salad or we'll be taking a trip to the bathroom for a spanking."

Lindsey's jaw dropped. She looked at Sara.

Sara's jaw dropped with Lindsey's, her cheeks flaming red as she quickly stabbed a piece of lettuce with her fork and ate it. Talk about making her feel like a kid. And she couldn't *believe* Catherine said that in front of Lindsey. She gagged slightly as she swallowed the lettuce... she didn't like the texture.

The six and a half year old stared in wonder as the grown-up sitting next to her gagged down a bite of salad.

"Gagging, Sara? Lindsey has better table manners than you do. Really. Sit up straight and eat your salad."

"I don't like it!" Sara yelled petulantly, before she could think better of it. "It's slimy."

Catherine put down her fork and stood up, scooting out of the booth and putting her hands on her hips. "That's it. Stand up."

Sara's eyes went wide and she shook her head, grabbing up her fork again and trying to get a piece of lettuce on it. "I'm eating it!" she proclaimed a bit desperately.

"It's too late, you disobeyed me and you talked back. Now I don't think you want a spanking right here, do you? Stand up, Sara."

Sara slammed her fork down and got to her feet, thinking this was incredibly unfair. Chuck E. Cheese was supposed to be fun for Lindsey. And maybe for her too.

"Watch it," Catherine warned, grabbing her purse. She turned to Lindsey and gave her strict instructions to stay at the table and not speak to anyone.

Lindsey nodded agreeably and watched her mom drag Sara off to the bathroom. Poor Sara.

Poor Sara indeed. The bathroom was not empty, they had to wait in a short line, and Catherine already had her hairbrush out of her purse. And it was obvious she wasn't going to use it to brush her hair.

Sara stared at the floor with a frown on her face, only moving forward in line because Catherine pulled her by the elbow. When it was finally their turn, she heard a gasp of surprise from behind them as they entered the same stall.

Catherine locked the stall door and hung her purse on the hook, then turned to face Sara. "Pants down," she dictated, pointing the hairbrush toward Sara's jeans. When Sara looked like she might argue, Catherine added quickly, "don't make me tell you twice."

The brunette undid her pants and pushed them down, but she wasn't happy about it in the least. Her face was set in a scowl, her arms crossed over her chest.

"Just for your attitude? Underwear too," Cat said with a nod toward the garment in question.

The scowl escalated as Sara grabbed her underwear and jerked them down, returning her arms to the crossed position. "Whatever."

"Young lady, you had better knock the attitude off right now or you won't be sitting for lunch."

"I'm already not going to be able to sit for lunch, and everybody out there is gonna know why!" Sara whined, the scowl turning to a pitiful pout.

"You should have thought about that before you decided to misbehave." Catherine was done discussing it, and she closed the toilet seat, then sat down, pulling Sara across her lap. There would be no warm-up this time, this was going to be a quick punishment as if Sara really were a child.

After the first crack landed, Sara's hands flew back to protect her rear and she wailed into the stuffy air of the bathroom. "Noooooo!"

"You're making it worse," Catherine said calmly, pinning Sara's wrists to her back with one hand and peppering her bottom with crisp smacks of the brush with her other. Sara squirmed and kicked and vocally protested for the entire spanking, which she had never done thus far in their relationship. Cat knew this one was different, though, and that Sara needed to not want it and not like it. They both knew that.

As Catherine finished up the spanking with several sharp swats to the back of Sara's thighs, she finally spoke. "You are going to march back out to our table and eat your salad, am I clear?"

Sara howled, nodding over and over again. "Yes, yes, I'm sorry, I'll eat my salad," she promised. "I'll be good..."

Catherine helped her up and pulled her pants and underwear back into place over her bright red backside, zipping and buttoning the jeans for her. "You weren't bad, you were just a little naughty. Now go on..."

When she opened the stall door, she was so embarrassed she started to actually cry, staring at the floor as she shuffled out of the bathroom and toward their table. But she knew she'd deserved what she got, and a part of her was really glad that Catherine didn't let her get away with that bullshit. Even if she thought she might die of humiliation. She slid into the booth next to Lindsey, looking away to swipe at her tears, trying to pretend they weren't there. She was extremely surprised when she felt Lindsey's arms wrap around her.

Lindsey hugged Sara tight. "It's okay Sara, I cry when I get a spanking, too. It hurts."

Sara had no idea what to say to that, so she just nodded and swallowed before going with the truth. "I'm just embarrassed because there were so many people in the bathroom," she whispered.

"Yeah that's not very nice of Mommy." When Catherine returned to the table and sat down, Lindsey let go of Sara and crossed her arms over her chest. "Mom, that wasn't very nice of you to spank Sara when there was a lot of people. You made her embarrassed and crying."

Catherine raised an eyebrow at her daughter. "Sara needs to eat her salad," was the only explanation she offered.

"Mom that was totally not the point!" Lindsey informed her, gesturing wildly with her hands as Sara started to eat. "Couldn't she have gotten in trouble at home, or at her house?"

"Linds, I have my reasons," Catherine said firmly with a pointed look, and Lindsey got *her* point.

Sara managed to choke down the rest of her salad without further incident, and with a strained look around, she relaxed a little when no one was staring at her anymore.

"Sara, will you go in the tubes with me?" Lindsey asked hopefully when she noticed Sara was done eating.

Sara bit the inside of her cheek and glanced at the tubes in question. "Yeah, sure," she mumbled awkwardly, not wanting to disappoint Linds.

"Yeah!" Lindsey exclaimed, turning to her mother. "Can we Mommy?"

"Oh so now I'm Mommy?" Catherine asked with a smirk. "Go ahead, go ahead," she consented, nodding toward the play area. "Take good care of Sara in there..." she teased.

"I will!" Lindsey promised, grabbing Sara's hand and tugging her toward the structure.

--

Catherine watched from their table, sipping her soda and grinning like an idiot. She could see Sara crawling hesitantly through the tubes after Lindsey, glancing around nervously when they stopped in one of the 'cars' so Lindsey could pretend to drive. Really it was just a box at the end of a tube, with a steering wheel mounted on one side. Lindsey waved to her, and she waved back, her grin somehow getting even bigger at the sight. Sara was blushing, she could see it even from the table, and Cat could tell she was nervous about having too good a time in a children's playset. She waved at Sara too, and Sara shyly waved back. Then Lindsey started talking to Sara, and while she couldn't hear what her daughter was saying, she watched the transformation slowly take place in her lover. Sara listened raptly to Lindsey, her body language becoming less rigid, and tears sprang unbidden to Catherine's eyes when Sara nodded eagerly at some question or other and then switched places with Lindsey, taking hold of the steering wheel. Lindsey had asked if she wanted a turn to drive.

Up in the 'car', Sara was losing some of her inhibitions and starting to relax. Lindsey was great at having fun, and it was rubbing off quickly.

"Look out!" the little girl shrieked, ducking an imaginary object flying toward the car. She burst into giggles, flopping her head into Sara's lap. "Sara, you just drove us through a meteor shower! You shoulda turned left!"

Sara laughed too, pretending to be very serious as she replied. "I couldn't, there was a floating dinosaur blocking the way!"

Lindsey howled with laughter, clutching her stomach and kicking her feet as she rolled from side to side with her head in Sara's lap. "You're fun!" she decided once she had calmed down enough to use words.

"You're fun too," Sara agreed. "Uh oh..." She screeched the car to a stop and looked down at Lindsey. "Hurry up, that dinosaur's thinking we would make a good lunch!"

"Oh no!" Lindsey squealed, taking off out of the car and through the maze of tubes once more, with Sara hot on her heels. "Come on Sara, hurry! In here!" She found an exit and jumped into the ball pit with a squeak of delight.

Sara jumped in after her, careful not to land on Lindsey, then grabbed Lindsey and tossed her out of the way of the oncoming dinosaur. They ended up in a playful wrestling match, then had a game of basketball with the small round balls and Lindsey's hat. About a half-hour later, Catherine wandered over to the netting surrounding the pit and grinned in at them.

"Time to go, girls," Catherine announced, not surprised when Lindsey spun to face her with a pleading expression, but quite surprised when Sara did as well. She immediately laughed, shaking her head. "All right. Five more minutes, you brats," she conceded, wandering back to the table to gather up their things.

"Ten!" Lindsey called out, and she heard Sara's echoing voice agree.

"Five," she shouted back without turning around, because she knew she'd cave if she had to look at them. She heard groans behind her, then some sort of conspiratorial giggling, and she couldn't help laughing as she slid back into the booth.

Five minutes later, on the dot, Sara and Lindsey appeared in front of her. "Can we go for ice cream?" Sara asked.

"Yeah please Mom, please?" Lindsey added, jumping up and down in hopeful excitement. There was no way her mom could say no if another grown-up was asking! Even a really fun grown-up who was good at acting like a kid.

Oh boy. Catherine hadn't realized what she was getting herself into when she decided to take these two out together. But she wouldn't have it any other way, she realized with an affectionate smile. "Yeah, but only because you're so cute," she answered, tapping Lindsey's nose and standing to kiss Sara's cheek. "Let's go."

--

It was just assumed that Sara would spend the night, but Catherine and Lindsey argued over whose bedroom she was going to sleep in. Catherine only won because she pulled rank and used the hated reasoning of "because I said so".

As Sara settled down next to Catherine, she felt the inexplicable yet overwhelming urge to cuddle. Now that just didn't fit into the equation. Catherine plus Sara equals hot sex and no emotional attachment. Cuddling really did not fit. She took a shuddering breath and forced herself to stay still. But when Catherine turned on her side and reached her arms out, Sara willingly melted into them. "Don't think this means I love you," she mumbled under her breath, snuggling into Cat's side and resting her head on her lover's shoulder.

Catherine threw back her head and laughed. "Don't think this means I love you either."

--

Sara was exhausted, but as usual when not at home, she couldn't sleep. She lay staring at the ceiling for a few hours, sometimes glancing over at Catherine to watch her breathe in sleep. So calm, so peaceful - the exact opposite of their waking lives.

Finally she couldn't stand just laying there anymore, and she quietly slipped out of bed and into the bathroom, closing the door and stripping off her clothes, getting into a nice hot shower. She stood with her head down, so the water could get her hair and then cascade down the rest of her body. She was just about to reach for the shampoo when she heard the bathroom door open and close, then a rustle of clothing, and she looked up in time to see Catherine climb into the shower with her.

They locked eyes, staring in silence for a long time, and Catherine spoke first, stepping forward to touch her body to Sara's. "I want you on your knees," she whispered, snaking a hand up Sara's back to curl tightly in her dripping wet hair, made an even darker brown by the saturating water. "I want you on your knees with them spread wide, and then I want you to put your hands behind your back and lick me once."

The hot water beating down on her neck and shoulders somehow gave Sara an extra burst of confidence, and she immediately complied, sliding down to her knees and spreading them wide, then clasping her hands behind her back and leaning forward to slowly lick the length of Catherine's pussy. Her eyes closed at the exotic taste, and she shivered, but stayed still, waiting for Catherine's instructions.

"Good girl," Catherine groaned, releasing Sara's hair and just resting her hand on the back of the brunette's head instead. "Lick me again."

Sara licked her again, whimpering softly as she had to force herself to stop again and wait. Catherine felt and tasted so damn good, not to mention the way she smelled. Sara's nostrils flared slightly in an attempt to stifle some of her arousal at the scent. "Please Cat," she begged, flicking her eyes up to Catherine's.

Catherine's knees felt a little shaky, but she kept it together, managing a sultry smile down at Sara. She wanted to push, just a little. "Please Cat, what?"

Sara whimpered again, her eyelids fluttering as she struggled to keep them open. Catherine really wanted her to beg. She realized that the thought made her warm to a startling degree, and uncomfortably wet between her legs, in addition to the shower's water that had settled there. "Please Cat, let me go down on you... let me put my tongue in you... let me fuck you as hard as I want, please Catherine," she begged openly.

Catherine really liked the sound of that, but she wasn't quite done pushing. "Why should I let you?"

Sara whined, then growled. "Because I'm gonna bite you if you don't."

Catherine debated slapping her, but she didn't think Sara was ready for that yet. Instead, she was out of the shower before Sara could even try to protest. She heard a strangled cry and the water shut off. She was almost halfway down the hall, and with a sigh she turned around, intending to tell Sara to get back in the shower, but she almost fell over instead. Sara was on the bathroom floor on her hands and knees, crawling towards her. The play of muscles over her shoulder blades as she crawled was exquisite, and the rhythmic dripping of her hair on the tiles, then the hard wood of the hallway, was distracting. That wet hair draped across her eyes in curtains was almost Catherine's undoing. Sara was naked and wet, crawling toward her in the hallway. Holy shit. She was so focused on the eroticism of the situation that she almost didn't hear what Sara was saying.

"I'm sorry, Cat... I'm a bad girl... please, please, please punish me and then let me fuck you, I need to feel you around my tongue. I need to feel you cum in my mouth. I need to feel your discipline, Cat, I know I was bad and I'm sorry..." Sara shivered as she crawled slowly toward Catherine, keeping her head up to at least partially hide her scars from view.

"Jesus," Catherine whispered, watching in awe as Sara came to a stop in front of her and sat back on her heels, finally bowing her head.

"Please punish me, Cat... I can take it. I want to show you that I can do this... that I *like* this... that I'm sorry for talking back." It was hard to admit, but not as hard as she thought it would be. Her entire body was on fire, despite the chill in the air that settled around her wet, naked skin like a blanket. And she found that she was less worried about showing her scars than she was about making her indiscretion up to Catherine. It wasn't love, but it was damn good.

"How... how..." Catherine was at a loss for words, overwhelmed by Sara's pleas. She dropped to one knee and cupped Sara's face in her hands. "Sara," she began softly, rubbing her thumbs back and forth over her lover's cheeks, "I already blistered your bottom once today... it has to hurt still." She waited for confirmation, and when Sara nodded, she continued. "If I punish you, it'll be with one of my belts, and I can't see any enjoyment in that for you. The dynamic we're playing here is not one-sided, despite how it may look to people who don't understand. If you're not enjoying yourself, I don't enjoy it either."

Sara leaned into the touch with an appreciative sigh. "Once upon a time, you told me you usually enjoy getting spanked, but that sometimes you're not supposed to enjoy it."

"You haven't done anything that bad, Sara..."

Sara dropped her eyes to the floor. "It was bad enough to make you walk away from me."

Catherine had no argument for that. She tried to, but she didn't. "All right," she said slowly. "Get a belt from my closet and lay it on the bed, then bend over next to it. You may put a tank top on but nothing else."

Sara nodded wordlessly as she got to her feet, and then at the last second she rushed, "yes Ma'am," and hurried into the bedroom.

Catherine put a hand on the wall to steady herself, unprepared for Sara's words and the rush of liquid heat that twisted in her belly and settled between her legs. She took several moments to get composed, and then entered the bedroom to find Sara in a black tank top, bent over the edge of the bed, a sturdy brown leather belt laid out beside her.

Taking a deep, calming breath, Catherine stepped up behind Sara and picked up the belt, folding it in half to increase her control over the implement. "Sara, you know that what you're doing right now is submissive?"

"Yes," Sara answered, closing her eyes. She felt Catherine behind her, felt the belt in Catherine's hand even though it wasn't touching her. "I kept trying to tell myself that I would never be this way, not even for you, but sometimes I'm not a very good listener," she whispered.

Catherine laughed sweetly, tears pricking her eyes. "Thank God for that, huh?" she asked rhetorically, and then turned serious again. "What are you being punished for, Sara?"

Sara thought for a second on how best to word her reply. "For taking liberties I was not entitled to, for threatening you with physical harm, and for talking back. I'm sorry, Catherine."

"I know you are," Catherine assured her. She rested the belt over Sara's backside, the bruises already there pulling at her conscience. "Ten strokes."

Sara nodded. She knew Catherine was going easy on her with that sentence, but it was her lover's call, not hers. She wouldn't disrespect her Cat by questioning the decision.

The sting of the belt was different than the hairbrush or Catherine's hand. It was lighter than the brush, easier to take, but even so, the ten strokes left her clutching the sheets in tightly closed fists, panting out her breaths at a slightly elevated rate and rhythm. She could feel the stripes of fire licking across her ass and thighs as she breathed heavily into the bed. She liked it. "Cat, I'm sorry," she exhaled, her cheeks tinged with embarrassment. "I liked that. A lot."

Catherine could tell that Sara felt bad for enjoying what was supposed to be a punishment. She leaned over her lover from behind and nuzzled her lips against the soft, warm skin of Sara's neck. "It's okay, baby, I liked it too. And I'm glad you liked it because I'd love to do it again sometime," she purred, planting soft kisses along the top of Sara's spine. "I know you're sorry for what you did even though you enjoyed the punishment. Consider the slate clean, all right?"

"All right," Sara said, managing a weak nod, and then in a shaky voice, she added, "Cat?"

"Yeah baby?"

"Pl... please fuck me." Her voice still shook and it was barely audible, even to herself. She felt vulnerable asking, considering what had happened in the shower, but she wanted it so badly. She needed to feel Catherine inside her.

Catherine dropped her forehead to the back of Sara's left shoulder and groaned. "Just like this?" she asked, a lewd suggestion behind her words. "You like it from behind?" Her fingers snaked down Sara's back and over her backside, tickling their way across one thigh to stroke softly between her legs.

Sara breathed out slow, trying to control herself. She did not want to do or say anything wrong and make Catherine walk away again. What was a submissive thing to say? It's not like she had a lot of experience with this. Or even any examples, really. She racked her brain, finally coming up with something she thought Catherine would enjoy hearing. "I like it however you choose to give it to me," she whispered nervously. Did that sound right? God she hoped so.

Apparently Catherine was pleased with her response, because she felt Cat's fingers slide gently inside her from behind. Three of them, filling her completely, making her breath catch and forcing a shuddering moan from her chest. And then Catherine moved, and she missed the warmth of her lover's body covering her protectively, but hot breath on her abused thighs distracted her from the loss, and when Catherine started placing open-mouthed kisses on her bruises, she nearly came. She wanted to whine that it felt too good, that she couldn't take it, but she didn't. And then Catherine bit her. Hard. And curled her fingers, pressing against a very sensitive membrane. The intense, searing pain coupled with the intense, searing pleasure made her scream into the sheets, her body consumed with the white-hot pulsing fire of orgasm.

When she came down from the high, she was crying. Overwhelmed with sensation and vulnerability, satisfaction and gratitude, anger and love. She didn't want to feel that for Catherine, but how can you give yourself to someone so completely and intimately without making some kind of visceral, primal connection?

Catherine's heart seized as she noticed Sara's tears, and she pulled her fingers out, quickly sucking them clean and stifling an appreciative moan. "Hey now, what's wrong, baby?" she asked, rubbing Sara's back as she took a seat on the bed beside her lover's head.

"I could end up loving you, Cat, and I'm scared," Sara confessed without allowing herself time to invent an excuse for the tears. She didn't want to lie.

Catherine wasn't sure how to reassure Sara on that one. She couldn't promise that Sara would never love her, that would be ridiculous. Uncertain how to proceed, she just went with her instincts and pulled Sara's head into her lap, stroking her hair. The wet tears were warm on her bare thighs. "Would it be so bad if you loved me?" she finally asked.

Sara wrapped her arms around Catherine, pressing her face into her lover's belly. "I don't know," she murmured against the soft skin. "If I start to love you, and you're not on the same wavelength, it'll hurt."

"Well you can't tell your heart what to do, Sara," Catherine sighed. "All you can do is make the best of what you have right now, you know?" She paused for a minute, just looking down at the beautiful woman partly in her lap, and when Sara's eyes opened, Catherine gave her a coy smile. "Besides... I'm... pretty addicted to you," she said slowly, a soft pink tinging her cheeks at the admission.

Sara blushed as well. "What?"

"Yep," Catherine nodded, overcompensating for her discomfort by being especially confident in her next line of thought. "It's true. In fact, the Halloween party is next Friday night, and you're going to be my date."

"I am?" Sara wasn't sure if she was asking if Catherine was serious, or if she was being smug, so it came out about halfway between the two.

"You are," Catherine nodded again. "And you're going to wear what I want you to wear."

Now she knew she was being smug, but she couldn't help it. "Is that so?" Somehow Catherine had managed to quell her fears without really addressing the issue. She tried to hold back a smirk as she continued, "and what would that be, exactly?"

Catherine eased Sara's head off her lap and swung a leg over her lover's hips, straddling her and leaning down to whisper in her ear. "A collar and leash."

Good thing she was laying down, because she would've hit the floor on that one. "You're not serious," she managed to gasp around the sudden lump in her throat.

Catherine used the flat of her tongue to lick Sara's cheek, then kissed her temple. She held herself up with one hand and lightly feathered the fingers of her other hand across Sara's throat, delighting in the surprised whimper from the woman beneath her. She applied a bit more pressure and Sara started to squirm, so she backed off and kissed her sweetly, allowing her tongue to taste the fear so palpably clinging to her lover.

She kissed Sara for a long time, letting her calm back down, and then brought her fingers back to her lover's throat, barely touching with her fingernails as she raked them over the rapidly pulsing tendons.

Sara didn't know what to feel. She had never had a lover play with her throat. It caused an automatic tension, though she couldn't find a rationalization for it other than general wariness of having one's airflow cut off. It could also possibly be due to the sensitivity of the area. Whatever it was, she was on high alert, but she didn't struggle or ask Cat to stop. She trusted Catherine Willows more than she cared to admit. And that was Catherine's next question.

"Do you trust me, Sara?"

"Yes."

There was no hesitation in Sara's answer, and that thrilled Catherine on so many levels. "Good, because I would never knowingly or negligently put your life in danger. Now close your eyes, and just breathe... and trust me."

When Sara nodded and complied, Catherine scratched at her throat a bit harder, then once more hard enough to leave four red parallel lines marking her lover's skin.

Sara breathed deeply, in and out through her nose. She could feel the welts being left by Catherine's fingernails, and when she imagined what they would look like, a soft moan escaped her and she arched into the touch.

Catherine could feel the tendrils of dominance flare up in her blood. "Do you still trust me?" she whispered, her hands moving down to the neck of Sara's tank top.

"Yes," Sara answered, again without hesitation, though her voice was more strained this time.

"Yes Ma'am," Catherine hissed quietly, offering the correction just as Lady Heather had done for her, taking two handfuls of Sara's tank and carefully pulling in opposite directions.

Sara squeezed her eyes shut tight and gasped in a rush, "yes Ma'am." She heard the fabric rip and felt cool air on her newly exposed flesh. She wanted to make a sarcastic remark about the price of the luxurious wife-beater tank, but this time she swallowed it down. Fingers were immediately on her nipples, clamped softly and tugging until Sara couldn't help moaning.

"Do you like that?" Catherine was positively throbbing with the power Sara gave her.

"Yes," Sara answered, arching her back, pressing her breasts more firmly into Catherine's hands.

Catherine released her nipples and gave her a slightly sharp reminder. "Yes Ma'am."

Sara winced and quickly corrected herself, surprised at how easy the word was to say to Catherine. "Yes Ma'am."

The blonde slipped the straps of the tank top-turned-vest down Sara's arms and pulled the garment out from under her lover. Sara was naked, looking nervous but flushed with excitement. "Mine," she whispered, lowering her lips to Sara's quivering stomach and placing a soft, sweet kiss there. She noticed the nasty bruise her teeth had left on Sara's thigh, and she slid down to place a kiss there as well. Sara flinched, and Cat smiled. "I think you need a matching mark on the other side," she purred, shifting her mouth to Sara's other thigh.

"No!" Sara rushed, then corrected before Catherine could do it for her. "No Ma'am, I don't. I don't need another one, really."

Catherine was fast approaching headspace and she knew she had to be careful, so she talked herself back down quickly to avoid doing something that would break the mood for Sara. They hadn't talked about safewords, so she had to stop when Sara said no or stop. Even if the 'no' was in the form of a cute and desperate protest. No meant no, no matter what form it took. As much as she wanted to sink her teeth into Sara's thigh and hear her lover scream, she held back, instead licking her way up Sara's body and kissing her deeply. "Put your hands above your head."

Sara complied.

"Tell me what you feel."

Sara exhaled through puffed cheeks, not quite wanting to spill her feelings. "I don't know."

"Uh uh uh," Catherine shook her head, raising her left hand to hold Sara's face while she lightly tapped her lover's cheek with the palm of her right. "You do know. Tell me."

Sara gasped, even though the light tap didn't hurt at all. A multitude of sensations and thoughts rushed through her head and she tried to sort them all out. "Vulnerable," she blurted. "Safe." A short pause, then, "hot. Wet. Scared. Excited. Nervous."

"Give me more than one-word answers," Catherine coaxed gently, continuing to tap Sara's cheek.

"I feel desirable, and important, like I'm the only one in your world right now," Sara breathed. "I'm afraid of disappointing you, afraid of getting slapped harder, afraid I won't get slapped harder, all at the same time."

"You are desirable, and important, and the only one in my world right now," Catherine said in a quiet voice. "And you're naked for me, Sara. Just for me, right?"

Sara bit her lip and nodded, her eyes shining and sincere.

Catherine couldn't tell if Sara was trying to get in trouble on purpose or just forgot the rules, but either way, she gave her lover a slightly harder slap to the face. "Just for me, right?" she repeated.

Sara jumped and nodded again, her pulse racing, blood pounding in her ears. "Yes, yes, just for you, Ma'am," she remembered, the words tumbling out in a rush.

"That's my good girl," Catherine purred, rubbing Sara's cheek even though she still hadn't hit her hard at all. "If you forget again, I'd like to slap you hard enough to make you remember, would that be okay with you?" There was no way Catherine was going to haul off and smack her without permission. Not with Sara's past. She didn't know what exactly might trigger a bad reaction, and she never, ever wanted to do that.

Sara's breathing picked up as she thought about whether it would be okay. If she said no, she might never know how it felt. If she said yes, and she forgot to say what Catherine wanted to hear, she was afraid how she'd take the slap. But she was curious, and turned on, and she trusted Catherine, that was already established, so again she nodded her head, completely not realizing that she was failing to answer the way Catherine wanted her to.

Catherine waited a second to see if the nod would be accompanied by any words, but it wasn't. Slightly incredulous, she gripped Sara's chin tighter with her left hand and used her right to deliver a forceful, stinging blow flat across the plane of Sara's cheek.

Sara gasped out a whimper, instantly feeling the sting of the blow as tears sprang to her eyes unbidden. She worked her jaw in an attempt to ease out the pain, but her cheek continued to throb. She choked down a moan and rasped out an apology. "I'm sorry... I didn't do that on purpose," she promised, then quickly added, "Ma'am. I didn't do that on purpose, Ma'am." Her eyes closed and her heart hammered in her chest, her brain trying to focus on anything other than the burn. But the burn was the reason for the moan she'd managed to choke down. Imagining Catherine's handprint on her face. Imagining herself on her knees, begging for forgiveness, and Catherine slapping her again because she hadn't given permission to beg. Holy fuck. Her eyes snapped open, the tears gone, and she grabbed Catherine's wrist desperately, making the blonde stroke her stinging cheek. "Oh God, Catherine," she offered in a strangled cry. "I'm falling apart."

"No baby," Catherine soothed, allowing Sara to control the movements of her hand for the moment. "You're not breaking, you're learning new things about yourself. The hidden parts of you are coming out to play, and you might feel unhinged until your desires find a permanent place. Now, if you feel bad about what we're doing, feel like it's wrong for you, just tell me and I'll stop... but I promise, you're not falling apart."

"I just-- I just don't understand why it feels so good when you hurt me," Sara finally breathed. "I never thought I'd be... I never thought I would, you know, get off on being hit. I know the science behind it, I don't have a problem with the science."

"What does the science tell you?" Catherine asked, brushing a lock of Sara's hair back from her face and then running her fingernails lightly across her lover's scalp.

"That, you know, since I was abused as a kid, grew up in a shitty household, had no control over anything, that I'm taking my power back, being hit when I say so, not when I couldn't run fast enough to avoid it." She paused, and when Catherine nodded encouragingly, she continued, leaning into the gentle touches her lover was providing. "And that's probably true. And I'd be fine with that, could totally let it go, but it doesn't stop there, Cat. It goes way beyond making up for the past. I don't just feel empowered, I feel... I don't even know what the hell I feel but whatever it is makes me hot and wet and aching for you. What I let you do to me... what I *love* to let you do to me, has nothing to do with my past, Cat. It's all here and now, and I don't understand why it feels so good."

Catherine was never one for generic answers or standard advice. She wasn't going to sit there and try to help Sara figure out why it felt so good, when there was no hope of her being any help for that. "Honey I know you're a scientist, but for God's sake, sometimes you need to let go of that compartmentalization, stop trying to rationalize, and just get the fuck off. Your brain will tell you what's up when it's ready, and you're gonna drive yourself crazy trying to figure it out before then, so just *feel*, Sidle. Let go. You're still trying to hold on to control, and I want you to let go. Don't try to make yourself fit into a box... throw caution to the wind and ride the waves of *this*, baby..." Catherine indicated herself with an arrogant grin.

Sara rolled her eyes and groaned. "If your head gets any bigger it won't fit in the room..."

Catherine's grin grew and she kissed Sara. "I love you," she laughed.

For a brief second Sara's mind went into overload and her body stiffened, but she forced herself to calm down and instead of freaking out, she easily flipped their positions and pinned Catherine to the bed, her lover's wrists held firmly on either side of her head. "Don't say that," she growled, licking Catherine's lower lip with just the tip of her tongue. Her grip tightened around Cat's wrists.

Catherine struggled to lift her head and capture Sara's tongue, but the brunette was amazingly strong and determined, and she got absolutely nowhere. So she pushed a knee up between Sara's legs.

Sara groaned again, this time for an entirely different reason, and dropped most of her weight onto Catherine's body. "Cheater."

Catherine wriggled and rubbed her knee back and forth, with some difficulty due to Sara's weight pressing down on her.

"Don't make me spank you," Sara teased.

Cat's first instinct was to say something like 'for the love of God, no', but she decided that she wasn't going to play it that way this time. "Did you just threaten me, little girl?" she growled, her eyes shining bright with promise and intent.

Sara's breath caught and she stared at Catherine, having expected a much more light and playful response, maybe even for Catherine to beg her not to do it... but this... wow. She eased her grip until she was no longer holding her lover's wrists, then slowly sat up and shook her head.

Cat followed her up to a sitting position and took hold of her chin, applying a firm, swift slap to her cheek once again, reveling in Sara's sharp exhale. "Over my lap."

"Cat, I'm naked," Sara protested, her eyes wide and filled with tears, though they were only an automatic physical reaction to the slap. Like when you get something in your eye.

Catherine slapped her again, harder, feeling her palm start to sting. "Over my lap, Sara."

Sara cried out, her face turning sideways away from Catherine, her breathing labored. She could do this. Her cheek hurt like hell and the throbbing in her face matched the throbbing between her legs. She said nothing, could not look at Catherine as she slid off her lap and laid across it instead. Well this was it. All of her horrible scars on view for her lover. She'd either get pity or disgust. People who had seen them were always either overly apologetic or immediately turned off. She had just learned to hide them to avoid going through that.

"I don't like having to tell you twice. What do you have to say for yourself?" Catherine asked, determined not to be like everyone else when it came to dealing with Sara's physical scars.

Sara blinked, confused for a moment, sure Catherine couldn't be talking about anything other than what she saw. But apparently she was, and Sara felt herself smiling into the sheets. "I'm sorry, Ma'am," she said, hoping her giddiness wasn't portrayed in her voice.

"I should hope so," Catherine scolded, running her fingertips up and down one of the scars. "What made this one?"

Sara tensed. "Broken beer bottle."

Catherine continued to trace it, scratching lightly with her fingernail every so often. "Now it's mine."

"What?" That was certainly new and unexpected.

"This scar, it's mine. When you think of it from now on, you'll feel my tongue, my fingers, my teeth... not a broken beer bottle." She let her words sink in while she slowly scratched the length of the scar, which stretched from Sara's left shoulder down to her left hip in a jagged sort of pattern. "Understand?"

Sara willed herself to stop shaking so she could answer the question, but to no avail, so she had to answer with a shaky voice. "Yes Ma'am."

Catherine licked her fingers and traced the mess of scars covering Sara's back, causing the skin to glisten lightly with her saliva. "Beautiful," she murmured, meaning so many different things about Sara.

"They're not beautiful," Sara snapped, her voice suddenly full of acid. "Don't pretend on my account, I already know how ugly they are."

SMACK! "Don't you dare tell me that any part of you is ugly," Catherine scolded, her hand falling crisply over Sara's bruised bottom. "Not even your scars." SMACK! "They are a part of you, and that makes them beautiful, and sexy, and unique. Each one tells a story that helped make you the woman you are, and there is nothing ugly about that." SMACK! SMACK! SMACK!

"Ow! C-aaaaah! Cath-ahh! I thought you were just-- ow, Cat! I thought you were just trying to be different! I didn't know you really meant it... I thought you were patronizing me, I'm sorry!"

"You're going to be," Catherine promised. "Go stand in the corner."

"What?"

SMACK!

"God damnit!" Sara cursed, still not moving, waiting for elaboration on Catherine's instruction.

SMACK!

Finally she realized she wasn't going to get any elaboration, and she was going to keep being spanked until she obeyed. Grudgingly she scrambled off of Catherine's lap and shuffled miserably to one corner of the room.

"Face the corner," Catherine told her, pointing toward said corner with a stern look on her face. "Hands on the back of your head."

"Why are you making me do this?" Sara asked with a frown, turning to face the corner and lacing her fingers together behind her head.

"Because I've already told you how I feel about being accused of lying. And you just accused me of patronizing you, which is something we both know I would never do. I'm insulted, and you're going to make it up to me. You're being punished and I don't want to hear another word until I ask you to speak."

Punished? That sucked. Lucky for Sara, her brain was processing the information with such focus that it left no room for words. Otherwise she may have landed herself in even deeper shit. The scowl on her face would have been comical, if anyone could see it.

Finally Sara got tired of standing in the corner and she spun around to face Catherine, who was seated on the edge of the bed watching her intensely. "This sucks!" she announced hotly, narrowing her eyes at her lover. "What kind of punishment is this? Making me stare at the wall? What the hell is the point?"

Catherine stood and walked slowly to Sara, taking her by the shoulders and calmly turning her back around. "A punishment you don't enjoy," she explained. "I've just started your time over."

"How long am I supposed to fucking stand here?" Sara asked, getting angrier by the second.

"As long as I fucking want you to," Catherine warned darkly. "Longer every time you speak or turn around." She hoped she wasn't pushing Sara too far, but she had a feeling it was okay, and returned to sit on the bed and watch her lover. She watched the tension in Sara's back and shoulders stand out like ripples on a pond. She watched Sara squeeze her fingers together so tightly that her knuckles turned white. She watched her lover's knees falter every few minutes, and watched the way Sara forcefully straightened them to keep them from buckling each time. She watched as the defiance slowly began to drain out of the beautiful woman in front of her eyes, noticed the almost imperceptible bowing of Sara's head which signaled acceptance, whether it was intentional or not. And she watched as Sara's shoulders began to lightly shake with tears. "Come here."

Sara sniffed and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, then turned around and dropped down, crawling to Catherine's side.

"Now what do you have to say?" Catherine asked, her tone not gentle but not harsh, either.

Sara nuzzled her cheek against Catherine's knees, taking a slow breath before answering. "I'm sorry, Cat," she whispered. "I know I've been saying that a lot today, but I... you were so wonderful about my scars, and I didn't know how to deal with that, so I lashed out and questioned your sincerity. I'm so sorry... I know you would never say anything untrue, even if it was to make me feel good about myself."

"You're right, I wouldn't," Catherine agreed, pulling Sara up onto her knees by her hair and leaning down herself to be eye level with her lover. "If you ever accuse me of lying or being insincere again, my hairbrush will be making an appearance that'll make Chuck E. Cheese seem like a picnic. You get that?"

Sara shuddered, her head nodding before Catherine had even finished speaking. "Yes, yes Ma'am, I get it," she assured the blonde. Again she was struck by how easy it was to make herself call Catherine 'Ma'am'. It didn't feel silly or demeaning like she imagined it would. "Thank you, Cat..."

Catherine raised an eyebrow. "For what?"

Sara wrapped her arms around Catherine's waist and laid her head on the tops of her lover's thighs. "It's what I should have said in the first place. You told me I'm beautiful, that you think my scars are beautiful, and I should have said thank you. No one has ever said that to me before and meant it. And no one has ever said anything like that about the mess on my back. But I know you mean it. I know you do, Cat. Thank you."

"How do you feel about anal sex?"

Sara choked, breaking into a spluttering coughing fit. Catherine was so damn good at taking the solemnity out of a situation by throwing out something so far out of left field that you couldn't possibly ignore, thereby making you completely forget about what you were emotional about in the first place. Finally she squeaked, "what?"

Catherine threw her head back and laughed, then dragged Sara up onto the bed with her, laying down and embracing her lover tightly. "Go to sleep, naughty girl."

"Right," Sara snorted, rolling her eyes. "Like I can sleep after that. You'll probably wake me up with anal sex before you even get my answer."

Catherine cackled gleefully, the sound musical to Sara, and it made her laugh too. "So will you wear a collar and be on my leash for the Halloween party?"

Sara had forgotten about that request, conveniently, but how could she say no? It was a delicious thought, and despite the fact that she wasn't fond of being the center of attention, she didn't think she'd mind being looked at for being on Catherine's leash. It would connect her to the blonde on a level no one could question. "Yeah," she finally answered. "I'd love to."

--

"Uh, I don't wanna go in," Sara said nervously, fiddling with the hem of her skirt. They were in the car, in the parking lot, ready to head into the Halloween party, and Sara was freaking out just a little. Catherine had her dressed as a schoolgirl, with a white polo shirt and a light blue pleated skirt, white socks that stopped just below her knees, and blue patent leather mary-janes to match the skirt. She didn't even want to know how Catherine had managed to find the shoes. Her hair was pulled back into a ponytail, her face dusted lightly with make-up, and Catherine had fawned over her for the entire drive. Well, as much as she could while driving. You look so cute, I can't keep my hands off you, etc. etc.

Catherine got out of the car and walked around to open Sara's door, squatting down and resting a hand on Sara's bare knee. "Baby, we talked about this. Come on now." She took Sara's hand and gently pulled her out of the car, then took the pretty white collar from her purse and guided Sara onto her knees as she herself stood up.

Sara allowed herself to be pulled out of the car, though she was pouting about it for sure, and she went willingly to her knees, the asphalt uncomfortable but bearable, her eyes riveted to the collar that was about to be put around her neck. She tilted her head back slightly at Catherine's prompt, and gasped when the shiny leather touched her throat. Slender fingers slid across her skin as Catherine carefully buckled the collar in back, making sure it wasn't too tight, then attached the leash to the dainty silver o-ring on the front of the collar. As soon as the clip closed around the ring, she felt physically connected to Catherine. A shiver ran down her spine and she realized instantly that she liked the feeling. She felt comforted, safe, protected, and... cared for. It didn't make her feel owned or objectified, which she had been a little afraid of, and the sigh of relief that passed her lips didn't go unnoticed by either woman.

Catherine gave an easy tug on the leash and Sara got to her feet, brushing off her knees, which were now scraped, the blonde noticed with a sly grin. Scraped knees... the perfect accessory to Sara's outfit.

"Cat?" Sara asked in a tiny voice.

Catherine melted, but kept her cool exterior as she replied, "that's Ms. Willows tonight, little girl."

"Ms... Ms. Willows?" Sara asked, scuffing the toe of one shoe against the concrete as she stood in front of Catherine.

"Yes?" Hot damn, Sara was adorable.

"Will you... uh... what if..." Her brows furrowed as she couldn't quite get the question to form.

"Don't worry," Cat said softly, taking Sara into a hug and breathing in the strawberry shampoo she'd used on her lover's hair. "If anybody stares too long or even thinks of making a sarcastic comment, I'll put my foot so far up their ass they won't be able to talk... *and* I'll give them detention."

Sara laughed, squeezing Catherine tightly and appreciating the humor-laced sentiment. "Okay," she said with a nod. "Then I think I'm ready."

Catherine nodded too and stepped forward, leading Sara toward the building.

Now that her last-minute nerves were quelled, at least for the time being, Sara really noticed Catherine's costume. She wore a dark blue, very chic, very expensive business suit and a pair of black wire-rimmed glasses. She looked... fucking amazing, and every bit the teacher she was playing tonight. The glasses especially sparked Sara's fire, and then a sharp cadence drew her eyes to Cat's navy pumps, the heels of which were rhythmically clicking against the sidewalk until they reached the doors.

Catherine paused with her hand on the doorknob and turned to face Sara. "Are you going to be a good girl tonight?"

Sara blushed, but managed not to look away, and nodded. "Yes Ms. Willows." See? She could remember instructions once in awhile.

"You're gonna do what I tell you?"

"Yes Ms. Willows."

"And do you know what'll happen if you don't behave?"

Another blush. "You, uh, you'll slap my hands with a ruler in front of everyone." She almost couldn't get herself to say that aloud, but the look of pride on Catherine's face made it worth it.

"Damn right I will, little girl," Catherine grinned. "But I'm sure I won't have to."

"No Ms. Willows, you won't," Sara said with a goofy grin.

"Okay, you ready?" Cat asked, and at Sara's nod, she started to open the door, and then at the last second turned around and pulled Sara into her arms, breathing in the scent of her lover's skin almost desperately. "Christ," she exclaimed, then let go of Sara and pushed inside the building, tugging gently on the leash.

Sara followed after her, confused as hell. She slipped one hand into Catherine's back pocket and walked very close behind her, whispering into her ear, "are you okay?"

Catherine took Sara's hand from her pocket and held it instead. "I'm okay, let's talk about it later?"

"Sure..." Sara grinned and then added, "I mean, yes Ms. Willows."

Catherine smirked and squeezed Sara's hand. "Such a good girl. How about you, are you doing okay?"

"So far so good, Ms. Willows. I don't think anyone's really looked up from their drinks yet."

Suddenly Catherine went rigid, but not in a bad way, and hissed into Sara's ear, "holy shit, look at Gil and Sofia..."

"That CSI from days?" Sara peeked around Catherine to see what she was looking at. "Oh wow." They were dressed as Caesar and Cleopatra. Gil looked right at home in a toga and laurel crown, Sara had to admit. And Sofia... fucking wow. With that Egyptian-style make-up and gown... she was like something out of a movie.

"Yeah, wow is right," Catherine agreed. She looked at Sara with a half-grin. "You're still the cutest, sexiest girl in the room," she whispered. And she meant it.

"Ms. Willowssss," Sara whined a little, ducking her head against Catherine's neck to fight the blush. Her body tingled at the statement, but she wasn't used to taking compliments like that, and old habits were hard to break.

Catherine laughed and ran a hand up and down Sara's back. "I know, I know," she said, still laughing as she kissed the top of Sara's head. "Would you like a snack?"

Sara shook her head, keeping it buried in Catherine's neck for the moment. "Can't eat," she mumbled into the soft, protective skin.

"I have never known you to be shy," Catherine whispered amusedly. "Why are you hiding?"

"Not really sure," Sara confessed, pulling her face away to grin sheepishly up at Catherine. "Not good at taking compliments, especially ones like that. Plus I think we've been noticed, because a million people are staring. I feel like they can see right through my skirt. I don't wear skirts."

"I promise, no one can see through your skirt," Catherine said lightly. "And the only one who's going to be seeing under it is me, much later on. Your cute little cotton underpants are safely secret, baby."

"I don't know why you're the top in this relationship," Sara teased into Catherine's ear. "You're much naughtier than I am."

"You have your moments," Cat replied with a shit-eating grin.

Greg waved at the teacher and student as he made his way to the punch bowl, and consequently, Sofia and Gil. "Hello, ladies," he said brightly, getting a dirty look from Gil and a laugh from Sofia as he filled a plastic cup with the classic 7-up and sherbert punch.

Sofia leaned over to Greg and nodded toward Sara and Catherine. "What's with them?"

Greg glanced at his two favorite women and then grinned at Sofia. "They're fucking."

Gil choked on his punch, even though he pretty much knew that piece of information, but Sofia just lifted one brow and smirked. "Really? I didn't think they were even friends."

"Does one have to be friends with another in order to fuck?" Greg asked, tilting his head to the side.

"I don't know, they look pretty friendly tonight," Sofia drawled back.

"*You* look pretty friendly tonight," Greg said with a hopeful wiggle of his eyebrows.

"Don't make me kick your ass in these shoes," Sofia said, rolling her eyes.

"Hey, there's Warrick," Catherine announced to Sara, pointing toward the golden boy, who had just walked in stag. As soon as he saw them he made his way over to them, whistling his appreciation.

"You two look *hot*," he complimented, shaking his head. "Damn, ladies."

Catherine snaked an arm around Sara's waist and tugged her close. "You don't looks so bad yourself, Batman."

"I'm not Batman," Warrick grumped. "I'm Val Kilmer."

"Who played Batman," Catherine supplied.

"He also played many other roles," Warrick fought back, intending to start listing them off on his fingers, but Catherine put up a hand.

"Why would you come dressed as Val Kilmer? Batman is so much cooler. You're losing style, Brown."

"You look nice," Sara quickly added when Warrick frowned. "I think Catherine's just joking. Aren't you, Ms. Willows?" she asked, feeling Catherine's fingers dig slightly into her hip.

"Thanks, Sara," Warrick mumbled, nudging Catherine's elbow as he walked past her toward the drink table.

Catherine turned to look at Sara, raising a dubious eyebrow. "I thought you were going to be good?"

"I am being good," Sara pouted, rocking back onto her heels, then forward again. "You were hurting his feelings. I was helping."

Catherine laughed, squeezing Sara's waist and kissing her on the nose. "Shall we get drinks?"

Sara nodded, and as they headed to the table, she asked sheepishly, "can I have a beer, Ms. Willows?"

Catherine made sure no one was looking and gave her a discrete, light little swat on the rear. "No you may not," she answered, trying to conceal her amusement at the question. There were other people nearby so she whispered into Sara's ear, "I can't believe you would even ask me that, little girl."

Sara played her part well, which was easy since she was actually frustrated at the answer. "Well what can I have?" she whispered back, resisting the urge to stomp her light blue mary janes in protest.

"You can have punch, young lady, and a trip to the restroom if you keep up the attitude," Catherine continued to whisper to avoid being overheard.

Sara frowned, her brows furrowed, but she was thrilled on the inside. She loved it when Catherine talked to her that way (when she was trying to get away with something she knew she shouldn't). "Sorry Ms. Willows," she murmured against her 'teacher's' ear.

"That's better," Catherine said with a nod, adjusting her glasses and picking up a cup. "Now, would you like some punch?"

"Yes please Ms. Willows."

Catherine filled the cup and handed it to Sara, struck for the thousandth time that night by her beauty and the look of innocence she was portraying. As Sara took the drink and brought it to her lips, Cat waited for her to swallow before saying quietly, "do you have any idea how fucking cute you look? You're driving me crazy just standing there."

Sara's jaw dropped in mock surprise. "Ms. Willows, did you just cuss at me?"

Catherine blinked, thinking over her words, and then smirked, tugging lightly on Sara's leash to bring her very, very close. "What do you think you can do about it, little girl?" she breathed.

Sara's eyelids fluttered and she fought to keep control of her senses. "Nothing, Ms. Willows," she let out on an exhale. "Not a single thing."

Greg chose that moment to meander over and sling an arm around each of the women's shoulders. "Hey lad--"

"Hands off, Greg," Catherine snapped, and he pulled back as if she'd burnt him, his eyes wide as they darted back and forth between her and Sara, fast enough to make him dizzy.

"Woah, a little territorial there, Cat?" he asked with a boyish grin.

"Didn't your mother teach you not to touch a girl without asking?" Catherine tsked, shaking a finger at him.

"Don't bring my mother into this," Greg rallied, his grin widening as he bowed and left them alone with a flourish.

Sara leaned in and rested her head on Catherine's shoulder. "I love it when you fight people off," she purred. The rest of the world was starting to disappear, and she could only feel Catherine. She was warm, and safe.

Catherine sensed the shift beginning in her lover, and she brought her arms around Sara, rubbing slow circles over her lower back. "I think we should go home now," she said softly.

Sara said nothing, she just nodded. They hadn't been here very long, but they had put in an appearance, and she really wanted to be alone with Catherine. She wanted to feel Cat's hands on her, and she liked playing student to Cat's teacher. It was more of a turn-on than she'd expected.

--

Catherine had excused them and led Sara to the car, helping her in and gently removing the collar, massaging Sara's throat even though the collar hadn't been tight enough to either hurt or leave any sort of chafe marks. It was just a gentle way to ease Sara out of the feeling of having it around her neck. Her palms stroked up and down, all the way around from front to back, and then she placed a kiss on pouty lips and walked around to get into the driver's seat.

Now they were parked in Catherine's driveway, getting out of the car.

Cat felt a giddy urge to hold Sara's hand like a teenager as they walked up to the door, and she let them in, locking up behind them.

Sara leaned into Catherine, nuzzling her lips across the side of her lover's neck. "Ms. Willows?" she asked, flicking her tongue over the soft skin.

"Yes?" Catherine asked, fighting down the moan that wanted to escape. Having Sara call her that was just... yeah.

"I know you're my teacher, but you're so beautiful, and sexy, and I can't stop thinking about your hands on me... does that make me a bad girl?" Sara asked coyly, looking up at Cat and batting her eyelashes.

Catherine's eyes threatened to roll back and she went with the scene Sara was creating. "Yes," she answered, slowly nodding her head, her blue eyes full of lust and longing. "But it makes me a bad girl too, for thinking about the same thing."

Schoolgirl Sara's eyes widened a bit and she gasped. "Really?"

"Really," Cat offered, breathing in Sara's deliciously natural scent in the air between them.

The brunette bit her lip and toyed with the hem of her skirt, pretending to be nervous about asking her next question. "Ms. Willows, would you... would you touch me?"

Catherine's nostrils flared. Sara was really too good at this. She was starting to *feel* like a naughty teacher. "Where would you like me to touch you, Sara?" she barely whispered.

"Right-- right here please, Ms. Willows," Sara breathed, placing a finger on her lips.

"I think I can do that," Catherine granted, and as Sara's finger slipped away she replaced it with her own, sliding it across her lover's soft lips and gasping as she felt it being sucked between them, a warm, wet tongue flicking over her fingertip.

"Mmmmm..." Sara purred, loving the taste of Catherine's finger. She took it further into her mouth, closing her lips around it and sucking rhythmically, her eyes focused on her lover's face. She liked what this seemed to be doing to Catherine. She leaned forward, slowly dragging her mouth away from Cat's finger and placed it beside her lover's ear. "What if Principal Grissom catches us?"

Catherine's knees buckled and she grabbed on to Sara for support.

"What's wrong, Ms. Willows?" Sara asked cheekily, holding Catherine up with ease.

"You know very well what's wrong, you naughty little girl," Catherine scolded her.

Sara bounced out of the foyer and into the living room to sit on the couch. This was a lot more fun than she would have expected. Especially the getting-away-with-teasing-Catherine part. "Who, me? I'm not the teacher. You're the naughty one for even thinking that way about one of your students." Oh yeah, the look on Cat's face was priceless.

Catherine's jaw dropped, and she adjusted her glasses as she stalked toward Sara, pulling her ruler from her purse. She dropped her purse, keeping hold of the ruler, and stood above Sara, tapping it into one palm in a menacing manner. "How old are you?"

The question surprised Sara, and she started to answer with her real age, wondering what it had to do with the situation, but realization quickly dawned and she answered haughtily, "twenty-one. So what?"

"Put out your hands."

"No." Said hands were folded across her chest and tucked underneath her biceps for protection.

"Little girl," Catherine warned, "do not make me wrestle you into compliance."

"You would put your hands on a student that way?" Sara mock-gasped.

"You are awfully cocky for someone who's in trouble," Catherine said with a raised brow.

"I'm only in trouble if you can catch me," Sara replied, and shot up off the couch and over the back of it, crouching behind the piece of furniture.

"Maybe I should send you to Principal Grissom instead. I hear he gives quite the spanking."

Sara was up and back over the couch, sitting up straight with her hands out in front of her before Catherine finished the sentence. "Why did you want to know how old I am?"

Catherine smirked, on the verge of laughing at Sara's quick compliance. "Because that's how many times you're going to get hit."

"Oh." Sara wrinkled up her nose. "Did I say twenty-one? I meant... one."

Now Catherine did laugh, and it took all she had not to smother Sara with kisses. She was so fucking *adorable*! "Nice try. We'll see if you want to keep teasing your teacher when you can't even pick up your pencil to write the essay you're getting assigned."

Sara's pout was monumental, and her hands twitched.

Catherine laughed again. "Oh God, you're too cute. I'm just playing, I'm not going to give you twenty-one licks. Just one. But you do have to write me an essay, and I want your best work, little girl, you got that?" She pointed a stern finger at Sara.

Sara kept the pout as she nodded. "Yes Ms. Willows."

"Good." Catherine stepped forward and rapped Sara's knuckles once with the ruler, not very hard despite the imposing way she had advanced on her 'student'.

"Ow!" It hurt just a little, and Sara jumped, immediately popping one or two knuckles in her mouth to make it look like it had hurt more. She had been expecting much worse. She sat there sucking on her hand and looking penitent, gazing at Cath from under her lashes.

Catherine wanted to take a picture. "Oh stop it, I didn't hit you that hard," she said, shaking her head. "Now get your little butt up and go get a pencil from the desk in my office."

Sara groaned and made a show of dragging her feet the entire way, scuffing her shoes on the hardwood floor, but she went and got a pencil and returned to the living room.

"You'll be polishing the floor later," Catherine said with a raised brow. "And those shoes."

Sara didn't reply as she set the pencil on the coffee table and sat back down on the sofa.

"Now go back to the office and get a piece of binder paper from the top drawer."

"Uh!!!" Sara protested indignantly, jumping to her feet. "What's wrong with you? You couldn't have told me to get it when I was in there getting the pencil?!"

"Now you can get two pieces, the length of your essay just doubled."

The unruly 'student' stalked off to the office and returned with two sheets of binder paper. "Anything else before I sit down?" she asked tartly.

"No," Catherine said pleasantly. "I want a two page paper, front and back, single spaced, about why it is inappropriate to tease your teacher, and how you will go about avoiding the behavior in the future." She saw Sara pick up the pencil and start to write her name at the top, in rather large letters. "And if you write that big, or I get a smart-assed essay, not only will I spank you, but I will have you start from scratch and write three pages, sitting on a hard-backed chair. Am I clear?"

Sara's jaw dropped and she erased her name, writing it much smaller, eyeing Catherine with something akin to respect before she answered. "Yes Ms. Willows."

Catherine gave her a smile and nodded toward the paper. "Good. Get working."

It took Sara nearly half an hour to get two pages worth of decent material that wouldn't get her spanked, and when she looked up Catherine was reading a book. "I'm finished, Ms. Willows," she announced, waiting for Cat to acknowledge her before she held out the essay to her 'teacher'.

Catherine put away her book and took the papers, settling back to read them while Sara watched raptly, hoping her work was good.

A few parts made Catherine smile, a few others made her laugh, and she was very pleased with Sara's work. She set the essay on the coffee table and moved to sit beside Sara on the sofa. "That was very well written," she praised her girl.

"Thanks," Sara beamed, biting her lip nervously when Catherine took gentle hold of her hands.

"I think you deserve a little reward, what do you think?" the blonde asked, rubbing her thumbs back and forth over Sara's (not) bruised knuckles.

Sara nodded. "I think I deserve a kiss," she said quietly.

"I can't do that," Catherine said regretfully. "I could be fired."

"I won't tell anyone," Sara said earnestly. "Please?"

The pleading in her 'student's' eyes did her in, and she started to lean closer, still trying to talk herself out of it. "I really shouldn't..."

"You're the most beautiful teacher I've ever had, Ms. Willows," Sara whispered, leaning in closer as well. "I've been dreaming about kissing you ever since I ended up in your class." Their lips brushed, just a fleeting touch, and Sara closed her eyes. "I always sit in the front row because I don't want to miss a word you say or a move you make..."

Their lips brushed again, and Catherine closed her eyes too. "I always catch you looking, Sara, and I wonder if your skirts are that short because of me, or if you have a crush on some boy in the class..."

"I wear short skirts for you," Sara whispered. "I think about how warm your hands would be underneath them."

"I wish I could help you find out," Catherine breathed, pressing her lips to Sara's, longer this time but no less chaste. "But I can't. That's something I can never do. I shouldn't even be kissing you, Sara. I'm putting my job on the line here already..."

Sara snuck her tongue out to take a swipe across Catherine's lower lip, reveling in the moan that poured from her sexy 'teacher's' throat. "No one would ever know..." She sensed Catherine's resistance fading, and took hold of her teacher's hand, guiding it to rest on her bare knee. "I won't tell anyone Ms. Willows, I promise," she swore. "Please?" She spread her legs a little, encouraging Catherine's hand to travel...

Catherine was nearly gone and she hadn't even felt Sara's heat yet. She knew it was there, she could tell by the breathy quality of that trying-to-be-innocent voice. When her girl spread her legs a bit, her resolve crumbled and her morals as a 'teacher' went to hell. She slowly inched her hand up Sara's thigh, under the hem of her skirt, stopping there to rub up and down.

Sara's breath hitched and she moved her legs further apart, leaning her back against the couch and pinning Catherine with a wide-eyed gaze. "Higher Ms. Willows... touch my panties..." Her cheeks flushed and she bit her lip, waiting for Catherine's fingertips to graze her aching sex.

As soon as her hand reached Sara's panties, Catherine groaned, shedding all pretenses of the teacher persona, tossing her glasses over her shoulder and pulling those white cotton panties down around Sara's knees. "Sara," she breathed. "Do you have any idea--"

"Yes," Sara interrupted, not needing to hear it to know what Catherine was going to say. "Fuck me, Cat."

"Oh I plan to," Catherine growled, putting her hand back under Sara's skirt, combing through her soft curls and parting her lips with two fingers, stroking between them with a third. "I like your panties around your knees..."

"Me too. I like your hand up my skirt," Sara agreed, rocking her hips into Catherine's fingers. "Inside please? I'm fucking aching for it, Cat..."

"I know," Catherine moaned, pressing one finger slowly into Sara's opening. "I can feel how hot and wet and swollen you are..." Her lover's pussy swallowed her finger too easily, she added another and slid in deep.

"Don't forget throbbing," Sara added, dropping her head back onto the top of the couch, cursing the ponytail getting in the way of her comfort and quickly reaching up to yank out the rubberband holding her hair up. As it fell down over her shoulders, she laid her head down with a sigh, wanting to open up further for her lover, but the panties around her knees wouldn't let her.

Catherine didn't need Sara's thighs spread any wider, she had worked her hand between them without a problem, and even two fingers wasn't enough to fill Sara's need at the moment, nor her own, so she slipped in a third, stretching lightly, pausing to let the muscles adust to the intrusion.

Sara didn't need adjustment. She groaned and whined and pushed up hard into Cat's hand when she felt a lack of movement. "It doesn't hurt," she panted. "Keep going. Please. Hard."

Catherine was surprised at that, but she wasn't about to argue. She drove her fingers in hard, absolutely fucking reveling in Sara's satisfied growl. She pulled out and pushed in again, getting into a rhythm, watching Sara buck and writhe under her touch. It was intoxicatingly, mind-blowingly, head-spinningly hot. Little explosions were going off on all of her nerve endings as she fucked Sara like a rockstar, good and fast and hard. And Sara took it like a rockstar, good and fast and hard, making noises Catherine could only dream about and had never heard before.

The first hint of contact to her clit sent Sara screaming over the edge, her fists squeezing the sofa cushion beneath her as she came. Muscles clamped on Catherine's invading fingers, convulsing and pulsing pleasure outward in waves in all directions. The orgasm claimed her, body and mind, and she released onto Catherine's hand, slumping back to the couch, exhausted and drained and with a very content expression. She laid still for a few minutes, getting her breathing back to normal, and when her eyes finally opened with a lazy blink, they locked onto Catherine's blazing ones, surprised to see something besides just lust and passion lurking behind the clear blue windows. She didn't know what it was, but the sight of it warmed her from the inside out, and she gave her lover a lopsided smile.

--

Catherine wanted to tell Sara what she felt, but she couldn't quite explain it to herself, so she'd have a hell of a time trying to explain it to Sara. She made the mistake of glancing down and noticed Sara's panties still around her knees, and she flopped backwards onto the couch with a groan. "You're just... you've got to pull up your underwear Sara. I can't take the heat."

Sara grinned wickedly and shook her head, no longer bound by the rules of being a student. "No." She slipped the panties off over her shoes and crumpled them into a ball, quickly laying on top of Catherine and shoving the wet cotton into her lover's open mouth.

Catherine's eyes widened almost comically and she actually whimpered at the taste, and at the fucking audacity of a bold move like that. She kept the panties in her mouth, closing her teeth around them as she sat up, grabbing Sara around the waist and hoisting her into the air, depositing the smirking brunette across her lap. She flipped up her lover's skirt and started peppering her backside with playful swats that left her kicking and squirming and laughing. Catherine loved every minute of it, and when she'd had enough, she stopped spanking and took the panties out of her mouth. "Stand up..."

Sara, still laughing, managed to get to her feet.

"Actually, first sit down," Catherine changed her mind, and when Sara sat, she took hold of an ankle and lifted it, sliding the panties over one shoe, then repeated the process with the other leg. "Now stand up."

Sara stood, and shivered as Catherine pulled the wet panties up her legs and fitted them around her waist.

"Now you have to wear them wet."

"How unsanitary."

"Speaking of unsanitary, miss 'scuff up the floors', you have some hardwood to polish."

--

The next night, in the middle of shift, Sara couldn't hold off the question she needed to ask Catherine any longer. She found the blonde peering into a microscope and lingered in the doorway, biting her fingernails until Catherine looked up.

"Hey, what are you doing standing there staring?" Catherine asked with a smile, stretching with a yawn and then walking over to Sara, kissing her cheek. "Shouldn't you be in the garage with Warrick? I hear you've got a car to take apart."

"Yeah," Sara said nervously, continuing to chew on her nails as she spoke. "I just, I have a question first."

"Well spit it out, it's obviously killin ya," Catherine said, tilting her head to the side, resisting the urge to pull Sara's hand away from her mouth.

"Yeah, it's no big deal, it's just that a friend of mine called me a couple hours ago and begged me to do a double date with her."

A very green-eyed monster reared its head in Catherine's psyche, but she choked on it and did her best to play it cool. "And you're asking me for what, for permission?"

"Well, not exactly... I just wondered if you'd mind."

"Hey, I don't own you, you can do whatever you want." Catherine waved a hand dismissively, though she was dying to scream that yes, she did mind, and she wanted Sara all to herself.

"Catherine--" Sara started to say, but stopped, realizing she couldn't expect more at this point. She didn't know whether she was relieved or disappointed that Catherine was taking this so casually. Or at least appearing to take it so casually. "I mean... yeah. Okay then," she stammered, biting into the quick of her nail and wincing, pulling it away from her mouth to avoid further damage. She really had to find another nervous habit.

"When is the date?" Catherine asked, keeping the jealousy and possessiveness temporarily at bay.

Sara puffed out her cheeks as she exhaled. "Tomorrow night, I have it off."

A sarcastic comment about enjoying it was on the tip of Catherine's tongue, but instead she kissed Sara's cheek and ran a hand down her arm. "Have a good time," she said with as much sincerity as she could muster, and she had to admit, she was damn proud of herself for being so cool about this on the surface. She didn't want to scare Sara off again with any inkling of 'you're mine' behavior.

Sara watched her go down the hallway, her cheek burning from the touch of Catherine's lips. She still didn't know what to feel.

--

Sunday night came far too quickly for Catherine's liking, and she paced the living room aimlessly for a good ten minutes until Lindsey came in and stared at her. "Mommy? What'cha doing?"

Catherine stopped and glanced at the clock for the hundredth time that evening... damnit, it was only seven-thirty. Hours and hours to go before Sunday was officially over. She looked at her daughter and flopped down onto the sofa. "Your mommy's being stupid," she said honestly.

Lindsey scurried over and sat in her mother's lap. "Is it about Sara?" she asked.

The innocent yet innate knowledge of a six-and-a-half-year-old child never ceased to amaze her. "It is," she confessed.

"Did you have a fight?" Lindsey scrunched up her nose.

"No honey, we didn't have a fight."

"Then what's wrong? Did she go to Chuck E. Cheese with somebody else?"

Catherine choked on a sudden lump in her throat, tears stinging her eyes as she hugged Lindsey tight. "Something like that."

"Don't be sad, Mommy. Will you read me a story?"

"Sure sweetie," Cat said with a smile, nuzzling her daughter's nose and standing up with Lindsey in her arms, carrying her to her bedroom.

--

Catherine woke up to... a rock hitting her window? What? She sat up and rubbed her eyes, glancing at the clock - two a.m.- and quickly got out of bed to investigate the sound. As she opened the curtains, another rock bounced off the window and she heard her name amidst the pouring rain outside.

Sara was standing on her front lawn, soaked to the bone, clearly drunk, throwing rocks at her window at two o'clock in the morning and calling her name.

She threw open her window, rain immediately pelting her in the face and she raised a hand to ward some of it off. "Sara? Go to the door, I'll let you in!" she yelled over the downpour.

Sara stayed where she was. Her jacket was going to be ruined. "She was beautiful, Cat!" she shouted across the yard, the wind whipping her wet hair arrhythmically against her face and neck, the water mixing with the salty tears streaming down her cheeks. "She was gorgeous and sexy and sweet! She kissed me, Catherine! She kissed me, and I should have melted into her but she didn't even get my pulse racing!" Her tears fell harder as she let the rain hit her body, her arms going around herself as she shivered violently.

"Sara, get in the house!"

"She didn't even get my pulse racing with a mind-blowing kiss, and all I have to do is look at you or smell your shampoo and my knees go weak!"

Catherine couldn't take another second of Sara pouring her heart out in the bone-chilling rain. Drunk or not, Sara's words meant something to Catherine, and she went to the front door and out into the mess, determined to drag Sara inside no matter how much the brunette resisted. The grass was freezing on her bare feet, and within seconds she was soaked through and through, but she pulled Sara into her arms, kissing her fiercely and wiping away her tears. Her lover tasted like whiskey.

"Are you crazy?" Catherine finally pulled back to whisper. "Come inside, Sara, please."

Sara nodded, following sedately now, her world turned upside-down.

Catherine led her inside and locked the door, then turned to her and kissed her again, as if discovering her lips for the first time. "You're freezing," she breathed, unmindful of her own body temperature as she stripped Sara out of her wet clothes, leaving them on the floor in the foyer, leading her lover to the master bathroom in just her bra and underwear. She turned on the shower and divested Sara of the remainder of her clothing, stealing several kisses as she did so. Once the trembling woman was naked, she pointed to the shower. "Get in."

Sara didn't argue, she just stepped under the warm spray and let it wash over her, melting away the icy cold of the weather outside.

Catherine undressed and joined her in the shower, and as she gently washed her lover's body, she made a confession of her own. "I didn't want you to go," she said quietly.

Sara nodded. She had figured as much. "Then why didn't you tell me that?" Her words slurred slightly together.

"I didn't know how."

Sara could understand that... hell, she didn't know how to tell Catherine half the things she wanted to say. She knew what it felt like. "I didn't know it when I asked you, but now I know I wanted you to mind." Did that make sense?

"I minded. A lot. But I didn't want to scare you away."

"Before tonight, it might have scared me away. But now I know. You said awhile ago that you're addicted to me."

"I am." Catherine nodded.

Sara turned around in her embrace and rested her forehead against her lover's. "I'm addicted to you too, Cat."

Catherine's breath hitched, her lips finding Sara's and dancing sweetly across them. "Even when you're sober?"

Sara nodded, closing her eyes and putting her hands on the wall to steady herself. "Especially when I'm sober."

Addiction was so much easier to cop to than love.

There was a long, comfortable silence, and Sara was the first to break it, her throaty words a whisper. "How did this happen to us, Cath?"

"I don't know," Catherine whispered back. "You're surprisingly lucid for a drunk person, but don't think too hard tonight, okay? Let's just get your hair washed and get you to bed."

Sara gave in to the dizzy exhaustion that had been trying to claim her all night, and as her head dropped to Catherine's shoulder, she mumbled agreeably yet sarcastically against Catherine's wet skin. "Yes Mommy."

--

Sara woke the next afternoon with a pounding headache, and after a momentary panic that she'd slept with Annabelle, she remembered the events of last night in crushing, vivid detail and groaned. "Tell me I did not," she muttered to herself. Oh, God. Her mouth tasted like something had crawled into it and died. She needed a toothbrush, immediately. She got out of bed, heading for the bathroom when she heard Catherine answer her non-question.

"Tell you you did not what?"

She continued into the bathroom, picking up Catherine's toothbrush and spreading more paste on it than necessary. "Throw rocks at your window in the middle of the night." She turned the water on and started scrubbing her teeth.

"Sorry, can't. You did. But it was... charming."

Sara choked on the toothbrush, causing bits of paste to fly everywhere, especially the mirror in front of her. "Charming? In a Silence-of-the-Lambs stalker type way?"

Catherine laughed, stretching out on the bed with a very content yawn.

Sara finished brushing her teeth and rinsed out her mouth, then shut the door and emptied what felt like five gallons of whiskey from her bladder. That accomplished, she returned to the bedroom, where Catherine was laying in bed, seeming to be watching her carefully. With a tentative smile, Sara started to put a fingernail into her mouth, but Catherine's words halted her.

"Don't you dare chew on your nails. Come here."

Surprised, but willing to comply, Sara dropped her hand to her side and walked over to the bed, sitting on the edge of it. "Did I fuck this up, Cat?" she asked bluntly, before giving Catherine a chance to avoid the subject.

"Do you think you would have woken up in my bed, freshly showered and wearing my bathrobe if you had?" Catherine teased, pulling Sara to lay down next to her. At the stiffness in her lover, she kissed the back of Sara's neck and amended her answer. "No, you didn't fuck anything up. Except your leather jacket."

"I'm pretty sure I confessed things to you that now in the light of day I'm horrified that I admitted." The unmistakeable body language of hurt from her lover made her cringe. "No wait, Cat, that didn't come out right. I'm terrible at this."

"Terrible at what?"

"Talking about my feelings."

"You did fine last night... Just tell me the truth, Sara. I'm a big girl, I can take it."

"Last night *was* the truth," Sara frowned. "I know I was drunk, but it was the truth. I just-- I'm just--" She stopped trying and shook her head.

"You're just addicted to me?" Catherine breathed, running her hand down Sara's arm, over the fluffy white bathrobe.

Sara held her breath. "Didn't I already say that last night?"

Catherine's hand tightened around Sara's shoulder. "I want to hear you say it without liquid courage."

"I don't know if I--" A tightly curled fist in her hair changed her mind, and the words flowed effortlessly from her lips in a rush. "I'm addicted to you, Catherine."

Catherine's eyes filled with tears and she pushed them away, curling her fist tighter in Sara's hair and breathing hotly into her ear. "I want you naked."

"I am naked, Cat," Sara said in a shaky voice.

"Physically naked," Catherine clarified, resisting a smirk or a sarcastic comment. "Naked and spread wide for me, Sara. Take off the robe and lay on your back with your legs apart and your arms stretched above your head. I need to see you. I need to-- I just need--" She stopped trying to explain, because Sara rose from the bed and removed her bathrobe, letting it fall to the floor at her feet.

Catherine moved off of the bed so her lover could lay down, and she watched with rapt fascination as Sara laid on her back, slowly stretched her arms out above her and spread her legs. Oh God... it was exactly what she needed to see. Affection washed over her and threatened to choke her as she stopped fighting the tears and let them fall. She had never wanted to feel so strongly for Sara. That had never been part of the plan. But what they had shared, what they had given each other... what Sara had given to *her*... she could no longer imagine life without it. She finally asked the one question that she had never thought to ask. "Why do you trust me enough to give me your power?"

Sara didn't expect the question, but she lifted her eyes to Catherine's. She had to think about it for a few minutes, but she realized that she did in fact have an answer. "Because you never tried to take it." She was quiet for a minute, and then asked gently, "Cath, why are you crying?"

Catherine shook her head, indicating she didn't want to answer, and replied with a command instead, her voice thin and wispy. "Touch yourself."

Sara flushed with heat, her cheeks burning at the two-word request. She was naked, and open, and Cath would see *everything*... every touch, every twitch, every stroke. "I-- I don't--"

"Please," Catherine interrupted.

The need in Cat's smoky voice penetrated Sara's defenses, and she slowly brought her arms down from above her head. Just as slowly, she placed her right palm on her stomach and slid it lower until she reached the small patch of curls covering her sex.

"Oh baby," Catherine rasped, her eyes glued to Sara's hand. "Are you wet?"

Sara's eyelids fluttered closed and she slipped her fingers into her slick heat, biting her lip with a nod. "Ye-yes... What do you... want me to do?"

"I want you to make yourself cum," Catherine hissed quietly, her eyes darkening with passion. "However you most enjoy it."

"Okay," Sara whispered, keeping her eyes squeezed shut as her fingers played through her folds, parting and stroking them hesitantly. She had never done this in front of anyone before, excluding the time in the car, but that was entirely different. She had been fully clothed and not spread wide for Catherine's viewing pleasure.

Catherine sat on the edge of the bed next to Sara's left side, admiring her lover's beautiful body and the way Sara's fingers trembled as she pleased herself. She wanted to direct but she also didn't... she settled for laying a hand on one smoothly defined hip to offer silent encouragement.

Sara's hips jerked at the touch, her eyes snapping open and finding Catherine's again, her lower lip sliding between her teeth as she pushed two fingers inside herself. It felt weird. Familiar, she'd done it a thousand times before, but foreign, because the only fingers that had been inside her lately were Catherine's.

Catherine's pulse was pounding frantically in her ears, her heart racing as she struggled not to put her fingers inside along with Sara's. "I know I can see everything, but tell me what you're doing," she half-commanded, half-begged. "And try not to cum until I tell you to... if you can..." The last was definitely a request, not an order, and Cat swallowed hard, hoping Sara would do as she asked.

The thought floored Sara and her fingers stilled for a split second before she started moving them further into her. And if the rush of heat between her legs wasn't enough incentive, the unmasked vulnerability in Catherine's voice certainly was. "Okay," she consented, taking a breath and forcing the words past her lips. "I'm... I have two fingers inside myself, and I...'m pushing them in and out... they, they feel different than yours, Cat... I'm used to yours now..." She hoped this was what Catherine wanted - she had never narrated when touching herself.

"You amaze me," Catherine breathed on a shaky exhale, her eyes clouded with desire. "You make me feel so powerful, Sara... do you have any idea what a precious gift that is to me?"

"No," Sara admitted, and as she brushed her thumb over her clit, she gasped out a moan, vocalizing for Catherine at the same time. "Oh fuck, Cat, I'm-- I'm touching my clit... it's so hard... it's, I think it's swollen."

"For me?" Catherine's breath hitched, her gaze darting back and forth between Sara's hand and her face.

"Yes Cat, for you, I'm swollen for you, I'm fucking myself for you, I've got my fingers inside me and I'm playing with my clit, all of it's for you, oh please, shit, please say I can cum, I'm so close already Catherine, you make me so fucking hot..." She was getting into it more as each word left her mouth. It felt really, really good to talk dirty to Catherine. And the effect on her lover was incredible. She didn't know Catherine's eyes could get that dark. Fingernails dug sharply into her hip.

Catherine thought she might pass out. She realized the change the instant Sara started to get off on the dirty talk, and she loved it. She knew she was digging her nails into her lover's hip but she couldn't help it. "Yes baby, you can cum," she husked. "Tell me."

"Ohhhh, Catherine, fuck, I can't believe I'm doing this, can't believe it's making me so hot to talk to you while I do it, oh God, oh God, oh G--" She stopped talking as her orgasm overtook her, sweeping through her body like wildfire, singeing everything in its wake. As soon as she could, she talked through it. "I love cumming for you Cat, it feels so good, it's like a fucking explosion, it's, it's, it's, oh God..." She shuddered, the last vestiges of the flames licking themselves out, and she let her fingers slide easily from her pussy, her hand falling limply to the bed at her side. She could feel the sweat lining her brow, her neck, in the valley between her breasts.

Catherine watched. And listened. And throbbed, pulsed, ached. She couldn't believe she had this woman in her life, in her home, in her bed. Naked, vulnerable, confident. Touching herself. Talking. Cumming. And then lying there satisfied as if it were the most common thing in the world to have done for someone. As if there was no thanks necessary. As if she would have done anything asked of her to make Catherine smile. Anything. Without complaint or a second thought. Sara was, in a word, magnificent. And she looked simply majestic at the moment, those deep brown eyes clouded over, her motionless fingers glistening with honey, her lips parted but her mouth umoving, a light sheen of sweat dusting her skin.

After just staring at Sara for a long, long time, Catherine finally spoke, her fingertips lightly stroking Sara's claw-marked hip. "Sometimes, Sara, you take my breath away."

--

They laid together, holding each other, for a few minutes, and then Sara spoke up. "Last night... I think you said you hadn't wanted me to go on that date... was that true?"

Catherine flushed mildly and nodded, unwilling to lie. "Don't run."

"Run?"

"Like the last time I made the mistake of treating you like I owned you."

"This is different, Catherine," Sara said affectionately, giving her lover a kiss. "This is us talking about, God forbid, our feelings. This isn't you throwing your weight around without asking me first."

Catherine nodded, returning the kiss, tasting the faint hint of toothpaste that lingered in Sara's mouth. "Oh, by the way, help yourself to my toothbrush," she said with a wry smile.

"Thanks, I already did. You should be glad. You might be dead otherwise."

Catherine laughed and kissed Sara again, letting her tongue trace her lover's lips. "Mmm, I like my toothpaste like this."

Sara grinned, playing with Cat's tongue with her teeth, then groaned as she caught sight of the clock on the nightstand. "We have two hours until shift," she complained.

Catherine turned around briefly, noting the accuracy of that statement, and groaned as well. "I wanted to stay in bed with you all day... awake. Not sleeping the whole damn time."

"We could call in sick," Sara suggested, though she was not at all serious. Sara, call in sick? Unheard of. Sara call in pretending to be sick? Not a fucking chance.

"Funny, Sidle," Catherine snarked, rolling her eyes and turning onto her stomach, burying her face in her pillow and pounding her fists repeatedly in what appeared to Sara to be a temper tantrum.

Cat's head snapped up, blue eyes wide as she felt a light smack to the seat of her pajama pants. She flipped onto her back faster than she could ever remember doing so, putting her hands out in front of her for protection. "No! I stopped." She would never, *ever* forget the way a spanking from Sara felt. And the one time it had happened, she had only been hit three times!

Sara just stared at her, jaw dropped. "It was *that* bad?" she asked.

"It hurt so fucking bad," Catherine confessed candidly. "I have never been hit that hard in my life."

Sara's jaw dropped even further if possible and she continued to stare at Catherine. She focused on the memory, and slowly her expression faded into a frown. "I did hit you pretty hard," she said, rather embarrassed about that fact. "I think it was because I was so angry."

"It's okay baby, I deserved it," Catherine assured her, kissing the tip of her nose. "I just don't want to go through it again," she added with a playful grin.

Sara exhaled slowly and nodded. "I guess I wouldn't trust me either."

Catherine made a noise of protest and hugged Sara tightly to her, kissing her forehead. "No, no, no, that's not it at all," she promised. "I trust you, Sara."

Sara turned away from her with an amazing pout, crossing her arms over her chest.

Catherine fought down a chuckle, biting her lip to stifle it. "Are you being petulant so I'll punish you and forget about this conversation?"

"Yes."

The laugh escaped and she leaned forward, kissing Sara between the shoulder blades, right on top of a starburst-shaped scar. "Not gonna happen."

Sara stiffened at the touch. She knew which scar Catherine's kiss had landed on. Puncture wound from the neck of a broken whiskey bottle. Most of her scars were from broken bottles. She still wasn't used to sharing those with anybody, especially not a lover, and her instinctual reaction was to tense up. But instead of pulling away, Catherine kissed her there again, and again, and again, until she slowly relaxed into the feeling of having someone care about her that much. Enough to push through her walls instead of bounce off of them. Enough to really want to get inside her, for better or worse, and not only when it was convenient. Never in a million years would she have thought Catherine to end up being that person. Well, truth be told, she never thought that person would even exist. She never thought she would have that kind of bond. But here it was, staring her in the face, so to speak, and despite how good it ultimately felt, it would still take some getting used to.

"Sara?" Catherine whispered.

"Yeah?" Sara whispered back.

"What would you think about getting tattoos over some of these?" the blonde asked, tracing a few more of the scars with one fingertip. "I think they're beautiful, but I know that you don't... and getting tattoos would mean you could make new memories for each one."

Sara started to cry. She didn't know why the urge had come up so suddenly or so forcefully, but she turned over and clung to Catherine, burying her face in her lover's neck, sobs shaking her naked body.

Catherine gasped in surprise, quickly pulling a blanket up over them. She knew Sara felt vulnerable being naked, and that her lover would take comfort in the blanket's protection. She didn't even ask what was wrong - there was no way Sara would be able to answer right now, and she was more in tune with Sara's needs than anyone else on the planet at this point. Sara needed to cry, and she needed to do it without words from Catherine. Cat knew that as much as she knew anything.

Sara cried for a long time. She was past the point of being embarrassed about her tears, and at the point of acceptance - she obviously had needed this to happen for awhile and had never felt safe enough to let go until now. And Catherine was perfect. She didn't fuss over her, didn't ask a million questions, she just held her close and offered silent comfort. And covered them both with a blanket, for which Sara was so grateful. There were a lot of things about Catherine that Sara was grateful for, she realized. Moments of emotion between them never got awkward. And that was largely due to the fact that Catherine always seemed to know what to say to break the tension before it even formed.

When she finally calmed down, Sara sniffed and wiped her eyes on the shoulder of Catherine's pajama sleeve. "I'm sorry," she whispered.

"Don't you dare," Catherine said in warning.

"Okay." Sara nodded. Again, she was grateful. Grateful this time that Catherine wouldn't allow her to apologize for *feeling*. Because if the blonde had not refused to accept it, Sara would have kept apologizing. The fact that Catherine wanted her even when she wasn't happy and sarcastic and bleeding sexuality, well... that fact blew her mind, in the best of ways.

Catherine nodded as well, seemingly satisfied with that response. "I'm here if you want to talk, but I'm not going to ask you to. I'm just going to tell you a story, and when I'm done, we'll take a shower. We don't have to talk. Or we can talk about anything. And then we'll go to work."

Sara curled into Catherine a little further, resting the side of her head on Cat's shoulder, settling in for whatever story her lover had in mind.

"Once upon a time, there was a princess named Sara, and she was the most beautiful girl in the entire kingdom. Everyone thought she was perfect... except for the trashy girl from the other side of town, Catherine, who liked to take her clothes off in front of the princes and princesses for gold coins."

Sara snorted with laughter, but Catherine interrupted her, pretending to be serious.

"I'm not finished!" she scolded, trying to keep her grin at a minimum. "So. Catherine knew that Sara wasn't perfect. In fact, she knew that Sara was the loneliest princess she'd ever met. And Sara would never ever give her gold coins for taking her clothes off. The princess would turn away whenever Catherine started to dance. At first Catherine was mad, she felt rejected, but she soon realized it was because Princess Sara respected her and didn't want to see her doing that to herself."

Sara was intrigued now, wondering where this story could possibly be going.

"One night, Catherine snuck into Princess Sara's bedroom, and found her sitting by the window, staring out at the stars like she wanted to be taken away. She didn't know exactly what had happened to the princess, but she knew it had to be pretty bad to put that look in her eyes. Princess Sara heard a noise and turned to see Catherine in her bedroom. She asked what the other girl was doing there, and Catherine answered like it should have been obvious. She told Princess Sara that she was there to rescue her. The princess looked confused, and shook her head. She asked what she was supposed to be rescued from. Catherine said that it didn't matter... that everyone needed to be rescued from something, and that no matter what scary things happened to her, Catherine wanted to take her away to the stars, where she would always be safe."

"Mmm," Sara purred, snuggled up tight with her very own knight in shining armor. "Did the princess ever change her mind and decide to watch Catherine take her clothes off?"

Catherine grinned, showing her teeth. "You bet your ass she did."

"You know... I've thought about seeing you naked before. Before I actually did, I mean."

One of Cat's eyebrows arched dramatically. "Oh really?"

"A few times here and there, yeah."

Catherine liked this revelation. "When?"

"I don't remember specifically," Sara crinkled her nose. "I just vaguely remember thinking about it."

"All right, all right. We need to shower."

"Yeah," Sara grumbled, rolling out of bed. She was halfway to the bathroom when she turned around and walked back to the bed, where Catherine was just starting to stand up. She put her arms around the blonde and pulled her into a tight hug, much like Catherine had done to her outside of the halloween party. "I like the idea," she said. "Of the tattoos. You'll go with me?"

"Every step of the way, baby," Catherine said gently, resting her head on Sara's shoulder.

--

"Okay, everything's set. As soon as you get your shirt off and lay on the table, I'll get started."

"Ooh, let me take care of that," Catherine said with a mischievous grin, moving closer to Sara and sliding her hands under the hem of her lover's tank top.

The purple-and-green-haired girl snickered, but made no comment.

Cat's hands went up further, teasing Sara's nipples erect before removing the shirt. With those nipples standing proud in front of her, she couldn't resist leaning down to take one in her mouth.

Sara groaned, hyper-aware of their audience, but the fact that Catherine apparently couldn't help herself gave the brunette a sense of pride, and she allowed the contact for as long as her lover wanted it.

"Ladies, not that I don't enjoy the show, but I get paid by the job, not the hour," the tattoo artist said with a smirk.

Catherine grinned and tugged Sara's nipple through her teeth before letting go. "All right baby, let's get you some ink."

Sara loved tattoos. Even when they didn't have as much significance behind them as the ones she was about to get. She gladly laid face down on the table. She was about to reach for Catherine's hand when she felt slender fingers interlock with hers. How the hell did this woman know exactly what she needed and when? She didn't know how, but it made her feel so good, and a lazy smile graced her lips as she closed her eyes.

Most of the scars were on her upper back, and she had decided to get a pair of wings in place of those. The wings would also cover the top half of Catherine's scar, the one she had claimed so many mornings ago. The bottom half would bear Catherine's name. Sara knew that they might not be together forever, she wasn't that naive, but whether they were together or not, that scar would always belong to Catherine.

The constant hum of the needle lulled Sara to sleep, and she dreamt of herself as a lonely servant girl, rescued from evil bandits by Catherine on a white horse. In a white velvet queen's robe, a gold jewel-encrusted crown atop her head. The queen slew the bandits with her sword of silver, then hopped off her horse to lift Sara into her arms. Sara was shaking, more scared than she had ever been, and just as the queen leaned down to kiss her, she woke up.

"Sara... Sara," Catherine gently shook her lover, and once brown eyes were open and gazing into hers, she smiled. "It's done, we're all set to go."

Sara shook her head to clear it, some of the fog drifting away, and she blushed. "I was having a weird dream, thanks to your little story the other day."

"Well if it was good enough to make you blush, do tell," Catherine said, intrigued.

Sara slowly sat up and made sure she had her equilibrium before standing. Catherine was still holding her hand. She allowed Cat to help her back into her tank top, careful not to disturb the bandages on her back that covered the new tattoos, and then they walked out together.

"You were a queen," Sara started to tell about her dream. "You rode up on this magnificent white stallion and rescued me from a bunch of bandits." She should probably be blushing harder, but she wasn't.

"Wow, I sound great," Catherine laughed. "What was I wearing?"

Sara snorted. "You looked like the White Witch from Narnia."

Catherine popped her on the ass as they reached the car, shooting her lover a pout. "That's mean."

Sara grinned, pulling Catherine into her arms and breathing in the scent of her hair. "I'm just kidding. You were breathtaking in my dream, just like you are when I'm awake."

Catherine was the one to blush now, ducking her head against Sara's shoulder. "You're overcompensating."

"For what?"

"For the White Witch insult."

"That wasn't an insult, the White Witch was hot."

Catherine's jaw dropped. "But she was evil!"

Sara hadn't laughed so freely in a long time. "So?"

"So, you think I'm evil?" Catherine's pout grew, her blue eyes wide as she pulled back to look into Sara's.

Sara was highly amused at Catherine's childish behavior. "You know I don't," she laughed.

Catherine started to grin, but suddenly turned serious. "Hey, Sara?"

"Uh, yeah?"

"There's really no good time to ask you this, so I'm just going to spit it out before I lose my nerve."

Sara did not like the sound of that. "Okay..."

"I don't know if I'll end up working at Lady H's or not, but I still really want to learn how to use a flogger, and since I can't learn on you..." She paused, hesitantly looking at Sara, biting her lip. "Would you be okay with me learning on one of Lady Heather's submissives?"

Sara let go of Catherine completely and took a step away from her. Her first instinct was to frown, get defensive, and clam up. Refuse to answer. But the expectancy and confusion in Catherine's wide blue eyes made her reconsider. What right did she have to object, really? They had no official relationship status, they didn't even refer to each other as girlfriends, so how could she justify saying no to that? Especially when it was hard to deny Catherine anything in the first place. She really didn't want Catherine to flog someone else, but she wasn't going to make herself 'ready' for Catherine to do it to her, because she was nowhere near ready.

"You don't want me to."

Shit. Apparently she was quiet for too long. Might as well be honest now. "I don't have a right to object."

"Your right lies in the fact that I asked you," Catherine explained carefully, as if tip-toeing around the fragile areas of Sara's psyche.

Sara opened her mouth to say something to that, but Catherine started talking again before she could get a word out.

"I have to admit, the thought of anyone else spanking or flogging or touching you like that makes me crazy. So I'll accept it if you say no, Sara. I wouldn't have asked if I didn't really want to know how you feel."

Sara felt a flush of heat and stepped closer to Catherine again, ducking her head to hide her blush in her lover's neck. "Nobody else touches me like that," she mumbled against Catherine's soft skin. "I never let anyone before you, and I won't let anyone after you, either." She took a deep breath and continued. "I can't say no, Catherine. I wish I could let you learn on me, but I just can't. I won't ask you not to pursue something you're interested in, though. I want you to learn if you want to learn."

Catherine wasn't quite sure how to feel about that answer... grateful that Sara didn't object, yes, but also a little sad, because she knew Sara was only agreeing to make her happy. That her lover really didn't want her to do it.

It seemed Sara could read her thoughts, because the next thing Catherine knew, soft lips were on hers, warm whispers flowing into her ear. "I want you to learn, Catherine... Take the offer while it's still on the table."

Catherine grinned, returning the kiss and pulling back to look at Sara. "You'd take it back?"

"Damn straight," Sara said with a grin of her own.

"All right, let's go home. Why don't you lay on your stomach in the back?"

"Yeah," Sara agreed, climbing in behind the passenger's seat and stretching out on her stomach. "No sudden stops, okay?" she teased.

"I'll do my best," Catherine said wryly, getting in and starting up the engine.

--

"Ha ha HA! YES!" Catherine nearly shrieked as she waved a piece of paper in the air, thrusting it toward Sara while Greg watched on in fascination.

Sara didn't have to look at the paper to know what Catherine was so happy about. She raised an eyebrow, a smirk tugging at the corners of her lips. "It was Mr. Ziegler's?" she asked.

"It was Mr. Ziegler's," Catherine confirmed with a shit-eating grin. "You owe me... something."

"I don't remember betting?" Sara stated, in a tone that made it sound more like a question even though it was indeed a statement. And then she looked at Greg. "What took so long to get those results?"

Greg glared at Catherine. "Someone put it in the wrong spot, so I didn't even know it existed until Grissom barked up my ass about it."

Catherine got a vivid mental picture of that scenario and burst out laughing.

Sara smirked, turning to her lover. "I take it that 'someone' was you?"

Greg continued to glare. "It was," he confirmed. "Swami Greg is not pleased."

"Oh, get over it," Catherine said, rolling her eyes. "Stop trying to ruin my victory."

"Catherine, we did *not* bet," Sara insisted. "There is no victory."

Catherine looked at her and in an unexpected move, she pouted.

Sara's jaw dropped. "Cat, what could I possibly owe you that I haven't already given you? You get to spank me, paddle me, belt me whenever you want, we've had loads of sex, which you can also have whenever you want, I let you fuck me at work, confessed to being addicted to you, and got your name tattooed down my back." She had forgotten Greg was in the room for a minute until she heard his ass hit his chair hard. She ignored him for now, though, her amusement with Catherine taking precedence. "What is it you want that you think you have to win a bet to get?"

Catherine's pout turned to a grin and she pulled Sara into a sideways hug. "I don't know... I just like the thought of having you owe me something."

Sara groaned exasperatedly and finally turned to Greg. "The tattoo thing is not what you think."

Greg stared at her. "I was focused on the fucking at work part. Could you ladies possibly do that again? Say... right now?"

Before Sara could kill him, or at the very least shoot down his request, Catherine turned her lover to face her and gave her a hot, wet, open-mouthed kiss, her hands sliding under Sara's sweater to glide across her ribcage with firm, meaningful strokes.

Sara got the message loud and clear: Catherine wanted to kiss her in front of Greg, and unless she had a serious, soul-shattering problem with it, then she'd better allow it to happen. So she did, despite the fact that she was blushing ten shades of red and acutely aware of everything around her. Greg was gawking openly, she knew it without even looking at him, and if he was pitching a tent she would... whine about it later to Catherine, but she wouldn't do a damn thing. Damnit.

The heady sensation of Sara's quick compliance made Catherine dizzy, her eyelids fluttering as she kissed her lover, pouring herself into the connection between them. Her hands slid further up to find Sara's nipples straining against the fabric of her bra, begging for attention.

Sara gasped as she felt Catherine's hands on her breasts, even through her bra, and skilled fingers trapped both of her nipples, giving each one a firm squeeze. She opened her mouth to protest, but Catherine's hot breath on her ear and the husky whisper that followed changed her mind.

"You're not about to argue with me, are you little girl?"

Sara swallowed hard, the whole world fading away, leaving just her and Catherine, and she melted at that tone of voice and those words. "No, Ms. Willows," she murmured, her own voice softer than a whisper. She was suddenly so turned on that she actually thought about suggesting they leave work early and go home. Er... go to Cat's place. Her knees were actually shaking. "Please don't do this to me here," she begged just as quietly.

"Do you trust me?" Catherine asked, releasing Sara's nipples.

Sara whimpered, not liking that question right now, but nodded her head in honesty. "Yes."

"Then you should know I won't do this to you here," Cat said softly, stroking her hands back out from beneath Sara's sweater. "Not in front of Greg. Not in front of any of the guys we work with. I don't want to humiliate you Sara, not ever."

"But Chuck E. Cheese..."

"Chuck E. Cheese was a situation you got yourself into with your disrespectful attitude. If you were humiliated it should have been because of your behavior, not because you were spanked for it." Her tone took on a sharper edge, but immediately softened as she realized what Sara was saying. "I didn't mean to make you feel humiliated, Sara... I really didn't, and if that was the case, then I'm really sorry and I wish you would have brought it up sooner."

"It's okay," Sara blushed. "I didn't leave you much choice... I did misbehave, and in front of Lindsey at that. I know I deserved what I got, even if it was embarrassing. And I... I wouldn't ask you to do anything differently if it happens again. It won't, though, because I won't talk to you like that, especially not in front of Lindsey and--" she stopped when she realized she was rambling, and just looked at Catherine from under the curtain of dark bangs that had fallen in front of her eyes.

Catherine relaxed a little, brushing Sara's hair back behind her ear and giving her a radiant smile. "I can't wait to get you home after shift."

Without thinking, Sara answered instinctively, "I can't either, Ms. Willows."

"Mmm, so it's like that, is it?" Catherine purred against Sara's soft skin.

"God yes," Sara nodded. "Don't you remember how wet I was that night?"

"... Greg heard that."

"... Fuck."

Greg folded his hands behind his head and grinned. "Don't let me stop you."

Catherine shook her head at Greg and rolled her eyes, then leaned in close to whisper in Sara's ear, words meant only for her. "Be good now, make sure you get all of your homework turned in before we leave."

A shiver ran down Sara's spine as she nodded and whispered back. "Yes Ms. Willows."