House and Co. aren't mine…but, oh, how I wish they were!

CHAPTER 18

In the car on the way to her house, Sera called Martini's, the Italian restaurant that she ordered from sometimes. She ordered a large variety of food for 9 people and told them that it would be picked up by Lisa Cuddy. Robert glanced at her then back to the road. "I thought you said you were gonna whip us up some food?"

Sera looked at him like he was crazy. "Do I look like Martha Stewart to you? "Whip up some food"? For nine people? Hah! That's why the good Lord created carry-out, my friend!" Sera dialed Lisa next. "Hey, Lis! Stop at Martini's on the way over to my place. The order will be ready for pick-up in an hour."

Lisa laughed on her end of the phone. "Yeah, I knew you were full of crap when you said you were fixing us dinner. Is there some particular reason you want me to pick it up? Why can't you get it?"

Sera sighed. "Lisa, think about it." Sera waited a moment for the light bulb to go off in her friend's head. She heard Lisa gasp. "Exactly. So can you pick up the food or what?"

Lisa hesitated. "Peace, are you sure? I know there's a lot going on and you're worried about tomorrow, but that's no reason to rush into things."

Sera snorted. "I'm 34 years old, for crying out loud!" Sera lowered her voice so that Robert couldn't hear her. "Look, I'm sure. He's the one. And I need some time with the hot doc. I want to do this. Now, you remember my alarm code, right? Let yourself and everyone else in. Just buzz the intercom when you get in so I know it's you. We'll be downstairs in the F.O.S." Sera waited for Lisa's agreement then hung up.

Robert looked at Sera. He hadn't been able to catch most of what she said to Lisa, but he did know that he had one hour alone with this beautiful, sexy woman. He got a flashback of Cameron screaming and shook off the image that came to him of Sera being in that same position. He knew that, come tomorrow, there was no way he was letting her go to that madman. He pulled into her street and stopped in front of her house. They sat in the car for a few moments.

Sera's voice broke into his thoughts. "I don't want to think about or talk about Winston Dumas for at least one hour. I need this time, Robert. Okay?"

Robert took her hand and kissed the palm. "Okay. What do you want to do for an hour?" Sera smiled at him. "NOT sit in the car! C'mon. I have something I want to show you."

Sera entered her security code and went inside. After re-setting it, she dumped her jacket on a chair by the door and grabbed Robert's hand, dragging him to a door near the kitchen. She gestured for Robert to go ahead of her and she followed him after locking the door behind her. She heard his "Whoa" as he took in the basement.

Sera had converted the basement into her workout room. In addition to the usual exercise equipment, Sera had a display of knives, swords, and throwing stars on one wall, a free standing weight bag, staffs of different sizes, and a chin up bar in the doorway that led into a short hallway ending in a smaller room. Robert poked his head in there and saw a mini-fridge, a TV, a small dresser, a full-sized bed, and a bathroom complete with shower. The floor in the main room was covered with a mat and there were several speakers hanging from the walls. A giant stereo system was in the corner of the room.

Robert shook his head. "You know, I can just cancel my membership to the gym." Sera smiled and told him, "Look, I want to workout a bit. I'll even show you a few moves…is that cool?" Robert nodded like an eager kid. Sera went into the room and pulled something out of her dresser. She tossed him an old pair of sweatpants.

"I swiped these from Mitch years ago when we used to work out together." Robert looked down at the sweats and asked her, "Do you have a T-shirt or something?"

Sera decided some boldness was in order. She walked over to him and pulled his shirt out of his pants. She slowly began to unbutton his shirt, never breaking eye contact. She noticed that his eyes became stormy when he was turned on, too. After all of the buttons were undone, including the cuffs, she slid her hands inside his shirt, feeling his stomach muscles tighten when her fingers brushed against them.

She was pleasantly surprised to see the fairly well-developed abs on her doctor. Sera slid her hands slowly up his stomach and across his chest. She slowly moved her hands across his shoulders and down his arms, bringing the shirt along for the ride. His soft cotton shirt fell to the floor, leaving Robert's upper body exposed.

Robert was desperately trying not to give in to his baser urges and haul her down to the mat and have his wicked way with her. He was fairly sure she had no idea how strongly she was affecting him.

Sera took a good look. He was lean, but toned…he had a swimmer's build. Not to bulky, but not flabby or flaccid either. He looked yummy and she started feeling those tingles again as she ran her hands back down his chest. She could see his pulse jump and his breathing speed up and smiled to herself. She knew exactly how she was affecting him.

Sera smiled seductively at him and said softly, "I don't think you need a T-shirt." She turned and walked down the hallway into the other room, shutting the door. She leaned against the door, taking several deep breaths to get herself under control. She looked at her hands; they were actually shaking, from desire or fear, she wasn't sure exactly which.

Robert sank down to the mat and put his head down on his knees, which he had pulled up close to his body. "That woman is going to kill me", he muttered softly. He quickly slipped off the rest of his clothes and put on the sweats, glad he had on his moderately sexy black underwear instead of tighty whities. He still felt a bit wound up and looked around for a way to alleviate some of his…er…stress before Sera came back out. He didn't want to scare her or rush her into anything. He thought about the way she prowled around and rubbed over him a minute ago. Maybe he wouldn't scare her…but still. His eyes caught the chin up bar. He tossed his clothes over in a corner and went over to the bar.

Sera walked over to the dresser and pulled out her black sports bra with the purple stripe down the side and the matching bottoms. Purple and black were her favorite color combo and she always felt more confident wearing it. She pulled a black headband on to pull her hair back and looked at herself in the full length mirror.

She liked what she saw. She had been working out in some form nearly every day for the past 5 years, and that, combined with eating healthy (mostly), had made her fit, trim, and strong. She turned slightly and checked out her back side. "Still got back, though", Sera thought smugly. She had been worried when she first started loosing weight that she would lose her curves, but she learned how to keep toned without bulking up or becoming too thin. She didn't think Robert would have anything to complain about when he saw her.

Sera frowned at the eyes looking back at her. She had never truly gotten used to seeing brown look back at her. She always felt like she was betraying her grandmother. The gray eyes seemed to pop up every other generation, and they only showed up in one female in that generation. She had about 60 zillion cousins (actually 27 – her grandmother had 9 children), but she was the only one with gray eyes. Her grandmother told her that the women with gray eyes always went on to do extraordinary things. Sera smiled ruefully as she popped the brown contacts out of her eyes. She definitely had the "extraordinary" thing down pat.

Sera had showered at the hospital after the unfortunate emesis incident with her patient, so she still felt relatively fresh. She spritzed some rose-scented body spray on, laughing softly at herself for spraying on something sweet to go work out. She then took a deep breath and went into the main room.

Sera nearly bumped into Robert as she went down the hall. He was doing chin-ups on the bar. She had to lean against the wall in the hallway because her knees went weak. Mitch's sweatpants were loose on Robert and they hung low on his hips. She could see the waistband of his black briefs peeking above the blue sweats. When he pulled himself up, the muscles on his arms bulged with exertion. Sera had just had her hands all over his body, but nothing prepared her for seeing that body in action. What really made her weak was his back.

She knew that everyone had their favorite body part. She knew that House was a breast man, Mitch and David both liked legs, and Jamal had definitely enjoyed looking at women's butts (much to her increasing irritation as they had gotten closer). Sera had never realized that a muscular, nicely shaped back could make her swoon.

She watched the play of muscles along his back as he pulled himself up and down almost effortlessly. Her heart was beating faster and faster every time she watched the trapezius muscles and lats tense and release. Sera noticed that it was starting to feel extremely hot in the hallway. Maybe she was getting ill? She whispered almost desperately, "Robert."

He heard her and dropped gracefully to the floor. When he turned and saw the way she was leaning weakly against the wall and breathing heavily, he became concerned for a second. Then he saw the desire clearly reflected in her eyes. He walked over to her and put his hand on the back of her head, pulling her to him for a hungry kiss.

She went up in flames. Saw stars, fireworks. Felt sparks, lightning bolts. All of the stupid romance novel clichés she'd always sneered at came back to bite her in the butt, because she felt all of them. The only parts of her that were touching Robert were the back of her head where his hand was and her lips. She felt like she was being devoured and nothing…absolutely nothing had ever felt so amazing. She wanted to grab him to steady herself, but she knew that if she touched him, they wouldn't make it out of the hallway.

Robert was trying to rein himself in, but he felt like his tenuous grasp on control was slipping slowly away. 'If she moans like that one more time, it's over. I'm turning caveman and throwing her over my shoulder and taking her into the bedroom." The thought that she would probably kick his butt from here to kingdom come if he did that cooled his ardor somewhat, and he reluctantly broke off the kiss. He had to step away from her, supporting himself on the wall. Sera leaned against the wall on the other side. They were both breathing heavily. Sera took several deep breaths to get herself together that said to Robert. "C'mon, I want to show you something."

She walked to the middle of the room and gestured for Robert to sit on the floor on the edge of the mat near the stereo. She asked him if he was familiar with T'ai Chi Ch'ü. He nodded. "There was this stress relief T'ai Chi class at the hospital that ran for 6 weeks. The instructor used T'ai Chi as a relaxation technique."

Sera wanted clarification. "Did he or she go over the postures?" Robert nodded again. "She told us something about the Yang tradition, forms, stuff like that. I don't remember much of what she said, but I remember most of the movements. Sometimes I still do them." Sera nodded in approval. "Then what I'm going to do should look familiar to you. Just watch me a bit and then come on over and mirror what I do." Sera glanced at the clock. The restaurant never had the food ready on time, so she probably had a good 45 minutes before everyone arrived. She shrugged. If her plan to seduce him took longer than she thought, the group could just wait upstairs until they were ready. She had locked the door and no one could get into what Lisa referred to as her Fortress of Solitude.

Sera mentally flipped through her CD's that she worked out to, trying to figure out which one would do the job. She smiled and asked Robert to put on the purple CD. "What's it called?" he asked, shuffling through the CD stack. "It's the only purple CD over there."

Robert found it with an "Ah-ha!" and put it in the CD player. The opening strains to "The Beautiful Ones" by Prince started playing. The whole CD was full of Prince slow jams with a couple of other good songs thrown in. She had heard a co-worker say once that no one could set a sexy mood like Prince. She'd soon find out how true that was.

Sera started the T'ai Chi movements as Robert watched her intently. He watched how the light shone on her skin, making it seem to glow. Her muscles were evident in her barely there workout outfit, but they didn't detract in any way from her sexiness. He watched her move, saw her focus on what she was doing. He wanted her more than he had ever wanted anyone in his life. He was worried, though, that she would only make love to him because she thought she might die tomorrow.

That thought got derailed when Sera did a posture that he vaguely remembered being called "the whip" or something like that. All he knew is that she had her arms spread open in front of him and he got a really good view of her breasts. The black top thingy that she was wearing left no room for imagination. He could see the stripes of purple going down the side of her breasts and down her hips. He decided then and there that purple was his new favorite color.

He went back to wondering if he would be doing the right thing if he made love to her tonight like he wanted to. He already had a lot of guilt still embedded in his soul over what happened with him and Allison. His gaze focused again on Sera, who was "waving her hands like clouds" in front of him. Her eyes looked deeply into his and he gave his conscious a kick in the teeth. He knew that if she wanted him tonight, he was hers. He got to his feet and joined her on the mat. Over the speakers, Prince was screaming that he was begging down on his knees because he wanted some beautiful woman. Robert could definitely relate.

Sera watched Robert as he watched her. She knew he wasn't focused on what she was doing. If she was a gambling woman, she would have bet that he was debating whether or not it was morally acceptable to make love to her tonight. 'C'mon, Prince, don't let me down!', she thought. As "The Beautiful Ones" was about to go off, Robert got up and stood behind her. She was startled and looked back at him questioningly. "I thought you were going to mirror me?" Robert smiled his toe-curling smile at her. "I think I'll pick up on it quicker this way."

The CD moved to the next song, "When 2 R in Love". "Perfect", she thought, and began to go through the postures again. Robert followed her movements perfectly, his front pressed up against her back. Sera never realized how stimulating T'ai Chi could be if done this way. It was like an erotic dance between her and the beautiful man behind her. "You're completely ruining my balance", she murmured softly. "Does it bother you?", he asked. "No, not at all", she replied dreamily. She lost herself in the movements and the music and her man. She listened to the words of the song, never actually realizing before how incredibly sexual the song was. She could tell Robert was listening, too. His hands started roaming up and down her body as they moved, still in almost perfect sync. His hand hesitated for a moment then grazed over her breast.

Sera's eyes, which had been half closed, slammed open and she gasped at the heat from that one little touch. All thoughts of Ta's Chi, postures, and "white crane lifting it's wings" fled from her head as she turned in his arms and laced her fingers in his hair. Their kiss was hot and went on until both of them were gasping for air.

Robert put his hands on her sides and lifted her up, letting her wrap her legs around his waist. He looked into her eyes…those beautiful gray eyes that were looking at him with an emotion he couldn't identify. Whatever it was, though, it made him feel very anxious to get her into the back room. But he had to ask her something first.

"Are you sure? I don't want any regrets about anything. If you're not ready…"

Sera put her hands on both sides of his face and kissed him deeply before answering, "I am surer about this than anything else in this world. And my only regret will be if you don't take me to that bedroom and make love to me right now."

Robert smiled, kissed her back, and said, "Yes, ma'am!" as he carried her into the room.