They're still on her bedroom floor where they'd fallen forty-five minutes ago.
Sex on the ground had never been very comfortable but somehow, with Barney, Robin didn't seem to mind. Besides, neither one of them could bear to stop until they'd climbed back up into bed.
Now their breaths and their bodies have recovered, but still they lie there. His lips are trailing down her neck. His hips are pressing hers to the carpet and it feels like Round Three is fast approaching, but she's not complaining. Every man should make love like Barney Stinson – or at least the way he makes love to her.
He moves just right against her and she lets out a low moan. He grins lecherously down at her in response. Then his mouth is on her chest and it's just starting to get interesting when she hears the sound of the front door opening, followed by Ted's voice.
They freeze for an instant, then there's a flurry of moment. They gather up articles of clothing and Barney's dressed so fast it attests to how practiced such quick getaways are for him. He's halfway to the fire escape when he turns back to look at her, just as she's shrugging into her robe. Before Robin has the chance to belt it, she watches his eyes trail down then back up her naked body.
She's not quite sure how he manages it, but in an instant he's back across the room and she's in his arms. The look of indecision is plain on his face; she can she that he's clearly torn.
"It's alright," she whispers. "Go." When he still fails to move, she gives him a gentle little push toward the open window. "It's fine…..We're fine."
She sees him absorb the statement, then he nods and his arms slip from around her. He has one leg hoisted over the window when he reaches back in and pulls her to him, their lips connecting. The slow, sensual slide of his tongue over hers tells her they are far from done. It's an awfully good thing they're both so great at keeping secrets, because this time definitely happened.
Barney's exit comes in the nick time. Just as he's out the window, she hears Ted approaching. "Robin, are you home? I heard a noise. Are you in there?"
"I'm here, Ted," she calls back, popping out of her bedroom perhaps a little too quickly. Noting that the sheets are strewn on the floor, having fallen off the bed along with them, she hastily closes the door behind her.
Ted takes in her disheveled appearance – the haphazardly knotted robe, her bare legs and feet, her mussed hair – and can't resist commenting. "Awfully strange time of day for a nap…..if that is what you were doing."
There's just a half second of panic before she coolly replies, "Please, Ted. Since when have I hidden men in my bedroom? I've never been ashamed of my love life. You guys know everything."
"True," he concedes, sounding mostly convinced.
"I had a headache," she explains. "I was hoping to sleep it off."
"Oh, I'm sorry. You want some aspirin?"
"No, I'm good. It's mostly gone now."
Ted nods and is about to walk away when he stops, a strange look on his face as he sniffs the air around her.
"Was Barney here? I smell his cologne."
It's only years' worth of being awesome that keeps the color off her cheeks. "I don't know. I guess he could've been while I was sleeping," she shrugs.
Ted shakes his head. "I swear, if he's bringing his skanks back to the apartment again….."
"Maybe all his women aren't skanks," she says, and it sounds a tad defensive even to her own ears.
Thankfully, Ted doesn't seem to catch it. "Come on, if a woman's getting down and dirty with Barney Stinson, the king of the one-night stand, there's got to be some skankiness in her somewhere."
Robin forces a laugh. "Yeah, I guess so." Mental note not to tell Ted. At least they'd made it all the way to her bedroom before clothes starting coming off. It would've been hard to explain a pair of panties on the living room floor.
Ted goes to make himself a sandwich, still blessedly unaware, and she breathes a sigh of relief. However, in that breath, she realizes Ted is right. You can smell Barney's cologne on her – and it's no wonder; there's not a single space on her body he hasn't rubbed across.
"I think I'm just gonna go grab a shower," she says. "Maybe it'll steam away the rest of this headache."
"Okay," Ted calls out from the kitchen.
She slips back into her bedroom for a change of clothes just in time to hear her cell phone vibrating on the nightstand with an incoming text. She picks it up, sees 'Swarley' on the screen, and smiles.
Close call. Next time we'll have to go to my place.
And so it begins.
She picks the sheets back up off the floor and lays them across the mattress. Tilting her head to the side, she studies the bed, picturing the more memorable moments, and already she has tingles in places that lately only seem to tingle for Barney.
She feels vibration against her thigh and for a moment thinks it residual tingles until she remembers the phone in her hand.
Robin?
And when she doesn't immediately reply.
Do we need to talk about this?
She can almost hear the reluctance in his words as if he were speaking them aloud. The distaste, the terror, at having "The Talk". Because she feels it too.
She types back a message and hits sends: Talking is overrated.
Unfortunately the group, especially Lily, won't see it that way.
His answer comes back in an instant – a grin with a wink, that even in icon format somehow manages to look sexual. Then: MacLaren's, 9:30.
She writes back: We'll find an excuse to break away.
Sweet, he answers. Then, after a pause, How do you feel about whipped cream?
She smirks as she types, The same way you feel about handcuffs. Bring both.
This time his answer sets off vibrations of both kinds. I always knew you liked it dirty, Scherbatsky. Wait till I introduce you to my swing.
It was a very good thing they were so great at keeping secrets.