Disclaimer, Pairing, Rating & Spoilers: See Chap. 1
A/N: Again, my sincere thanks for your lovely reviews so far! Just wanted to say that there's a mention of the effects of chemotherapy in this chapter – now, from what I've read, I know that these powerful drugs can cause sensitivity to cold but I'm not sure how long-lasting the effect is. For the sake of the events in this chapter, I've assumed they're quite long-lasting but I apologise if this is incorrect – hope it doesn't detract too much from the story x
"Oh, for fuck's sake." Boyd's irascible complaint was thunderously loud in the eerie stillness of the tent, his voice echoing ominously against the rippling canvas of the tarpaulin as they surveyed the unwelcome scene in front of them.
Grace gripped tightly against his arm, fingernails biting into muscle through the soft cotton of his shirt. "Keep your voice down," she urged in a commanding undertone.
"He needs to move, Grace. It's either I shout loud enough to wake him or I go and kick him in the ribs; what's it to be?"
The psychologist gave a soft sigh, watching the steady rise and fall of their colleague's chest in the sharp torchlight as he lay across the expanse of the ramshackle bed, his long limbs spread carelessly in slumber, his frame engulfing the space such that Eve to his left was curled into a tight foetal ball. "I'm sure he's not doing this deliberately…."
"I wouldn't bet on it. He's not exactly used to sharing a bed, is he?"
Grace raised her eyebrows in amusement. "Are any of us?"
Boyd was calculatingly silent in response, suppressing his instinctive rejoinder and presently exhaling with a forceful decisiveness. "I'm going to kick him in the ribs."
"Don't you dare."
"Well, how the hell else are we going to get him to shift over?"
Grace shrugged. "Once we're in there, I'll just….gently roll him…."
"He weighs fifteen stone, Grace. At least. And he's a complete fucking dead weight."
"Well, we're just going to have to compromise, then. Or is the idea of sleeping that close to me simply too abhorrent to contemplate?"
Boyd held her gaze unwaveringly, relieved at the playful glint sparkling across her eyes in the harsh glare of the torch and he grunted in amusement, handing her the slender lamp and beginning to unbutton his shirt. "I'm not going to go there. Whatever I say is bound to drop me straight in the shit."
She laughed lightly, purposefully turning away as he slid the garment from his body, his trousers falling to the ground in quick succession and she drew a breath as her imagination exploded behind her eyes, anxiety gripping her anew as the reality of their imminent sleeping arrangements loomed agonisingly in her mind once more. She inhaled slowly, feeling the air circulate through her chest in a futile attempt to restore calm, and she paused for a brief moment more until she heard him clamber into the makeshift bed, shrugging his coat from about her shoulders and feeling the corresponding chill instantly infusing her synapses.
"Budge up, then," she told him stoically, amazed at the even timbre of her voice despite the roiling anticipation churning desperately in her stomach, the goosebumps prickling across every inch of her frozen skin.
"Last chance to kick him in the ribs, Grace."
She chuckled and shook her head, stepping carefully into the narrow space between her two male companions before slipping down beneath the blankets, arranging the final layer of Boyd's thick coat in an even distribution across her body and turning onto her side away from him. She felt the breath shudder from her lungs as she began to shiver, the spasms becoming increasingly violent despite her concerted efforts to control them and she bit back a sigh, frustrated and embarrassed by the betrayal of her body. Oh, God….and I was doing so well….
Boyd's voice was laced with concern as she felt him shift towards her. "You okay?"
"I'm fine," she replied unequivocally, forcing a reassurance into her tone she knew was at odds with her physical symptoms. "I'll be fine. Just give me a minute."
"Bollocks." His comeback was characteristically brusque, his hand reaching for her arm and this time successfully locating its target, his fingers jolting against her skin as he registered the significantly reduced temperature. "You're freezing."
She shrugged, the bitter words leaving her mouth before she could stop them, her teeth beginning to chatter against her will. "A left-over present from the chemotherapy."
"What is?"
"Sensitivity to cold. It's really not a big deal, Boyd."
He blew out an incensed, incredulous breath, manoeuvring closer towards her and sliding one arm between her shoulder and the ground, pulling her against his body and into the depth of his embrace, ignoring both her noises of protest and the insatiable doubts of his own mind as they flared hotly in technicolour against the contrasting ebony of their surroundings.
"Relax," he told her gently, the tension pervading her limbs making her brittle, rigid against the warmth of his chest and he shifted slightly to apply pressure to her arms with his hands, rubbing rigorously in strong lines in an attempt to imbue her with heat.
"Boyd…."
"This is purely pragmatic, Grace, before you decide I've totally lost it. You need to get warm."
"You're very sweet," she insisted momentarily, mortified by the steadily mounting desire beginning to ripple through her blood. "But this is overkill."
He grunted, continuing to firmly caress her bare skin in spite of her objection, his breath fervent against her neck as he demanded, "Why the hell didn't you say something before?"
She gave a slight shrug, feeling her shoulders connect with his chest and reinforcing once more their sudden and intimate proximity. "Because I don't need to be treated like china…."
"That's ridiculous."
"I mean it. I've been in remission for more than a year…."
"And, what?"
"And this is just an irritating legacy, that's all. It's never a problem under normal circumstances."
"Well, these hardly qualify, do they?" He released another frustrated breath. "For God's sake, Grace…."
"What do you want me to say?"
"I told you when…you were going through all that, that I wanted to be kept in the loop."
"I did keep you in the loop…."
"But you didn't think to mention this? Even stuck out here in the arse-end of nowhere?"
She sighed. "I told you, Boyd. It's just a side-effect, nerve damage caused by the drugs…."
"A dangerous side-effect?"
"Well, not as far as I know."
"But I'm guessing your doctors weren't exactly expecting you to be sleeping half naked in the woods in the middle of winter."
She felt her lips curve into a smile and she inclined her head in accession. "Probably not."
"So, get off my case, then, and let me get on with this."
Her smile became a throaty laugh, her body beginning to relax of its own accord as he continued to vigorously massage her arms, his actions stimulating her circulation and flooding her with warmth, arousal beginning to snake its way traitorously towards her centre despite her mind's brutal insistence that she maintain some semblance of control. Instinctively she reached towards him with her feet, her need to escape from the icy barbs impaled in her extremities outweighing her sense of propriety and she grinned as she heard him yelp in protest.
"For Christ's sake, warn a man before you do that," he grumbled testily, though he immediately began to rub her feet with his own, their limbs intertwining easily as the heat of his body suffused into hers in a comforting wave.
Grace sighed softly, caught between a gentle cocoon of relaxation and a spiralling torrent of desire, the undeniably sensual experience of being held against the reassuring breadth of his chest as his hands attended expertly to their task. The enveloping darkness allowed her the pretence of irreality, that the bizarre nature of their circumstances could excuse the uninhibited physical freedom that was completely at odds with their ordinary interaction. It's like a moment out of time, she rationalised silently, biting back a groan as his fingers lessened their pressure to trace delicate circles atop her skin. And it has to be if we ever want to look each other in the eye again….There's absolutely no sense in wishing for anything else….
"Better?" he asked huskily after several further moments had passed, his lips in agonisingly close proximity to her ear.
"Much," she replied, her voice barely above a whisper, and she turned her head slightly to address him. "I think that makes us even."
"Is that right?"
"Hm. A one-all score at half time."
He tutted disapprovingly, though his palms continued to move soothingly against the lengths of her arms. "Everything's always bloody football with you, isn't it?"
She laughed throatily, quietly thrilled by his persistent ministrations. "Not everything."
He drew a ragged breath, at once unable to quell the vicious pounding of blood against his skull, the stirrings of an organic reaction to the swell of her hips moulded against him in the gloom causing an odd combination of excitement and humiliation to coil uncomfortably in his gut. Shit….Shit, shit, shit…. Aloud he cleared his throat, forcing his voice to remain steady as he gently spoke her name into the obsidian air. "Grace…."
"What?"
She gasped as she felt his fingers slide deftly beneath her silken slip to caress the smooth curve of her belly, instinctively reaching for his wrist to still the tantalising motions of his hand, his name leaving her lips in a shuddering rush of hunger. "Boyd…."
"What?" The repeated rejoinder was one gravelled amusement as he felt himself suddenly lost in a fervour of intrinsic want, his better judgement forcibly cast aside as he nuzzled brazenly against her neck, the heady scent of her skin producing an answering response in his groin. "Fuck."
She took a juddering breath to reply, unable to prevent herself from angling her neck towards his searching mouth before feeling him freeze in his actions, Spencer's suddenly loud snort to her left jolting them both from their intense cloud of self-absorption and re-establishing a merciless sense of reality to counter their rapidly spiralling abandonment.
Grace was the first to recover, rolling regretfully onto her back and away from his embrace, instantly missing both his touch and his warmth. "Well," she managed eventually, willing away the agonising frustration, the bitter disappointment swirling acidly in her gut. "It's probably for the best."
He gave a grunt of disapproval, rocking his hips deliberately against her thigh. "Speak for yourself."
She reigned in a moan, his evident arousal, the first she had experienced in more than a decade, reigniting the lightning crackling in her blood. "You're incorrigible."
"Do you want to go down the 'ten year hard-on' route?"
She laughed huskily, incredulous at his admission, the raw honesty underpinning his words. My God…trust us to wait for just such a moment before we…. "I just meant…," She began quickly before she could complete the thought, breaking off and sighing as her mind wholly refused to process the authenticity of the previous few minutes. "Well…it's hardly appropriate timing, is it?"
He gave a mirthless laugh. "Is it ever?"
"Come on, Boyd. It's like being in bed with your children."
"Thanks, Grace. That's a mood-killer if ever I heard one."
"Well, that was rather my intention."
He sighed heavily, allowing a gradually calming silence to descend over them before addressing her again, a sense of crippling doubt crushing his heart like a vice. "Do we just put it down to a moment's sleep-deprived stupidity, then?"
Grace was quiet for a long moment as she battled to re-establish the characteristic order to her thoughts, the interwoven strands of ingrained suppression and rational judgement threading ever more chaotically together despite her efforts and she drew a centring breath, frantically willing the return of her usual composure. "I think," she began slowly, "that this is all wildly out of context…."
"And then some."
"…which makes it difficult to categorise as one thing or another."
He gave a scathing grunt. "Is that absolutely necessary?"
"What?"
"The black-or-white thing. Haven't we always been more…?"
"Grey?"
"Well, haven't we?"
She sighed. "I don't know how to answer that. I'm not even sure…."
"For Christ's sake," he exhaled strenuously before she could vocalise her thoughts further, self-directed frustration gnawing at the edges of his stomach. "Aren't we too old for all this crap, Grace?"
The psychologist gave a soft chuckle at his tone, a surge of fondness washing through her at his typical idiosyncratic coarseness. "Which crap, specifically?"
"Well, obviously not the sex…."
"Boyd…."
"We're adults, Grace. Adults who've known each other for a very long time…."
"Right," she interjected firmly with another heavy sigh. "And I think that might be part and parcel of our problem, don't you?"
He was pointedly taciturn for several elongated moments, her words tumbling in a rush through his mind as he tried to make sense of his increasingly marred perspective. Is she right? He mused silently, frowning gloomily into the darkness as he sensed the increasing tension in her body at his side. Is it possible that we know each other too well, that we've moved beyond the point at which something might have been viable? Christ, I think we had our chance years ago…so why the hell has it taken until now, in this completely fucked up scenario, for us to even hint to each other that we…? Fuck it. I can't do this now. Aloud, his voice was cuttingly accusatory as he asked, "I suppose you're going to want to talk about this properly at some point, aren't you? At length and until my ears are bleeding?"
She gave a gentle laugh, instantly settling him. "Well, I wasn't planning on the last part…."
"It's a given."
"But," she replied evenly, ignoring his jibe. "I actually think it might be beneficial to give it a while before we go down that particular road."
Boyd felt his eyebrows rise to his hairline, incredulity ricocheting through his bloodstream at her words. "Are you being serious?"
"Absolutely serious." Grace paused briefly and released a thoughtful breath. "This is such an unusual situation, Boyd….We need to process it separately before we even think about discussing it together."
He exhaled derisively though he failed to completely eradicate the note of admiration from his tone. "You're always the damned voice of reason, aren't you?"
She laughed. "Would you rather discuss it now?"
"God, no."
"Well, then."
He breathed out in a rush of frustration, the residual arousal flickering through his veins mingling uncomfortably with a lingering sense of guilty uncertainty, and her name had left his lips before he could engage the instinctive suppression. "Grace?"
She had turned on to her side away from him but twisted her head back in his direction, frowning at the darkening edge to his voice. "What?"
"I didn't…set out with the intention of…."
"I know."
"I really was just trying to get you warm."
"I know, Boyd."
"Good. So long as you don't think I'm the type to take advantage of a defenceless woman in the dark."
She grinned at the teasing lilt to his voice. "Oh, you're absolutely the type…."
He nudged her playfully with his elbow. "Come on…."
"…but luckily for you I'm hardly defenceless."
"True." He smiled, unable to prevent himself from turning towards her anew, relief settling across his shoulders as he felt the warmth now coiling in enticing waves from her slender body and he yawned lazily, the siren call of sleep beginning to edge into his eyes. "Wake me up at noon with a coffee and a bacon sandwich, would you?"
Grace gave a gentle snort. "I'll just magic them from my handbag, shall I?"
"Wouldn't be a bad way to wake up, Grace, is all I'm saying."
"Hm. I think this might constitute 'talking about it', don't you?"
"A coffee and a bacon sandwich?"
She rolled her eyes at the feigned innocence of his tone. "Layers within layers, Boyd. I know exactly what you meant."
He gave another exaggerated yawn, ignoring the surge of exasperation rolling in his chest, the perpetual impediment to their mutual honesty. "Whatever. Let's just try and salvage some sleep, eh?"
"Sounds like a good idea."
They descended into a strained silence, Grace tempering a sigh as she mused the ease with which the atmosphere between them was, and had always been, capable of shattering, of disintegrating within the blink of an eye. God…one minute we're on the verge of a seriously misguided fumble and the next….The next, what? He tries in his ham-fisted way to tell me how he feels and, leaving aside the circumstances, I point-blank refuse to entertain it? Christ, a decade of being in love with the man and that's how I choose to react to the fact that apparently, unbelievably, he wants me too? She released the pent-up lungful of air in an unrestrained rush, feeling him shift onto his back beside her. I'm sure it'll all look completely different in the morning, at any rate, and once we've got some distance the rationality is bound to follow. We'll chalk it up to sleep-deprivation, hypothermia, low blood sugar, and we'll move on. The way we always do. The way we always have to. Swallowing the sudden, aching lump in her throat, she forced her eyes to close, preternaturally aware that sleep would prove to be agonisingly elusive.
TBC
