A/N: Yay! A long one! And the plot thickens.... maybe.
Scully sat straight up in bed.
Inappropriate... she thought.
She was now very disturbed. She glanced at her shut door, took a deep breath, and got out of bed. The clock read 6:52am. She opened her door and went to the kitchen for a glass of water.
As she was drinking from her glass, her eyes wandered to Mulder's shut bedroom door.
Completely inappropriate, she told herself again.
She placed the glass in the sink. She leaned against the counter, crossed her arms, and looked at his door again.
Screw it, she thought, and marched straight over to his door.
Scully slowly cracked it open to see if Mulder was still asleep. She hoped that he was awake, but the light filtering into the room showed him laying on his back with his eyes closed. She opened the door further and tip-toed into the room. She quietly shut the door behind her. She made her way through the darkness and slipped into the bed. She turned onto her side, facing him, and shut her eyes, willing herself to fall back asleep.
She didn't really know why she was doing this, but she really wanted to be near him now. It comforted her.
"What brings you to my bed this morning, Agent Scully?" Mulder's voice suddenly broke through the silence of the room.
Her eyes snapped open. However, his eyes remained closed. She stared at him, not knowing what to say, until he opened his eyes and rolled onto his side to face her.
"Bad dream?" he asked, smiling.
"I don't know if 'bad' is the right word, but interesting might be a word that I would use to describe the dream I had last night. How was your dream?"
"Very bad. I would classify my dream as very bad. It kind of left me feeling a bit depressed."
"Hmm. Mine did not make me depressed, but it obviously made me not want to be alone."
"What did you dream about?" he asked, now very curious.
"You first."
"In a nutshell? They fought. He called her a whore. She slapped him. He left. I think that he went to propose to her. He had a ring. But I woke up too soon to see anything else."
"Mine was the opposite of yours. He did propose. She accepted. But more importantly, she figured out who the killer was."
"Really?"
"I think that you're right, Mulder. I think these dreams do mean something."
"You finally agree with me?"
"To a degree. I have a strong feeling that I'm meant to find the killer here. Don't ask me why. It's just a feeling."
"You sound like me," he pointed out, smiling.
She rolled her eyes. "I know."
"Anything else important in your dream?"
"No," she answered quickly, a little too quickly.
"Scully...?" he said in a tone that let her know that he knew that she was lying.
"I still owe you a cuddle," she changed the subject.
"I'll take that kiss that I've been begging for instead..." Mulder smiled.
She stared at him for a second, contemplating, before she ran her hand through his hair and let it rest on his cheek. She inched forward so that her lips were mere inches from his. She took in a breath of air and pressed her lips against his.
This was what he had been waiting for. The moment when Scully finally broke down her walls to him.
He deepened the kiss, rolling her onto her back. His torso hovered above hers.
"See, that wasn't too bad, was it?" he asked once the kiss ended.
"Not too bad," she replied. "I wanted to see what it felt like to really kiss you, anyway."
"You kissed me in your dream!" he realized.
"Among other things..." she muttered.
"What things?" he said, not letting her out of this one.
"They had sex in my dream."
He stared at her, speechless.
He finally found his voice. "So, basically, you're telling me that you had a dream where you had sex with me...?" he said, using what she had said to him the day before against her.
"Ummm, basically. Yeah."
Mulder took a moment to process the information that he was just given.
"So, you had the sex dream? So unfair! It would have been more beneficial for me to have had it..." He took a deep breath. "So, does that mean that you want to have sex with me?" he added hopefully.
"No!" she answered, pushing him off of her.
"Not even a little bit?"
"Mulder!" she exclaimed, getting out of the bed.
"Wait. Come back."
"I'm going to take a shower; though, apparently, you need one more than I do! A nice cold shower!"
Scully left the room, leaving the door open as a hint that he needed to get up as well.
She wants me, he thought, smiling to himself.
***
The weather had finally caught up with the season. It was a sunny, but cooler day than the previous ones. Like a true gentleman, Mulder had given his light jacket to Scully, who, even with her long-sleeved shirt, was still cold.
They were standing in the front yard of the murder victim's house with Sheriff Clark and three of his officers. Scully was brought to the home to take a look at the scene just in case she could see something that the five men had missed. This, of course, was against Mulder's wishes. He didn't want her to see all the blood, knowing what her fate could be.
"Are you ready?" the sheriff asked.
Scully nodded and entered the home. She calmly looked around. Mulder studied her body language. Seeing nothing but her usual coolness, he scolded himself for not having more faith in her to be able to handle this. She had been through worse in the past, and he knew it. Why should this be any different. But it was different. He could feel it.
"Nothing," she told them. "I don't see anything more than you all have already found. Sorry."
"Do you think that you could take a look her body? Agent Mulder told us that was your specialty," Sheriff Clark said.
"Of course. Anything to help," she said, giving them a faint smile.
The small group made their way through the town streets and to the coroner's office. They introduced Scully to the coroner, and he led her to the back room, where the body was being kept.
"Darlin', if you could could make this quick, that would be great. It would be nice to finally be able to give Claire a funeral," the coroner said, somewhat snippy, but was just being honest.
"Did you know her?" Scully asked, as she began her examination.
"Darlin', this is a small town. We all know each other. But Claire was my cousin's best friend. So, yeah. I knew her."
"I'm sorry for your loss."
"Thanks. If you could just do your job, darlin', and not have another one of my friends end up on my table, I would appreciate that. Besides, weren't you brought here to prevent any more murders? Maybe you should work harder next time."
Scully looked up at him, slightly shocked at his comments towards her. She had a feeling that he was slightly sexist. The fact that a woman was brought in to hopefully find something that he had missed definitely seemed to rub him the wrong way.
"You know, I could work a lot quicker if you could just stop talking," she shot back at him.
He made the motions of zipping his lips, locking them, and throwing the key away.
"Thanks." She gave him a fake smile and got back to work.
She had almost given up on finding anything here, too, until a slight indention on the woman's inner thigh caught her eye.
"What's this? Did you see this?"
The coroner peered over her shoulder.
"No," he simply said, though sounded surprised that she found something that he didn't see.
"It looks like a school ring or, maybe, a family crest or something like that. What do you think?" she asked, looking over shoulder at him.
He nodded.
Scully took a picture of the mark. She then took a small mold of the mark.
"Okay. That's all I've got! You may proceed with funeral preparations. Again, I'm sorry for you and your town. We will do our best to catch this guy."
Before he could reply she made her way back to the front of the office and back to the police officers and Mulder.
"Found something," she announced to them.
She handed the evidence to the sheriff.
"Do you recognize that?"
He shook his head. "No. What is it?"
"It looks like an impression of a ring. Something very easy to miss. It was located on her inner thigh," Scully explained.
"So, if we find the owner of this ring, we find our killer?" one of the officers asked.
"I think so," she replied.
"Well done, Agent Scully. Thanks. This is very helpful," Sheriff Clark told her.
"Anything to help."
"Well, I'll let you two get going. I'm sure you're famished. Hope you're not sick of our little diner!"
"Absolutely not! We love that little diner," Mulder spoke up, draping an arm over Scully's shoulders. "We're heading straight there. If you need us, we'll be around."
Scully smiled up at Mulder. He was always hungry! He was worse than a pregnant woman!
"Let's go, chunky," she said, lightly slapping his stomach.
"Hey! Don't do that. I gotta pee. AND I'm not chunky!" he defended himself, holding the door open for her.
They walked down the street. Just before they got to the diner, Mulder patted his pockets.
"Damn. I forgot my wallet," he told her.
He patted the pockets of his jacket, which Scully was still wearing. They were also empty.
"Can I pay you back?" he asked.
She smiled. "I didn't bring mine either. I was going to make you pay today."
"Really...?"
"How about you go ahead and order the food, I'll run back and get your wallet, and I'll be back in a second."
Mulder looked uncomfortable about letting her go anywhere alone, but he really had to pee and wasn't going to make it back to their room.
"Okay," he reluctantly agreed. "I'll be timing you. If you're not back in five minutes, then I'm coming after you!"
Scully rolled her eyes. "It's across the street. I doubt that it should even take five minutes."
"Okay. Okay. Go."
Mulder entered the diner. Scully jogged across the street. She made her way up the stair and to their door. She unlocked the door and ran into the room. Locating the wallet would be the hard part. She went into his room and picked up the jeans that he was wearing yesterday. She found it. Wallet, front right pocket. She ran back out, pulled the door shut behind her, and locked it.
She was making her way down the steps, when a piece of folder paper stuck under the windshield wiper of their car caught her eye. Scully looked around before slowly walking towards their car. She pulled what seemed to be a note out and held it in her hands for a second before unfolding it.
She scanned the two lines written on the paper. She quickly looked around her, spinning in a small circle. She sprinted across the street, not slowing until she was in front of the diner.
Scully entered the diner and found Mulder in what was now their usual booth. She slid into the seat next to him, which was weird because she usually sat across from him. She dropped the note on the table in front of him.
He looked at her, confused.
"Read it," she simply said.
He obeyed.
There were two sentences printed on the paper:
We'll be together. He can't keep you from me.