'Seriously. We've had flirting,puking, bickering, fighting, fighting, fighting and more jealousy than you can shake a stick at.

The time is ripe for some excruciatingly nauseating fluff of hideous proportions. No half-assed fluff, but fluff, fluffier than a fluffy pink giggling honey-bunny in a peachy fuzzy angora cardigan and a tiara made of candy and lollipops. So please don't throw up on this fic.

And if you happen to be a delicate, sensitive soul - I suggest you just skip by all this crap and read someone else's, something decent. - Lot's of god fics out there.'

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It's no accident

"If the person you are talking to doesn't appear to be listening, be patient. It may simply be that he has a small piece of fluff in his ear."

- Winnie the Pooh -

Nothing.

Absolutely nothing – is what he says.

He just leaves. She hears the shlosh-shlosh of his humid feet against the floor, a little like tentacles letting go. The mute, unspoken hurt in his footsteps echoing against naked tiled walls, and then the heavy door that shuts behind him. Not a word. Nothing. No reaction. He just leaves.

Shit.

The water is growing colder, the warmth rapidly evaporating. But she can't make herself get out of the shower. She just stands there in the surreal fluorescent light. Letting the chilly water gush over her.

Shit…..

She is so stupid, so incredibly, ludicrously stupid. Hitting him pang boom in the middle of his soft defenseless underbelly. Hugo's skin - thinner than an apricot at the very best. Moron! She scrapes herself up enough to turn the valve of the faucet off. As she stretches for her thin Dharma issue terrycloth towel on its simple hook, the door opens again. Her heart momentarily soars.

All hope is not lost. They can talk.

After all it isn't a big thing - not huge. Just a little wayward slip of the lips, more Lara's than hers, to tell the truth. She doesn't really swing that way, hot as Mrs. Chang might be.

-

The footsteps.

Different.

Lighter, brisker.

She freezes up. Stiffly clutching the towel in front of her, scanty and ineffective shield as it is. The steps moccasin-soft now. Like someone deliberately slinking up.

Barbara? Or that creep - Ceccherini?

An unfathomable terror grasps her and she instinctively flattens herself back, slick against the wall. Paralyzed with the stone-cold, glossy ceramic against her damp skin.

Please go away!

-

Pow. Someone rounds the corner and her heart stops. Ambushed by a nondescript Dharma overall - roughly colliding with her bare skin and useless terrycloth buffer. A potentially blood curling scream, trapped in her throat, and her mouth grotesquely ajar in a shriek that never materializes.

Something's familiar about….

She struggles to rear the galloping blind panic back in. It dawns on her that she is ensnared and glued up to the wall, nose to nose with…

The sneaky bastard!!!

She is thrown. – fumbling, realigning to get her bearings back.

Here? On Hydra!?

She struggles to digest the reality of him here, edgy flammable, and in her face. The baffling, aggressive provocation of his stance. Too close. Too much. Too weird.

What is he doing here?

In an inconspicuously furtive move, he snakes both of his hands down. Artfully catching her wrists, restraining them down by her flanks. Not hurting her but not caring if he does either. Palms like warm toffee against her slippery wet coolness. The coarse fibers of his overalls against the delicate skin above her towel. And he just stands there - in an alarming proximity. If anything he edges closer still. Unfeasibly close. Staring her down as if he'd like to flame-grill her. Black and scorching. Grumpy and irrationally combustible at the same time.

What the hell is his problem?

She allows herself to take him in properly. Damn! He is a right eyesore. Like he has fallen asleep and woken up in a barrel of sardines – angry martial art, ass-kicking sardines. Spiteful inky eyes sporting the two most extravagant shiners ever seen this side of professional boxing. An outrageous range of colors from deepest indigo to lightest lime yellow. As if someone has tap-danced all over his ugly face wearing steel spiked golf shoes. Knowing him - someone probably has.

His salt and pepper hair stands up in wild cowlicks and might as well have been styled with congealed gravy from the way it looks. Swarthy scarce stubble covers a small section of his stubborn chin and above his sullen mouth. The mouth. That dreadful sumptuous mouth, deep depressions at its corners. With the split bottom lip – and the upper one - implausibly sweet and crescent-shaped. Shit. She can't even go there.

So close. She can smell - no - savor him. His fragrance, puckish and ambrosial, all at once. That heady combination of nutmeg and ginger fudge. Of heat and of an unspoken dare. He doesn't budge a fraction. Obstinately, in her face. Boring down on her with an absurdly, illogical animosity as if she's personally, and single-handedly, to blame for both world terrorism and global warming.

Speak. Say something. Diffuse….

" What, what are you doing here?..." she manages. " On Hydra?" Needlessly wanting to clutch the towel to her, tucking it in closer. Protect herself.

He has some nerve!

"What do you think - just dropping by?! Was voted off freakhog island with the rest of you of course. " Awkwardly gruff and glowering like it is all her fault..

He purses his lips. - Impossibly plump and raspberry sauce red.

Much as she tries to resist can't help staring. His cinnabar mouth. Her downfall. Sweet Madeira infused cherries and honey, now with a perfect gash in the middle. She doesn't know what it is about them – this affliction. Maybe the amount of cruel arrogant bullcrap that these lips have uttered in their days. Maybe it is her stupid, dreams. In any case – it is deeply disturbing.

He smirks as if he can hear every fucked-up thought in her head. Loud and clear - like he has first row, VIP seats, with a full blaring audio system announcing this crap out specifically. Shit. She hates that about him. The getting in under her skin, into her mind.

" You like? " he exhales, hot breath tickling her face. He stares back at her unflinchingly, hardly blinking. Black, derisive and volatile. Like he might spontaneously ignite at any given moment. Dark licorice and lemon sherbet fizz.

" Pffft, hardly!" Badly feigned nonchalance. Doesn't fool him one bit. Never did.

Hates him. - Wants him.

" Ha. Still… - you're always checking me out," he says, eyes almost punching her out. They glimmer, a naughty pitch black somewhere in the middle of the bruising and the twirls of color. How in the world does he keep his cool?

" And so,.. you're always staring at me!"

An embarrassingly pathetic attempt at getting back that falls flat on its face. She regrets it the moment she says it. Impossible to throw out witty one-liners with his lean mischievous body crushed up against her, his lips inches away. Oh, god. He knows. He always knows.

" Maybe 'cause you're a total exhibitionist!"

He cocks his head. Mercurial cool cat grin. Looking slightly crooked and categorically insane, he swipes a sassy nod towards her paltry excuse for a towel. She clenches her armpits tighter against her body and the flimsy terrycloth, faded and washed threadbare into a pale nondescript color.

Damn pervert.

She wasn't planning on saying anything but before she can stop herself, she blurts out, in a meek, pathetic little girls voice:

" Why didn't you come? The other night?"

She sounds like a victim. Someone who gets stood up. Well – she did. The humiliation; excruciating and raw.

" I was there. Got an eyeful of the bouncy freckled twins too while you were submerged in booze. " Arrogant dip of his chin indicating her breasts with a snappy raise of sardonic eyebrows.

Christ. Un-fucking-believable. Slam-packed, bursting, full to the brim of one hundred per cent drivel! The kind of crap that spatters out of that snide potty-mouth of his….

" Ok, smartass - if you were there - what was I wearing for our big date?" Ha, ha, got you there!

" Ha, trick question - I like the way you think! You were wearing a stinky jumpsuit unbuttoned Elvis style to your bellybutton - letting both of the glorious jiggly twins play outdoors."

Damned Dharma issue vodka!

Her face, bright claret red while the maddening distraction of his thumbs sweeping her arms in small circles is making her blood fizzle. Baiting, Teasing, brushing her fidgety wrists with his smooth, softly padded thumbs. His grip solid, not giving her the slightest chance to yank her hands. Damned Miles. Evil son of a bitch! And damn heart for jostling in her chest like an excited sparrow.

He came. He was there, it chirps.

" So - you got to ogle my boobs. Big deal Miles. Something for your teenage brain to doddle with when you are all alone picking at your pimples." Looser!

" Big fat chance of that. All I can picture right now is your puked-down wiggly fun-bags in LaFleur's big sleazy paws."

Pah-paw! Hitting back quicker than a cobra strikes. He looks down at her, unflappable, a vexing, belittling little half grin playing at the edge of his mouth. He just wants to flip her lid – oh he's so enjoying this. She knows this – and still - she can't stop herself from being drawn in.

" What?! What are you on about Miles?"

What the hell is he talking about? The sordid, repulsive image already burned into her psyche. She's got no idea what he's up to but she is aware of the eventuality that he might be onto something. Since honestly, she recalls absolutely zero - zilch - from night in question.

" Are you with him?" The blatant question, a buckshot in passing, catches her palpably off guard. She doesn't get it. Doesn't follow.

" What? Who?" Shaking her head in utter and flat-out incredulity.

" The big-wig. Jimbo, Jimmy-boy my man. Mr. hot-shot boss-man LaFleur! Who else?!" he blows hotly. Incomprehensively peeved and worked up.

What has he been smoking? Frankly, she has no idea how to answer that. With him? How? Where? He's with Barbie for god' sake! And she is here, cast off on a polar beer island, miles and miles away from both the security head and civilization. With him? A truly mind-blowing question.

.

.

And before she has time to collect herself enough to reply, someone enters the shower area. She recognizes Hugo's trundling footsteps. He only takes a few inside the door. Stops there. She thanks her lucky star that both she and her assailant are invisible from behind her cubicle. They stand there, hardly daring to breathe. Hands clasped to their sides like a prim Victorian couple.

"Kate! You still here?"

"Yeah, yeah Hugo….I'm here!"

Hugo permits himself a loud mournful, defeated sigh. As if he'd rather not have found her. She can hear him switching feet, shuffling slightly against the floor. Gathering strength to face her. To say what he's got to say.

" Look Kate, sorry to storm out like that….but….I've got to talk to you.."

" It's ok Hugo…I'm, I am sorry too.."

" No it's not ok Kate. Dude it is s-o n-o-t fine. I am so mad at you, I could just , I

could just … I don't know what to do!!! "

" Yeah, I get that …I'm…" she mumbles though she doesn't get it at all. Not really. Unable to take the usually jovial and seemingly shallow Hugo quite seriously. Unable to fully empathize with him.

" I used to have your back, you know. During the whole screwing around, messing about with Sawyer and the doc saga. All that crap, leading them on and playing them against each other. You know - plenty of people called you a bitch behind your back."

Bitch!? What the ….?! But, yeah, people do say the darnest things. He doesn't wait for her reply - just continues. Seemingly in a hurry to get it all out before he regrets it.

"I used to feel sorry for you like, for being such a goof-up. And I defended you! Always did. But you know, you really are something Kate….really a piece of work dude! You just trample all over other people Kate!"

"Yeah…I'm so sorry Hugo….I really didn't mean to..."

Miles eyes on her, so close they are effectually blurred, blistering. Painfully intense.

She pulls her hand free to place her fingers up against his lips. Oh, crap. Would it have been any other time… He ignores her and takes charge of her hand, removing it from his mouth. Nudges even closer to her. Sandwiching her against the shiny wet tiles, he angles his head and burrows his face in the crook of her neck.

Oh.

Wrangling with him, trying to distance herself from that. No, no, no, no. Anything but that. Asshole! That spot, the biggest chink in her armor.

And how the hell does he know? The bastard.

Some one has definitely kissed and told. She fumes as she considers the likely suspects. Probably Sawyer with his big yapping flapping mouth, But she wouldn't put it beyond Jack either.

Damn. She can clearly discern his smile against her neck. Wicked and goading. This is just entertainment to him – just a mean little game. Just wants to see how far he can go before she beats the living daylight out of him.

" Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just wanted to say….I know you're having a tough time with Jules and Sawyer and all but… "

" Didn't mean to…" She interrupts but doesn't manage to finish. He cuts her off, his cracked voice harsh and sore, and very obviously wounded.

"I know it's pretty shitty right now….but still. That's not an excuse! Dude, what the hell?!! What the fuck?! You could have had anybody…still you had to…

" I didn't think. It just happened…. I really didn't think." she mumbles. Not used to this Hugo - the furious, cussing Hugo.

Miles.

His lips against her throat. She can't stand it. His breath on her neck, in her ear. She can't help inhaling. His hair right there near her face. And in spite of it looking sullied and filthy like it was washed and soaked in beef-juice, the scent is inebriating. Like clean linen hung out to dry on a sweltering, late summer day. Shit!

Focus Kate - focus!

She takes another stab at loosening his iron-grip on her hands. Impossible. He doesn't give her an inch. What the hell does he want? She can't think straight. It is impossible. Warm cinnamon mocha against her. Adjoined in a quasi embrace by the sheer weight of his torso backing her up to the wall. Like hanging out with an unhinged homemade Molotov cocktail squashed up against you. She has no idea what he is up to. No idea what he is playing at.

" Dude, maybe you should have! Maybe for once you should have thought before you did something!"

The big gentle guy sounds like he is on the verge of crying now. She can't believe it. Over one little stupid kiss. That meant less than nothing. A silly misunderstanding. But Miles releases her there and then, letting some air seep in between them and the instance he steps away, she finds herself missing him. The smell of him. The pressure.

She is suddenly vulnerable, feeling the contempt behind Miles' retreat. As if she had just revealed to have a penchant for bludgeoning cuddly baby seals to death with a spiky club. Though come to think of it, what the hell is there to like about her? She has managed to bring the finest man on earth to tears. It's like being responsible for making the Dalai Lama bawl his eyes out. It's just not something you do.

" I know, I am so sorry Hugo…" Useless repetition of meaningless words. She doesn't know what else to say. She is mostly just sorry she told him. The kiss, she still doesn't feel she had anything to do with it. Lara was the aggressor and she was just an easy prey. But she can't say this to Hugo, not about his beloved. Shit. Not daring to look at Miles' stiff posture in front of her. She find herself wanting him back, thrust against her. Breathless.

" Yeah man, – some self-control would be nice for a change!"

Her undivided concentration on Hugo. She tries to block out the distraction of Miles' ugly, gorgeously ugly, butterscotch face.

And just like that, in an unguarded millisecond, Miles executes some sneaky-ass brazen kung-fu move on her, whipping his nimble fingers by. She barely has a chance to register it before her towels falls down around her hips. She can't help letting out a little gasp.

"Hmmff!"

" Good thing I don't have to see your face… 'cause dude I can't even stand the thought of you right now, I'm so pissed Kate!"

The dirty little swine!

" Oh…oh" she can't speak.

Damn Miles to hell and back! The pervy son of a bitch.

Quick and lithe as a demon he glides back in audaciously, catching her flighty hands, solid grip on her wrists. Holds them there, preventing her from tugging the towel back up. Her breast, cushiony vanilla cream exposed, rammed against the scuffing fabric of his uniform. And there it is. The tease. His capricious little victory - triumphing over her. He loves the fact that with Hugo here, there is nothing she can do. Rendering her decidedly incapacitated and powerless to bash his cheeky-ass head in.

Crap. Crap. She can't have this. None of it!

" I just don't know Kate. I know you have your problems and all but this is way beyond that. Totally unbelievable…and I thought you were my buddy … really did."

" All the same, know that I am sorry Hugo. For the for everything… so sorry."

Desperately trying reach the towel, to cover up. He doesn't let her. Just smiles blissfully like it is bloody D-day and his trickery alone have just won the entire war. She can't think. Deliciously hot, his heat clearly discernable through the ugly beige jumpsuit, coarse and abrasive against her chest.

The gall of him!

"Sss, 's ok. Well, no – hell no! It's not ok. From now on, just stay out of my face Kate!" Out of ammo now, he backs off, disengages. He stomps out as if to prove a point, letting the heavy door fall shut. Just what was missing.

Shit. - There goes her last friend.

And here she is, trapped by the devil himself.

He's here. For some incomprehensible reason, he is here. With her. All irrepressible cruel playfulness. She is terrified. And seriously piqued but - all the same- drawn in by his weird outlandish galvanism. The almost electrical tension he gives off. A downright mystery – an angry pissed-off charge - that she finds oddly alluring. He isn't anything special at all. Just a guy. Just a grumpy, disagreeable guy. Distant and sarcastic and unreservedly wrong for her….Well wrong like all the men before him were wrong. She knows this is her thing. She will, without fail, pick the guy she is least likely to end up having a functioning relationship with. Her mother has sure set a daunting precedent with her debilitated, screwed-up history of marriages and men.

This simpering little-girl-crush. She could kiss him right now. His lips are a flutter away and she could just lean forward. It wouldn't be so hard. What would he do? Beat her off? Say something nasty and make her feel like a brazen hussy? Yeah, most likely the latter.

She doesn't understand her fear of him, the pure terror of being ridiculed or rejected. It is a peculiarly new and foreign sensation to her. Impossible for her to stay in anything, stick with anything, but she was never afraid to take what she wanted, to make the first move. She is not sure of many things but a constant in her life, something she has always been sure of, is her own beauty. She doesn't think of it often, takes it completely for granted – it just is. God knows she has used it to get what she wants more times than she cares to think of.

But this scares her. He scares her. She doesn't know what he wants with her. Yes you do! He just wants to play a bit. He is bored and this is what he does. At your expense.

" So what was that all about?" he asks. " You making Hugo cry?" He tuts-tuts like a disappointed mother hen. He is far to slick to leave his mouth agape at the scene he has just witnessed. He pretends it is nothing. But she can see the curiosity winning over whatever fucked-up emotions he came in with.

" Oh, that," she has to force herself to keep the fluster out of her voice. Stupid, stupid crush! But if he can play it cool, so can she. At the very least she can try.

" I accidentally kissed someone."

"How do you accidentally kiss someone? Was it a hit and run or a slow burner? Did you stumble, fall down on someone, slip onto somebody's mouth – how does something like that even happen? How? " Supercilious, deliberately winding her up. He is enjoying this. Relishing in it. The leering, the teasing and the mocking.

" Well, it was an accident!" Priggish, prickly and hypersensitive. " I didn't mean for it to happen. I sort of went in for a polite peck on the cheek and ended up on the lips."

Miles wily, sly gaze searing across her naked shoulders. He leans back enough to be able to enjoy the unclad sight of her properly, maintaining their body contact low below the stomach. Hipbones meeting hipbones. Towel squashed in between them. Determinedly restraining her hands. And he just looks. Just looks at her.

What he does, he does so well.

He might as well have had his hands on her. Black cat eyes licking across her throat, lapping down to the crevice, circling a horizontal eight on her chest. They dip down her belly, brushing far down, as low as they can and then flickering back up slowly the very same route. Oomph - finally landing on her lips. She realizes she has been holding her breath too long. A little huff escapes her.

The cheek of him! What the hell does he think he is doing? She knows she could fight him. Effortlessly. She could get him with one well-aimed head-butt. She is no shrinking violet. And it wouldn't be the first time.

Why don't you do it then?

He takes in the full vision of her, naked to the waist down. Quite obviously far too delighted with the view for his own good. She squirms, tugs at her hands, trying to twist them free. She isn't prude – not really. That is mostly an act. She's got nothing to hide but this excruciatingly embarrassing puppy love. And she doesn't entirely trust herself. Not at all actually.

Here with him.

And then he smiles. At their predicament, at the sight of her halfhearted struggle. In a way she is not used to. His whole naughty feline face cracks up in an ear to ear smile, stretching his funny non-existent cupid's bow so that it looks like it is going to split in the middle.

The beauty of him right here. It unravels her.

" An accident…imagine that, " he repeats, knowing full well that he has the upper hand. The annoying gravitation towards him. She wants to kick her heels in. Resist. She bucks her back as far as it can go. Which isn't very far.

Wall pushing up against her naked back, sleek infuriating bastard from the front.

" Yes, an accident!" she says tartly. Thinking that this would have been a good moment to shove him away, aim a punch at his already broken-up face. Get away. She doesn't want this. Not him. Not now. Not ever. But there's this other woman in her head, whispering, "let your hair down – let him in – live a little. " She hates that bitch. She imagines she has Juliet's smug, self-satisfied face.

He leans forward then, defying all rationality. Defying reason. She knows this is the time to bolt, butt her forehead hard and merciless against his swollen nose, knock him senseless.

But she doesn't.

" An accident huh…?"

With that his hot mouth finds her temple, his lips delicious and dizzying, a hair's breadth away. Balmy and dulcet breath against the fine downy skin on the top of her cheek. Rounding the curve of her cheekbone, his breath on her lashes. Oh. She closes her eyes but she doesn't turn away. The hue and cry of an alarm deafening in her ears.

This is no accident.

Not ready. She doesn't know if she'll ever be. And who is he anyway? Just another man who for sure - of this there is no doubt -will break her heart a little more.

This is ridiculous. She will regret it

" Like this….?" The words, murmured, feathery breath painting a determined route across her face, down the slope of her cheek. A kiss. A lapse of judgement; all creamy vanilla and blackberries. Innocent, like her first, at the corner of her mouth.

She shouldn't do this. Mustn't.

" Or like this ….?" He glides over her lips with his. Nudges them open. Unbearable tangy sweetness and inflamed peppery fervour. She breaks and disintegrates upon impact. She can't. Still. This is no accident. She meets him . Surrenders to the taste of cayenne and of sugared lemon flowers. A delicious transgression.

It's no accident.

The soft wonder of his mouth, grazing hers. Who would have thought it would be like this? Who would have thought…..? A pendulum between fiery and sweet. She senses acutely, the basso rilievo of every little minute vertical cleft, the slightly chaffing sensation of the split bottom lip. Humid, honeyed and heated. The succulent upper half moon caressing hers. Staggeringly, knock-your-socks-off tender.

It's nothing special. Just a crush.

Don't stop. Don't.

She inhales sharply breaking the moment of apnea. She has to, the urgency, too much. Too soon. She pulls away brusquely, painfully aware of the way his whole body presses up, leans onto her in poignant perfection.

" Something like that?" he whispers oddly winded and tender, visibly out of balance.

Suddenly incongruously timid. All his smooth swagger and oomph gone.– spent just like that. He looks like a beaten puppy, hair crazily slicked whatever which way. His eyes wavering, shyly – in a way that she doesn't recognize.

" No. No it wasn't." she rebuts, indignant, all senses on fire.

Who would have thought…?

"No," she repeats. " It was nothing like that!"

.

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Nauseous yet? A marathon fluff session that is bound to run into next chapter. Sorry, got really caught up and now I can't stop… Don't hit me over the head with a pick axe, ok?.... ok?... Are we ok?...Are we?