A/N: Backstory time.... This is part one of the backstory. This is going to take awhile..... Please be aware that this chapter has Key Lime Pie in it. It's not as robust as I usually write, but I am bumping this story on up to M to be safe. I pretty much figured this one would get there.....
To dare is to lose one's footing momentarily. To not dare is to lose oneself. ~Soren Kierkegaard
They'd just been eating lunch. Marshall had seen that damn tan line on her finger, and when it had finally registered as she'd pulled that hideous ring out of her pocket and slapped it down on the table as if it were something she were being arrested for, he thought he would simply stop breathing right there. A tingling cold had started in the middle of his chest and spread from head to toe in sweeping waves as he'd stared at the little circle of shiny metal and pressurized carbon atoms that rocked so gently on the Formica of the diner tabletop.
He'd wanted to dash it aside with his hand the way one might do with something hazardous that had suddenly appeared to close to him or her, simply sweep it away with a quick gesture. He had, of course, instead, wound up with the ostentatious thing stuck on his own ring finger, plaything of the gods that he was.
Every time he'd looked down, he'd felt the stabbing of both the painful tightness of the ring and a second echo around his heart as he looked at the overly-elaborate confection Raph had bought for her. Marshall knew Mary wouldn't like it at all but would wear it all the same. It was too much for a woman who worked with, even fought to stay alive with, her hands every single day. Didn't he notice that she rarely even wore earrings other than basic studs? What possessed that idiot to buy her such a gaudy bauble? Did he have to stake such an overt claim on her? It reminded him of a dog marking its territory....
After the case was all over and his hand was his own again, he'd made his decision. He'd raised his glass, looked her right in the eyes, and in front of Eleanor and Stan, in front of God and Country, told her he'd loved her. He'd seen her narrow her eyes and look at him sideways, unsure, uneasy, trying to pretend he didn't mean what she knew, deep inside that place where she couldn't lie to herself, he really meant. She was, however, an Inspector Marshal, and she knew shit from shinola when she chose to make those sorts of judgment calls. She could decide for herself what to do with this newfound knowledge, whether she was going to sweep it under a rug and pretend that it hadn't been said, or at least, not really meant, or whether there was going to be anything more to it than that.
He had the oddest feeling of totally hopeless freedom that night. He didn't regret telling her at all...at least not then. The regret would come later.
---
The change in her was subtle. He'd caught her eying him with that same watchful stillness several times over the next few days, that same sideways glance, head cocked, eyes slightly narrowed, mouth twisted up at the corner. He'd meet her look, curious, and she'd just hold it for a moment, then go back to whatever it was that she was doing. It unsettled him. He felt a little like something being stalked by a very nervy jungle cat.
She'll have this conversation when she's ready. I'm not saying another damn word.
He resolutely focused his attention, all of it, on the computer screen. But he found himself helplessly watching her fingers twining in the cord of her phone as she called to make preliminary arrangements for one of her witness's son's school enrollment a little while later.
Across the office, a throat cleared. Eleanor was watching him with a knowing and somehow sad smile from her desk. He looked up at her, startled, and he felt the color start to flood his cheeks. His eyes darted back to Mary and she was looking directly at him, pinning him with her golden gaze.
---
Perhaps what happened next, then, was inevitable. Mary and Marshall had to transport a witness to meet with a team in Texas. At the drop-off point, a dusty, left-over, after-thought of a town, though, they were ambushed by a small but impeccably professional hit-squad from the opposing team, and everyone involved had to fight for it to survive.
Mary and Marshall survived, mostly due to their innate sense of partnership, that unteachable, untrainable way they anticipated each other and knew without telling each other what to do and when to best assist the other and get out of the way when that was what was most useful, too. They kept their witness alive by hiding her inside the long-since defunct freezer of an old, shutdown concrete block grocery store and taking their stand behind its sturdy marble, oak, and steel deli counter, a relic of bygone days. The glass windows shattered and the metal shelves of the old store pinged as stray bullets hit around them, but Mary and Marshall were fairly well-protected.
By the time the backup U.S. Marshals and the Texas Rangers had arrived to assist them, four people were dead and five wounded, mostly superficially, including Mary and Marshall. One of the Texas Marshals was being airlifted to the nearest medical center for a serious gunshot wound. One of the hit men lay in a pool of his own blood just outside the doors to the grocery, a bullet from Marshall's Glock in him, dead eyes staring up at a rusting metal sign of the Sunbeam Bread girl whose cheery smile was undimmed by the spectacle before her. Another lay just outside a window in the cracked parking lot, a neat headshot by Mary having ended his attempt to shoot them through the opening.
Texas took possession of the witness, and Mary and Marshall watched as she was whisked away, her wide, wet, and frightened eyes one of the last things they'd ever see of her. Throughout the gunfight, they'd heard her, a devout Catholic, praying her rosary over and over in the echoing chamber of the old freezer. She lifted her hand and pressed it against the glass in a gesture of parting to Mary and Marshall from the window of the Expedition. They could see she still had the rosary draped across the hand, the round glossy black beads making indentations into her palm. From somewhere, they summoned up enough energy to wave back, to wave farewell....
When it was time for them to leave, they found that their vehicle had been sabotaged quite deliberately by the hit men and rendered undriveable. The Texas officers took them to the nearest town of any size and dropped them at a hotel with promises that they would get them a vehicle in the morning. Mary and Marshall had just leaned against each other, too weary to do more than that.
Now Mary stood aimlessly in the lobby, trying not to think about how much the huge bleeding gouge on her shoulder was hurting her under her jacket. She had deliberately dodged the medical unit, her only wish to get away as fast as possible from the dead man under the sign with the happy little golden-haired girl. She could feel a small trickle of blood run down her back. Moments later, Marshall was back with a rueful expression on his face.
"What? That's your 'there's a problem' face. And there so doesn't need to be another problem right now."
"Not a problem per se. More like a potential inconvenience." He held up his hand to show the little paper envelope that room keys came in. There was only one. He was balanced lightly on his feet in order to escape if she swung.
It was tempting, but she was too tired, and it wasn't his fault anyway. This town was in the middle of some kind of local annual festival, and it was packed full of tourists. She'd seen Marshall slap his badge down on the countertop of the registration desk, a behavior she might indulge in frequently but something he almost never did, and she knew that he'd already bumped somebody out of a room just to get the single key he held. She could not claw at him for this. She sighed. "Of course. Everything else has been totally screwed this trip. Why not? Come on. It's not like we haven't done this before."
---
Marshall opened the door and they stepped inside. The room was clean and neat, the furnishings were new, but there was only one bed. Granted, it was a large bed.... Mary looked at it and back at Marshall. She was watching him sideways again.
"What? I told you it was the best I could do...." His voice was full of weariness and frustration until he looked at her face again.
A snicker escaped her despite her best efforts to contain it.
"Ah, now, that's just low. You're not angry?"
She drew back and lightly punched him in the side, "Idiot."
He winced far more than her light blow warranted and staggered slightly.
"Let me see it." She dropped her bag carelessly and pushed him toward the bed.
"It's nothing. Really. I'll get it when I get out of the shower."
"Now. Or I'll strip you myself."
He summoned up a suggestive leer. "That's my girl. Nothing goes with a little violence like a little.... oooopphh" The last of his words were cut off as she shoved him, albeit gently, to sit down on the bed.
"The shirt, Marshall, the shirt."
He stared at her, and for a minute, they had a brief and furious battle of the wills. Then he sighed and began to try to do what she asked. She helped him remove the jacket and she saw the rip down the side, tracing along his ribs, wet and glistening where some flying debris had grazed him during the action.
"Damn it, Marshall...." Her hands flew to the injury, gently probing.
"Take it easy. If it had been serious, I would have let the EMTs see to it. I don't have this grand phobia that some people seem to have. It's just a big ugly scratch, basically."
"The shirt, goddamn now, or I will be ripping it off you and not in that way you dream about."
He smirked and started working buttons. "How the hell would you know what I dream? And why do you keep assuming that all my dreams have to have something to do with you?"
"Oh, I don't think they center on me entirely," she said absently, focused now on the wound that was being revealed to her eyes. She dug in her bag for her first aid kit, got out some disinfectant and some cotton balls, began to clean the area. He hissed lightly as the liquid began to sterilize the area, and she laid a gentle hand against his side, looked up to meet his eyes briefly, her thumb tracing lightly in apology for the sting.
She's only ever gentle, only ever soft, when there's blood on the ground. She can only show that she cares when one of us is wounded... Ah, Mare....
"Well, just so long as your ego is in the right place...." He tried to focus on something other than the pain, other than her capable hands repairing the damage done to him.
She looked up at him and smirked, arch. "Do you ever really have to worry about my ego, Marshall?"
And he couldn't resist it. He reached out traced just the tips of his fingers over her cheekbone, tucked her hair behind her ear. Said it soft, husky, because his voice seemed to pitch itself that way without his being able to help it, "I worry about all of you all the time, Mare. That's what I'm here for." Their eyes locked and her hands froze on his side where they were finishing up cleaning out the wound and applying a waterproof bandage.
Then his fingers finished their motion and settled lightly on her shoulder. Her face flickered into a grimace of pain. His eyes shot to her shoulder and he quickly but gently pulled her up to sit next to him on the bed.
"Do we need to go through the whole song and dance, or are you going to let me see to it?"
She smiled, but it wasn't very convincing. "Sort of would be hypocritical at this point, wouldn't it?"
"Yeah. More than a little."
"Hell." She sighed and tried to remove her jacket. Her shoulder had begun to stiffen up from its injury, and she looked at him with irritation and embarrassment in her eyes.
Without saying a word, he helped her slip the jacket off. What he saw underneath made him wish he could go back to that little nothing of a town and kill more of them. They hurt her. They caused this pain to her. She's been bleeding like this for hours. This jacket was a loss. He'd throw it away stealthily in the morning if she wouldn't. The lining was completely bloodsoaked and some things a person didn't need to be reminded of. Her shirt had large bloodstain on it, too, and it would need to be tossed as well.
She looked back over her shoulder at him. "How bad does it look? 'Cause it feels like hell."
His lips quirked, but he knew it didn't reach his eyes. "More or less the same from this angle, too. I'm going to need to see the wound itself to see if you need stitches."
She groaned and leaned over, placed her head on her knees. "Don't say the 'S' word, Marshall. No hospitals, no needles, no stitch-happy doctors for me today, please."
He gently pulled up her shirt, baring her back to him. "Let's see what we have. I'm not making any promises I can't keep."
No, she thought idly, you never do that, do you? You must be the only person I know, then.... There was something terribly appealing about that, wasn't there?
She sat up as he set about pulling the shirt the rest of the way off. He used it to wipe away the blood from her back and what was still liquid around the cut on her shoulder. It was a clean rip, shallow, wide, nothing that would need stitches. He took up her first aid kit and prepared to sterilize the area.
"You need to hold your hair back out of the way for me if you can," he said. She obliged, using her other hand to pull the heavy curtain of her golden hair away, twisting it up and out of the way to leave her neck and shoulder free for him to work on.
She muttered a curse as the first of the liquid began to burn. He smiled, but only because he was sure she couldn't see him. When he had it bandaged and covered, he found that he was intensely aware of her. He sat just behind her, and while a moment ago, this position had just been the most convenient one to dress the wound, he was now aware that her bare back and his shirtless torso were close enough to touch, had been touching off and on for some time now and he had been reaching and stretching to treat her injury.. He was close enough to her, in fact, that if he leaned in just an inch or two, he could press a kiss to the exposed curve of her lovely neck or her now bandaged shoulder, could nuzzle her ear or catch the lobe between his teeth and give it a nip or a gentle tug. His breath sped up as images of all those scenarios crowded into his head suddenly as if some secret floodgate had been opened. His hands, so steady until just a moment ago, trembled slightly, and he laid them gently on her upper arms, squeezed softly in preparation for moving away.
Got to get her away from me. Got to get away from her before I do something stupid...stupider....
Suddenly she turned her head and looked at him over her shoulder, and the eye contact made him blink. "So you think about all of me all the time, do you, Marshall? What sorts of things do you think about when you think about all of me? Satisfy my curiosity." She shifted and somehow one of her bra straps slid down her shoulder.
His mouth suddenly went dry. That tone and...and....She's much too close, we're too close, I have to...I have to... The images in his head were carnal, graphic, sliding his hands slowly up her torso, down her, cupping, questing, her lips parting in pleasure on the sound of his name....
It occurred to him that she was waiting for an answer. He tried to gather the scattered pieces of his wits and scrape one together. There was nothing. All of his words and witty banter had deserted him. He could only say her name, "Mary...." His voice was low, hoarse. What was this she was doing now?
She shifted, turned on the bed to be half-facing him. She placed her injured arm just below his bandage, and he felt the contact as though someone had shocked him with a taser. Her eyes continued to hold his captive. He was acutely aware that they were sitting in bloody and tattered jeans, weapons still holstered, boots still on, but almost naked to the waist and that she was suddenly sinuous before him, that he was being stalked. He wasn't sure he had the power to resist this....
"Aren't you going to kiss it to make it better?" Her expression was perfectly serious, slightly challenging even.
I can't stand it. I can't stand it. If I just do this, maybe she'll let me go...Maybe I can let her go...Maybe....
With a shiver that traced through his whole frame, he leaned down and lightly, lightly pressed his lips to the bandage. Her eyes swept closed briefly.
"Is that a panacea?" He sat back, managed to find his words at last.
A tiny smile flickered, catlike, gone. "Mmm..." He felt her thumb circle slowly on his side. "You and your words....If that means makes it all better, then yeah. For just about everything, I've found." She shifted again, laid her other hand gently on his shoulder. Her tongue came out to wet her lips briefly. "Want me to show you?"
He was shaking. "Mare..."
She moved, and before he knew how to stop her, she was straddling his lap. His hands helplessly settled on her waist, unsure yet whether he should push her away or cling with determination. "I think I should show you," she said. That tone of voice is a felony. It has to be.... "After all, you're hurting too, aren't you, Marshall?" This was murmured inches from his mouth. One of her hands was braced on his shoulder lightly, the other was cupping his cheek. "I don't want you to hurt anymore. Let me show you..."
He couldn't breathe, he couldn't think, he couldn't do anything except watch that beautiful mouth descend on his. And then she was kissing him.
---
Her first kiss was gentle, not teasing because she did not tease, but surprisingly delicate from this hammer-down, all-out woman. She felt Marshall trembling as she softly brushed her lips against his, again, again, with no change in the intensity or the pressure. She felt his hands slide down from her waist to cup her, strong hands spanning, pulling her against him.
She felt his heart pounding against her palm, could hear the shakiness in his breathing, and it made her want to throw him down, rip open his jeans and have what was pressed so firmly against her as fast and as hard as she could take it. She moved her mouth from his and buried it in the curve of his shoulder for a moment fighting for control. His hand came up to press lightly against her back, embracing her.
When was the last time I was wanted this much? When was the last time any man fought this much need this hard? All the others would be ripping off what's left of the clothing and inside me now. But he's fighting this, fighting me, fighting himself.
Ah, by the little tiny gods there are, that makes me so hot for him I can barely stand it....
She lifted her face from his shoulder and looked him in the eyes. Those startlingly blue eyes were midnight now, and much more black than blue. They dropped down to her lips before coming back to meet hers again, helplessly revealing his thoughts to her. He shifted his hips instinctively beneath hers and she smiled in anticipation.
Because partners share the good things and the bad things, Marshall. And that is a very good thing you have there. Let me show you something bad....
She leaned down and took his mouth again. This time, there was less gentleness, less soft coaxing and more fire. He responded immediately, pulling her against him with a little groan from deep in his chest, the sound of a dying man just offered salvation. She opened her mouth, flicked her tongue against his lips, aroused and just a little amused by the depth of his response...until he slipped his tongue in to duel and dance with hers.
Sweet holy mother of all the...where the hell did he...what is he...and why l am I asking questions when I just want some more some more some more....ohyesohyes....
She felt as if she'd accidentally taken a step off a very tall tower and was falling through emptiness. She held to him, trying to get as close to him as she could, hands tugging at his hair, feeling herself pulled hard against him as if he, too, was also falling and straining for stability.
He broke the kiss this time, and she felt his mouth on her neck just below her ear, nibbling, kissing, and he began to work his way down. She simply arched back and gasped for breath, small noises of pleasure tumbling from her lips when he found the most sensitive spots on her neck and paused there. His hands cruised slowly up her body to cup her breasts over the bloodstained remnants of her white satin bra.
And it's the blood that's stopping me, he thought. Why are you doing this, Mare? What are you using me for? How can I tell you no now when everything I have ever dreamed of is here for me to have, to touch, to take?
He gently ran his thumbs across the peaks of her nipples, and he looked into her eyes. Hers slid closed in pleasure, and he leaned forward to press a kiss on her lips.
But it's going to be some kind of lie if I take you this way, something less than what I really want. So...
Then his hands were gone, back to her waist where they remained, still except for those thumbs which didn't seem to be able to stay still. She could feel them against her skin just above the waistline of her jeans.
Her eyes opened. "Marshall," her voice was a low growl. "There had better be a goddamn spectacularly good reason you quit." She rocked against him gently, watched his face tighten up, and felt his hands on her hips grip hard. She leaned in to fill his ear with her breath, "'Cause, believe me, I know you're not done yet." She sent one of her hands trailing lightly down his chest between them. He caught it before it got past his navel and twined it with his own. His fingers were shaking.
"Mare, why are you doing this?"
She looked at him, incredulous. "You're asking? You never heard that old saw about gift horses?"
He smiled just a little, didn't let go of her hand. "I know. Having you like this here and trying to use my brain makes me the world's stupidest man. I freely admit it."
"And I'll happily get you a trophy tomorrow... Meanwhile..." She reached behind her and deftly unfastened her bra with the hand he wasn't currently holding. This should get his attention. Come on. Get back in the game. I need you, Marshall. Sure enough, his eyes were riveted to the now-exposed swells of her cleavage as her bra slowly slid down.
"You have no tan lines," he said irrelevantly, and then he shook his head as though he'd been hit hard and was dazed.
"Private pool, backyard lawnchairs," she said with a wicked grin. "You should come over some time." She took the hand he was gripping and brought it to the exposed swell of her breast, laid their combined fingers together over it. "You could help me make sure I get the sunblock....everywhere...."
His fingers slipped from hers to touch, but the motion wasn't what she was used to. It was gentle, almost delicate. No grab and squeeze from Marshall. He touches me like I'm made of glass, like...like...I'll shatter if he's not careful. And oh God, I might.... His caresses were soft, sweet, and they made her feel like something priceless. He had a look of something like wonder on his face, and she reached up to touch his cheek softly.
When he cupped the weight of her in his palm, she filled his hand perfectly. His thumb teased and circled her nipple gently, and she murmured his name, arching her back. He looked at her face, and with a soft hungry sound, he lowered his head. She felt the heat of his mouth, his tongue as he leaned her back, and she twined her fingers in his hair to keep him there. Her hips rocked against his as he suckled her.
"Please, Marshall, need you," she panted. "Now, dammit. Don't make me wait anymore." She met his mouth with her own, and she pushed him back toward the bed. Their hands were suddenly frantic as weapons were unfastened, denim was stripped off and boots were kicked away. Then, without knowing how it had happened exactly, he was running a hand down her, staring at her beneath him, golden against white bedsheets, and she was wrapping one leg impatiently around his waist. He was cupping her, tangling his fingers through damp golden curls to stroke the slick center of her as she made a little sound that was both pleasure and impatience.
"Now, Marshall, or so help me!" Her voice broke as he sank a finger deep inside her, plunged, on the next stroke added a second. Her back arched.
He leaned down next to her ear, whispered harshly, "Or you'll what? Tell me, Mare....or you'll what?" His thumb circled the swollen bud of her, sliding, sliding. He watched her eyes go blind. He held her as the orgasm took her under, hard, fast, a secret undertow ripping her off her feet and taking her far out away from land.
When she knew where she was again, she became aware of him holding her, of the length of him still hard, still pressed against her.
"Marshall, you didn't, you haven't...." She turned to look at him over her shoulder, and he leaned down and kissed her, hard, fast, and with an edge of desperation to it.
"No. I didn't. I haven't." He moved to get up from the bed. "And I'm not going to."
She fought off the languor the orgasm had left. "What the hell, Marshall? What are you talking about?" She grabbed him before he could go, pinned him. He turned his head away.
"Mare, you need to let me go."
"Not until you explain yourself. I... we... you...and then you're going to get up and walk away like that? Didn't you understand that this offer was mutual? Didn't you understand that I want you?"
He sighed. "I understood that you wanted somebody, Mare, that you needed somebody. I also understood that I happened to be the one that was handy. Like you said, you needed somebody to kiss it and make it better, the gunfight, the corpses, the witness and her rosary, that squalid little town, all of it. I know what you needed. It's okay."
She felt herself go very, very still. I don't like this. I don't like this at all. I may even be pissed about this because I think he's right about this, and I don't like what this makes me, and I don't like that he knew this about me and I didn't....
She looked at him lying there beside her, his face so open, so honest, somehow suddenly so beautiful, and something inside her clenched uncomfortably. He reached out and tucked her hair behind her ear again, that same gesture he'd made earlier when he'd told her that he worried about all of her all the time, and then he got up. She let him. He headed into the small bathroom and she heard the shower come on.
But he's too worked up not to have some relief. And it's not right to leave him to suffer alone, to the discipline of cold water,to the frustration of waiting, or to the dubious pleasures of his own hand.
A pair of lines from Romeo and Juliet started chasing through her head, a fragment from her forgotten high school dramatic career: "Oh, wilt thou leave me so unsatisfied?" / "What satisfaction canst thou have tonight?"
He gave you satisfaction. He took care of you. Her body still hummed from it, her toes curling.
"Oh, wilt thou leave me so unsatisfied?"
He's in that shower now. He couldn't possibly run away from you in the shower. And you need to get clean, too, you know.
"What satisfaction canst thou have tonight?"
She stood up, strode to the door, walked in. He hadn't bothered to close it. There was no steam. Cold water. I could have laid money down on it. My little monk Marshall. Hopefully you're not too far gone to revive just yet.
She pulled back the corner of the curtain to see him leaning against the wall, back to the chilly spray, eyes closed, body shivering slightly. She reached down, adjusted the water temperature.
"Mare, don't. I can't keep telling you no forever." There was an edge of desperation to his voice.
"Then why the hell don't you quit trying?"
As the water warmed, she slipped in, wrapped her arms around him. His arms came around her convulsively.
She kissed him, and he kissed her back, that same despair underlying the kiss. Steam began to fill the small bathroom as she gently took the soap from the little ledge and with a washcloth thoroughly washed them both. She took the time to really look at him for the first time. He was lovely, this partner of hers, tall and slender, the power of him concentrated in his shoulders and his thighs. He was built like the swimmer, like the runner that he was, and she explored the subtle carvings of his muscles. He stood still, allowing her to do as she willed. Blood and dirt washed away, spiraling down the drain.
God, we should have done this first. Better to be clean. Better to start clean.
His body was still erect for her, still straining into her touch. She finished washing him and simply held him close for a time. She could feel him against her belly, hard, perfect, and she felt her own desire stir again.
She stroked down his flat abdomen gently, softly. His hands were on her shoulders, avoiding the injured area. He simply left them there, grounded birds.
"Touch me, Marshall," she whispered. "It's okay."
"Mare, I..."
With a soft sound, he brought his hands back down to her breasts, cupped them, kneaded them gently. Against her, his erection pulsed and grew.
"What satisfaction canst thou have tonight?" Any kind you want, Marshall. Any kind you'll let me give you. Almost there. Almost there. I won't leave you unsatisfied, gentle man...
Her hands finished their slow tour of his flat belly and slipped through the dusky trail of hair that led to him. She slid her hands around the shaft, and he jumped slightly and sighed, buried his face in her neck. She began to work him with firm, unhurried strokes, and for a time he simply stood and let her touch him. She felt him kiss her neck from time to time, and she knew he was fighting an internal battle of some kind.
To hell with this. I can help you win this war, Marshall. We'll both win.
She pressed him gently back against the wall and she kissed his chest, her hand still stroking, caressing. Her next kiss came lower, nearer the bandage he wore on his ribs. Her next flickered her tongue into his navel, and his eyes flew open. She smiled up at him, sinking down onto her knees in the warm spray of the shower.
"Kiss it and make it all better, right? It's my turn."
His hands slid helplessly into her hair.
"You don't have to do this..."
Exactly.
The first swipe of her tongue across him had him stuttering. The third made him obscene. The fifth took him beyond words all together as she drew him deep and kept him there until he was gone, knees going out and folding until he, too, knelt beneath the spray, embracing her, kissing her as if to stop would be to die.
Okay, part one of the backstory complete. This ain't all folks, but I think you can see how this might confuse somebody and sort of gum up the works a bit if she's still a marryin' Raph....