No true plot advancement, but there's some smut at the end.
Tim threw a few paper towels on the coffee and spared a thanks that the mug was unbroken when he put in the sink. Raylan grabbed a plate and his blueberries and sat, watching Tim clean up as Clare gathered silverware and Elizabeth shot him dirty looks, convinced Tim had cause to hit him and her baby brother could do no wrong. As is Raylan's head didn't hurt enough already.
Elizabeth supplemented her ice cream with half a steak and more yolk than fried egg before she decided it was time for bed. "I'm going to bed before I turn into a pumpkin," she announced, rising with her empty shake glass balanced on her plate, "Clare," she pecked Clare on the cheek before giving her brother half a hug and ruffling his hair with her free hand. She gave Raylan a dirty look but otherwise ignored him, as she had through the whole meal.
From the kitchen she called back, "You know what's really awesome? Someone else gets to remind Tim to do the dishes."
Tim rolled his eyes as Clare snorted and Raylan pressed his lips together. Elizabeth had dropped flirting with, or even paying much attention to, Raylan as soon as Tim had hit him. Sisterly loyalty.
Raylan and Tim were still at whatever impasse had led to the swing when Clare kissed Tim on the cheek and told Raylan good night around ten. Tim held her hand as she walked away and waited until she was all the way upstairs before saying, "Are you gonna push this?"
"It's a faster way to remove a threat. You want to wait until Moss is ready to make his move or do you want to make it for him?"
Bastard. It really sucked not being the logical one in the argument. Tim sighed.
"Clare's a tough chick. Elizabeth and I were talking about it. Just think about it for a day. Ok?"
Tim continued glaring, motionless.
Raylan finished his coffee and collected the remaining plates, letting Tim stew. He was running water over the plates before he heard Tim from the next room, "I'll talk about it with her, ok?"
He turned off the water, "All I ask. You can finish your own dishes."
"And here I was thinking you were earning your keep," Tim drawled, taking over at the sink as Raylan dried his hands.
"Hell, no," he snorted to Tim's amusement. "I like your sister," was his parting shot.
"Go ahead."
Wait a second. "What does that mean?"
Tim smiled, "I hit you. Elizabeth is many things, but no one has ever faulted her loyalty. You're not getting near my sister... Even if you say she looks like Ava Gardner."
He seemed so relaxed about it, Raylan was a little disappointed. "Fine, then. She's more of a punk-rock Barbara Stanwyck anyway."
"If I find out that's insulting after I imdb it, I'm loosening teeth."
"You're such a good widdle brother," Raylan baby talked, resulting in getting splashed by dishwater, "Call me after you talk to her."
"Yeah, yeah. Get outta here."
"I'm gone," he was at the door when Tim came around the corner to say, "Thanks, Ray."
"Return the favor sometime."
"You're a dick." Tim could hear Raylan's responding chuckle on his way out.
He let his mind wander as he loaded the dishwasher, and found himself wiping down counters when he was interrupted by Clare clearing her throat. She was, sans jeans, in the doorway with one eyebrow raised, watching him.
"What?"
"I've never seen you domestic. It's new," she smiled, leaning on the doorframe. "I thought you'd be coming back to bed. I heard Raylan leave over an hour ago."
He rinsed his hands before moving to slide them around her waist, she stopped them, intertwining their fingers, "I didn't realize it'd been so long. What is it?"
She took a deep breath, as if weighing whether or not she wanted to ask the question, "Are you going to tell me what Raylan said to make you hit him?"
He pursed his lips, "Eventually."
She nodded, seemingly satisfied, "Ok." She tugged his hand, "Coming to bed?"
"Is that it?"
"Yeah," she cocked her head at him, "You want me to push it?"
Sort of. "Raylan wants us to push Moss into making a move."
"Ok."
"By rushing the wedding."
"Ok."
"That's it? I push you into an engagement after you've been back in civilization for what? Three? Four days? And all the reaction I get from the idea of rushing the wedding is 'ok'?" It was a bit of a letdown, really.
Clare pursed her lips, "Bèbè, I let you push it because I'm sure about us. Aren't you?" She fondled the engagement ring.
He leaned into his responding kiss, pushing her back into the living room, "Stupid question."
She kissed him back, sweet and teasing, "Then come to bed and we'll talk about it tomorrow. You can explain to me all the angles."
Tim followed her back to bed.
She didn't doze off, but lay next to Tim as he drew circles with his fingertips across her back. "Tim, did you propose so we could get married later or so we could be engaged?"
"Huh?"
Clare pushed herself up on her elbows, "Are we just engaged or are we engaged to get married?"
"You askin' 'cause I don't want to rush to wedding?"
"I'm askin' 'cause you hit Raylan-"
"To be fair, I want to hit Raylan most of the time. And it's the implication that us rushing the wedding will spur Moss on to trying to kill me, is the problem."
"But Edgar likes you. Quite creepy really, if I think about it."
He tickled her side, trying to keep a scowl on, "Funny."
She giggled and rolled and he chased her the inches she went. She turned it around, going for his middle, until he caught her wrists above her head, "Alright. Uncle."
She was gasping on her back when he kissed her, coming up for air she whispered, "Could just say you didn't want to talk about it."
"It's-"
Clare covered his mouth. "No. We're not talking about it. See. Not talking."
He looked down at her with such tenderness in his eyes, Clare couldn't move, but to pull her hand away from his mouth, "I want to marry you. I want to have children with you. I think. It's still a fairly new idea for me-"
"Tim-"
His turn to cover her mouth, "I don't want to screw this up. I know I've rushed it- more so than I'd really intended to rush it since Elizabeth was really on the ball with that ring-"
Clare smiled behind his hand.
"I don't want to screw this up." He pulled his hand back to buss her bruised cheek, letting his fingers trail down her scar. "Haven't you been marked by this shit enough?"
"I love you. And I don't want to screw it up either, baby," Clare said, "How do you see this going? We going to shack up for a few months or years or whatever, then what? We get married and have two point whatever kids and raise them up and live happily ever after?"
"Clare-"
"We both know that's shit. Things don't work out. There are no happily ever after's. People we love die. We both know this."
"Grab it while we can? That your plan?"
"Worked so far."
Tim refused to smile at that so he turned away, "That what you were doing when you turned down the easy life in Belize?"
Clare took a breath. And hesitated.
"Is the great Dr. Lidet dodging a question?"
"Not dodging, no. Just advising you that you don't want to hear that story any more than I wanna hear about anyone else you'd been in this bed with," she said gently.
Tim sobered, "Fair enough. He why you didn't stay or why you wanted to?"
"Tim-"
He rose, "Not asking. Don't want to know. Bathroom, go to sleep, babe."
Clare scowled at the ceiling and waited.
Tim took his time before returning to the bedroom. "Baby, I never slept with him," was the first thing he heard in the dark.
"I don't want to hear this, do I?" he leant against the doorframe, where he could just barely make out that she was sitting up with the sheet around her breasts.
"His name was Enrique-"
"Well, that's charming." He crossed his arms.
"He was a cardiologist outside of Dangriga. He was... Good to me when I got there. Very understanding. Got me my job, apartment. He was sweet and listened to me. Shoulder to cry on when I needed one."
"Very sweet of him," he glared at his ceiling. "Am I going to want to kill anyone when this is over?"
"So, when he asked me to go out dancing with him I said yes."
"Dancing with Enrique, nice." Tim seemed deeply involved in his major hobby of ceiling exploration.
"And that was when I realized I was screwed," Clare waited until she was sure she had his full attention, "Because there was more heat when you were holding my wrist in front of that damn fire that I had salsa dancing with Enrique."
"Nothing happened?"
"Nothin' happened and I started heading north again."
Tim nodded, "So, I could find you in...about five months after you ran?"
Clare nodded.
"Guatemala, maybe?"
"It's a border country," she nodded.
"When you say nothing happened you actually mean..."
"Would have been a bit like choosing a wine cooler over absinthe. Not even worth the glass." Clare patted the bed next to her, "I knew what I wanted. Still know what I want. Are you coming to bed now?"
Tim nodded, kissing her as he crawled in. "I want you too."
"I told you, you can't hurt me, Tim," she whispered when she could breathe again, clinging to him.
"I know. I won't," he breathed, hands ghosting over her.
She looked up at him, holding him and warning him with her eyes, "I've loved you too damn long, Tim. What do you want to do here?"
Tim scowled, then pinched the bridge of his nose, "I wanna make love to you. Then sleep. Then with full stomachs, in the light of day, we can run through this subject again. How's that?"
Clare took a deep breath, something new in the pit of her belly, "You said it first."
"Huh," Tim paused in lying next to her.
"You said "I love you" first."
He reached for her, pulling her to him and wrapping himself around her, "I do love you, idiot." He kissed her head, "You're mine. I love you, Clare. I just want you safe. Us safe."
Clare tilted her head back, "Tim-"
"Yeah, it does exist. I make 'safe' exist. It is, literally, my job. Let me make us safe. I'll find a way, ok? We can rush the wedding or I can find another way and we can take our time. Just trust me?"
Clare nodded, eyes full of doubt, "We rush the wedding, it'll end badly anyway."
"Oh?"
"Do we not remember that Chris is only one of my brothers?" she quirked an eyebrow.
Tim winced, laying back, pulling her with him, "Jackie never liked me anyway."
"If he only knew," she agreed, sliding her hand down his chest, feeling his muscles tense beneath her fingertips and watching him stiffen. His hand trailed a lazy squiggle down her spine before pulling her thigh so she could straddle him. "Lazy," she muttered, moving to nibble his collarbone while one hand wrapped his cock and pulled.
Tim had a throaty moan and chuckle before reaching for one of the condoms on his nightstand, and tearing it open with his free hand and his teeth. Clare was occupying her mouth with his throat when he moved to slip it on and she took it from him. Sliding her body father under the sheets and letting her tongue trail down his torso, dragging to dip into his navel, before lapping softly at his beading tip.
Tim let himself buck at her mouth gently, watching her face as she took him. He gripped the bed sheets to keep his hands occupied, as her eyes met his for the brief moment before they rolled back in his head, "Clare?"
Clare flicked her tongue as his tip again before replying conversationally, "Yeah, babe?" and dragging her nails across his hips.
Tim bit the inside of his cheek to keep from reacting, either to her tone or her hands, before he said, with near equal nonchalance, "Either do something with that rubber or give it back so I can fuck you properly."
She moved the tip of her tongue along the end of him until he growled. Clare managed to put the condom on him between giggles before he tackled her, tossing blanket and pillow alike to the floor. "You are a deeply," he said penetrating her to her soft moan, "difficult woman."
Clare's eyes fluttered but didn't open as she whispered gruffly, "Thought you said something about fucking me properly?"
"Then you decided to tease," he shifted her leg for a better angle and she bucked against him with a whimper, and her nails dug in his ass, "Tim." He dropped his mouth to suckle her neck and thrust into her as her pinched her left nipple gently.
The nipple tweak was too much for Clare, she was aching enough with him within her—her eyes were permanently rolled back in her head- but the tease of his finger on her breast had her begging, "C'mon, babe, I was gonna get you off however..."
He shifted into her and she moaned, "Are you implying I'm-"
Clare bucked against him, cutting him off, "Fuck now. Talk later-"
He obliged. Keeping her eyes rolled back, they went at each other like animals, screwing like rabbits, coming together noisily and breathlessly. Collapsed on top of her, Tim heard her say, "I love you, even if you can't decide if you're a tease or a stevedore."
He kept himself within her as he rolled on his back, holding her to him, "What's a stevedore?"
Clare picked her head up to look at him under her lashes and say, "You're an adult... Google it," and dropped her head onto his chest.
He looked at his phone, all the way over on his nightstand and reached futilely, whining, "What's the point of dating a doctor if she's not going to enjoy lording the fact that she knows more over me?"
Clare rolled her eyes and sat up, still straddling him, "A stevedore, young Gutterson, is a term for a managing dockworker. Y'know, strong, well-built, excellent work ethic..."
"And you're applying this to my sexual proclivities?" Tim smirked, "We should discuss this further..."