For all you do...
"That was incredible. Thank you." Elizabeth settled into the front seat of the Jeep as Lucky started the engine. "I have never seen that movie up on the big screen like that."
"Well I'm glad you enjoyed it."
She smiled over at him. "Do you normally go to such extravagant measures for a first date?"
Lucky winked in her direction as he turned the radio on low. "It was just a movie."
"That was playing in a theater you rented out."
"I thought you liked it?" He affected a pout. Elizabeth put her hand over her mouth to stop the laughter from spilling out. She had seen that look on Cameron's face the few times she had to redirect him in class. Like father like son.
"I did like it. I'm just saying you set the bar pretty high for a first date is all. If renting out a gorgeous movie theater and playing a girl's favorite movie is date number one, what's to expect for date number two?"
"In the first place, this date isn't over yet." He reached down and took her hand in his. "I wasn't planning on just taking you to the movies."
He played with her fingers and Elizabeth felt her breath become shallow. She had been without a boyfriend entirely too long if his just tracing her fingers like that was turning her on like it was. "It's not?" she managed.
"Not by a long shot."
"And the second thing?"
Lucky had been distracted by the touch of her skin. It was bringing back memories of exactly what had happened in the front seat of his truck the week before. He regretted for a second not bringing the truck, it would have been much easier to pull her close to him on the bench seat. Too late he had realized she spoke. "I'm sorry, what was that?"
"You said in the first place, which implies there is a second place. So what's the second thing?" She was impressed by her ability to think at all with his light touch driving her so crazy much less string together a competent sentence.
Slowly, a lazy grin appeared on his face. "In the second place, I'm glad to hear there will be a second date."
"I never said that."
"Yes you did. You asked if I set the bar so high for a first date, what was to be expected on a second. That implies there will be a second."
She scrunched her face up and twisted her lips. Pulling her fingers from his grasp she played with the hem of her red sleeveless blouse. "Well that was when I thought the date was over. You said you had more planned. So the second date is now officially shelved until the date is ended properly." Mentally she snorted. Ended properly. Her mind was spinning a million and six different ways to jump him before the end of the night.
"We shall see Miss Elizabeth. I think I'll have that second date before I even pull into your driveway."
"Awfully full of yourself aren't you?"
"Darling you haven't seen the half of it."
"What are you doing here?" Alexis regarded the commissioner with a funny expression. He was sprawled across her couch, his hands behind his head, looking rather pleased with himself. He had long since torn his tie away and unsnapped the top two buttons of his blue and white striped short-sleeved t-shirt. Moving a sleeping Kristina to her right arm, she waited impatiently for his answer, not displeased he had stopped by, only that he hadn't told her beforehand.
"You told me you were going to be working late, so I thought I'd stop by and bring you something to eat." Mac explained, getting to his feet. He took the snoring child to her bed and returned a minute later, looking smug.
Alexis smiled when she noticed that he had placed two bags full of food in the middle of the dining room table. She read the writing on the sides and almost sighed in relief. "You brought Kelly's!" She couldn't help but shriek, taking his hand and leading him to the dining room table.
"Only the best." Mac grinned devilishly, slowly releasing her hand. "Sit down." He pushed on her shoulders until she did what he wanted and took the nearest chair.
"You always take such good care of me." Alexis moved her shoulders up and down when she realized he was going to give her a massage.
"I have an agenda." Mac replied, kneading away at the numerous knots in her neck.
"I can't wait to hear it." Alexis assured him, her head falling forward.
"I'd rather show you, but first, eat up." Mac suggested, choosing a seat to the left of her.
Alexis almost moaned aloud at the sudden chill surrounding her, but instead focused on the task of extracting the chicken, biscuits, mashed potatoes, and macaroni & cheese from their separate containers. "Thank you for this." She said, stabbing her plastic fork into the macaroni & cheese. Usually she would wait for a plate, but she had skipped breakfast and lunch today, and she was taking no chances. Besides, Mac wouldn't tell on her. At least he wouldn't if he knew what was good for him.
"It's my pleasure. I knew what you would have done if I wasn't here." Mac told her.
"And what's that?" Alexis sounded genuinely interested as she peeled away a rather large piece of chicken from the bone and set it on her tongue, savoring it for a moment.
"You would have had microwave popcorn for dinner and started in on your cases for tomorrow." Mac informed her.
"That is not true." Alexis argued, narrowing her eyes at him. "I would have added some melted butter and you're right about everything else too." "How'd you get to know me so well, anyway?"
"It took a lot of practice." Mac assured her.
"For the record, going to your office subtracts those getting that second date odds." Elizabeth folded her arms and leaned back in the swivel chair. She would have twisted herself so as to not face him, but she was petrified she was going to tear loose a million dollar wire from its position and break it.
"Oh ye of little faith." He teased and chuckled lightly when he saw her stick her tongue out in his direction. "I have a plan here."
"If it's to help you complete your new CD on time, you can outright forget finishing the first date, much less getting a second."
Lucky ignored her, flipping switches and adjusting levels to exactly the place he wanted them. His reputation for perfection in the studio was well known. If a side benefit of this second part of the date was that he would set the sound board up exactly the way it needed to be for the next day's recording, it was just an added bonus. Finally satisfied with the levels, he reached over and flipped the lights in the booth.
The producer who normally used this particular booth, Anthony Rogers, had a strange fixation with white Christmas lights. He decorated his booth, his office, and Lucky had heard rumors of his home completely in the white twinklers. As he had expected, when he flipped the overhead lights in the booth off, the Christmas lights hung from the ceiling began to glow. Anthony was getting a raise, he decided.
"One more thing." He pulled a CD from the stack in the back. Placing it in one of the slots in front of him, he smiled at Elizabeth, who clearly still confused as to what exactly was going on. "This is why we came here."
"I can see Christmas lights..." Her protests died on her lips when she recognized the singer's voice that floated through the speaker through out the room. "Is that..." She paused to take a breath. "Is that Evans Blue?"
"Yeah they used a studio of ours earlier in the week to try out some new stuff. I thought you might enjoy a sneak peek of the new CD they are working on."
"Enjoy? Are you out of your mind?" She sat with her mouth wide open, her eyes still incredulous. "What planet are you from Lucky Spencer?"
"What are you going on about?"
"This...all this...this whole date. It's probably the most personal and extravagant first date ever recorded. Normal people don't do all this for someone they barely know."
"I know you."
"You know I'm a teacher and I work at Chuck E. Cheese's. I live with my grandmother and you know who my friends are in this town. You don't know me." Her head was spinning. No one had ever worked so hard to impress her before. Even in all the time she was with Max, he hadn't ever done something even remotely close to this. She had to get a grip and start thinking rationally before she did something stupid. Like shove him up against that control panel and break her every rule about no sex on the first date.
He pulled his chair closer to hers, using his index finger to trace her face. "I know you are sweet. And kind. I know my son thinks you're the best thing since Sponge Bob. You'd do anything for your family. You have excellent taste in movies and music." He gently pulled her closer to him. "I know enough to know I want to know more."
Elizabeth felt herself melting with his every word. Even though she knew it would intensify faster than she wanted it to right now, she couldn't resist when his lips descended upon hers. Their lips began to move in time to the music and when his tongue sought entrance into her mouth, she readily allowed it.
He massaged his tongue over hers until he heard a low moan in his ears. Was it her or was it him? Lucky wasn't sure and he didn't really care. Wanting to be closer to her, he pulled her over to his chair, her legs straddling his as he leaned them both back in the chair.
Her hands moved of their own accord to his waist, sneaking beneath the tails of his untucked white button down shirt. Following her lead, his hands moved to release her shirt from the waistband of her skirt, which had shifted higher the more she leaned into him. He wasted no time running his hands up and down the length of sides stopping whenever he came in contact with fabric at either end.
Her hands were tracing the outline of his abdomen, his forearms resting on the tops of her thighs. His mouth left hers and started to blaze a trail from her earlobe down her neck. She removed one hand from his waist to steady herself by gripping his neck.
His lips traced a path all the way across her neck to her other ear. Elizabeth gasped when she felt him take her earlobe in his mouth and suck on it. When he released it seconds later, Lucky gently blew on it.
Roughly she pulled his mouth back to her own, plunging her tongue into his mouth. Some small voice begged her to slow down when she felt his hands leave her waist and make their way up to the buttons on her shirt but she was close to the point of not caring.
He fingered the buttons, not sure how far she was going to let him go. Lucky would be lying if he said he hadn't thought about the possibility of this date ending this way, but he had not planned on it. It had been a very special, very private fantasy of his. One that he was happy to report reality far surpassed in every way.
Her constant shifting in his lap was making it extremely hard to remember to be a gentleman. If she moved a millimeter forward he swore he would lift her up on to the sound board and take her right then and there. If she didn't move, he would die from anticipation and most likely do the exact same thing.
Her fingers moved first to unbutton his top button so he followed her lead. Just as he freed the button from its home, he vaguely heard something that was decidedly not Evans Blue in the background. Trying to ignore it, he continued his assault on her lips, but he could tell she was hearing the intruding noise as well. It was a cell phone Lucky realized. Her cell phone. He groaned as she pulled away from him. "Ignore it." he growled, attempting to pull her back.
"I can't. It could be my grandmother." Much as she didn't want to, she slid off his lap and dug in her purse for the offending piece of technology. Right now she was cursing its existence, but she realized things were going way too fast for her. She needed to slow down just a little before she did something she regretted. Like sleep with a guy who possibly was seeing another girl on the first date.
He tried to control his breathing and pretended not to listen as she had a short conversation with her grandmother. It had only gotten this far, this fast once before in his life. And that was with Jess. The fact he had so quickly lost himself in her was scaring him just a little. He and Jess had both realized many of their issues came from the fact that they had based their relationship on sex. While it had been fantastic, they were awful in everything else they tried to do together. This had made co-parenting with her almost completely impossible at times.
He liked this girl. God help him, he really liked this girl. There was no way he wanted whatever this was to crash and burn quickly because they had nothing but the physical between them. He'd probably curse himself later on tonight because of this decision but he was going to slow this train down. Seeing her end the call, he managed to speak in a normal tone of voice. "How's your grandmother?"
Smiling, Elizabeth settled into her original chair, straightening her clothing as she sat down. "She was just worried because she heard there was a bad accident out there and she didn't know if we were caught in it or not."
Belatedly he realized the CD had stopped. Ejecting it from the case, he placed it in the clear cover and handed it to Elizabeth. "Here. Maybe you can listen to it where you won't get so distracted." He winked at her.
Cautiously she took the case. "Are you sure?" She felt a weight lift from her shoulders as she realized he was letting her slow this down and he was being a complete gentleman about it. It was almost enough to make her want to jump him again.
He gestured towards the stack of CDs behind him. "Those are more of the same. But if you are really concerned, I asked them about it and they were fine for their number one fan to have it."
"Thank you." Her smile stole his breath and he seriously debated just grabbing her and kissing the life out of her right then and there. Lucky was reasonably sure she wouldn't put up much of a fight and they would soon end up exactly where they were heading before.
She deserves better than a fast screw on top of the sound board, he lectured himself. You knew you would hate this decision, but it is the right one. Standing up he offered her his hand. "Shall I take you home now?"
Taking Lucky's outstretched hand, Elizabeth raised herself up. Smiling, she poked him in the chest with her index finger. "On one condition."
"Name it."
"You tell me what we are doing on our second date."