A/N: Two chapters in two days? What have you all done to me?!
They have been kissing for an unprecedented amount of time. He finds he really doesn't care. Mainly because, well, he never thought he would get to kiss her like this, ever, and the fact that not only is she not pulling away, but is in fact kissing him back? He isn't about to stop any time soon. He's never been one to look a gift horse in the mouth (which, really, what does that even mean?!) or shy away when what he wants most in the world is offered to him. And right now, kissing Nikki is definitely up there and he is taking full advantage while all appendages remain intact.
Oxygen is starting to be a factor though, but he tries to stave off the inevitable, instead presses his mouth infinitesimally harder against hers, demanding more of the quiet stillness to the noise of the anger and fury in his mind only her touch (and tongue!) can provide. (Maybe, if he can just keep kissing her until the end of time, maybe he might just get through the day with just the minor cuts and bruises he's already sustained thus far.) In the end, however, it is not oxygen levels (or her fist to his face) that stops them, but the shrill ringtone from her jacket pocket.
She is out of his hold and has her back to him before he can blink. Hazily, he's aware it is Clarissa on the other end of the phone call, but he's more interested in getting Nikki back in his arms before she can totally freak out on him and he's left with worse than nothing. Coming up behind her, he rests his head on the back of her head, breathing in her unique scent. His hand comes up to rest on her hip, wanting, needing the contact, and he is more than a little surprised when she leans back and rests the smallest amount of her own weight against him in return. He's about to start to try to distract her from her phone call, when he realises he is the topic of discussion. "He's here, don't worry."
Glancing over her shoulder, he is startled to see her eyes go wide in response to whatever it is that Clarissa is telling her. Not wanting too much to be said when even he doesn't know what to say, he smoothly reaches up and plucks the phone from her unsuspecting hand. Bringing the phone to his own ear, he takes a step back before continuing the conversation himself.
"I'm fine, Clarissa."
"Jack." He hears her sign of relief, but before she can continue he is talking once more.
"Just been working off some steam." In more ways than one, but she doesn't need to know about that. He raises his eyes to Nikki's, and once the contact is made he cannot break it. Face serious, knowing the effect it will have on his tone across the line, he continues, "Let Thomas know I'll be in once I've dropped Nikki off home. Bye." Then, unceremoniously, he hangs up. There'll be hell to pay for that move later, he knows, but right now he has other concerns.
What he didn't consider (which, really, he should have) was the reaction of Nikki to his bold statement. Her eyes have gone a wonderful shade of dark, her brow furrowed, and the foreboding nature should really warn him of her anger, but he is too enthralled by her to really pay attention. With a slight grin he cannot for the life of him keep from his face, he offers her the phone back, only to find himself holding back a slight wince when the force of her hand snatching it back jars his still tender one.
"Dropped me off home? What am I, some damsel in distress? I don't need you to…"
"The hell you don't!" Any amusement has gone from his tone, and his face is once more deadly serious, his eyes on the cusp of being annoyed. He sees her draw back from him slightly, and his heart stutters. He didn't mean to scare her.
"I…"
The quiet, slightly scared tone of her voice breaks something in him. Restraining his anger as much as possible (which, it turns out, is harder than he thought it would be), he implores, "No. Don't. Don't you dare stand there and tell me you don't need me. Not after…" He pauses, breathing heavily, and waves his hand around, as if she will have any idea what he means by the gesture. (Everything. He means everything.) He might have kissed her, but she kissed him too, and she doesn't get to pretend it never happened. Not with him, not so soon after the fact and while he can still feel the taste her on his tongue.
A horrible thought crosses his mind, and the hateful words are out before he can stop them. "Or what, was that just pity?" (Jesus, if she turns away from him now he really doesn't know what he'll do.) Unaware of just how much he's about to let slip, he continues in a mocking tone, "Poor Jack can't deal with the fact someone fucking tried to kill the woman he…" (Loves. The woman he loves. Jesus, why has it taken for them to get to this point for him to realise it?) He is interrupted before he can complete his tirade though, and he finds he is both thankful and a little mad at her for that.
"NO!" The word is forced out far stronger than he thought she would be capable of right now. Her face shows her horror of her reaction to his accusation, and he finds he is slightly placated by it. More gently now, she sighs, "Of course not."
He sighs in return, his anger pushed away once more by the helplessness he feels instead. (Why, of all the women in the world, did he have to go and fall for this one?) "Then why are you trying to push me away, huh?" Unable to stand idly by and watch as she all but falls apart in front of him, her strong façade beginning to fall away, he reaches forward to caress her cheek. He feels her drop her chin slightly to rest against his palm, and his thumb gently strokes the outline of her cheekbone. In as whisper, he asks, "What's going on, Nikki?"
Her eye line falls to his chest, and he wishes she would keep eye contact instead. Sometimes it is easier to read what is going on with her through her eyes than her words. Her voice is so quiet when she does speak, he almost misses it. "I can't lose you again."
The word again throws him. When has she ever lost him? He has been there for her time after time, even to the point of saving her life. He has never left her floundering without him before. Bending down slightly, he tries to get her to meet his gaze again, but she is fixated on his chest. A small knot of worry begins to form in the pit of his stomach, but he pushes it away.
Instead, he asks, "Again? What are you taking about?" When she doesn't reply, he gives a small sigh. "C'mon, Nikki, you're not gonna lose me. Hey, I'm right here, see? I'm not going anywhere."
Trying to comfort her, feeling confident she won't shy away from his touch if the last half hour is any indication, he pulls her against him. He feels her rest her head on his chest over his heart, and he is helpless not to press a gentle kiss to the top of her head. He feels her arm snake around him to his back, and tightens his own hold on her slightly in reply. They stand that way, neither speaking, for an endless moment before she mutters, "But you did. You left me, and I can't go through that again. Not again."
A roaring noise begins up in his head again, even as the little knot of fear begins to grow. (Jesus, don't let her mean what he's beginning to suspect her to mean.) Her tone has taken on a pleading quality that is cutting him to the quick. "Please, Jack, don't ask me to deal with that again."
This time, it is he who is begging. He's worried, petrified even, the knot of tension becoming a rock in his stomach. "Nikki, I swear to god, I have no idea what you're talking about. I never left you." (Right?) His muscles have begun to tighten against her again, and he tries to get himself to relax his hold, not wanting to scare her.
Then, with a sob into his chest, she breaks his heart. "But you did. You left me. Jesus, Jack, you went and fucking died on me."
He can feel her tears as she cries against him as they fall onto his bare chest as she lets go. Feeling like he's been plunged into icy water, heart and lungs frozen, his stomach a dead weight, he finally manages to gasp, "What?"
He pushes her back away from him, needing to see her face, needing to understand. (Dead. He'd been dead. What? When? How?) He sees her take a breath, trying to hold back her tears to answer the demand he knows his face is showing. Her voice is still choked up though, her words coming out in broken fits and starts. "You… that car. The one that ran you…"
He drops his hands, his mind taking him back to that cold night. The car that had appeared as if from nowhere, before the brutal beating that had followed it. He remembers it had taken him close to two months to get out of the hospital (one of which to even stay awake for more than a couple of hours at a time). And she had barely left his side the whole of that time. Goddammit, he knew there was more to the story there than she's ever told him. Stuck in the past, it takes him a moment to notice she has fallen silent. Needing more, he doesn't realise his tone has turned distant when he says, "I remember."
Her eyes still filling with tears, she brushes one away, glancing at anything but his face. Eventually, her eyes come to rest on his hands. They have stopped oozing fresh blood, but what was there before has begun to dry in dark red trails across his knuckles. He really ought to go clean them up, but this takes precedence. "You had massive internal bleeding."
He nods. "Yeah, I know. They told me."
He sees her nod. He knows she knows he knew; she'd been there when the ICU nurse had listed all his injuries to him when he'd finally woken up. Haltingly, she takes up the narrative again. "We… Thomas and me. We were finally allowed to see you, to get evidence. You looked…" she trails off, eyes dropping to the floor, and he reaches over to rest his hand on her arm again, trying to give her some support while he is still reeling. She glances up at him quickly, before her gaze slides away once more. "And then all these machines started blaring, and you were rushed into surgery. I couldn't… I didn't even…" Again, she trails off, a haunted look taking over her face.
Wanting desperately to keep her from being lost in what are obviously painful memories, he gently calls her name. "Nikki?"
Finally raising her head to meet his eyes again momentarily, his own beg her to tell him what he needs to know. She drops his gaze, and instead her confession is to the floor between them. "You crashed on the operation table." He sees her take a deep breath, before finally bringing her head up, meeting and holding his eyes with her own still tear filled ones. "It took them 98 seconds to get your heart beating again."
He had known it was coming, from the moment her halting words began. But even though he knew it was so obviously the end result, he can't help but draw back from her; his hand leaving her arm as he does so. Wanting, needing to understand how they could keep something like his own fucking death from him, he demands, "What? Why didn't you ever tell me any of this?"
(When he'd finally woken up after the attack (apparently 10 days later, seriously, what the fuck?) they'd told him all about the swelling around his brain and the punctured lung and the bruised spleen and the battered kidneys and how lucky he was to have made it through, but nowhere in all of that or the agonising stay in hospital that had followed had someone bothered to mention he'd gone and fucking died.)
Nikki is facing the floor once more, and this time he's glad she's dropped her gaze. When her muttered, "You survived. It didn't seem important," reaches him, however, he feels his anger take over once more.
"Bullshit. Didn't seem important? I died and you didn't think it would be something I might want to know?!"
He can't look at her, the fear and the pain and the anger and the sheer helplessness of it all battling it out in his head. Jesus Christ, how is he supposed to react to all of this? Whirling away from her, he spies the long forgotten punch bag. Never has he been more thankful to be in a place where he doesn't have to waste time before he can hit out at something without the feeling of guilt that so often follows. He rises his right hand, balled into a fist, fully intent on letting out all the emotions into the bag, when he is stopped by the feel of her hand on his arm. He freezes, unable to pull away from her, but unwilling to turn to face her.
"What would it change? Really, Jack, what would it have changed?"
He doesn't know if she's talking about punching the unholy shit out of the bag before him, or if he'd been told he'd died before now. He knows it doesn't really make much difference; the answer's the same. Nothing. It changes nothing. He still died. (Jesus. He died. And Nikki… holy crap. Nikki.) He feels the anger fly out of him, and his hand drops to his side once more. He stays silent though, still facing the bag.
Behind him, he hears Nikki sigh. "That's what I thought."
He sighs in response, before her name comes out more as a prayer than anything. "Nikki…"
He wants to hold her. Hold her and apologise and never let her go until she forgives him for leaving him for those 98 seconds. But before he gets a chance to say more than her name, she is turning her own torment on him. He lets her lash out at him, willing to take all her words of hurt and fury, wishing he could spare her all the pain that has lead them up to this. "So don't fucking stand there and tell me I don't know what I'm talking about."
She falls silent, and he feels her pause before turning to leave. But he cannot let her out of his sight. Not now. Not after all of this. His hand is out and gently latching on to her wrist before she can take a single step. He turns to face her finally, only to see she is back to looking at the floor.
(God, what are they doing to each other?!)
On a broken sob of her name, he gives her wrist the slightest of pulls, thankful beyond belief when she falls into his waiting arms, holding her tightly against him. Ear pressed to chest over his heart (he knows what it is she is listening to now), he holds her tighter when she begs, "Don't ask me risk going through that again. Because I won't. I can't."
He feels her try to fight his hold, but he still cannot let her go. Instead, he presses a kiss to her crown, his arms minutely tightening their hold. Letting her feel the weight of his head against her own, he whispers, "Shhh."
She finally stops trying to push him away, and for that he is truly thankful. Letting her rest against him, for the first time since she arrived in the gym he notices the slight chill in the air. He really ought to get them out of here before someone comes and sees what all the fuss is about.
"I can't go through that again, Jack. I can't. I can't."
He finds himself kissing her head again at the imploring words. "Shhhh. It's OK. I'm OK." Pushing her back slightly so he can meet her eyes, he holds them for a long minute before giving her as much as a reassuring smile as he can muster in that moment. "I'm right here, see?"
She nods in return, and he sees her give a hitched sob as her eyes take him in. He's never felt more like he's been placed under a microscope before, and wonders exactly what she sees when she looks at him. Her eyes have focused on a scar down his sternum, and he sees her still. Before he can say anything however, she gently runs a finger of the pale mark. The unexpected contact of her warm finger on his vastly chilled skin makes his breath hitch, and he wonders at the quick grin his response spurs from her.
Her eyes have calmed dramatically from before, and her voice has a soft lilt to it he's never heard before. (He wants to hear it again, though. Soon. And often.) "Yeah, she breathes. "I see."
And then she's kissing him.
TBC