Chapter 8

#smutalert - Although this chapter certainly doesn't warrant an 'M' rating, there is implied sexual content that may offend some readers...so consider yourself warned!

This isn't just smut, this is M&S smut... you two know who you are ;-)

Deep Down

Sitting at her desk, making a few amendments to her report, Harry could feel his eyes on her.

Eventually, she couldn't resist a quick glance in his direction and found him staring quite openly at her. She frowned and returned to her work, feeling strangely gratified by his attentions.

Chas strode past him carrying a typewriter in his hands and jerked his head back at Harry.

"She's not interested, mate," he told Dempsey.

Harry suddenly felt a wave of embarrassment. What had Dempsey been saying to them? Had he suggested there could be something between them? Had they been discussing her in the office?

She risked another look and found he hadn't moved an inch but still sat watching her, expressionless.

"What?" she asked finally, annoyed.

Dempsey smiled slowly. "She ain't interested…" he drawled, "and my wife don't understand me… Whadya gonna do?"

She couldn't look away from him now and his eyes held hers wantonly.

He was doing something to her, he was communicating some terrible desire that was insinuating itself about her and she felt herself engulfed by his very presence.

"Dempsey…" she began.

Slowly he lifted a match to his mouth and involuntarily, her lips parted.

"So?" he asked teasingly.

She didn't understand. She couldn't move and yet her whole body felt like there was molten lava swirling beneath her skin.

"What are you doing?" she managed to ask, throatily.

Closing her eyes for a moment, she ran a hand down her neck, feeling the sweat trickling down between her breasts and when she opened them again, Dempsey was right beside her, bending forward so his face was within a few inches of her own.

"Do you like it, Makepeace?"

She was so hot. He was doing something to her that she couldn't quite comprehend but whatever it was, she loved it. Her body was quickly flooding with a warm, vibrating sensation that was increasing in intensity as he stared deeper into her eyes. She couldn't look away – didn't want to now.

Dempsey leant his right hand on the desk and he brought his left up to cup the side of her face. The sensation of his fingers on her skin was so exquisite that she gasped out loud. He continued looking into her eyes with such a beautiful tenderness that she felt tears beginning to well.

And then an unimaginable euphoria began to build up within her.

She was breathing shallowly, panting for air now.

"James! What are you doing?" she gasped.

"Whadya think?"

Her back arched sharply as she sought physical contact, wanting him to touch her, to stroke her, to slide up under her blouse and

to roughly clamp his hands upon her breasts. She needed him to just do something to alleviate the torture that his eyes were inflicting.

"That's it, Harry, that's it baby," Dempsey smiled encouragingly. "Just keep lookin' at me."

She was aware of the others in the office now taking an interest.

Fry, eating a cheese and pickle sandwich commented, "I don't think I've ever seen her do that before."

Spikings put his foot up on the end of the desk to tie his shoelace and shook his head, tutting his displeasure but saying nothing.

Dave Markham and Ron Dalton were discussing football results from the previous night as they viewed the scene before them.

Dempsey's thumb gently caressed her jawline, moving up to her parted lips, tracing over the moist, clinging skin and deflecting her hot breath back to her in an ecstatic rush of magnified heat and sound. His dark eyes held her fast, completely immobilizing her for one eternal second and then as a thin, keening note came up from within her, he dove deep down to meet it. Bright hazel, gold and flecks of green all seemed to spark from within soft, velvet brown, plunging down hard inside her core and filling her up with the darkness of lunacy.

"Is that good, Harry, huh?"

Oh God, she was going to…

She was falling backwards in the chair, losing balance, spinning.

"YES!" she cried out and somehow his eyes still held hers, still thrusting down into her, over and over.

"Yes, arrrgh, yes!" she screamed.

Harry's eyes snapped open but her hips continued to move forwards for the couple of seconds it took for her to re-orientate herself. Her own cries were still ringing lustily in her ears as she pushed herself up onto her side with both hands, fearful of seeing Dempsey in the adjacent boudoir chair. Her heart was beating so fast she could barely breathe as she registered the empty space.

"Oh, god," she whimpered.

Had that really just happened; in a dream, asleep for god's sake?

Had she really just had …?

And with Dempsey!

She was so hot.

Flinging back the quilt, Harry dragged herself out of bed and padded in bare feet to the bathroom. Her baggy brushed cotton pyjamas clung limply against her burning skin and with fumbling fingers she unbuttoned the jacket top to allow some air to circulate.

Harry ran the cold water tap, looking up at the mirror as she did so and was shocked by what confronted her.

Pillow-tousled hair framed her flushed, heavily perspiring face and strands lay plastered to her cheeks. Her pupils appeared dilated and her lips, swollen and moist. She could actually see the sweat running down her neck in rivulets. She looked, and more to the point, felt like she had just had sex!

Reluctantly, she allowed the dream to resurface in her mind.

She hadn't actually dreamt of them 'together'. And they'd both been fully clothed. He'd just looked at her and held her cheek and… Of course, the really embarrassing thing was that she knew why it had been that way. When Dempsey gave her one of those long, lingering looks of his, well, it excited her. As much as she tried to deny it, that look stirred some instinct within her, something wickedly primitive that robbed her of all sensibility. He was dangerous to be around sometimes. She wet her hands with the cold water and patted them over her face and neck. Most of the time lately it seemed.

She was not looking forward to seeing him at work later today.

Reaching over, she dried her hands on the towel hanging from the rail above the radiator. So it wasn't just Dempsey who'd made her so hot she realised - she'd left the bloody central heating on overnight! But for some reason she found scant solace in that knowledge.

Dempsey hadn't phoned yesterday. At first she had been glad but as the day wore on she had begun to wonder why. Obviously Toni would have made a big deal out of Harry taking the 'wife' thing seriously, they would have laughed together at her expense and maybe now, Harry thought, Dempsey was less interested in introducing them. He would've got a kick out of extending the misunderstanding, playing it for all it was worth only now Harry was aware of the situation he had been robbed of his little joke. He didn't understand his cruelty of course; he would never dream that she had developed these 'feelings' for him that went way beyond any working partnership or off-duty friendship. It still seemed quite bizarre to her in fact but there was no denying that the thought of he and Toni together in whatever capacity provoked a mind-boggling jealousy.

And God, it hurt!

She realised how childish she was being but it seemed as though that beautiful woman had just turned up and 'spoilt' everything. There had been no suggestion of other women for weeks now and his outrageous flirting with the females he came into contact with during the course of duty was, she suspected, purely to annoy her because there was never any mention of a follow up.

Things had changed imperceptibly between them since she had tendered her resignation - only to retract it again the following week.

They still fought and teased and ridiculed each other but it was becoming more and more apparent that they also 'cared' for each other.

Harry had noticed a downturn in the crude flirting of late which seemed to have been replaced with… she wasn't even sure how to describe it…affection? Sensitivity? Sometimes she got the impression that he wanted to play the role of big brother but then, big brothers never looked at their little sisters in quite the way Dempsey looked at her sometimes.

Harry felt a shot of lust vibrate up through her core as she remembered the reason she was standing here in the bathroom at a quarter to five in the morning.

She wondered if, as far as Dempsey was concerned, they had reached an understanding. You can look but don't touch. Did he think she had come back to work on those terms? Had he given up the chase because he thought that was part of the deal? But all the out of hours 'arrangements' they had made lately, surely that told a different story – it did for her. She thought back to last weekend and the fun they had had watching the snow-bound traffic from the open window. It had been more than the hot chocolate that had warmed her through. They had stood so close that their shoulders were leant together as they rested forwards on the windowsill. At one point his left arm had wrapped about her as he pointed a car out with his right. His friendliness had almost overwhelmed her at that moment and it was all she could do to stop herself from turning her face to his and instigating a kiss.

Harry lifted her eyes to those of her reflection. This was the first time she had been so brutally honest with herself and it was a bit of a shock.

She knew she wanted more from him now. But Dempsey had his ex-colleague on tap and she was definitely no Simone – she was the perfect match.