A/N: All the wonderful reviews. I love knowing that so many people enjoy reading this as much as I enjoy writing it. Now, post-coital E/P - y'all ready for this? ;)

(For disclaimer, etc. - see chapter 1)

Chapter 15

Eliot Spencer woke up with the sun in his eyes, sand in unpleasant places, and an elbow in his ribs. Maybe he should've closed the blinds and taken a shower before sleeping last night, but that pain in his ribs reminded him in glorious Technicolor why those thoughts had never crossed his mind. Parker.

A smile came to Eliot's lips unbidden as he realised she was still exactly as she was when they fell asleep late into the night, their passion finally spent. If anything, she was curled up closer than she had been before, and he hadn't thought that was possible. Parker never seemed like the cuddling type, but then most people would say the same about Eliot. Only the two of them needed to know the truth, that with the right person, all they wanted to do was be as close as possible.

It was a relief to realise that he had slept soundly all night, and a pleasant surprise to note she had done the same. Eliot hadn't considered what had happened the last time Parker slept in his arms just twenty four hours earlier, or the pain he had caused either. When he made love to her last night, he laid kisses on those angry marks he had made on her neck that were now already fading. She healed fast, like he did, the body adapting to the necessity over the years perhaps. In this moment, it didn't matter so very much. She had proved that, his fallen angel, his beautiful Parker. She put every ounce of trust she had in him last night, and he was determined to prove himself worthy of that.

Eliot let his fingers wander through her long blonde hair and kissed the top of her head. She wasn't just gorgeous in her looks, she was just as beautiful on the inside. Despite her love of thievery, she had this pure heart, and she wanted him to have it. No, she never said she loved him, and he never would expect her to. The fact was he hadn't said it either, but there couldn't be any doubt after the night they'd spent together that it was what they both felt. Sex was all well and good, but they made love here in this bed, that much Eliot was sure of, even if everything else was such a blur.

"Hmm," Parker made a little sighing sound as she shifted against his chest.

"Morning, darlin'," he greeted her as her eyes fluttered open and she peered up at him.

"Hi," she smiled slowly, shifting her naked body against his own amongst a tangle of covers, loving the memories that flooded in just as soon as she was more awake.

Last night had been the most amazing experience for Parker, something she never did expect. She told Eliot just a few days ago that she had little experience of sex, just the two guys that were far from memorable. Now her hitter friend had become number three on her short list of lovers, only she couldn't call what they'd done the same thing as she'd experienced before, not at all. This had been more than memorable, more than just a physical release for the sake of doing it. He made her feel alive in a way even stealing a diamond or throwing herself off a high rise could not achieve. Parker didn't understand, but for once that wasn't a scary feeling, not when Eliot was here to hold her.

"You okay?" he checked, and neither of them were sure exactly what he meant.

Physically she was fine, a little tender from the new type of exertion perhaps, but that was all. Emotionally she was kind of drained, but still okay. All in all, Parker wasn't sure she had ever felt this calm, not least when she realised she had a whole night's sleep without a single hint of a nightmare.

"Yeah, I'm good," she promised him. "You?" she asked, with just the slightest hint of nerves in her tone, as she propped her chin on her hands and peered up at him from his own chest.

"I honestly don't know," he admitted, rubbing his eyes with the hand not still tangled in her hair. "I do know that you are the most amazing woman I ever met," he told her then, a smile that he couldn't help playing at his lips. "But that just makes me wonder what the hell you're doin' anywhere near a guy like me?"

"Hey," she socked him in the chest for such a comment, catching Eliot off guard. "You're not gonna start that again. Not after... I mean, I didn't know..."

Parker was frowning hard as she tried to find the right words. It wasn't easy for her to verbalise feelings. She never really thought much about having any since they only seemed to make her weak in the past. With Eliot, it was different. She liked the things he could make her feel, she didn't want that to go away, she didn't want him to go away. In fact it was her biggest fear that he might, and that was scary all on its own. The thought of it had her sitting up fast, clutching the sheet to her chest.

"Parker?"

He had only said her name but there was so much to the question it sounded like.

"You said when you love someone it feels different," she said too softly, barely looking back over her shoulder at Eliot. "You said that, and then we did it and... Was it just me?" she asked, spinning around so fast she almost threw herself clean off the bed. "Did you not feel different? Because I feel different. All the kinds of different, and I like it, a lot, but at the same time..."

"It terrifies you," he finished for her, knowing just exactly what she was saying because he was there with her, right down to the tears in her eyes and the shake in her voice.

He reached for her then and she went willingly back into his arms, sinking into the kiss that came next and seemed like the most natural thing in the world. They were people of action, not of words. It was that much easier somehow to show how they felt than ever speak of it. That was okay, because they were both on the same page, they both understood what this was now. No more pretending they were just friends or that neither of them had feelings or a past. They weren't perfect people on their own, but more and more it seemed they were proving to be perfect for each other.

"Y'know," Eliot sighed as Parker laid down beside him once again, her head on his shoulder now. "I can't ever deserve you, Parker, but damn it, I'm gonna try," he promised.

"So long as you're gonna stick around, and just be Eliot like always," she told him. "That works for me, except..."

"Except, what?" he checked when she didn't finish her sentence after a few moments, shifting to see her face.

"Well, I don't want to be just like we were before," she said, turning her whole body into his own. "Last night was... We can do that again, right?"

Parker didn't get a verbal response, but she really didn't need one. Eliot's mouth capturing her own, his hands moving over her skin was enough for her to know his answer was a definite yes, and a whole lot sooner than she expected.

Parker couldn't stop smiling. It wasn't all that strange a feeling. She got happy a lot, when she was stealing things, or counting money, or eating her third bowl of delicious cereal. The difference today was that she hadn't done any of the usual things that made her giddy like this, she had done other things that made her feel very different, but very, very good.

Sex with Eliot was amazing; the first time last night, and the second time this morning, and the third time in the shower which she was still buzzing from. That hadn't really been a plan so much as the lure of getting near Eliot's naked flesh again had been too much for Parker. They were supposed to be getting clean and dressed, and setting off on the next leg of their journey. Now finally she was mostly ready, and Eliot was just finishing up in the bathroom. They'd be back on the road within a half hour, just a little behind the schedule Eliot seemed determined to keep.

"I know you're there," she said, looking over her shoulder to see the hitter leaning in the doorway to the bathroom. "What?" she asked, just a little self-conscious when he continued to stare at her so seriously.

At first he didn't seem to have an answer for her. He shook his head almost imperceptibly as if he wasn't even sure himself. Then eventually he spoke.

"Thank you, Parker," he told her, the merest whisper, but in the silence of the small hotel room she heard well enough.

"For what?" she asked in earnest. "Because what happened in the shower was not all me, not by a loooong way," she said, her hands making wild gestures to match her words.

Eliot might've laughed at her over-enthusiastic ways, but now wasn't the time. There was nothing funny about how he felt, about how Parker could make him feel. He walked further into the room and reached for her hands, pulling her closer, looking her right in the eyes.

"No, thank you for... for just being you," he sighed, tucking her damp hair back behind her ear. "For not running away when you saw the worst of me. For still caring after everything," he explained, his fingers stilling on her neck where he had hurt her before.

"For maybe the first time in my life, I don't have anything to run from," she shrugged, as if it were no big deal at all, even when they both knew it certainly was. "I have you now, and you have me, and yeah, that's kind of scary as hell," she admitted. "But it's also nice, it's... good," she smiled again then. "It's like for the first time in my life I know where I belong, and it's with you."

It was a sweet sentiment, but somehow Parker made herself laugh with it. Eliot ought to have known she would, since the woman would almost always bust up into fits of giggles whenever a normal person would just smile or even cry.

"There's something wrong with you," he told her fondly, his hand cupping her cheek. "But since I'm pretty sure there's something seriously wrong with me too, this crazy thing just might work out."

"Maybe," she agreed with a nod and a bright smile that out-did the sun in Eliot's eyes. "And if it doesn't, at least the sex is fantastic."

That one even made Eliot laugh as he pulled Parker closer and wrapped his arms right around her. The word 'love' was on the tip of his tongue, but he swallowed it down. Now wasn't the time somehow, even though it might've seemed perfect to anyone else in a similar situation. Parker was like no-one else in the world and that meant nothing was ever going to be normal for as long as this relationship lasted. Eliot could live with that. He honestly hoped and prayed he got the chance to do so for a long time yet, whether he deserved it or not.

Parker wasn't sure she'd ever felt as relaxed and happy as she did today. Waking up in Eliot's arms after a night experiencing feelings she never knew she could have was the strangest kind of perfect. Now here they were, back on the road, him driving and her right there beside him, her feet propped up on the dash and the sun blazing down on them, all warm and reassuring. It was as if the weather wanted to match the mood Parker found herself in, and she liked that a lot.

Eliot had got them back on the right track after her little detour into Kansas. They were headed where he wanted to go, and that was fine by her. She never had asked where they were headed in the end, because it honestly didn't matter. It still didn't now, not when she was with Eliot. He was never going to take her anywhere bad or let anything awful happen to her. She had known it before and believed it all the more strongly now.

"Huh," she said aloud as a thought struck her, one thing about their shared night that she hadn't thought of before.

"What?" asked Eliot, looking sideways at her for all of a moment before he had to concentrate on the road again - the sign said they were now entering Oklahoma state.

"I was just thinking," she admitted, staring out of the windshield still. "I can't remember the last time I spent a night without Bunny when I wasn't afraid the nightmares would come... until last night."

Eliot couldn't help the smile that came to his lips then. It wasn't just that he was flattered by her probably unintentional compliment. It was so much more.

"Y'know, I thought of that too," he told her. "Any normal night and I would've been freaking out about letting a woman stay with me, in case... But not last night."

Parker knew exactly what he meant, one hand going absently to her throat where he grabbed her before. She had almost completely forgotten she was ever injured. That incident seemed like a lifetime ago somehow, as did the one where he talked her through her own nightmares, and the fight they had over her making him sing at that bar in Covington. This trip that had been just a week long so far seemed to have been going on forever, and every day was a new world, most especially today.

"You never did tell me where we were going," she realised then.

"Maybe because you never did ask, sweetheart," Eliot reminded her. "You wanna know now?" he checked.

"I guess," she shrugged, making it clear that it still didn't really matter.

If he gave her the name of the place it probably wouldn't mean much. There was another way to say it, the truest way he knew. Eliot just wasn't sure how Parker would react.

"I'm takin' you home with me, to my home, where I'm from," he said, sparing her a quick glance. "You okay with that?"

"Uh-huh," she nodded, still smiling brightly he noticed. "Wherever I go with you is home for me now."

Eliot had never heard more perfect words than those.

To Be Continued...