AN: Alrighty, folks...so we definitely toe the line between T and M in this chapter. If that's not your cup of tea, skip to the page break!
And, as always, thanks for your comments and words of encouragement.
It's not how he expects.
As it turns out, it's far better.
He turns to face her after shutting the door to their hotel room behind them, and she looks smaller than usual, having exchanged her heels for practical ballet flats. She takes a deep breath, and he can literally see her body shake as she inhales. He pulls her against him, smiling against her lips and willing her nerves away.
Jane thinks he can pinpoint the exact moment when her anxiousness is replaced by arousal. How he knows this, he's not entirely sure: her pulse doesn't speed up or slow down, but there's something different in the air between their bodies.
Or the lack of air between them.
Tentatively, he reaches for the hemline of her shirt, knowing he has to be the one to make the first move. She moves her arms over her head without resistance, pulling back from him slightly when he pulls the shirt over her head.
They find each other again immediately after.
He grins when he realizes that she's somehow managed to divest him of his jacket without his notice; she's already moved to the buttons on his vest. His shirt follows soon after, though her fingers fumble slightly on the last few buttons. He helps her out.
The shirt rustles as it's tossed to the ground, barely audible over the sound of their breathing. Jane is floored, wondering how it's possible that Lisbon—normally so composed, so stoic—is letting him see her raw for once.
He lifts her up, and her legs wrap around his waist exactly as they did weeks ago.
"Second time's the charm?" he whispers roughly, and she giggles.
Actually giggles.
He steadies her with his hands and walks forward, letting her back come to rest against the wall, and he hears her shoes fall to the ground. She shivers at the cold surface, pushing herself against him in response. Jane gives her a last kiss before pulling away to explore more of her body. When his lips reach the tops of her breasts, her head falls backward, and Jane's hand shoots up to stop her from hitting her skull against the wall.
Lisbon smiles at him. "Ever the gentleman," she whispers.
"Only if that's what you want."
He swears he can actually see her pupils dilate as he says these words, and he stores the response away in his memory palace.
Lisbon gives him a coy smile. "I'll remember that for future reference," she says. "Right now I'm kind of enjoying the gentleman."
"In that case," says Jane, and he shifts her slightly, stepping back and wrapping his arms around her torso. He moves them away from the door and toward the bed, flicking open the catch on her bra.
He sets her down, and she lets the bra fall to the floor. She reaches for the button on her jeans, but Jane grabs her hand in his, brings it to his lips, and pops the button with his other hand.
The last of their clothes are discarded.
Then suddenly the world speeds up, the mattress dips, and he is guiding her to lay down, her hair sprawled over the champagne pillows.
"I love you," he says. She gives him a blinding smile and shifts her hips, encouraging him to join his body with hers.
He does so.
She gasps, and he stills. "Teresa?" he whispers, his eyes roving over her face, concerned.
But her eyes have rolled back, and she groans as he moves slightly. He repeats the movement, gets the same response.
"Tease," she murmurs, and moves her ankles to rest on his lower back. He groans this time at the heightened sensation.
"My god," he says.
She hums against him.
The sound amplifies his arousal, but he pulls back, reaching underneath her to bring her up with him. He sits back, and she rests her weight on him, still moving together. When she lifts herself up only to settle herself down again, Jane almost swears in agony.
Lisbon actually does so.
"Fuck," she says.
Jane grins against her lips and rests his hands on her hips. "We are."
Lisbon snorts then kisses him again. His hands move to her breasts, and her laughter is strangled into another gasp.
He kisses each breast as she begins to move again. Slowly. Torturously.
He moans, not sure how much more of this he can take. "Please," he pleads.
But she just smiles, giving him a small tilt of her head that he takes to mean she wants to change positions. He lays her back down.
"You take the lead on this one, alright?" says Lisbon softly.
He knows how momentous it is for that sentence to come out of her mouth. He doesn't need to be told twice.
He covers her body with his once more, braces himself on his forearms, and begins to thrust.
A few seconds pass, the bed creaking just barely with every impact. Lisbon reaches up to stroke his face. "Patrick," she says, and he looks at her, never breaking his rhythm. "Don't hold back," she whispers.
So he doesn't.
He rests his head on her chest, listening to her heart slow.
"I'm so happy," she murmurs, and her chest vibrates with her words under his ear.
Jane turns slightly to brush his lips against her collarbone before kissing his way up her throat and then finally meeting her lips.
"Me, too," he says in between kisses, and he shivers when she ghosts her fingers up his spine. "God, woman," he groans, flipping over onto his back and pulling her on top of him. Her hair falls over one shoulder, tickling his nose, and he brushes it aside before guiding her lips back to his with a hand at the back of her head. "Would you judge me if I told you I wanted to spend the rest of our weekend in bed?"
Lisbon tugs at his lower lip gently with her teeth. Then she grins. "Well, we should probably get our money's worth," she says. "It was an expensive room."
"Give me a little time to recover," he pleads. "Some of us aren't in our prime any more."
She chuckles. "Could have fooled me."
He gives her a cocky grin, but inside he is elated. It has been years, after all, since he's been with a woman. He hadn't wanted his first time with Lisbon to fall short of expectations.
She seems to know exactly what he's thinking. "Patrick," she says softly, pulling back from him and brushing his curls off his forehead. "You are everything I'd hoped." She blushes suddenly. "And more, if you must know. Please, don't worry so much."
His fingers splay across her ribcage. "And you are more than I could have dreamed," he says. "More than I deserve."
"Don't say that," she whispers, her thumb stroking his lips. "Please don't say that, Jane."
"But it's the truth. Isn't that what you always wanted from me?"
"I don't think it's the truth," she says. "I think you deserve happiness, and you deserve to be loved. Whose judgment are you going to trust—yours or mine?"
Jane looks up at her, trying to sort through every loaded word she's just spoken.
Her makeup has begun to fade, revealing the freckles that only endear her to him more completely, and her cheeks are flushed crimson.
She's stunning.
And she's right, of course.
"You," he says simply. "I trust you. I believe you."
Lisbon smiles. "Good," she says. Then she moves a hand to his chest, tracing the outline of his muscles there. "Now," she begins, leaning down toward him again. "What was it you were telling me about being ungentlemanly?"
It's his turn to grin.
"How about I show you instead?"
Their limbs are still twined around each other an hour later. Jane is attempting to memorize the sound of Lisbon's even breathing.
His thumb brushes over her upper arm, forward and back and forward again, and he sees the corner of her mouth lift up.
Then she sighs. "We need to get up."
"We don't," he says. "It's only half past four. We could stay in bed for the rest of the afternoon, for the entire evening—"
She cuts him off. "You bought us tickets for a musical," she says, shifting in his arms. "And I'm guessing they were rather expensive tickets."
"Meh," says Jane, shrugging. "It's just money. I can buy the tickets again for some other day."
Lisbon rolls her eyes, but she smiles at him. "We're going to the musical, Jane."
"But I can't kiss you whenever I want if we're in a theater."
Lisbon considers this. "Yes, a fatal flaw in an otherwise perfect plan. But what if I let you hold my hand the entire time?"
Jane gives her an identical pensive look. "Hmm," he says. "I suppose that would be acceptable. Given that there would be ample opportunity after the show to make up for lost time."
"You're ridiculous, you know that?"
As she speaks, she rolls out of bed, reaching for the dress shirt he'd discarded when they'd returned to the hotel room. She slips it on, and Jane watches, entranced, as she moves back to the bed to sit down next to him.
He's floored by the intimacy of the moment. His shirt. His barely-buttoned shirt, covering her ivory skin. She smiles at his reaction.
"I know," Jane says, in response to her question. But it comes out a hoarse whisper. He lets his eyes wander over her shoulders, her breasts, her hips—because now he can, and he suddenly can't keep himself from looking. He inhales, not at all surprised when the breath is shaky. "I pictured this moment a thousand times," he admits, reaching over to run a finger over the collar of the shirt. He soon abandons the fabric in favor of the delicate skin of her neck.
Lisbon leans over. She kisses him.
"So did I," she says against his lips.