Ch. 6 - In the Face of Death
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A/N: there be smut. You have been warned.
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The safehouse was more of a shack, tucked between a rather low-rent karaoke bar and a factory filled with dilapidated sewing machines. Danny paused at the entrance - as though he would be able to hear anything over the tourists screaming the words to I Want to Fuck You Like An Animal next door - pulling out his pistol.
In retrospect, getting out of the hotel had been the easy part. In the chaos, it was simple enough to join the crowd of people flooding down the stairs, and even to sneak through the kitchens and into the back garden where Tex was waiting. He stayed with them for only two blocks, filling them in on the situation, although he did find time to point out that it doesn't take a Navy SEAL to realize that standing at a window backlit by the ceiling fixture makes you an excellent target. More helpfully, before circling back to the hotel, Tex confirmed that no less than three witnesses had identified Vargas as being on the scene, leading Sasha to suspect that there was more to this shooting than a mere effort to disrupt the party.
The plan was simple. Danny would take Kara to the safehouse while Azima and Wolf officially offered their assistance to the Brazilian government, dropping less-than-subtle hints that Kara was safely back aboard the Nathan James. Sasha and Tex would take the time to reach out to their contacts for more information on Vargas. Once done, they would all meet up at the safehouse no later than 0600.
It was only once Tex disappeared that the true challenge began.
Danny's arm wrapped around her waist, his voice in her ear, as they walked down the street, playing the part of lovers out on the town.
His jacket sliding around her shoulders, his scent filling her nostrils, an effort to conceal her identity disguised as an act of gallantry.
The feel of his body against hers when they passed too close to a police patrol and he spun her against the wall, bodies wedged together, lips teasing her neck.
Who knew how many times that Danny had played this game. How often he might have pulled Sasha or Azima close, using their presence as a cover. And yet, despite knowing that none of this was real, Kara could feel herself responding. Her heart pounding, senses flaring, body craving more with each step, each touch. Unbearably aware of the man beside her.
The one she almost lost tonight. Again.
Had Danny not been looking into the gardens. Had his responses been a microsecond slower. Had the falling glass hit his neck rather than his back. One tiny changes and, rather than being tortured by his presence, she would have been staring down at his lifeless body.
"I'm going to clear the house," Danny whispered. "Stay here."
And then he was gone and she was alone, shivering in the night air but not due to a chill. Fearing that the next sound she heard would be a gunshot, or the thump of a body collapsing on the floor. Of Danny hurt, or dead. If that happened, her orders were to run, to get herself to the secondary location immediately.
She didn't think that she could do it.
To leave him. To fight on.
To live in a world with no Danny in it.
What was it that he had said?
Too focused on saving the world to realize that I was giving up the reason that I wanted to save it.
Tears blurred in her eyes as she remembered Danny's words of earlier. Was that what he had been doing? Hell, was that what she had been doing? How many times over the past five years of fighting - first the virus and then the red rust and then Tavo - had she said that she was only doing her duty? Just doing her job. But was that true?
Was it really about saving the world? Or just about saving one person?
Shaking her head, Kara blinked until her eyes cleared. This was not the time, the place. Of course, that was the problem, wasn't it? It was never the time or the place. So, instead, they just kept moving, clashing, hurting, never figuring anything out.
The door to the shack swung open to reveal Danny, and Kara realized that she had aimed her gun at his chest. The action so ingrained as to become automatic.
Danny raised his hands. "Woah, it's me."
Kara lowered her hands, feeling the slight tremor. "All good?"
He nodded. "We're clear."
She followed him into the small space, nothing more than a lumpy couch and a small kitchenette. "We're alone?"
"Yup." He turned, placing his gun down on the kitchen table, switching on a table lamp. "There's dried food if you're hungry but nothing in the fridge. Sasha usually stocks it..."
Kara set her gun next to his, no longer listening. She didn't care about food or the safehouse or even the rest of the team right now. All she could think about were those days on the Nathan James, back in the Arctic, just after the Captain made the announcement about what was going on at home. The desperate need to be together. The frantic desire that allowed both of them to forget, if only for an instant. One ear listening for approaching footsteps. Muffling her mouth on his shoulder to stop from making a sound.
But for those few stolen moments, being exactly where she wanted to be.
Kara didn't know what she was thinking as she moved towards Danny, raising her hands to cup his cheeks. Hell she wasn't thinking, instead acting on instinct, the urge to reassure herself that he was safe - that they were alive - on the most basic of levels overpowering. "I don't want any food, Danny."
"Kara," he began, voice soft, not pretending to misunderstand her request. "This is probably not a good idea."
"I don't care." Shrugging, she dropped his jacket from her shoulders and, giving up on pulling him down for a kiss, starting on the buttons of his tuxedo shirt instead.
"Kara," he began again. "We should ta..."
"And right now I don't want to talk either," she snapped. She stopped abruptly, hands still on his buttons, eyes squeezed shut. God, how did she explain when she didn't understand it herself? "Please Danny. I need..."
For a moment she teetered on the edge of hell, eyes filling with tears, imagining what would happen if he walked away, rejected her as he had before. I love you. Just stay away from me. If tonight had reminded him, once again, of all the reasons why this, why them, should not, could not, happen.
And then Danny groaned, his arms encircled her, pulling her tightly against him. She glanced up through wet lashes. He stared down at her, eyes blazing with desire, yet there was also a question there that she didn't understand. She raised a hand to touch the side of his face.
"Tell me what you need, Kara."
"You." She stared up at him as she whispered the words, their eyes locked. "I need you."
Talk about a cliché. She should be mortified but instead she felt... free ... everything about this man, this moment, feeling right. The years, the hurt, the anguish, all disappearing. Just like they always had when she was in Danny's arms. Kara wasn't fool enough to believe that any of this was permanent but, right now, this was enough. Tonight would be enough.
"If you're sure..."
"Oh for fuck's sake."
Kara wrapped her arms around the back of his neck, jamming their mouths together in a final effort to get him to stop talking. He gave a snort of laughter and then he was kissing her back. The clash of lips and tongues and teeth both desperate and gentle and oh, so, familiar. Kara shifted, attempting to close the space between them, as Danny began lifting her, only to discover her gown was in the way. She would have cursed but that would have meant breaking the kiss. His hands fumbled to push it up, and Kara could hear ripping, but she didn't care, too focused on the incredible feeling of his mouth on hers, his hands sliding under her bottom, his gasp when her legs wrapped around his hips, pressing her heat against his erection.
Danny swiveled, heading deeper into the small house, bumping into walls as they moved. After hitting a particularly sharp point with her back, Kara broke the kiss, sultry laughter spilling from her lips. "This might work better if you let me walk."
For a moment he looked blank, before he grinned, lowering her to her feet. Kara reached up to trace the line of his lips. "I never could resist that smile."
"This way." Grabbing her hand, they tripped down the hallway to a small room. Danny dropping to the bed and pulling her towards him, until she stood between his legs. Her hands dropped again to his shirt, this time managing to get it open and he quickly shrugged it off, lips on her shoulder as he yanked on the zipper of her dress. She ran her hands over his chest and back, searching for cuts or bruises, any fallout from their close call that evening. After a moment or two of tugging at her zipper got them nowhere, Kara spun so that her back was to Danny, amused by his fumbling. "Perhaps this is a better angle?"
"Damn thing is stuck," Danny muttered, but he wasted no time getting her dress open, his lips running down her spine as she pulled down the sleeves and allowed the ruined gown to fall to the floor. A suntanned hand slid around to capture her breast, then tweak a nipple. "Fuck. If I knew that you weren't wearing a bra we would never have made it out of the kitchen."
She sank back against him, head falling onto his shoulder. God she had missed this. His hands knowing just where to go, his memory impeccable when it came to locating her sensitive spots. The feeling of being safe, protected, as if nothing could possibly hurt her when they were together. Kara shifted as he caught the side of her briefs and began dragging them down her legs, only then realizing that she was standing on his foot. She giggled. "My boots."
"Kind of sexy," Danny's voice was mumbled, nuzzling the curve of her neck, one hand remaining on her breast as the other played with her curls.
"Only you would think so." She turned again, laughing, but stopped as she took in his face. Looked - really looked - at the man before her for the first time in too long. She lifted a hand to his cheek, watching his throat bob as he swallowed, taking in the slight changes that she hadn't noticed before. More wrinkles, darker circles under his eyes, his hair longer than regulation. And yet the same man she first laid eyes on in Norfolk. The same man she fell in love with. Kara sighed, leaning forward to rest her forehead against his. Just as Danny wasn't that idealistic young man anymore, she was not that naïve young woman. "You better have a condom."
"I do. Never take that chance." His head tipped to the side, eyes never leaving hers, and he bit his lip, as though he wasn't sure how she would react to the question. "You still on the pill?"
"I am," she confirmed. "But..."
"I know."
Danny leaned forward slowly, his lips barely brushing against hers. The soft touch mesmerizing. One arm wrapping around her, shifting her until she was kneeing on the edge of the bed, sitting in his lap, their chests pressed against each other, naked flesh to naked flesh. His hands smoothed across her flesh, soothing and awakening at the same time. Her own hands wandered across his chest, his stomach, until she came to rest on his belt. They separated a millimeter, eyes meeting as she slowly undid his buckle, dipped the zipper. She tugged off her boots as he wiggled out of his pants and briefs, stopping only to gather a small round package from one pocket. And then they were pressed together again. He leaned back, taking her with him, their lips never parting.
Slowly, so slowly, she sunk down on him. So familiar, so achingly familiar. Everything that she remember, and yet so much more than it had ever been.
"Perfect, just perfect."
She wasn't sure who spoke, if it was him or her or even if the words were said out-loud. Their eyes met and held as she rose and fell, her heart pounding, the tension building and building. The silence broken only by gasps and groans. Her universe compressed to this man, to this moment. The world around them forgotten. It might have been five minutes or an hour, time losing all meaning, when Kara collapsing onto Danny with a final sob.
His arms wrapped around her, pinning her to him as though he were afraid that she would disappear. "I love you." The words were so quiet that she almost didn't hear. "Now, forever, no matter what happens. I love you, Kara."
She didn't want to respond. It was all too much, too soon. She needed time to think, to process, to make sure that she wasn't making another mistake - one that could destroy both of them. And yet the words spilled out before she could stop them.
"I love you too. God, I love you too."
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"Did you mean it?" Kara asked quietly. Although Doc Rios was busy putting away equipment, she didn't want to take the chance of being overheard.
"Mean what?"
"What you said...after the mission at Gitmo. When you told me to leave you alone."
Danny smiled, but it was a pale imitation of his usual grin, an indication of how weak he still was despite his fever breaking almost forty-eight hours ago. "You mean about loving you? Yeah, I meant it."
Kara blinked. He sounded so casual. As though he had just confirmed that water was wet. "Really?"
"You sound surprised."
Probably because she was. Despite spending weeks rolling the words around and around in her head, she hadn't really believed them. "We just...you never said it before, that's all. I thought maybe heat of the moment..."
Danny's forehead crinkled, the way it did when he was grumpy. "Well, it's not the way I planned to tell you, that's for sure."
Kara took a deep breath. "I love you too."
"Yeah, I figured."
Kara narrowed her eyes. "Excuse me?"
"You purposely put yourself in the crew lounge without protective gear during the lockdown," Danny pointed out. "Pretty sure that counts as good as the words."
Despite herself, Kara began to laugh. "I suppose that it does."
xxxxx
"I don't think my dress is salvageable," Kara said a few minutes - or an hour - later, after they had caught their breath. As much as she didn't want to move, to end the moment, she wanted to get caught by Tex in her skivvies even less.
His voice was still husky. "The girls keep some extra stuff here. Let me see what we have."
After a few minutes of rummaging, Danny had managed to locate a cami, a long sleeve shirt, and some cargo pants that looked like they might fit. Avoiding Danny's eyes, suddenly feeling awkward with all that had happened tonight, all that had been said and done, not just here but also at the hotel, Kara made her way to the small bathroom.
Inside, she stared at herself. Her hair was a wreck, lying in straggly tangles around her face. She was covered in sweat and, Kara realized with a wince, that the whiff of something bad she smelled was most likely herself. With no shower available, Kara did the best she could with a wet cloth. Trying to ignore the memories that flooded her as she ran the cold water over her breasts, her stomach, her legs.
Already craving more of his lips, his hands, his cock.
That instant of climax, when all she cared about was him.
When, for a moment, the world disappeared.
And all that mattered was the two of them.
Sliding into her underwear, Kara rued the fact that they were damp but there was little she could do about it. She wasn't wearing random panties, even if Danny claimed that they should be clean, and going commando in borrowed pants was unequally appealing. The lack of a bra was more problematic but there was nothing to be done about that. The cami would have to suffice. Fortunately, Danny had located a hairbrush and Kara quickly brushed out the knots, before twisting her hair back with a random hair-tie.
She could feel Danny's gaze on her when she joined him in the kitchen, dropping the ruined gown in the trash can. Taking a deep breath, she met his eyes. Carefully keeping her space. Knowing that, if she touched him, they would end up right back where they started. And, given the light that was already filtering into the small house, they had pushed their luck too much already.
Again his eyes flickered with a question that she didn't understand. He took a sip of what looked like bottled water and Kara made a mental note to avoid the taps. "You want a drink?"
"Got any ice tea?" Kara asked, realized how parched she was.
That grin flashed and he rattled around in a cabinet before tossing her a bottle. "Always."
She took a drink, fiddling with her bottle, before looking up. "Thank you."
"Pretty sure that is supposed to be my line," Danny joked.
"Not for that." Kara paused. "Well, for that too. But also for telling me...about Laura and ... everything."
He nodded and she searched for the right words. But before she could speak, there was an elaborate knock on the door.
Danny picked up his gun. "That should be Tex but wait in the hall, just in case."
Nodding, Kara went to step past him, only to stop when he leaned down to catch her chin, drawing her in for a brief kiss. His eyes piercing hers. "We'll talk later. Okay?"
Her breath caught and she nodded, unable to say a word as she moved into the hallway.
Wondering what in the world she was going to do.