"Jane."
Her name came at the same time as a warm and slick pressure arrived against her stomach. She groaned quietly, but feigned sleep. Whatever time it was, she was certain it was too early.
"Jane, I know you're awake. Your breathing changed, and your pulse is elevated."
Begrudgingly, she opened her eyes and the view immediately softened her disappointment. Maura was nude and straddling Jane's abdomen, sex-mussed hair thrown over one shoulder, face clear of make up and eyes shining bright as she looked down at Jane. Her fingers were pressed against Jane's chest, just below her breasts, fingertips gently and intently cataloguing Jane's ribs. Maura was glowing, and Jane wondered not for the first time how she'd managed to end up in the orbit of this woman.
"There we go. Good morning," Maura greeted her serenely as she slid her hands up to Jane's shoulders and lowered herself down to press her lips against Jane's. The kiss was minty fresh and delivered with purpose and Jane immediately gave herself over to it, mouth opening to allow Maura's tongue to slide languidly along hers. They kissed slowly and deeply until Maura broke away to trail her lips down to Jane's neck, where she latched herself on to the delicate skin that covered Jane's clavicle. Jane arched into the attention, her voice hoarse as she swore out loud. She could feel Maura laugh against her chest.
"Y'know, I did just wake up," Jane quipped raspily. Maura halted her assault on Jane's neck to sit back up and level Jane with a skeptical expression. She reached behind herself, and Jane drew in a sharp breath as Maura parted her to dip a single finger into the apex between her legs.
"You seem quite alert, Jane," Maura retorted airily, as she began to trace lazy circles against Jane's clit. "You're very wet already."
Jane went a little red but couldn't deny it. She grinned. "How long have you been awake? Where did you get toothpaste?" she demanded.
"A while," Maura replied noncommittally, a second finger joining in the slow stroking. "When I booked the room I arranged to have some things brought up in the morning—toiletries, the bag of spare clothes I keep in my car. They were delivered with breakfast."
"Breakfast?" Jane was definitely awake now, and craned her body around Maura's to try and see further into the suite. She could just barely make out the telltale covered trays of room service. Maura huffed indignantly at Jane's eagerness for the food, and leaned back a little further to slide two fingers inside of Jane, who fell back against the bed with a whimper.
"Breakfast. Croissants, fresh fruit. Nothing's hot except the coffee, which will stay hot in the carafe. I clearly have something else in mind first, Jane," Maura said, voice stern and hand insistent.
"You got a lot done last night, hmm?" Jane gasped out, writhing against Maura's touch. The doctor's eyes flashed with determination. It turned out a lot of Jane's suspicions about what Maura would be like in bed were proving to be true. She'd successfully caught Maura off-guard the night before, lulled her into a false sense of complacency before turning the tables, but she was getting the sense that Maura wouldn't be quite so easily subdued going forward. Jane's eyes fluttered shut as skillful fingers did skillful work.
"I did, yes," Maura agreed. "I also had a bottle of champagne sent to room 521 with my condolences." Jane's eyes snapped open at the reminder of the sales representative's flagrant attempt at seduction the evening prior.
"You what?" Jane sat up on her elbows and gawked at Maura, who only shrugged and removed her hand from between Jane's legs. Jane's hips twitched up at the loss and Maura's eye raked boldly over Jane's flushed body. Jane hadn't expected Maura to be the possessive type. She hadn't expected she'd enjoy it so much either. She smiled stupidly at Maura, who wet her lips and looked coy.
"I just wanted things to be clear. Though I have to say, after last night, I understand why she felt the need to assert herself so brazenly." She placed her hands against Jane's torso and slid herself down, leaving a trail of her own want along Jane's belly and pelvis before she settled on her knees between Jane's thighs. Jane experienced an amalgam of emotions: her ego feasted hungrily on the flattery, while her disappointment at the loss of Maura's hot, wet sex pressed against her was quickly replaced by the anticipation of what Maura's new position was promising. Jane also found the moment unexpectedly bittersweet. Wait, what? Oh no. The literal love of her life was settling in between her legs and Jane was about to get weepy about it? Jane tried to stop it, tried to flex her well-defined repression muscles, honed sharp by thirty years of precisely practiced denial, but the emotion train was coming off the rails. She drew in a shaky breath, and it must have sounded wet with potential tears, because Maura was diverted. She looked up right away in concern, lust-darkened eyes suddenly crystal clear as they locked on Jane.
"I used to hate this, you know," Jane said softly, knowing there was no way she couldn't address it, and trying not to shy away from Maura's unwavering eye contact. She would just have to be honest. "Not that long ago, I hated this. I was so self-conscious. With men. I could never…" She trailed off, and felt herself burning up. She wasn't sure where this was coming from, and she was more than a little annoyed that it was hitting her right now. She exhaled sharply, frustrated that she'd taken the sexy vibe and turned it so earnest. "I'm sorry," Jane laughed hoarsely, trying to brush it off. "It's dumb."
"It is not dumb," Maura admonished. Jane could tell by Maura's face that she had been caught off guard by the vulnerability and the confession, and that there would be no sweeping this under the rug. Maura's eyes searched Jane's and her expression switched from concern into something softer. She scooted back up to kiss Jane tenderly, her right palm pressed against Jane's heart while her other hand reached down to grab Jane's and place it over her own. She leaned back from the kiss so they could see each other clearly and Jane was overly conscious of the effort it was taking to breathe normally. The night before had been so hot and heavy, then Maura had woken her so seductively, and it had been easy to forget that the woman she was with was also her best friend, her single most important person. The way Maura was looking at her brought all that into sharp focus. Jane gave her a shaky smile, and Maura pressed her hand even more firmly against Jane's heart.
"I love you, Jane. And I'm so glad I finally get to love you this way. There's so much we should talk about. Not just the last six months, either. I don't want you to…" She trailed off, taking a moment to compose her thoughts before starting again. "I want you to be your full self with me, Jane. I need you to be. Please don't try to hide anything from me. You can be soft with me, too." The corners of Maura's eyes crinkled with affection before she spoke again. "Whatever you can give, Jane. I promise I can take it."
Jane's mouth dropped open just slightly at Maura's repurposing of the previous night's words, and the other woman gave her a look both loving and sly. Jane was at once deeply touched and also a little turned on.
"Well, you were certainly telling the truth the first time you said that." Jane reached up, cradling Maura by the back of her head and drawing her in for a kiss.
"You know I can't lie," Maura breathed, right before their lips came together. Jane wound her fingers into Maura's hair and gave a sharp tug, and when Maura parted her lips to gasp, Jane made herself at home in her mouth, inventorying her teeth and sucking on Maura's tongue until the other woman was groaning, each sound of Maura's sending bolts of electricity through Jane's body. Despite Jane's best efforts, Maura managed to pull away to appraise the other woman suspiciously.
"Are you using sex to avoid having a conversation about emotional intimacy or did a conversation about emotional intimacy turn you on?"
"The second one." Jane waggled her eyebrows suggestively. Maura laughed and examined her studiously before she seemed sufficiently satisfied that Jane was telling the truth.
"I accept. We do need to talk, though," Maura chided before she leaned in to place lingering kisses against Jane's neck, and when Jane grunted in pleasure, she continued down her shoulders and chest, punctuating her words with the press of her lips. "But I'd really like it if you'd let me do just one little thing before that…" She reached Jane's breasts, and Jane shuddered as first one nipple and then the other was drawn into a warm, wet mouth before a trail of kisses resumed down her stomach, teeth and lips nipping and sucking, leaving very intentional marks on clenching abdominals.
Jane watched as long as she could, took in the sight of Maura between her legs, looking up at Jane with those half-lidded eyes, moaning so soft and deep at the sheer pleasure of getting to put her tongue on Jane, but it wasn't long before her eyes were rolling back in her head and she was throwing one arm across her face, biting the flesh of her inner arm to try and keep from climaxing too soon.
It really didn't work. Maura slipped three fingers inside Jane, paused only long enough to tell her she loved her, and it was very quickly curtains for the usually subdued detective.
Jane let go and came louder than she ever had before.
"I think it's your turn for a question, Jane," Maura said, as she reached between them to grab a strawberry. Jane sipped at her coffee and considered carefully. They were bundled up in their robes now and the breakfast tray had made it into bed with them. After recovering from the shock of Jane telling her she'd preemptively arranged to come in late that day (Jane using half of one of her dozens of neglected personal days somehow registered as a bigger surprise than anything else that had happened), Maura had called down to the concierge to arrange for a late checkout. The women had then settled in, unexpectedly able to take a bit of time before returning to the real world. They'd exchanged several questions and answers already.
"Why has it been so long since you dated a woman?" Having now dated women, Jane found herself stunned that anyone with that option available to them would choose to do anything else. She recognized this as a very, very gay reaction.
Maura had evidently been waiting for this one, and she nodded in recognition. "I thought about it, occasionally. There were a few potential suitors. But I don't think it would have worked out."
"Do you just not like women as much?"
Maura gave her a look. "Does it seem like I don't like women as much?"
Jane laughed. "I don't know. I could be special. I could be an exception. That happens."
"You are, but not how you think. I couldn't have dated a woman because any queer woman would have had serious questions about the nature of our relationship—yours and mine, that is. I think they would have rightly wondered about the intimacy you and I share. Men, however, haven't once been perceptive enough to register you as a threat." She finished off the strawberry and daintily sucked her fingertips clean. Jane stared shamelessly. "Since I didn't want to interrogate our relationship and since I certainly didn't want another person doing it, I just dated men. Not especially many of them either."
Jane laughed ruefully. "Yeah, you're right. Women see it right away," Maura looked at her inquisitively, and Jane responded with a sheepish smile. "Amy sniffed it out right away. The very first night we hung out, I was telling her the story of our fight and our friendship, and she basically told me we had it bad for each other, which I outright denied."
Maura looked a little surprised by this. "And then what happened?"
Jane blushed. Maura pressed her lips in a thin smile, but her eyes twinkled with amusement.
"I see," she said. "She still wasn't entirely discouraged. And then all the others too, hm?"
Jane blew out an awkward breath. "Does it bother you?"
"That you've been with other people? Does it bother you that I have?"
"Well, some of them, yeah." Jane grinned. Maura rolled her eyes and gave her a jab in the stomach. Jane grabbed her by the wrist, but her expression turned serious and she stroked her finger along Maura's pulse.
"I'm not joking. You picked some awful guys. But looking back, I was definitely just jealous as well. That's not exactly what I mean, though. Not other people, but other women. Does it bother you that I figured it all out away from you?" Jane swallowed thickly, remembering the evening at Maura's from earlier in the week. "You said it should have been you."
Maura sighed softly and settled deeper against Jane's shoulder, who felt herself grow warm at the contact. Even after all they'd done the night before, and even with how physically affectionate their friendship had been, it was still somehow bewildering that they could now just touch each other however they wanted. Jane wrapped her arm around Maura's waist, her fingers slipping between the edges of her robe to trace patterns against Maura's stomach. Maura murmured her appreciation, reaching up a hand to stroke along Jane's cheek as she considered her answer.
"It did bother me. It bothered me for several reasons. I wondered how it had never come to light while we were best friends. We'd certainly had conversations where it could have. So the fact that you'd come to this realization while we weren't even speaking…It felt awful to be on the outside looking in on this huge change in your life. I felt alone again, the way I had before you came into my world."
Jane frowned and leaned her head in to press a doting kiss on the top of Maura's head. She hated thinking about Maura being lonely. Maura leaned contentedly into the affection.
"And then I thought it meant you weren't ever or could never be attracted to me, which hurt. And honestly, I'd both romanticized and especially eroticized the idea of being the first woman you were with." Maura ran her fingers along Jane's hand as it continued to caress her abdomen. "I…thought a lot about seducing you. Showing you what you were missing. In general, with women, and also very specifically, with me."
Jane didn't bother to hide her delight at the confession. "Is that right? I wouldn't mind hearing more about what I missed out on." She allowed her hand to drift lower, fingertips skimming over the crest of Maura's hip and down along one thigh. Maura sighed softly, and ever so slightly parted her legs. Jane didn't miss the invitation, but she felt Maura grab her hand before she could get much further.
"Gently," Maura said, almost begrudgingly. "After what you put me through last night I will need to be touched very…respectfully."
"Oh, I will be so respectful, Doctor Isles," Jane teased as she gently parted Maura with her middle finger, dipping in to find the wetness at her core and delicately spreading it around her clit. Maura exhaled shakily and melted against Jane. Jane continued like that for a while, offering long, slow, soft strokes as Maura relaxed against her.
"How would you have done it, hm?" Jane pressed her lips to Maura's ear, her words coming out at a low simmer, one finger continuing its unhurried work. "Would you have shown up at my apartment? Invited me over to your house?" She felt Maura shiver and Jane adopted an even more leisurely pace. She had no intention of rushing this one.
"Your place." Jane watched as Maura's eyelids fluttered shut, and Jane reveled in the knowledge that Maura was actively imagining it. "Just the one bed. Forced proximity. I show up late." Maura took a halting breath, her fingers pressing in against Jane's forearm, silently demanding a firmer hand despite her protestations just minutes ago. Jane instead lightened her touch, her fingertips just barely sliding along the length of Maura's slit. She watched as Maura's body arched into her touch, admired the elegant slope of her neck, watched lips part to push out a moan of frustration. " Jane. "
Jane tutted quietly. "What do you do after you show up?"
Maura sucked air between her teeth, beginning to understand that her orgasm was being withheld as ransom for the rest of the story.
"I tell you I'm tired. I'm so tired, Jane," Maura slipped actively into her role and gasped as the pressure increased just barely. "I'm tired of the flirtation, the sleepovers, the way you look at me, I'm tired of it all not meaning anything." Her brow was knit as she writhed wantonly and ineffectively against Jane's withholding fingers.
"How do I look at you, Maura?" Jane asked, voice low. Maura's eyes flew open to look at her, as if she needed to check for herself before she could answer. Jane watched as her mouth parted and her eyes darted all over Jane's features.
"Like I belong to you," she breathed.
"You do," Jane confirmed.
Maura let out a low whine and tried again to take what she needed, pressing herself up into Jane's hand, seeking friction and release.
"What happens next, Maura?" Jane watched as Maura squeezed her eyes shut in frustration, wetting her lips as she struggled to find the words to finish her fantasy.
"I push you down on the couch. I straddle you." Maura took a shuddering breath, and Jane rewarded her by pressing more insistent circles against her clit. "My skirt is hiked up around my hips. I unbutton my shirt. I had taken my panties off before I even got there."
Jane groaned in assent, fingers working quickly now, moving slick and wet across Maura's swollen sex. Maura cried out in relief, and Jane tried to memorize every moment of the impending climax.
"I make you touch me," Maura gasped breathlessly, finally as committed to finishing the story as Jane was to hearing it. "I force the issue if I have to. If you won't touch me right away, I touch myself. Right in front of you, right on top of you, and I am so wet for you." The words were tumbling out of her now, and her hips were moving in rhythm with Jane's hand. "And then I paint your lips with the taste of me until you finally fuck me yourself."
"Jesus Christ, Maura." Jane couldn't even begin to understand how she could feel so fucking desperate about the thought of touching Maura while already doing it. She felt Maura's nails dig into the fragile skin around her wrist.
"Jane, please. "
Jane dropped any pretense of denying Maura and pressed fingers firmly against her, giving her the pressure and speed she'd been looking for. Maura's body arched up and went rigid. Jane was enraptured as her features contorted in the most exquisite way—her eyes screwed shut, her lips taut and trembling, her brow knit tightly in frustration before relaxing as her whole body released. Maura came silently, perfectly, before collapsing back against Jane with a sharp, shuddering oh.
Jane pulled her hand away and lifted two fingers to Maura's lips. With a hum of approval, Maura gladly took Jane into her mouth, licking her clean before depositing a kiss against Jane's fingertips. Jane pressed her own lips against Maura's temple, and spoke without moving them.
"Well fuck. I really missed out."
Maura laughed that beautiful, musical laugh and turned her body in towards Jane, burying herself in her the crook of her arm in an uncharacteristically bashful display. She wrapped her arm around Jane's waist and held her tight. They lay like that for a comfortable, quiet moment before Maura spoke again.
"Why wasn't it me?" Maura's muffled voice didn't carry any hurt, just genuine curiosity. "When we first became friends I thought I was going crazy. There were so many indicators of attraction, but then nothing would happen. Eventually I learned to be unaffected by them, convinced myself you were just extremely affectionate, but…how did you not know?"
"Remember when you told me about the old maps and the warning about dragons?" Jane asked. Maura lifted her head to look up at her, a little puzzled at the mention of medieval maps but also unable to resist being excited by the topic. She sat up eagerly and Jane's heart did little flips flops at the expression on Maura's face. The immediate switch from wanton sex goddess to brainiac book nerd could not possibly have pleased Jane more.
" Hic Sunt Dracones— 'here be dragons'. I was telling you, actually, about how they used to draw dragons and other mythical beasts on dangerous or unexplored terrains on maps, but how the actual phrase itself, while popularly believed to be on all sorts of maps, had only ever been found on one sixteenth century globe, the Hunt-Lenox Globe. But actually, this is very interesting! So this year another sixteenth century globe was for sale at the London Map Fair, the Ostrich Egg Globe, that also bears that phrase, and some investigators are suggesting that the Hunt-Lenox Globe was possibly cast from this one. It's being claimed that, ah—" Maura cut herself off abruptly, like she'd lost the plot, and looked quizzically at Jane.
"What?" Jane asked. Maura shook her head, bewildered.
"I…I was expecting you to interrupt and you didn't. I'm not accustomed to going on that long."
Jane raised both brows at that. She wanted to protest, but before she could, an easy montage of her cutting off the medical examiner to demand a quick and dirty answer played through her mind. Man, she was really kind of a jerk. Though, Jane noted to herself, most of the time it was in the interest of moving along a murder investigation. She looked down at Maura's keen, guileless face. "I should really be nicer to you," Jane said softly.
Maura blushed, and laced her fingers through Jane's. "This is a good start."
Jane looked down at their entwined fingers and lifted their hands up to kiss Maura's knuckles. "You can tell me the rest of that very interesting story later, but for now, what I wanted to say is this: that's what I did with my feelings for you. They were dangerous and unexplored territories on the map. So I slapped some dragons on them and I didn't even think about going there. I wish I hadn't done it, but I've protected myself from some really awful things with this ability to just lock something in a box and leave it. I'm sorry."
Maura leaned up and pressed her lips against Jane's. "Don't be. We're here now."
They certainly were. And maybe it hadn't been meant to happen any earlier than this. Jane chewed her lower lip. "Is it my turn for a question?"
Maura tilted her head thoughtfully, as if weighing something in her mind.
"Technically, I think so. Although I really think you asked me about ten or so…let's call them 'follow up questions' before I just asked you one."
"You did get an orgasm out of it." Maura offered an indignant humph, but relented. "Fine, yes, your turn."
Jane took a deep breath. Everything was perfect right now, in their little post-coital hotel room bubble, each both loved and in love, but a real world awaited them. An entire future stretched ahead, friends and family waited. Intertwined careers existed. Jane leveled Maura with a meaningful look.
"What happens now?"
Maura's mouth dropped open a little. Whatever questions she was anticipating, that hadn't been one of them. Her lips started to move wordlessly, but before she could attempt an answer, the two part harmony of their cellphones rang out in their suite. Cursing, the detective launched herself from the bed to find her pants, while the doctor scoured around the side of the bed for her purse. Phones finally in hand, they both looked needlessly at their displays (as if there could be any doubt about who was calling), then exchanged glances. Duty literally called.
"Hearing our echo on each other's phone after six months will certainly get dispatch talking." Jane winked and then answered her phone. "Rizzoli."
Maura laughed, and hit 'accept' on her own. "This is Doctor Isles."
