Lightning Strikes Twice - Part 55
Title: Lightning Strikes Twice
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Pairing: Duh. (Mer/Der)
Rating: M
Timeline: Post Time After Time.
Well, here it is at long last! This part is sort of a last minute retrospective to get us up to the big day. I hope you like it :)
~~~~~
Derek Shepherd wanted Meredith.
As he climbed out of his Lexus into the cool, drizzly March air and leaned against the wet, slippery metal of the door, his mind broke apart. He'd been awake for over forty hours, and he'd managed to hold it together for that never ending shift and then some, but now? Sleeping, sleeping, sleeping, with her, he wanted. His joints ached. His head hurt. She would take it all away. He didn't want to be standing - lying, lying, lying down, with her, her wanted. The world swam whenever he blinked.
Shouldn't have been driving. Shouldn't have... Bad.
His nostrils fluttered as fine rivulets of precipitation collected against his chilled skin. He breathed. The air smelled wet and earthy and full of life. His fingers slicked down the bridge of his nose as he snorted, sending a cloud of chilled, misty air into the space around him. A car drove past, kicking up a spray of water at him.
He moved out of the street at a lumbering pace and stood on the sidewalk, blinking. Despite the dull gray that tempered the world, everything felt like it was sparking with electricity. Snap. Snap. Pop. Snap. Like the way she looked at him. His eyes focused on the lush green of the trees that lined the walk, the bright flare of life.
Life.
He'd saved a life. By himself. He'd been on his feet for twelve hours performing complex emergency surgery, forcing his fingers to perform repeated, tight, focused movements, the sharp smells of antiseptic and internal body matter - brains, blood, bones - winding through his nose. His joints had been screaming by the end, arthritic, crying.
And it felt fucking great.
Derek smiled, running his fingers back through his damp hair, barely noticing the pull when his knuckles found neglected tangles and wet loops, catching and coming to a halt. He'd stayed long enough to do the first neuro check after Mr. Kowolsky had woken up. The older man's eyes had been glazed, looking dull and stoned with morphine, and Derek hadn't expected much from the man as Derek had run through the routine that never seemed to feel routine anymore.
You were in an accident, Derek had said, his voice a low, sympathetic murmur. Everyone is fine. Your wife will see you very soon. Can you tell me the date? Can you wiggle your fingers and toes?
The questions had been answered absently, as if they only made a superficial sort of sense, as if Mr. Kowolsky hadn't quite caught up with the situation. But that had been okay.
Bouncing back from that kind of surgery and that kind of injury? Mr. Kowolsky would be in the hospital for a long time, and, particularly since Derek's accident, Derek had felt a deep, understanding kinship beyond the normal requirements for good bedside manner. A kind of kinship that left him coming home at night feeling more fulfilled and more tired all at once.
Your wife is here, Derek had repeated as he'd checked the man's pulse and given him a touch of reassurance. Everything will be fine. Take your time. The brain is a complicated thing. Healing takes a while.
But then, as Derek had been walking out of the recovery room, clipboard in hand, Mr. Kowolsky had done something unexpected. Thank you, he'd said, clearly, coherently. I wasn't ready to leave my wife.
Derek had smiled, his thoughts shifting elsewhere in the sudden rush of pleasure over the words. My wife, my wife, my wife. Not yet. But... Soon. Derek had booked off, that one thought lingering like a high or a warm blanket or something else he needed. Meredith. His wife. Soon.
Two months.
He needed her. Because he wanted to show her, and he just wanted... Her. Her company. The day had been rather momentous.
He'd saved a life. He felt like his body was going to shut down and fall to aching pieces, except he felt fucking great. Because he'd saved a life. And his body only felt like it was shutting down because it damned well deserved to do that after more than forty hours of slave labor for the crazy doctor at the reins. Forty hours. Dr. Derek Shepherd was back. Back to doing what he loved, unsupervised, unhindered, feeling like crap only because he was supposed to feel like crap, and it was one of the best fucking highs he'd ever experienced outside the realm of her.
Meredith.
Derek laughed. And laughed. And laughed, sending a spray of mist into the air. Passersby stared at the crazy, waterlogged man, but he didn't care. He was getting married in two months, and he hadn't seen her since before he'd scrubbed in. He'd saved a life, and, now, he wanted the frosting for the cake.
Meredith.
The rest of the world didn't seem very important right then.
He blinked, leaving the security of the car for the vast expanse of sidewalk. One step, two steps, three. Twelve feet, he wandered before he remembered he needed to put money in the meter. Money. Pay. Quarters. He rummaged through the contents of his right coat pocket, annoyed as the water made his fingers slip against his wallet and his cell phone. He wanted to see her then. Right then.
The parking meter clinked as he fed it a quarter. A few minutes. That was all. He just wanted to see her. He put a second quarter in the meter for good measure and wandered back across the sidewalk until the rain stopped, reduced to quiet tapping overhead as the multicolored store awning blocked the drizzly onslaught.
A frilly dress in the display window blocked his view, and so he stepped to the side, blinking, searching. This was the right address. The right address. Where was... The glass seemed to flash away from him as he stared at the rows and rows and rows of dresses, bows, ribbons, lace, buttons, zippers, clothing racks, shining fabric...
This was where Meredith had dragged him, wallet in hand - I don't want Thatcher to pay for it, she'd snarled, and Susan is trying to make him pay for it as some sort of sorry I abandoned you present, so we have to do this, now, before they get a chance. He hadn't been able to find any words. I'll chip in, she'd rushed to say, misinterpreting his silence. But I... I can't... I don't make... She'd looked at the floor. Enough money, his addled brain had finished for her, catching on the molasses of surrounding lace and silk. I don't make enough money.
Meredith, Izzie had said, bursting, This is the part where you appreciate the prince charming aspects and let him pay. Right? Izzie had turned to him and glared, almost as if she'd feared she might find the creep who'd dumped Meredith for Addison staring back. Cristina had rolled her eyes, her own expression making it clear there was no might about what she expected to find. The creep.
He'd swallowed, leaning into Meredith as Izzie had dragged Cristina off to start looking around. To look at the choices. The choices. He'd dumbly not realized what had been going on, even as the four of them had entered the frilly dress shop, even as Izzie had squealed with delight, even as Cristina had moaned and grumbled but come along anyway.
Hey, he'd said, trying to distract Meredith from what she'd always perceived to be their awkward financial situation. I'm willing to splurge on anything that gets you into formal wear. You'll look hot with a garter belt. All the while, his mind had been whirling. A dress. She was actually going to wear a wedding dress? A real one? A real--
She'd blinked, a snicker twitching across her face. Well, she'd purred, her fingers clasping the lapels of his coat. I get you in a tux. I suppose it's only fair.
A tall, thin, brunette man had smiled and spirited Derek's credit card from his lax grip. Meredith had kissed Derek deeply, without abandon, and the chime of the register as a very large chunk of his salary joined Alice in Wonderland hadn't bothered him one bit.
The man had returned quietly with Derek's credit card. The grin on the man's face had been infectious as he'd clapped excitedly. Oh, your fiancé is lovely, the man had said, his voice dripping with sincerity. Just lovely. Delicious eyes. We'll find something perfect to bring them out for your big day. Derek hadn't been able to tell if the assurances were meant for Meredith or for him. The man had stood there smiling cheerfully until one of his assistants had called him away.
Mr. Eliot, Mr. Eliot, you have a phone call from Janine about your flowers.
Don't tell me she ruined my order again, Mr. Eliot had moaned with a disgruntled, horrified gasp. I stated very specifically I wanted crushed red rose petals for the front display in time for Valentine's Day.
Mr. Eliot had left them standing there in silence, surrounded by racks and racks of dresses, breathing softly against each other.
Oh, this is simply a disaster! Mr. Eliot had cried from somewhere far away, but it hadn't mattered. Not when Meredith had been standing there, staring at him in the quiet, the smell of fabric and the spill of lace and frilly things all around.
Derek had inhaled her along the line of her collarbone. A dress, Meredith, he'd mumbled. You're really going to get... A dress? A real dress? A... With lace?
Well, maybe not lace, but... she'd whispered. You want the dress.
Meredith...
I got two proposals, an expensive freaking ring, a wonderful family, and you. I think I can deal with a dress for a few hours, Der. We do the compromising thing. Remember?
He remembered.
It was rude to put his hands against the glass, yes, but he did it anyway, leaning against the gold lettering as he stared. Meredith had a fitting today, and Sarah and Kathy had flown in for their fittings as well. Cristina and Izzie would be there also, but his mind stopped analyzing things the second he found her profile. The chill of the glass sank into his fingertips, but he didn't notice, didn't care as his gaze found its target. A small blond head bobbed in the air just above the sea of dress racks. Meredith.
Meredith.
For the longest time, he could only stare, captivated, enthralled, mesmerized. Pick a fucking word, he was stuck that way. But as quickly as he'd sighted her, her profile retreated behind an illuminated wall of mirrors, back to the dressing room. A cadre of his sisters and their children, Cristina, and Izzie followed Meredith, all chatter and shifting fabric.
He swallowed. Meredith pulled him after her like a siren tormenting Odysseus. Derek barely noticed the cold chill of the glass as he pushed the door open, barely noticed the quiet ding announcing his presence to the register, or the happy greetings of Mr. Eliot. Meredith was already gone, and he had to follow her.
“Just going to see Mere,” he mumbled to Mr. Eliot, who smiled, waved him on, and returned to a heated conversation with his receptionist. Something about the newest offerings by Versace. Their voices fell behind Derek's shoulders and waned into a faint buzz as he plowed onward, caught by the magnetic pull of her.
Meredith, Meredith, Meredith, he needed.
The dressing room was more of a dressing warehouse than an ordinary room. Each stall was a huge box meant to accommodate a huge claw-foot mirror and several women in flaring dresses. Heavy, plush burgundy curtains hung down from the ceilings, creating the sensation that he was walking through the chambers of a heart, the pulse of life around him urging him forward, forward, forward into the depths.
Voices cloyed around him, though none of the words formed the female-shopping-pitfalls he had often encountered when Addison had dragged him out. Does this make my hips too wide? Is this color flattering? Do you like this? Which do you prefer? Trap questions that he'd learned to skate around. No, he didn't hear anything like that. Everyone seemed happy with Meredith's choices.
I don't want to force anyone to look like a freaking candy factory explosion. Or gaudy drapery. Or Little Bo Peep or whatever, Meredith had said, first looking to him for guidance.
Still stunned that she had even been considering a wedding dress at all, he'd given her a rather Gallic I'm-a-man-don't-make-me-pick shrug. She'd then turned to Cristina, who'd stood beside Izzie, a scowling, mirthless happiness vacuum. Cristina had attended more in a you're-my-person-and-this-is-the-corpse-I-have-to-lug sense than anything remotely involved in the selection of a dress. Meredith's stare had lingered on Cristina perhaps a half a moment before skipping to Izzie, who had been bouncing on her feet as if the soles of her shoes had been spring-loaded.
Pick me. Pick me. Pick me.
Izzie had swooped in on Meredith as soon as she'd been given the opening, all nuclear-watt smiles and high-pitched gaggle talk, the kind that tended to happen whenever women congregated, and he'd sat back in silence to watch the parade of This? How about this? Is this any good? Cristina had sat next to Derek on the ornate, velvet bench as the parade of shifting fabric went by, her eyes unblinking, lips slightly parted, the reactive tremble of her loose hair the only indication that Mr. Eliot's staccato, excited clapping was hitting her eardrums.
Do we really have to... Cristina had begun to say, her voice wispy and barely audible over the trading laughter and suggestions. Her shoulders had slumped, and she'd let the sentence die when she'd watched Meredith looking at herself in the mirror. This is your fault, she'd grumbled as she'd leaned back on the bench and crossed her arms with a subtle growl.
You already hate me, he'd said, unwilling to stop the smug grin as he spread his legs and slouched, and unable to tear his gaze from Meredith. What's for me to lose?
Good point, Cristina had replied, and then she'd gone silent for the rest of the torture.
He'd settled in. Hours must have passed as dress after dress after dress passed by him for inspection. He knew he should have remembered her in every elegant iteration. Strapless, sleeveless, puffy-shouldered, long-sleeved, form-fitting, slim, loose, flaring, white, cream, lace, satin. But he hadn't been able to stop watching Meredith's face, and the rest of the experience had faded into the blurry fringes of his senses.
She'd said her decision to wear a wedding dress was a compromise for him, but the way her lips had twitched upward as she'd pondered her many choices, the way she'd posed and preened before the mirror as if imaginary weddings were happening behind her eyes... I could be a princess for a day, her expression had said, and everything in his body had loosened when he'd read the words off her face as though she were his novel. He'd been tired, a little achy, but in the moment when he'd gleaned the meaning of her twitchy, hesitant smile and the dreamy sparkle of gray in her eyes, his discomfort had bled away, and he'd found he loved her more.
Derek blinked, pushing the memory away with a grin as the surrounding voices pulled him back into the present. He felt a little voyeuristic, slipping into the dressing room unannounced, but his need for her thrummed inside his body like the bass beat in a noisy club, and it wasn't like he was looking for... Well, the only person he would be wantonly staring at was someone who usually rather enjoyed the attention from him. His heart joined in the excitement with a gasping flutter before it kicked into higher gear. Thump-thump, thump-thump, thump, thump, thud, thud. Slam. Slam. Slam.
He breathed softly as he searched. Quiet, quiet, he thought frantically at his rampaging heart. Not yet. You can't have her yet, and being caught is bad. Bad, bad, bad. He forced himself to take a long, even inhalation, to calm the slow-burn of excitement, only to bring a hint of lavender wafting against him. The heady scent of it welled in every crevice of his lungs, and his only hope for rational thought ceased. Right that moment, somewhere in that dressing room, she was in a dress. Her wedding dress. And she was taking it off.
He wanted her, he wanted, he want-- Stop. Stop it.
He moved past his sisters. Cristina's deep, growling expressions of discontent jarred him to a halt. Not the last dressing room, then. Which left...
Meredith's mumbling brought him to her like the North Star in a midnight sky.
“Stupid... This... Crap. Stupid, stupid...” she muttered behind the curtain to his right. He pushed the drape serving as her dressing room door several inches to the side, only to find her twisted around like a pretzel, caught in the middle of a flowing, white dress. She'd picked a simple white strapless dress that flared a bit at the feet, no overly embellished lace, no train that would require a forklift to move. The fabric had a subtle sheen to it, like snow resting under the last hint of moonlight in the morning. The dress was elegant, understated, and perfectly... Meredith. And Meredith? Meredith was very, very flexible. Very--
“Cristina!” Meredith belted as she twisted around, oblivious to his presence. The dress flared as she spun and hopped. “There's buttons on this thing!”
“I know,” Cristina replied from somewhere to the left. “One-hundred and twenty-two. I remember every single one of them, by the way.”
“I thought you said all these buttons were good for surgical dexterity!” Meredith called back as she tried to reach behind herself only to fail and growl in frustration.
“That was before my obligatory five minutes of person-ly tolerance went poof.”
For a moment, Derek couldn't breathe as he watched her. Meredith. His. His wife. Soon.
Derek Shepherd… Will you marry me?
Two months.
Even shuffling and off balance, Meredith looked beautiful, breathtaking... Garter. You'll have to take the garter out from underneath-- He swallowed as he stared at her. The dress hugged her curves and coaxed her hips into a gorgeous, smooth hourglass. Her pale, sloping shoulders dragged his attention away from the luxurious fabric. He blinked as he filled in every naked line of her smooth skin from the shoulders down, and the dress seemed to fade away as desperate memories took control.
I love you, I love you, I love you...
His throat. Couldn't... He swallowed and couldn't find anything else to do but step forward. The drape rustled as he pushed past it.
His hands found the silk that hugged her waistline, and he pulled her up against him. “Need help?” he murmured into her neckline as he breathed her in. “I'm extremely good with buttons.” The scent of lavender stroked the back of his throat, and in a flash, breathing wasn't enough. His lips parted, and he tasted the soft knot of skin over her clavicle. He could help. He could.
“Crap!” Meredith screeched, but he covered her lips with his palm to silence her. Her body tightened in his arms, as if she were about to bolt, but as she seemed to realize who her dressing room intruder was, and what he was doing, and that she rather liked it, her muscles loosened, and she sighed.
“I'll help you in a minute,” Cristina growled. “I have my own buttons to deal with at the moment. Seventy-two, I might add.”
“Seventy-six,” Izzie corrected, giggling lightly as an exclamation. “I love weddings. I feel like I'm in a Disney movie!”
“Only you would think that's a good thing,” Cristina snarled. “Now, shut up and get me out of this thing.”
“Then stop squirming!” Izzie replied.
For several seconds in the following silence, Meredith remained pliant, sighing with enjoyment as he nipped and licked and teased. He found the first pair of buttons between her shoulder blades and slipped the tiny loops of fabric free. Surgical dexterity, he pondered. Definitely required. The thread was minuscule and delicate, and the buttons were smaller than peas. He wondered if he would have been lying about the buttons if he were a construction worker, or a sedentary insurance salesman, or... His thoughts trailed away as he tasted her and tasted her again, clean, the slightest hint of salt and cinnamon. Mmm. But instead of relaxing further, Meredith stiffened.
“You're not supposed to be here,” she hissed as she found her words again. “It's bad luck! You can't see--”
“I saw it already, remember?” he said, his voice a hoarse growl. “You dragged me shopping!”
“I didn't drag you. You were happy to--” Her voice jarred to a halt, and what little progress he'd been making on relaxing her into a pile of moaning regressed to nothing. “Right? You were happy, right?”
“Thrilled,” he assured her. “It was just an expression, Mere. But I saw the dress. It's been seen.”
“It's been...” She sighed. “You did, but...”
“But?” he whispered against her ear. The fabric of the dress slipped against his fingertips as he found her hips and rubbed her.
“But it wasn't mine then!” she protested. “It was baggy, and--” Her voice fell into a deep, withered, staccato moan as he ground into her. The dress rustled and shifted, mingling with the sounds of his breathing as he pried four more pairs of buttons loose. Get it off. Get it off. Get it off, his mind screamed as the need to reassure her drifted away, replaced by desire. A thrill of heat galloped down his spine. She was perfect. “And stiff,” Meredith commented.
“Oh, yes,” he whispered, a delighted chuckle escaping with his surprised exhale. He roamed up her neck and nuzzled against her hair. “You can feel it through all that silk?”
“No, I meant,” she panted. “Dress. Starchy. Not mine... Bad. Bad luck! No...”
His excitement plummeted.
He paused, trying to collect his thoughts and his breath long enough to get her off the ramble train. This wasn't going quite how he'd planned it. He'd only wanted to say hello, to see her. But seeing her had torn all that to shreds, and he'd found himself stuck with the now plan. The plan that replaced propriety with the desire to sweep her off her feet as only words of oh, yes, Derek, please, please, more, fell from her lips. She hadn't yet said oh, yes, Derek, please, or more, let alone any of it in multiples. Oh for five after that much saliva spent was rather discouraging.
“Meredith, please,” he murmured.
“But--”
“I can...” he whispered, grasping for words and failing as the fire drove his body into her, grinding. Down-shift, he thought. You can do slow. You can-- Incredibly slow, damn it. Can... He popped the next pair of buttons, revealing a sliver of creamy skin that he hadn't had access to before. He rubbed his thumb between a set of pale freckles on her back that looked like a miniature version of the Orion constellation. Her skin followed the pressure of his fingertip like smooth molasses. “Please,” he managed.
“But everyone is here--”
“I just finished twelve hours of surgery at the end of a thirty-six hour shift,” he snapped. “I haven't seen you naked in more than two days, and I need you. I don't care if the Pope himself is watching.” His frustration melted into desperation as she shifted, trying to look at him. He caught the dim reflection of the overhead lights glittering in her right pupil, which dilated with lust as he watched. She wanted this. Her expression was what he'd been waiting for. An indication. A sign. Something... She wanted... God, damn it. He couldn't do slow today. He renewed his efforts, rhythm broken to shreds by desire, and he suddenly didn't care where they were, who was nearby, or what sort of art he applied to the experience. “I need you, now, Meredith. Right now.”
For a moment, he thought he would lose her, that her interest would dissipate when it crashed into the murmur of his family and her friends all around them like waves breaking on rocks. It would be the smart thing. It would be the appropriate thing. God, was he really acting like this while his sisters and their kids were in talking distance, separated from them by nothing more than drapes?
Yes, he really was. He was--
“Meredith,” Izzie called, her voice fluttering down over the curtains. “How do you think you're going to do your hair for the wedding?”
Too many people, too close, but if they could do it fast, if they could... He inhaled sharply, annoyed at how desperate it sounded, just a slip of vocalized air, quivering, pained. He'd come here to... Just to see her. And he'd devolved into a pile of lechery with one whiff of her hair, one focused moment on her curves, the dress, the... Jesus.
Hard. Fucking hard.
“A French...” Meredith said, but her voice came out growly and hoarse and barely there as he shakily freed her of button after button. Get it off. Get it off. Get it off... Stop. Stop it. You'll get caught. You'll rip the buttons. You'll... Had to get... Inside. Had to-- His chest heaved with pain at the prospect of such a long unwrapping process. Go slow. He had to-- She blinked, cleared her throat. “Something French. Twisty. Or... Something,” she managed, but he barely noticed in the fray of wanting.
You like my twisty.
Are we talking literal twisty?
Her body stiffened in his arms as he arrived at the very last stretch of buttons, and she turned. She stared at him, eyes hazy with the same desire he felt burning through him. Her shallow breathing would have calmed him if her dress weren't unfurling from her body like a banana peel. The curve of her hips lay just below the flowing white, a present waiting for him.
“I guess if we can do planes,” she whispered, “We can do a dressing room quickie.”
He shuddered with relief as he curled his arms around her. “I don't know what's wrong with me. I just wanted--” You. Naked. Now.
Her lips twitched and parted, revealing the pearly shine of her teeth. “Nothing's wrong,” she said. “Nothing at all.” Her voice dropped into a low and throaty pitch, like a cat, purring. “Surgery is such a high...”
I don't know why anybody does drugs...
He dipped into her cleavage with his tongue and wandered up the line of her throat, breathing, sighing, sucking. “I love you,” he said.
She gasped a breathless set of syllables that could have been, “Me, too.” His fingertips brushed her shoulder blades, stroked the curve of her spine into the valley at the small of her back. He thrust against her, jamming his hands between her and the wall.
She gasped. “More, there,” she moaned, and through the shifting, flowing dress, he felt her grinding against his erection. Her hands wormed at the buttons of his jeans, and with a vicious string of pop, pop, pops, he was free, free and wanting, only his boxers between his skin and her dress.
Fire.
Her body thumped as he rammed against the wall with her. Gentle, be... Slow. What? His teeth skimmed the line of her jugular, under her jawline, everywhere, tasting. Tasting heaven. He imagined he could feel her pulse, alive underneath her skin, thudding, hot. And then his fingers found their prize. The last set of buttons between him and her.
“This sort of breaks the whole virginal dress thing,” she murmured, hiccuping on each sigh as he pressed into her and they shuffled toward the wall. He popped the last six buttons, giddy as the white dress crumpled to the floor. He found a black lace thong waiting for him south of her navel. No garter or stockings or... His breath stopped. She was wearing a black lace thong with the surface area of a small post-it note, and she thought that the quickie sex was what was ruining the virginal dress aspect? Don't say that. Don't say-- Stop. Stopstopstop.
“Hmm,” he purred, almost dizzy, as she thumped against the wall and stretched against him, making him feel a little like a lion taking a gazelle down for the kill. Take her. Take her. Take her. “That's a misconception, you know.”
“Well,” she replied, breathless. “What's it mean then?”
He sighed, nuzzling against her. “Purity of heart.”
“I guess I screwed that up when I met Jose.”
“You didn't screw anything up,” he said. Her hands slipped underneath his boxers and stroked him. “Fuck.”
He growled at her, leaning against her shoulder as she shimmied his boxers down, down, down, silk sliding against his burning quads, until they pooled at his thighs on top of his jeans. She felt good. She felt... God. He shoved into her, sliding his length between her legs. Wet, warm heat enveloped him, and all he could do was focus his blurry vision on the tiled ceiling and moan. Sin. Sin. Sin. You'll get caught. You'll get-- Heaven. His moan lengthened. He nipped at her fingers when she brushed against his lips to silence him. Her hands roamed up, and needle points of pain brought his gaze back down as she wound her fingertips through his hair and yanked. A curdled groan broke apart over her lips.
His gaze met hers. Her eyes shone bright with his reflection. He saw himself in the black pools of her pupils, panting, dazed. Aroused. Her lips had parted, and she stared dully at him, removed from sentience by lust. The twist and wind of her stray curls, the way she breathed, short and stilted, the way her stare lingered on him as though she were high, drugged on him, just as bad as he was on her... Heaven. His.
I have what I want.
“All right, Meredith,” said Cristina, impatience biting at her tone. “Which of these ridiculous fluff pits did you disappear into?”
At least you’re not the ones she heard.
With a startled blink, Meredith returned. “Nowhere!” she croaked as her cheeks reddened, and heated blush that had nothing to do with sex snaked down her neck, her breasts... Everywhere. “I mean...” She sucked in a breath, and he felt snarls of pain at his scalp again.
At least you’re not the ones she saw.
He leaned into her neck, letting his teeth brush her skin. Part of him, a dark part that he hated, wanted Cristina to find them. Find them so she would know. Meredith. His. His, his, his. His wife. Derek sniggered against Meredith's ear. “You're playing with fire, you know, naughty girl.”
Okay, shutting up now.
Meredith stiffened, which only made him moan as her inner quads clenched, enveloping him, stroking him. He pushed against her, barely noticing as the breath leaked out of her. Silk rubbed over him. Silk that wasn't supposed to be there. His fingers slipped down her skin, following the swell of her breast, the bumps of her ribs, the dip at her waist... He found the lace straddling her hips in a scalpel-thin line and clawed at it. It shouldn't. Be there. It shouldn't... God. What was he doing? He was... Acting like... Acting...
I love you the most. I really can’t imagine wanting to die in light of that.
“I'm fine,” Meredith snapped. “Buttons are... I can do the buttons thing.”
“No, you can't,” Derek growled playfully. “But I can.”
“Whatever, Meredith,” Cristina replied. “I'll be outside sucking down Guinness.”
“Really?” Izzie asked. “Where?”
“The bar across the street,” Cristina said.
Meredith's thong slipped down to the floor in a pile with her dress, and her left knee slammed up against his hip to grip him. His body wavered like a tree prostrating for the wind. What would have been more words punched out of him, a staccato march of nonsensical sounds. I want you. I need you. Woman, you're killing me, and I don't care, because this is like fucking nirvana. Except it sounded more like unghhh when his vocal cords were through mangling the thoughts and turning them into syllables. Wrong. This was all wrong. They would get caught, but he couldn't care, he couldn't--
Footsteps. Coming toward them like hammers of judgment.
“Mere, honey,” Sarah's rich voice said just behind the curtain. Just behind... So close. Dangerous, and suddenly, he cared. Cristina was one thing. Sarah was another. And Sarah... “Let me come help you,” she said.
“No, really...” Meredith blurted as she leaned her forehead against his chest and squeezed her eyes shut. Her nails dug into the bunched muscles of his back, stabbed him through his cotton shirt with pain he was sure served as a harbinger for runnels of blood. But he didn't care about the pain, he didn't-- “I'm fine...” Meredith said, shifting against him in a way that made his knees quiver and threaten to give out. God, she was... Sin. “I'm totally fine.”
Sarah chuckled. “Don't be shy. It's impossible to get these things off...” The curtain hissed as she pushed the fabric back. All Derek could do was shimmy in front of Meredith and fight to keep his balance while he protected her modesty, while he... Did... something. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck. “Without...” Silence. A gasp. “Help,” Sarah finished weakly. “Der... Um. Hello.”
“Crap,” Meredith hissed against his chest. He heaved a breath as her nails dug into his skin.
A set of little footsteps approached while he tried to collect his thoughts, but Meredith's skin touched him, he was so close, and he needed. Dizziness halted any capable response, and he couldn't... Jesus. Why did she have to keep squirming against his...
“Unca Derk, whatcha doin' to Aunt Merdith?”
He turned his head and watched as Sarah swooped down and plucked Elizabeth, one of Kathy's kids, up into her arms. “Okay, then,” Sarah said, her eyes sparkling with mischief. “Uncle Derek's busy, sweetie. Let's go for ice cream. I saw a shop across the street.”
A chorus of shrieks pierced the dressing room. “Ice cream!”
Sarah disappeared, and Derek watched Elizabeth's tiny, buckled shoes slide out of view. The curtain swooshed shut. Voices cracked down around them like anvils. What? Derek's here? When did that happen?
Meredith's fingers loosened, and the spikes of pain against his back relinquished their grip on him. Footsteps cluttered the air around them. Then the noises in the dressing room thinned, and a quality of aloneness hit his awareness. Everyone had left to give them privacy. Or... He glanced at Meredith. Or to give him time to apologize.
He groaned and stepped back to keep from squashing her against the wall. She slid into a sitting position, her creamy skin set ablaze by blush, her expression dazed, and her wedding dress spread around her like the petals of a blooming flower. For a moment, she sat there, stunned and silent. He blinked, watching her as the fire coursing through his veins became uncomfortable icy floes.
“Crap,” Meredith repeated softly, and he couldn't help but grimace in agreement. Her fingers shook and, suddenly, she was on her feet again, pulling up the microscopic thong he'd rid her of not minutes before. She stepped out of the dress, leaving it crumpled in the corner, and rushed to her street clothes, which were folded on the seat by the mirror.
“Mere,” he tried, his voice cracking with remnants of his halted frenzy. He coughed, trying to clear his throat, trying not to focus on how disappointed he was that she was covering up, that she was hiding all her precious, beautiful skin.
“Well,” she said flatly as she yanked her shirt over her head. “I'm sort of on the mortified train. Are you?”
Not really. Just... He bit his lip and forced himself to reassemble his brain. All the desire he'd pent up leaked out of him like air from a days-old balloon. Replaced by... What exactly? Not shame at being caught. Just shame that he'd degenerated into... that. The thing that had lined them up to get caught in the first place.
“It's okay, Mere,” he said as he buttoned up his jeans. He felt raw and uncompleted, vastly uncomfortable in the space provided to him. The denim rubbed through the silk of his boxers, abraded him like sandpaper, and he longed for the slick feel of her thighs against him. But he forced himself to ignore it. “It happens.”
She stopped and glared. “It happens,” she said. Her eyebrows rose into a sharp arches. “It happens?”
Derek shrugged. “With my family? It totally happens, Mere. Have you listened to Sarah and Stewart at all when they talk? Or Mark? Or--”
Meredith sighed. “At least your mother wasn't here...”
“Mere, it's really okay,” he assured her. “This is all--”
Meredith's lips formed a flat line. She zipped up her jeans and paced, and he got the distinct impression he was watching a lioness as she moved back and forth, back and forth, as if she were debating how to-- She wheeled to an abrupt halt in front of him. The heat of her skin throbbed against him, and her breathing filled the silence. The air seemed to crackle. Her eyes glittered and narrowed, and her arms crossed over her chest.
“I think we should stop having sex,” she said. “Until the wedding night.”
His mouth fell open. “Don't you think that's a little... drastic?”
The skin around her gray eyes twitched, and a heated blush spread across her cheeks. “Derek, we were just caught having dirty sex in a bridal shop by your five-year-old niece. Nothing is too drastic. She's probably scarred for life.”
Derek snorted. “She's not scarred for life, Meredith,” he said. “This is--”
“Damn it, Derek,” Meredith snapped. “Can you please care for a second that you made me look like a whore in front of your family?”
You don't get to call me a whore.
His muscles clenched, and an agonizing chill slipped down his throat, as though he'd swallowed an ice cube, and it'd gotten stuck somewhere between his mouth and his stomach. It ached. His eyes watered, and he swallowed. “A who-- Whoa,” he said, his voice hoarse. He reached out and clutched at her shoulders, suddenly desperate to bring her close. His arms folded around her. Her muscles loosened, and she leaned into him.
The relief he felt at just that small concession fired in all his joints at once. He started to shake, not quite sure what to do with the sudden swell of everything. The exhaustion from before. Shame.
“Meredith...” he said. Her shoulder blades cut into his forearms he squeezed her so hard, but he didn't care. “Mere, I didn't mean... I never meant...” None of the words were coming out. They kept knocking against his teeth and falling flat on his tongue. “You're not... I just wanted--” To bask. To love.
She sighed. Warmth spread across his chest, and she snuggled closer. He felt her fingers at the small of his back, clutching his shirt. “Forget it,” she said. “I'm being stupid. You're right. Your family is... Different. Different than mine was.”
“It's not stupid,” he said, teeth gritted. Hate sluiced down over all the other ugly things constricting around his heart. Damn her fucking family. Damn them all to-- “No. There was something there, Meredith. There was... And I am so sorry. I just wanted-- You're not a whore, Meredith. Never.”
“I know, I...”
“No, Meredith,” he growled. He leaned back and touched her chin with his fingers, tilted her head up. The fine hairs dotting her skin felt like silk underneath his finger pads, and he longed to run his splayed hand down her throat. To explore. Lower, and lower, and lower still. But the feeling was pale in comparison to the sudden certainty that there was something he needed to pry from her. Like a splinter, or a... “Look at me. Where on Earth did this come from? I thought we were okay.”
She blinked, eyes shining. “We are okay, Derek,” she said. She reached up and wiped her face with her palms, sniffling. “We are... I love you. It's perfect.” Her lips twitched, pulling her expression into a deep, warm smile. “I feel... perfect. Like I'm in a fairytale or something. It's just...”
“Just?” he prodded.
“Our wedding night should be special,” she said. “It should be... It shouldn't be just another night.”
“It won't be, Mere,” he assured her. “It will be our wedding night.
Anger flashed again. “It won't be special if we're having sex in dressing room closets in my freaking wedding dress right up until the day before.”
“Meredith,” he murmured, leaning against her. Her arms wrapped around his waist, and he sighed. “Any sex with you is special. You're always special to me.”
“Exciting doesn't necessarily mean special,” she replied. “I want...”
When her voice trailed away, he kissed the top of her head and rested against her, breathing. “What, Mere?” he prodded. “What do you want?”
Her fingers clenched. “Everyone always thinks I'm the dark and twisty freak,” she said. “I get it. I do. I still think that, too. Sometimes...”
“Mere, you're not--”
“I want to be fresh and...” Her voice halted. He closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of her. Breathing. Blood rushing. “I want it to be...”
“Magic?” he whispered.
Her entire body loosened in his arms, and she hiccuped, or sobbed, or something that he couldn't identify. She sniffed and met his eyes. Smiled, brilliant, glowing. “Yeah,” she said, though her expression said so much more, so much that made his heart thud and his breath stop. You get me. You always get me.
Just for the record... I am your knight in shining whatever...
He grinned. “Okay.”
“Really?” she replied, eyebrows raised. “You're okay with this?”
“I like sex, Mere, with you.”
“Derek...”
“But I can definitely understand wanting the magic, Mere,” he assured her. “You give that to me every day...”
I don’t think a science book will ever figure that one out. I imagine it’s a bit like getting struck by lightning.
His words didn't have the desired effect. Her bright face crumpled into a frown. “Oh,” she said. “Crap.”
“I didn't say that to make you feel guilty...” he said.
“I'm...” she stammered and looked down. “Maybe it was a dumb idea. The no sex thing.”
He watched her gray eyes as she studied him. There it was again. The niggling realization that she wanted or needed... Him. To do something. For her. She knew what she wanted, except, she didn't *know*. She needed that push. She needed...
“My family will be around more and more as we get closer to the wedding...” Two months. Two months. Two months.
She nodded. “They will be. They're already here all the time, and the wedding isn't even in Seattle.”
“And Mark sucks at knocking,” he added.
“He does,” Meredith replied, wincing. From the look on her face, she definitely remembered that.
When they'd christened his desk for the hell of it. A sort of welcome back to the operating table extravaganza after Mike had cleared him for surgeries. Mark had decided to offer his own congratulations. Meredith had had on her lab coat. Mark hadn't seen anything at all except her pristinely ironed coat, the disarrayed trail of her loose hair, Derek's knees, and the scattered torrent of papers that had been in Derek's inbox until Derek's back had slammed on top of the tray and sent the whole thing tumbling to the floor.
Fuck, man, Mark had snapped. Lock your door, for Christ's sake. Or tie your stethoscope on the knob like we did in med school. The door had slammed shut behind him as he'd muttered curses to himself. Fucking congratulations.
Derek grinned. “So, it's settled then.”
Meredith frowned. “Derek...”
“Don't tell me you're backing out now.”
“What?”
He kissed her. “Can't make it two months without me?”
“I--”
“I know,” he replied. He leaned into her and brushed his lips against her. Soft. Soft. Heaven. He groaned, inhaling the scent of lavender as he nuzzled against her ear. His tongue skimmed her earlobe, tasting her. “I'm irresistible,” he murmured against her skin.
Wet, soft skin closed around his Adam's apple. The tip of her nose ran up against his jaw line. She wandered over his chin and found his lips. “You are,” she said. “Usually.”
“I love you,” he replied. “Always.”
She leaned against him and sighed. “Yeah.”
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Pairing: Duh. (Mer/Der)
Rating: M
Timeline: Post Time After Time.
Well, here it is at long last! This part is sort of a last minute retrospective to get us up to the big day. I hope you like it :)
~~~~~
Derek Shepherd wanted Meredith.
As he climbed out of his Lexus into the cool, drizzly March air and leaned against the wet, slippery metal of the door, his mind broke apart. He'd been awake for over forty hours, and he'd managed to hold it together for that never ending shift and then some, but now? Sleeping, sleeping, sleeping, with her, he wanted. His joints ached. His head hurt. She would take it all away. He didn't want to be standing - lying, lying, lying down, with her, her wanted. The world swam whenever he blinked.
Shouldn't have been driving. Shouldn't have... Bad.
His nostrils fluttered as fine rivulets of precipitation collected against his chilled skin. He breathed. The air smelled wet and earthy and full of life. His fingers slicked down the bridge of his nose as he snorted, sending a cloud of chilled, misty air into the space around him. A car drove past, kicking up a spray of water at him.
He moved out of the street at a lumbering pace and stood on the sidewalk, blinking. Despite the dull gray that tempered the world, everything felt like it was sparking with electricity. Snap. Snap. Pop. Snap. Like the way she looked at him. His eyes focused on the lush green of the trees that lined the walk, the bright flare of life.
Life.
He'd saved a life. By himself. He'd been on his feet for twelve hours performing complex emergency surgery, forcing his fingers to perform repeated, tight, focused movements, the sharp smells of antiseptic and internal body matter - brains, blood, bones - winding through his nose. His joints had been screaming by the end, arthritic, crying.
And it felt fucking great.
Derek smiled, running his fingers back through his damp hair, barely noticing the pull when his knuckles found neglected tangles and wet loops, catching and coming to a halt. He'd stayed long enough to do the first neuro check after Mr. Kowolsky had woken up. The older man's eyes had been glazed, looking dull and stoned with morphine, and Derek hadn't expected much from the man as Derek had run through the routine that never seemed to feel routine anymore.
You were in an accident, Derek had said, his voice a low, sympathetic murmur. Everyone is fine. Your wife will see you very soon. Can you tell me the date? Can you wiggle your fingers and toes?
The questions had been answered absently, as if they only made a superficial sort of sense, as if Mr. Kowolsky hadn't quite caught up with the situation. But that had been okay.
Bouncing back from that kind of surgery and that kind of injury? Mr. Kowolsky would be in the hospital for a long time, and, particularly since Derek's accident, Derek had felt a deep, understanding kinship beyond the normal requirements for good bedside manner. A kind of kinship that left him coming home at night feeling more fulfilled and more tired all at once.
Your wife is here, Derek had repeated as he'd checked the man's pulse and given him a touch of reassurance. Everything will be fine. Take your time. The brain is a complicated thing. Healing takes a while.
But then, as Derek had been walking out of the recovery room, clipboard in hand, Mr. Kowolsky had done something unexpected. Thank you, he'd said, clearly, coherently. I wasn't ready to leave my wife.
Derek had smiled, his thoughts shifting elsewhere in the sudden rush of pleasure over the words. My wife, my wife, my wife. Not yet. But... Soon. Derek had booked off, that one thought lingering like a high or a warm blanket or something else he needed. Meredith. His wife. Soon.
Two months.
He needed her. Because he wanted to show her, and he just wanted... Her. Her company. The day had been rather momentous.
He'd saved a life. He felt like his body was going to shut down and fall to aching pieces, except he felt fucking great. Because he'd saved a life. And his body only felt like it was shutting down because it damned well deserved to do that after more than forty hours of slave labor for the crazy doctor at the reins. Forty hours. Dr. Derek Shepherd was back. Back to doing what he loved, unsupervised, unhindered, feeling like crap only because he was supposed to feel like crap, and it was one of the best fucking highs he'd ever experienced outside the realm of her.
Meredith.
Derek laughed. And laughed. And laughed, sending a spray of mist into the air. Passersby stared at the crazy, waterlogged man, but he didn't care. He was getting married in two months, and he hadn't seen her since before he'd scrubbed in. He'd saved a life, and, now, he wanted the frosting for the cake.
Meredith.
The rest of the world didn't seem very important right then.
He blinked, leaving the security of the car for the vast expanse of sidewalk. One step, two steps, three. Twelve feet, he wandered before he remembered he needed to put money in the meter. Money. Pay. Quarters. He rummaged through the contents of his right coat pocket, annoyed as the water made his fingers slip against his wallet and his cell phone. He wanted to see her then. Right then.
The parking meter clinked as he fed it a quarter. A few minutes. That was all. He just wanted to see her. He put a second quarter in the meter for good measure and wandered back across the sidewalk until the rain stopped, reduced to quiet tapping overhead as the multicolored store awning blocked the drizzly onslaught.
A frilly dress in the display window blocked his view, and so he stepped to the side, blinking, searching. This was the right address. The right address. Where was... The glass seemed to flash away from him as he stared at the rows and rows and rows of dresses, bows, ribbons, lace, buttons, zippers, clothing racks, shining fabric...
This was where Meredith had dragged him, wallet in hand - I don't want Thatcher to pay for it, she'd snarled, and Susan is trying to make him pay for it as some sort of sorry I abandoned you present, so we have to do this, now, before they get a chance. He hadn't been able to find any words. I'll chip in, she'd rushed to say, misinterpreting his silence. But I... I can't... I don't make... She'd looked at the floor. Enough money, his addled brain had finished for her, catching on the molasses of surrounding lace and silk. I don't make enough money.
Meredith, Izzie had said, bursting, This is the part where you appreciate the prince charming aspects and let him pay. Right? Izzie had turned to him and glared, almost as if she'd feared she might find the creep who'd dumped Meredith for Addison staring back. Cristina had rolled her eyes, her own expression making it clear there was no might about what she expected to find. The creep.
He'd swallowed, leaning into Meredith as Izzie had dragged Cristina off to start looking around. To look at the choices. The choices. He'd dumbly not realized what had been going on, even as the four of them had entered the frilly dress shop, even as Izzie had squealed with delight, even as Cristina had moaned and grumbled but come along anyway.
Hey, he'd said, trying to distract Meredith from what she'd always perceived to be their awkward financial situation. I'm willing to splurge on anything that gets you into formal wear. You'll look hot with a garter belt. All the while, his mind had been whirling. A dress. She was actually going to wear a wedding dress? A real one? A real--
She'd blinked, a snicker twitching across her face. Well, she'd purred, her fingers clasping the lapels of his coat. I get you in a tux. I suppose it's only fair.
A tall, thin, brunette man had smiled and spirited Derek's credit card from his lax grip. Meredith had kissed Derek deeply, without abandon, and the chime of the register as a very large chunk of his salary joined Alice in Wonderland hadn't bothered him one bit.
The man had returned quietly with Derek's credit card. The grin on the man's face had been infectious as he'd clapped excitedly. Oh, your fiancé is lovely, the man had said, his voice dripping with sincerity. Just lovely. Delicious eyes. We'll find something perfect to bring them out for your big day. Derek hadn't been able to tell if the assurances were meant for Meredith or for him. The man had stood there smiling cheerfully until one of his assistants had called him away.
Mr. Eliot, Mr. Eliot, you have a phone call from Janine about your flowers.
Don't tell me she ruined my order again, Mr. Eliot had moaned with a disgruntled, horrified gasp. I stated very specifically I wanted crushed red rose petals for the front display in time for Valentine's Day.
Mr. Eliot had left them standing there in silence, surrounded by racks and racks of dresses, breathing softly against each other.
Oh, this is simply a disaster! Mr. Eliot had cried from somewhere far away, but it hadn't mattered. Not when Meredith had been standing there, staring at him in the quiet, the smell of fabric and the spill of lace and frilly things all around.
Derek had inhaled her along the line of her collarbone. A dress, Meredith, he'd mumbled. You're really going to get... A dress? A real dress? A... With lace?
Well, maybe not lace, but... she'd whispered. You want the dress.
Meredith...
I got two proposals, an expensive freaking ring, a wonderful family, and you. I think I can deal with a dress for a few hours, Der. We do the compromising thing. Remember?
He remembered.
It was rude to put his hands against the glass, yes, but he did it anyway, leaning against the gold lettering as he stared. Meredith had a fitting today, and Sarah and Kathy had flown in for their fittings as well. Cristina and Izzie would be there also, but his mind stopped analyzing things the second he found her profile. The chill of the glass sank into his fingertips, but he didn't notice, didn't care as his gaze found its target. A small blond head bobbed in the air just above the sea of dress racks. Meredith.
Meredith.
For the longest time, he could only stare, captivated, enthralled, mesmerized. Pick a fucking word, he was stuck that way. But as quickly as he'd sighted her, her profile retreated behind an illuminated wall of mirrors, back to the dressing room. A cadre of his sisters and their children, Cristina, and Izzie followed Meredith, all chatter and shifting fabric.
He swallowed. Meredith pulled him after her like a siren tormenting Odysseus. Derek barely noticed the cold chill of the glass as he pushed the door open, barely noticed the quiet ding announcing his presence to the register, or the happy greetings of Mr. Eliot. Meredith was already gone, and he had to follow her.
“Just going to see Mere,” he mumbled to Mr. Eliot, who smiled, waved him on, and returned to a heated conversation with his receptionist. Something about the newest offerings by Versace. Their voices fell behind Derek's shoulders and waned into a faint buzz as he plowed onward, caught by the magnetic pull of her.
Meredith, Meredith, Meredith, he needed.
The dressing room was more of a dressing warehouse than an ordinary room. Each stall was a huge box meant to accommodate a huge claw-foot mirror and several women in flaring dresses. Heavy, plush burgundy curtains hung down from the ceilings, creating the sensation that he was walking through the chambers of a heart, the pulse of life around him urging him forward, forward, forward into the depths.
Voices cloyed around him, though none of the words formed the female-shopping-pitfalls he had often encountered when Addison had dragged him out. Does this make my hips too wide? Is this color flattering? Do you like this? Which do you prefer? Trap questions that he'd learned to skate around. No, he didn't hear anything like that. Everyone seemed happy with Meredith's choices.
I don't want to force anyone to look like a freaking candy factory explosion. Or gaudy drapery. Or Little Bo Peep or whatever, Meredith had said, first looking to him for guidance.
Still stunned that she had even been considering a wedding dress at all, he'd given her a rather Gallic I'm-a-man-don't-make-me-pick shrug. She'd then turned to Cristina, who'd stood beside Izzie, a scowling, mirthless happiness vacuum. Cristina had attended more in a you're-my-person-and-this-is-the-corpse-I-have-to-lug sense than anything remotely involved in the selection of a dress. Meredith's stare had lingered on Cristina perhaps a half a moment before skipping to Izzie, who had been bouncing on her feet as if the soles of her shoes had been spring-loaded.
Pick me. Pick me. Pick me.
Izzie had swooped in on Meredith as soon as she'd been given the opening, all nuclear-watt smiles and high-pitched gaggle talk, the kind that tended to happen whenever women congregated, and he'd sat back in silence to watch the parade of This? How about this? Is this any good? Cristina had sat next to Derek on the ornate, velvet bench as the parade of shifting fabric went by, her eyes unblinking, lips slightly parted, the reactive tremble of her loose hair the only indication that Mr. Eliot's staccato, excited clapping was hitting her eardrums.
Do we really have to... Cristina had begun to say, her voice wispy and barely audible over the trading laughter and suggestions. Her shoulders had slumped, and she'd let the sentence die when she'd watched Meredith looking at herself in the mirror. This is your fault, she'd grumbled as she'd leaned back on the bench and crossed her arms with a subtle growl.
You already hate me, he'd said, unwilling to stop the smug grin as he spread his legs and slouched, and unable to tear his gaze from Meredith. What's for me to lose?
Good point, Cristina had replied, and then she'd gone silent for the rest of the torture.
He'd settled in. Hours must have passed as dress after dress after dress passed by him for inspection. He knew he should have remembered her in every elegant iteration. Strapless, sleeveless, puffy-shouldered, long-sleeved, form-fitting, slim, loose, flaring, white, cream, lace, satin. But he hadn't been able to stop watching Meredith's face, and the rest of the experience had faded into the blurry fringes of his senses.
She'd said her decision to wear a wedding dress was a compromise for him, but the way her lips had twitched upward as she'd pondered her many choices, the way she'd posed and preened before the mirror as if imaginary weddings were happening behind her eyes... I could be a princess for a day, her expression had said, and everything in his body had loosened when he'd read the words off her face as though she were his novel. He'd been tired, a little achy, but in the moment when he'd gleaned the meaning of her twitchy, hesitant smile and the dreamy sparkle of gray in her eyes, his discomfort had bled away, and he'd found he loved her more.
Derek blinked, pushing the memory away with a grin as the surrounding voices pulled him back into the present. He felt a little voyeuristic, slipping into the dressing room unannounced, but his need for her thrummed inside his body like the bass beat in a noisy club, and it wasn't like he was looking for... Well, the only person he would be wantonly staring at was someone who usually rather enjoyed the attention from him. His heart joined in the excitement with a gasping flutter before it kicked into higher gear. Thump-thump, thump-thump, thump, thump, thud, thud. Slam. Slam. Slam.
He breathed softly as he searched. Quiet, quiet, he thought frantically at his rampaging heart. Not yet. You can't have her yet, and being caught is bad. Bad, bad, bad. He forced himself to take a long, even inhalation, to calm the slow-burn of excitement, only to bring a hint of lavender wafting against him. The heady scent of it welled in every crevice of his lungs, and his only hope for rational thought ceased. Right that moment, somewhere in that dressing room, she was in a dress. Her wedding dress. And she was taking it off.
He wanted her, he wanted, he want-- Stop. Stop it.
He moved past his sisters. Cristina's deep, growling expressions of discontent jarred him to a halt. Not the last dressing room, then. Which left...
Meredith's mumbling brought him to her like the North Star in a midnight sky.
“Stupid... This... Crap. Stupid, stupid...” she muttered behind the curtain to his right. He pushed the drape serving as her dressing room door several inches to the side, only to find her twisted around like a pretzel, caught in the middle of a flowing, white dress. She'd picked a simple white strapless dress that flared a bit at the feet, no overly embellished lace, no train that would require a forklift to move. The fabric had a subtle sheen to it, like snow resting under the last hint of moonlight in the morning. The dress was elegant, understated, and perfectly... Meredith. And Meredith? Meredith was very, very flexible. Very--
“Cristina!” Meredith belted as she twisted around, oblivious to his presence. The dress flared as she spun and hopped. “There's buttons on this thing!”
“I know,” Cristina replied from somewhere to the left. “One-hundred and twenty-two. I remember every single one of them, by the way.”
“I thought you said all these buttons were good for surgical dexterity!” Meredith called back as she tried to reach behind herself only to fail and growl in frustration.
“That was before my obligatory five minutes of person-ly tolerance went poof.”
For a moment, Derek couldn't breathe as he watched her. Meredith. His. His wife. Soon.
Derek Shepherd… Will you marry me?
Two months.
Even shuffling and off balance, Meredith looked beautiful, breathtaking... Garter. You'll have to take the garter out from underneath-- He swallowed as he stared at her. The dress hugged her curves and coaxed her hips into a gorgeous, smooth hourglass. Her pale, sloping shoulders dragged his attention away from the luxurious fabric. He blinked as he filled in every naked line of her smooth skin from the shoulders down, and the dress seemed to fade away as desperate memories took control.
I love you, I love you, I love you...
His throat. Couldn't... He swallowed and couldn't find anything else to do but step forward. The drape rustled as he pushed past it.
His hands found the silk that hugged her waistline, and he pulled her up against him. “Need help?” he murmured into her neckline as he breathed her in. “I'm extremely good with buttons.” The scent of lavender stroked the back of his throat, and in a flash, breathing wasn't enough. His lips parted, and he tasted the soft knot of skin over her clavicle. He could help. He could.
“Crap!” Meredith screeched, but he covered her lips with his palm to silence her. Her body tightened in his arms, as if she were about to bolt, but as she seemed to realize who her dressing room intruder was, and what he was doing, and that she rather liked it, her muscles loosened, and she sighed.
“I'll help you in a minute,” Cristina growled. “I have my own buttons to deal with at the moment. Seventy-two, I might add.”
“Seventy-six,” Izzie corrected, giggling lightly as an exclamation. “I love weddings. I feel like I'm in a Disney movie!”
“Only you would think that's a good thing,” Cristina snarled. “Now, shut up and get me out of this thing.”
“Then stop squirming!” Izzie replied.
For several seconds in the following silence, Meredith remained pliant, sighing with enjoyment as he nipped and licked and teased. He found the first pair of buttons between her shoulder blades and slipped the tiny loops of fabric free. Surgical dexterity, he pondered. Definitely required. The thread was minuscule and delicate, and the buttons were smaller than peas. He wondered if he would have been lying about the buttons if he were a construction worker, or a sedentary insurance salesman, or... His thoughts trailed away as he tasted her and tasted her again, clean, the slightest hint of salt and cinnamon. Mmm. But instead of relaxing further, Meredith stiffened.
“You're not supposed to be here,” she hissed as she found her words again. “It's bad luck! You can't see--”
“I saw it already, remember?” he said, his voice a hoarse growl. “You dragged me shopping!”
“I didn't drag you. You were happy to--” Her voice jarred to a halt, and what little progress he'd been making on relaxing her into a pile of moaning regressed to nothing. “Right? You were happy, right?”
“Thrilled,” he assured her. “It was just an expression, Mere. But I saw the dress. It's been seen.”
“It's been...” She sighed. “You did, but...”
“But?” he whispered against her ear. The fabric of the dress slipped against his fingertips as he found her hips and rubbed her.
“But it wasn't mine then!” she protested. “It was baggy, and--” Her voice fell into a deep, withered, staccato moan as he ground into her. The dress rustled and shifted, mingling with the sounds of his breathing as he pried four more pairs of buttons loose. Get it off. Get it off. Get it off, his mind screamed as the need to reassure her drifted away, replaced by desire. A thrill of heat galloped down his spine. She was perfect. “And stiff,” Meredith commented.
“Oh, yes,” he whispered, a delighted chuckle escaping with his surprised exhale. He roamed up her neck and nuzzled against her hair. “You can feel it through all that silk?”
“No, I meant,” she panted. “Dress. Starchy. Not mine... Bad. Bad luck! No...”
His excitement plummeted.
He paused, trying to collect his thoughts and his breath long enough to get her off the ramble train. This wasn't going quite how he'd planned it. He'd only wanted to say hello, to see her. But seeing her had torn all that to shreds, and he'd found himself stuck with the now plan. The plan that replaced propriety with the desire to sweep her off her feet as only words of oh, yes, Derek, please, please, more, fell from her lips. She hadn't yet said oh, yes, Derek, please, or more, let alone any of it in multiples. Oh for five after that much saliva spent was rather discouraging.
“Meredith, please,” he murmured.
“But--”
“I can...” he whispered, grasping for words and failing as the fire drove his body into her, grinding. Down-shift, he thought. You can do slow. You can-- Incredibly slow, damn it. Can... He popped the next pair of buttons, revealing a sliver of creamy skin that he hadn't had access to before. He rubbed his thumb between a set of pale freckles on her back that looked like a miniature version of the Orion constellation. Her skin followed the pressure of his fingertip like smooth molasses. “Please,” he managed.
“But everyone is here--”
“I just finished twelve hours of surgery at the end of a thirty-six hour shift,” he snapped. “I haven't seen you naked in more than two days, and I need you. I don't care if the Pope himself is watching.” His frustration melted into desperation as she shifted, trying to look at him. He caught the dim reflection of the overhead lights glittering in her right pupil, which dilated with lust as he watched. She wanted this. Her expression was what he'd been waiting for. An indication. A sign. Something... She wanted... God, damn it. He couldn't do slow today. He renewed his efforts, rhythm broken to shreds by desire, and he suddenly didn't care where they were, who was nearby, or what sort of art he applied to the experience. “I need you, now, Meredith. Right now.”
For a moment, he thought he would lose her, that her interest would dissipate when it crashed into the murmur of his family and her friends all around them like waves breaking on rocks. It would be the smart thing. It would be the appropriate thing. God, was he really acting like this while his sisters and their kids were in talking distance, separated from them by nothing more than drapes?
Yes, he really was. He was--
“Meredith,” Izzie called, her voice fluttering down over the curtains. “How do you think you're going to do your hair for the wedding?”
Too many people, too close, but if they could do it fast, if they could... He inhaled sharply, annoyed at how desperate it sounded, just a slip of vocalized air, quivering, pained. He'd come here to... Just to see her. And he'd devolved into a pile of lechery with one whiff of her hair, one focused moment on her curves, the dress, the... Jesus.
Hard. Fucking hard.
“A French...” Meredith said, but her voice came out growly and hoarse and barely there as he shakily freed her of button after button. Get it off. Get it off. Get it off... Stop. Stop it. You'll get caught. You'll rip the buttons. You'll... Had to get... Inside. Had to-- His chest heaved with pain at the prospect of such a long unwrapping process. Go slow. He had to-- She blinked, cleared her throat. “Something French. Twisty. Or... Something,” she managed, but he barely noticed in the fray of wanting.
You like my twisty.
Are we talking literal twisty?
Her body stiffened in his arms as he arrived at the very last stretch of buttons, and she turned. She stared at him, eyes hazy with the same desire he felt burning through him. Her shallow breathing would have calmed him if her dress weren't unfurling from her body like a banana peel. The curve of her hips lay just below the flowing white, a present waiting for him.
“I guess if we can do planes,” she whispered, “We can do a dressing room quickie.”
He shuddered with relief as he curled his arms around her. “I don't know what's wrong with me. I just wanted--” You. Naked. Now.
Her lips twitched and parted, revealing the pearly shine of her teeth. “Nothing's wrong,” she said. “Nothing at all.” Her voice dropped into a low and throaty pitch, like a cat, purring. “Surgery is such a high...”
I don't know why anybody does drugs...
He dipped into her cleavage with his tongue and wandered up the line of her throat, breathing, sighing, sucking. “I love you,” he said.
She gasped a breathless set of syllables that could have been, “Me, too.” His fingertips brushed her shoulder blades, stroked the curve of her spine into the valley at the small of her back. He thrust against her, jamming his hands between her and the wall.
She gasped. “More, there,” she moaned, and through the shifting, flowing dress, he felt her grinding against his erection. Her hands wormed at the buttons of his jeans, and with a vicious string of pop, pop, pops, he was free, free and wanting, only his boxers between his skin and her dress.
Fire.
Her body thumped as he rammed against the wall with her. Gentle, be... Slow. What? His teeth skimmed the line of her jugular, under her jawline, everywhere, tasting. Tasting heaven. He imagined he could feel her pulse, alive underneath her skin, thudding, hot. And then his fingers found their prize. The last set of buttons between him and her.
“This sort of breaks the whole virginal dress thing,” she murmured, hiccuping on each sigh as he pressed into her and they shuffled toward the wall. He popped the last six buttons, giddy as the white dress crumpled to the floor. He found a black lace thong waiting for him south of her navel. No garter or stockings or... His breath stopped. She was wearing a black lace thong with the surface area of a small post-it note, and she thought that the quickie sex was what was ruining the virginal dress aspect? Don't say that. Don't say-- Stop. Stopstopstop.
“Hmm,” he purred, almost dizzy, as she thumped against the wall and stretched against him, making him feel a little like a lion taking a gazelle down for the kill. Take her. Take her. Take her. “That's a misconception, you know.”
“Well,” she replied, breathless. “What's it mean then?”
He sighed, nuzzling against her. “Purity of heart.”
“I guess I screwed that up when I met Jose.”
“You didn't screw anything up,” he said. Her hands slipped underneath his boxers and stroked him. “Fuck.”
He growled at her, leaning against her shoulder as she shimmied his boxers down, down, down, silk sliding against his burning quads, until they pooled at his thighs on top of his jeans. She felt good. She felt... God. He shoved into her, sliding his length between her legs. Wet, warm heat enveloped him, and all he could do was focus his blurry vision on the tiled ceiling and moan. Sin. Sin. Sin. You'll get caught. You'll get-- Heaven. His moan lengthened. He nipped at her fingers when she brushed against his lips to silence him. Her hands roamed up, and needle points of pain brought his gaze back down as she wound her fingertips through his hair and yanked. A curdled groan broke apart over her lips.
His gaze met hers. Her eyes shone bright with his reflection. He saw himself in the black pools of her pupils, panting, dazed. Aroused. Her lips had parted, and she stared dully at him, removed from sentience by lust. The twist and wind of her stray curls, the way she breathed, short and stilted, the way her stare lingered on him as though she were high, drugged on him, just as bad as he was on her... Heaven. His.
I have what I want.
“All right, Meredith,” said Cristina, impatience biting at her tone. “Which of these ridiculous fluff pits did you disappear into?”
At least you’re not the ones she heard.
With a startled blink, Meredith returned. “Nowhere!” she croaked as her cheeks reddened, and heated blush that had nothing to do with sex snaked down her neck, her breasts... Everywhere. “I mean...” She sucked in a breath, and he felt snarls of pain at his scalp again.
At least you’re not the ones she saw.
He leaned into her neck, letting his teeth brush her skin. Part of him, a dark part that he hated, wanted Cristina to find them. Find them so she would know. Meredith. His. His, his, his. His wife. Derek sniggered against Meredith's ear. “You're playing with fire, you know, naughty girl.”
Okay, shutting up now.
Meredith stiffened, which only made him moan as her inner quads clenched, enveloping him, stroking him. He pushed against her, barely noticing as the breath leaked out of her. Silk rubbed over him. Silk that wasn't supposed to be there. His fingers slipped down her skin, following the swell of her breast, the bumps of her ribs, the dip at her waist... He found the lace straddling her hips in a scalpel-thin line and clawed at it. It shouldn't. Be there. It shouldn't... God. What was he doing? He was... Acting like... Acting...
I love you the most. I really can’t imagine wanting to die in light of that.
“I'm fine,” Meredith snapped. “Buttons are... I can do the buttons thing.”
“No, you can't,” Derek growled playfully. “But I can.”
“Whatever, Meredith,” Cristina replied. “I'll be outside sucking down Guinness.”
“Really?” Izzie asked. “Where?”
“The bar across the street,” Cristina said.
Meredith's thong slipped down to the floor in a pile with her dress, and her left knee slammed up against his hip to grip him. His body wavered like a tree prostrating for the wind. What would have been more words punched out of him, a staccato march of nonsensical sounds. I want you. I need you. Woman, you're killing me, and I don't care, because this is like fucking nirvana. Except it sounded more like unghhh when his vocal cords were through mangling the thoughts and turning them into syllables. Wrong. This was all wrong. They would get caught, but he couldn't care, he couldn't--
Footsteps. Coming toward them like hammers of judgment.
“Mere, honey,” Sarah's rich voice said just behind the curtain. Just behind... So close. Dangerous, and suddenly, he cared. Cristina was one thing. Sarah was another. And Sarah... “Let me come help you,” she said.
“No, really...” Meredith blurted as she leaned her forehead against his chest and squeezed her eyes shut. Her nails dug into the bunched muscles of his back, stabbed him through his cotton shirt with pain he was sure served as a harbinger for runnels of blood. But he didn't care about the pain, he didn't-- “I'm fine...” Meredith said, shifting against him in a way that made his knees quiver and threaten to give out. God, she was... Sin. “I'm totally fine.”
Sarah chuckled. “Don't be shy. It's impossible to get these things off...” The curtain hissed as she pushed the fabric back. All Derek could do was shimmy in front of Meredith and fight to keep his balance while he protected her modesty, while he... Did... something. Fuck. Fuckfuckfuck. “Without...” Silence. A gasp. “Help,” Sarah finished weakly. “Der... Um. Hello.”
“Crap,” Meredith hissed against his chest. He heaved a breath as her nails dug into his skin.
A set of little footsteps approached while he tried to collect his thoughts, but Meredith's skin touched him, he was so close, and he needed. Dizziness halted any capable response, and he couldn't... Jesus. Why did she have to keep squirming against his...
“Unca Derk, whatcha doin' to Aunt Merdith?”
He turned his head and watched as Sarah swooped down and plucked Elizabeth, one of Kathy's kids, up into her arms. “Okay, then,” Sarah said, her eyes sparkling with mischief. “Uncle Derek's busy, sweetie. Let's go for ice cream. I saw a shop across the street.”
A chorus of shrieks pierced the dressing room. “Ice cream!”
Sarah disappeared, and Derek watched Elizabeth's tiny, buckled shoes slide out of view. The curtain swooshed shut. Voices cracked down around them like anvils. What? Derek's here? When did that happen?
Meredith's fingers loosened, and the spikes of pain against his back relinquished their grip on him. Footsteps cluttered the air around them. Then the noises in the dressing room thinned, and a quality of aloneness hit his awareness. Everyone had left to give them privacy. Or... He glanced at Meredith. Or to give him time to apologize.
He groaned and stepped back to keep from squashing her against the wall. She slid into a sitting position, her creamy skin set ablaze by blush, her expression dazed, and her wedding dress spread around her like the petals of a blooming flower. For a moment, she sat there, stunned and silent. He blinked, watching her as the fire coursing through his veins became uncomfortable icy floes.
“Crap,” Meredith repeated softly, and he couldn't help but grimace in agreement. Her fingers shook and, suddenly, she was on her feet again, pulling up the microscopic thong he'd rid her of not minutes before. She stepped out of the dress, leaving it crumpled in the corner, and rushed to her street clothes, which were folded on the seat by the mirror.
“Mere,” he tried, his voice cracking with remnants of his halted frenzy. He coughed, trying to clear his throat, trying not to focus on how disappointed he was that she was covering up, that she was hiding all her precious, beautiful skin.
“Well,” she said flatly as she yanked her shirt over her head. “I'm sort of on the mortified train. Are you?”
Not really. Just... He bit his lip and forced himself to reassemble his brain. All the desire he'd pent up leaked out of him like air from a days-old balloon. Replaced by... What exactly? Not shame at being caught. Just shame that he'd degenerated into... that. The thing that had lined them up to get caught in the first place.
“It's okay, Mere,” he said as he buttoned up his jeans. He felt raw and uncompleted, vastly uncomfortable in the space provided to him. The denim rubbed through the silk of his boxers, abraded him like sandpaper, and he longed for the slick feel of her thighs against him. But he forced himself to ignore it. “It happens.”
She stopped and glared. “It happens,” she said. Her eyebrows rose into a sharp arches. “It happens?”
Derek shrugged. “With my family? It totally happens, Mere. Have you listened to Sarah and Stewart at all when they talk? Or Mark? Or--”
Meredith sighed. “At least your mother wasn't here...”
“Mere, it's really okay,” he assured her. “This is all--”
Meredith's lips formed a flat line. She zipped up her jeans and paced, and he got the distinct impression he was watching a lioness as she moved back and forth, back and forth, as if she were debating how to-- She wheeled to an abrupt halt in front of him. The heat of her skin throbbed against him, and her breathing filled the silence. The air seemed to crackle. Her eyes glittered and narrowed, and her arms crossed over her chest.
“I think we should stop having sex,” she said. “Until the wedding night.”
His mouth fell open. “Don't you think that's a little... drastic?”
The skin around her gray eyes twitched, and a heated blush spread across her cheeks. “Derek, we were just caught having dirty sex in a bridal shop by your five-year-old niece. Nothing is too drastic. She's probably scarred for life.”
Derek snorted. “She's not scarred for life, Meredith,” he said. “This is--”
“Damn it, Derek,” Meredith snapped. “Can you please care for a second that you made me look like a whore in front of your family?”
You don't get to call me a whore.
His muscles clenched, and an agonizing chill slipped down his throat, as though he'd swallowed an ice cube, and it'd gotten stuck somewhere between his mouth and his stomach. It ached. His eyes watered, and he swallowed. “A who-- Whoa,” he said, his voice hoarse. He reached out and clutched at her shoulders, suddenly desperate to bring her close. His arms folded around her. Her muscles loosened, and she leaned into him.
The relief he felt at just that small concession fired in all his joints at once. He started to shake, not quite sure what to do with the sudden swell of everything. The exhaustion from before. Shame.
“Meredith...” he said. Her shoulder blades cut into his forearms he squeezed her so hard, but he didn't care. “Mere, I didn't mean... I never meant...” None of the words were coming out. They kept knocking against his teeth and falling flat on his tongue. “You're not... I just wanted--” To bask. To love.
She sighed. Warmth spread across his chest, and she snuggled closer. He felt her fingers at the small of his back, clutching his shirt. “Forget it,” she said. “I'm being stupid. You're right. Your family is... Different. Different than mine was.”
“It's not stupid,” he said, teeth gritted. Hate sluiced down over all the other ugly things constricting around his heart. Damn her fucking family. Damn them all to-- “No. There was something there, Meredith. There was... And I am so sorry. I just wanted-- You're not a whore, Meredith. Never.”
“I know, I...”
“No, Meredith,” he growled. He leaned back and touched her chin with his fingers, tilted her head up. The fine hairs dotting her skin felt like silk underneath his finger pads, and he longed to run his splayed hand down her throat. To explore. Lower, and lower, and lower still. But the feeling was pale in comparison to the sudden certainty that there was something he needed to pry from her. Like a splinter, or a... “Look at me. Where on Earth did this come from? I thought we were okay.”
She blinked, eyes shining. “We are okay, Derek,” she said. She reached up and wiped her face with her palms, sniffling. “We are... I love you. It's perfect.” Her lips twitched, pulling her expression into a deep, warm smile. “I feel... perfect. Like I'm in a fairytale or something. It's just...”
“Just?” he prodded.
“Our wedding night should be special,” she said. “It should be... It shouldn't be just another night.”
“It won't be, Mere,” he assured her. “It will be our wedding night.
Anger flashed again. “It won't be special if we're having sex in dressing room closets in my freaking wedding dress right up until the day before.”
“Meredith,” he murmured, leaning against her. Her arms wrapped around his waist, and he sighed. “Any sex with you is special. You're always special to me.”
“Exciting doesn't necessarily mean special,” she replied. “I want...”
When her voice trailed away, he kissed the top of her head and rested against her, breathing. “What, Mere?” he prodded. “What do you want?”
Her fingers clenched. “Everyone always thinks I'm the dark and twisty freak,” she said. “I get it. I do. I still think that, too. Sometimes...”
“Mere, you're not--”
“I want to be fresh and...” Her voice halted. He closed his eyes and listened to the sounds of her. Breathing. Blood rushing. “I want it to be...”
“Magic?” he whispered.
Her entire body loosened in his arms, and she hiccuped, or sobbed, or something that he couldn't identify. She sniffed and met his eyes. Smiled, brilliant, glowing. “Yeah,” she said, though her expression said so much more, so much that made his heart thud and his breath stop. You get me. You always get me.
Just for the record... I am your knight in shining whatever...
He grinned. “Okay.”
“Really?” she replied, eyebrows raised. “You're okay with this?”
“I like sex, Mere, with you.”
“Derek...”
“But I can definitely understand wanting the magic, Mere,” he assured her. “You give that to me every day...”
I don’t think a science book will ever figure that one out. I imagine it’s a bit like getting struck by lightning.
His words didn't have the desired effect. Her bright face crumpled into a frown. “Oh,” she said. “Crap.”
“I didn't say that to make you feel guilty...” he said.
“I'm...” she stammered and looked down. “Maybe it was a dumb idea. The no sex thing.”
He watched her gray eyes as she studied him. There it was again. The niggling realization that she wanted or needed... Him. To do something. For her. She knew what she wanted, except, she didn't *know*. She needed that push. She needed...
“My family will be around more and more as we get closer to the wedding...” Two months. Two months. Two months.
She nodded. “They will be. They're already here all the time, and the wedding isn't even in Seattle.”
“And Mark sucks at knocking,” he added.
“He does,” Meredith replied, wincing. From the look on her face, she definitely remembered that.
When they'd christened his desk for the hell of it. A sort of welcome back to the operating table extravaganza after Mike had cleared him for surgeries. Mark had decided to offer his own congratulations. Meredith had had on her lab coat. Mark hadn't seen anything at all except her pristinely ironed coat, the disarrayed trail of her loose hair, Derek's knees, and the scattered torrent of papers that had been in Derek's inbox until Derek's back had slammed on top of the tray and sent the whole thing tumbling to the floor.
Fuck, man, Mark had snapped. Lock your door, for Christ's sake. Or tie your stethoscope on the knob like we did in med school. The door had slammed shut behind him as he'd muttered curses to himself. Fucking congratulations.
Derek grinned. “So, it's settled then.”
Meredith frowned. “Derek...”
“Don't tell me you're backing out now.”
“What?”
He kissed her. “Can't make it two months without me?”
“I--”
“I know,” he replied. He leaned into her and brushed his lips against her. Soft. Soft. Heaven. He groaned, inhaling the scent of lavender as he nuzzled against her ear. His tongue skimmed her earlobe, tasting her. “I'm irresistible,” he murmured against her skin.
Wet, soft skin closed around his Adam's apple. The tip of her nose ran up against his jaw line. She wandered over his chin and found his lips. “You are,” she said. “Usually.”
“I love you,” he replied. “Always.”
She leaned against him and sighed. “Yeah.”