Lightning Strikes Twice - Part 56A (FINAL PART)
Title: Lightning Strikes Twice
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Pairing: Duh. (Mer/Der)
Rating: M
Timeline: Post Time After Time.
Well, here we are. At the end. It's been a long, long journey. I want to thank everyone who's stayed with me despite the hiccups. I hope you got as much enjoyment out of reading this story as I did writing it. I want to extend a huge thank you to my beta readers. SSBR, who's been there from the beginning. SSSB, who joined late, but has been no less valuable. Finally, Super Special Last Minute Beta SSLMB. Without all your help and encouragement, this story never would have been completed.
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Meredith stared through the latticework of the gazebo where she and Derek had gotten married, but no one in the moving sea of reception-goers stared back. The gazebo had been buried in ivy and floral arrangements, making its thick, foot-wide latticework slats into the walls of a lavender-scented fortress. She found the obscurement a comfort, because she could watch and listen and be while she tried to let her racing mind slow down a little.
Ellen's backyard was... Something. Sarah and Kathy had done a beautiful job with it.
Floating, twinkling lights dangled from invisible wires over the dance floor, and the four corner pillars holding up the tent stood up against the pinkish, purpling twilight sky, just like the tree trunks by the-- She saw a light wink on and off over the grass to her right. Another answered it. To the left. And another, and another, and another. Fireflies. She found the resemblance to that night on Derek's land uncanny, and Meredith wondered if Derek had confessed to his sisters about it.
Sarah and Kathy seemed to have a serious toehold into his psyche at times. And they were excellent interrogators. What would be the perfect way to set up the back yard for the wedding? He probably would have gushed about that night if they had tortured him with just the right sort of leverage. What would Meredith like? It has to be perfect for Meredith, you know.
Fireflies in the dark were perfect.
She closed her eyes and found the memory behind her eyelids, lambent, everlasting. Fireflies, a water-colored sunset, and a glittering, gurgling pond. She and Derek had made love for an hour under a canopy of stars and a pocked, pie-plate moon.
Her breath stopped as a familiar tightness rippled in her groin, deep within. Only a rush of laughter from the crowd compelled her back into the present, compelled her to remember that there were people. Stewart making jokes. Cristina drinking booze. People. All around. People who had watched her get married. Married! She scrunched her fingers tightly against the white latticework, forcing the ghost of Derek's palms running up her thighs to cease, beating down the whorl of sighs and touch and taste. People. All around. Ivy and lavender crinkled under her fingertips as she listened to the breeze and the movement of bodies.
People watching. It seemed like a weird thing to do when, theoretically, this was supposed to be her event. She was the people that people were supposed to be watching. Right? Except she felt ready to burst with the pent up sex and the I-really-did-it of it all, and if she watched, she felt less crazy, less like she'd hooked herself up to an intravenous line of espresso and overdosed. Less caffeinated was good. Less crazy was even better. So, she watched.
Izzie had dragged Alex onto the floor with her, but she stared mostly at George, who had paired off with Callie. Weird. Cristina and Burke and John and Kathy intermingled in Meredith's line of sight as they crossed paths. Meredith resisted a giggle at Cristina's bored expression. Cristina. Slow-dancing. It seemed wrong. She was more of a punk bouncer than anything else. Mike and Melinda Weller seemed to be cut off from their surroundings, staring into each other's eyes, as though they were buried in memories of their own wedding. Susan and Thatcher. Mark and Ellen. Sarah and... Wait.
It wasn't until Meredith's gaze drifted to Stewart that she frowned. He hopped up onto the platform on the deck where the disc jockey, who looked affronted to be sharing his space, sat behind a wall of speakers and electronics. Stewart grabbed the microphone in a brash act of thievery that left the disc jockey flailing, tapped it once, twice, three times, and cleared his throat. The people on the dance floor stuttered to slow halts and turned to look at him after the current tune screeched into silence, leaving only the whine of interference leaking from the speakers.
“Hello there, tonight,” Stewart said in a low radio-announcer voice that just made it seem comical. Several people chuckled.
He paused to tip the lip of a beer can back to his lips. Beer. From a can. When they'd spent a ton of money on really good champagne. And crystal champagne flutes. Where had he gotten that?
“It seems we have a problem,” he continued. “We're missing two very important people at this wedding.”
Meredith bit her lip. Which two people were missing? She couldn't think of anyone not already on the dance floor except... Her fingers tightened. She'd lost sight of Derek. Where was--
Two arms slipped around her waist. Her heart jackhammered and she resisted the urge to shriek as a low, breathy voice whispered next to her ear, “I get it. This is payback.”
“Payback?” she managed. She turned to find Derek smirking at her. How did you find me, wanted to tumble out of her mouth, but it halted with his look.
I know you, his sparkling eyes said. He winked. Winked! Which tossed her heart into overdrive. Hello, caffeine. Everything she'd worked to push down roared back, and she bit her lip.
“You want me to slave over the buttons tonight,” he said, his voice a low growl. “Because of the garter toss.” I know you. I know you. I know you.
“Derek and Meredith?” Stewart said across the crowd. “Anyone seen our two blissful trouble-makers anywhere?”
She quirked an eyebrow, settling into Derek's embrace. “The garter toss?”
His gaze wandered down. “You almost kicked me when I slipped my finger past--”
“Yeah,” she said. “I mean no, it’s just…”
She'd disappeared. She'd disappeared after their first dance together, after watching him with his mother, after all the special spotlight dances, barely breathing, relaxed, quiet, ready. She'd disappeared to change into the white sun dress she'd bought. The one she had intended to wear after the wedding while they were on the way to the hotel, because it was a bit more comfortable. Easy to get into and out of. Easier to freaking pee in. But she'd gotten into the bedroom to change, crazy caffeine had hit, and she hadn't been able to do it. Hadn't been able to hold still so Izzie could start picking her way through the buttons.
Meredith had stared in the mirror, at the gown she was only going to wear once in her life, on the day that would only happen once in her life, and she hadn't been able to bring herself to take it off. Not then. The sun dress lay unused on the guest room bed, and she still wore her wedding dress, but it certainly hadn't been to torment him.
Derek crushed her up against him, breathing softly into her hair near her ear. “It’s okay, Mere. I know. We made it. And I get that you want to keep your princess feeling.” I know you. I know you. “I get… Just…”
She petted the lapel of his tuxedo. He smelled so nice. She wanted to stand there forever. “What, Derek?”
“I don’t think you’ll ever lose it, to me.”
Her breath halted, and she stepped back to peer at him. He had a quirky grin on his face, though his stare pierced her more sharply than a scalpel. Like he knew he'd said something incredibly corny but he also knew he meant it from the beginnings of each syllable to the wispy ends of them, and so he'd leave it there, hanging in the air. Joke fodder for anyone who happened across it. Because he didn't care if it was corny as long as he said it, and she heard it.
“I love you,” she said. “I really, really do.”
“All right,” Stewart said. “I see drastic measures will be necessary. Behind the bench Knicks tickets to whoever can locate our perfect pair. It'll be very hard for them to drive off into the sunset for their honeymoon if they can't be located.”
“I love you, too,” Derek said as he pulled her with him into the shadow of one of the gazebo pillars. Flowers and latticework and frilly curtain things blocked them from the view of distant onlookers.
“Stewart's looking for us,” she murmured. “He probably did something horrible and cute to our car, and he wants to see me cringe.”
“Let them look,” Derek replied, and she relaxed. Relaxed like a wave settling on the beach in his arms. Because she wanted to stay there for a moment. Stay there in this place where they'd gotten married. Stewart was the tide that would pull them back out into the crowd, but he hadn't found them yet, and they were safe. Safe to stop and breathe and... Just be.
Derek started to sway with her, and she laughed. “We already did the bride groom dance thing,” she said.
He shrugged. “So what?”
She caught the mischievous look in his eyes only seconds before he dipped her backward.
~~~
When he'd found her standing alone in the gazebo still in her wedding dress, his heart had pinched with worry. Her soft fingers had been rubbing the wood of the gazebo almost... forlornly. What was wrong? What was-- But then she'd turned to face him, the worry had slipped away, and his heart had squeezed for an entirely different reason. Hopeful brightness had clouded her gaze. Not forlornness.
The moment. She'd been relishing the moment. A moment that involved him and only him, and she'd been relishing it. Something had closed his throat up, but he'd managed to punch his way through and form syllables.
Teasing. It seemed to be the only way he could communicate. Teasing. Because if he stopped finding humor in the situation, if he let himself pause, he'd think about that awe all centered on him from her, and thoughts wouldn't form coherently anymore.
It's on you. It's you. You. You can't mess this up.
You can't.
“Can I convince you to lose the dress, now?” he murmured as he pulled her spindly body back to him. Her face flushed, and she breathed hard, just like she did after she finished, which brought him to a different kind of pause. Jesus.
He blinked as she laughed and swatted at his shoulder. “Derek…”
“Sorry, had to try,” he said. His voice sounded rough and forced. Didn't it? “You’re very lucky I’m a surgeon.”
“And why is that?”
His palm wound its way up her spine, and he felt each little bump pass underneath his fingertips. Buttons. In his way. “If I wasn’t, we’d never get to the sex tonight.” Sex. Oh, god. How was he going to-- She wanted magic, and he could barely talk to her.
“It does take dexterity,” she replied, nodding. “Up to the task, Der?”
He coughed, trying to clear his throat as she stared at him, mischief wavering in her crystalline, gray gaze. His heartbeat slowed as he stared at her. Calm. You can be okay. “How did you turn this around on me?” he asked.
The corner of her lip quirked. He wanted to kiss it, wanted to lick, wanted to do... things. Sex. Sex. Sex. Her fingers wound against his neck. He tried not to watch the world spinning around as they spun around because he knew it would make him dizzy. “Turn what around?” she said.
“I was consoling you, and now you’re teasing me.”
“How is talking about getting rid of my dress consoling me?”
He paused, and their dance came to a jarring halt. They breathed. “I’ll be able to ravish you quicker that way,” he said.
“You’re a confident man,” she replied. They started to spin again. “You sure you’re not rusty?”
“Oh, I’m confident.” Not. “I’m very confident.” Not, not, not. “It’s like riding a bike.”
“A sexy bike.”
He slid his hand down. Low, low, lower, past the buttons. Her muscles tightened, which only made him want to rut like a fool, right then. Except rutting? Not magic. Not hardly. He swallowed. “Bikes need not wear dresses with one-hundred twenty-two buttons, you know.” He cleared his throat again.
She frowned, concern finally interrupting her sparkling glow. Damn it. “Derek…”
He shuddered. “I’m sorry, Mere. I’m so sorry.” He panted as he rested his forehead against hers, tried to breathe her in. It always used to calm him down before, and now he just felt more wired. More wired and ready for... Sex! Not. Not ready. He couldn't make it perfect for her if he couldn't even speak. “I don’t think I’m making this very magical for you. I feel so-“
She kissed him, and the gazebo wall hit his back with a crunch as she rubbed up against him. She pulled away, his lower lip caught between her teeth. Release. He couldn't move. “Horny?” she whispered. Kiss. “Aroused?” Kiss. “Lusty?”
Kiss.
He moaned. “You’re not helping.” This is what happened when he took two months off from sex. This. Oh, god. He couldn't make this perfect when he wanted to rip everything off right there and--
She sighed, pressing up against him. The gazebo latticework dug against his spine, but he didn't care. “It’s… caffeine,” she mumbled.
The world spun. “What?”
She grunted. Her palm waved as she tried to find the words, and he couldn't help but grin, even in the whirlwind of him, feeling, lusting. “The magic thing,” she decided on. “It’s happening, Derek. Don’t worry. It wouldn’t be us without the innuendo stuff, would it?”
He snorted, leaning forward. Lavender. Sprigs of it. Hanging from the ceiling of the gazebo. Buried in the depths of her perfume. Everywhere. He breathed. “I guess not.”
“And we’ve tortured each other for two months,” she said. “Why stop at the finish line?”
“This isn’t really a finish line, Mere. This is…”
His world came to a stuttering halt when he heard her sniffle. “We really did make it didn’t we?” she said, pausing to look at him. The sick, twisting relief in her eyes, her quivering lower lip, and the salty tears plopping against the lapel of his tuxedo drove everything out of his head except her. He could deal with his nerves later. He could deal with...
He shifted, reaching for her chin with his palm. He tilted her face toward him and stared at her. She blinked. “We did,” she moaned. “Oh, god, we did. And now we’re…” Married. Finished. Just starting. New. “We’re…”
He kissed her, nudged into her with his nose, and then he took her. Ravished her exactly like he said he would. Nerves gone. For a moment. She needed this. They spun around. Twigs snapped as he shoved her into the gazebo wall and tilted her head back for more. His fingers raked her neck, and he felt her. His belt loosened. “Mmm,” he purred as he took a breath. “We are. We did.”
She panted. A zipper screamed. “Karma can kiss my princess ass,” she growled.
“Mmm,” he agreed, and he found himself babbling like a thesaurus. “Karma. Fate. Destiny.” He couldn't think of anything else. She tasted like wine. Her tongue rubbed against his.
And then it all stopped.
“All right, you two, break it up,” Stewart rumbled. “This is public indecency. And you're scheduled for your theatrical exit in five minutes. Exits don't involve coming. They involve going.”
The world felt like it was falling out from under his feet. His head spun. He wanted her. Two hours, and they would be alone in a hotel room. Two hours. Nobody would interrupt them. And it would be all on him.
His nerves came rushing back as Meredith put herself back together. Perfect, except one strand of hair that refused to be swept up. Only her flush remained. Somehow, he managed to tuck his shirt in. Somehow, he found his zipper. Even if none of it made sense. He fumbled with his belt. Somehow, somehow, somehow.
“Excellent,” Stewart said, his fingers forming a stiff, O.K. salute. “No one will know. Well... No one will know for sure.”
“Oh, shut up,” Meredith growled. “We were good for two freaking months.”
“And I commend you,” Stewart replied with a wink.
“We were!” she insisted.
“Yep,” Stewart agreed as he clasped her shoulder with a big, splayed palm and directed her back toward the waiting crowd. He buckled slightly as Meredith shoved him with her hip, and then he cackled. “Okay, okay. But you'd think if you could make it two months, you could make it until you're in a hotel room, when bodice-ripping is an acceptable form of foreplay. I mean, really.”
“We wanted magic, damn it,” Meredith explained fruitlessly while Stewart laughed. “It's a thing.”
“Magic,” Derek muttered. “Right.”
“A magic thing!”
“Uh huh,” Stewart agreed. “You said it. Not me.” The crowd converged around them in a riot of well-wishers and cheers as they returned to the tables and the dance floor and the music, and Derek could only blink at the sudden onslaught.
Meredith slipped up beside him, wrapping her arm around his waist. “I think we'll manage,” she told Derek with a wink. He swallowed as the pounding nerves threatened to bury him.
“Definitely,” he replied. Barely.
Magic. All on you.
Despite the way her svelte frame reached over five-foot-six, Meredith Grey was a tiny person. He could easily encircle her wrist with just his thumb and pinky. He had long since mapped the paths he could meander up her slender neck with his mouth, though the choices always seemed infinite when in the process. His palm formed a vast expanse when he splayed it against the small of her back and followed the curve of her spine. When he spooned against her after sex, or just because he wanted her warmth, he felt massive. Strong. Virile. She had never felt heavy to him. Never, except in the days following his surgery when a bluster of wind or a light shove would have cowed him. And yet, as he shuffled down the hallway of the Algonquin, buried in the waterfalls of her body over his arms, feeling the light scrunch of her willowy fingers toying with the hair at the nape of his neck, he felt like he held the world in his arms, and the weight stunned him.
“Are we there yet?” Meredith murmured into his neck. Her knee tightened over the crook of his elbow as she flexed her leg. Her syllables hit the spot where his chin connected to his neck like a wave, and he felt her nails dip underneath his shirt collar, sensual, ready, waiting, needing.
“We're there already,” he said, locating his voice in the din. He felt hot and cold, still and moving.
A flash went off in his face. His fingers tightened, and the dim, narrow hallway seemed to darken further as the fuzzy blackness and sharp angry white smears faded. The camera whirred, and the concierge in front of them slowly rematerialized in the haze. Derek blinked, lips parted, feeling slightly slow, slightly high, slightly…
“Smile,” said the concierge - a tall man dressed in a sharp uniform, smiling, endlessly smiling - and the flash went off again.
Squeaks. Behind him. Wheels. The leather of their suitcases moaned as the luggage dolly came to a stop. The door to their suite opened as if by magic. The bellhop that had barely been in Derek's peripheral awareness began unloading the luggage, but it was just that. Peripheral.
All Derek could think was that when he flexed his fingers, he felt it sitting there, wrapped around his left ring finger. It pressed against the bone whenever he squeezed her. It. The ring. Platinum. Never to part. Never to…
I mean it this time, he swore silently. And I’m not screwing it up. Not ever. He found himself seeking the soft silk of her hair against his cheek.
“You really don’t have to carry me all the way,” Meredith said. She looked up at him, eyes glittering. He caught the flicker of his face against her pupils. He looked shell-shocked, white, and shaky. Stunned. How did I manage to get here? But not in a bad way. Not in a… His heart palpitated.
“I do,” he replied, swallowing at the sudden blockage in his throat. “First threshold. Tradition, you know.”
Her white satin dress shimmered as she shifted in his arms. World-heavy. But light and fragile like a dandelion seed at the same time. Paradox after paradox hugged everything into a tight little ball, and he didn’t quite think he could get much beyond the fact that her skin was millimeters away from him, but he wanted it closer, and there were at least one-hundred twenty-two pea-sized obstacles in his way. And the bell hop. And the concierge. And… everything. Everything. Before, he’d had words, but now, the adrenaline was settling, and everything else formed a halo around the fact that they were there. Now.
He swallowed, wanting to reach for the silk bow tie that should have been at his neck, but was dangling from his breast pocket instead. Meredith weighed his arms down enough to stop him, but the nervous desire continued, and the memory in his muscles wouldn't go away.
No matter what Derek did, he couldn't get his tie straight. “Do you have the rings?” he asked as he struggled with his fingers.
“Yeah,” Mike Weller answered from somewhere behind him. But Derek barely heard the syllable, eclipsed as it was by a roar.
Was it fingers over the loop? Or under? Or how did that go again... He should know this. He had an MD. Smart people knew how to tie bow ties. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
A vice grip squeezed his shoulders and wrenched him away from worrying at the mirror. The reflected world slipped out of view, and the real world spun until he found himself staring at Mike's chiseled, clean-cut face.
Mike stared intently at Derek's tie. “Let me get this before you choke yourself,” he said, the corners of his mouth twitching with a restrained, buried smile. His tongue slipped between his lips as he stared at his dire task.
Derek swallowed, felt his best man's fingers at his throat. Thanks, he should have said, but other words commandeered his mouth. “What about Quin? Are you sure you and Melinda are okay taking Quin for two weeks? He's very--”
The tie jerked, and Mike inched closer. His face blushed, and the smile he'd tried withhold earlier escaped into a grin. “Derek, we're fine. Mel loves dogs to pieces. You need to breathe, or you won't need the tie to choke yourself.”
“I know. I know. It's just...”
“The whole hospital has a betting pool on you two,” Mike informed him. “Not about any ifs. Just whens.”
Derek frowned, turning back to the long body-length mirror. He sighed and watched the way his tuxedo settled around him. He looked thin and pale. Shaky. His right hand found his hair and wandered back along his scalp, pausing over the c-shaped indentation in his skull as he grimaced at himself. “None of them know me, Mike.”
Mike stepped up behind him and met his eyes through the mirror. “I think I do.”
Time seemed to stop and settle in that moment. Derek's breaths came soft and slow. Mike Weller had saved his life. There was a level of intimacy in that sort of connection that no other experience in life could duplicate. In that brief ticktock, ticktock of seconds, Derek found some peace, but then it slipped away again.
Meredith had done more than save his life. She'd saved his soul. He'd never been more certain of anything. Panic burbled out of his mouth, unrestrained. “What if I--”
“Derek,” Mike bit out, cutting off the messup messupmessupmessup that had gotten stuck in Derek's head and on his lips. “Nothing will go wrong.”
Success. He wanted. But... Notafailure.
Knocks thundered against the door. “Okay, we're approaching fashionably late,” a familiar voice said. “What's going on?” Footsteps. Swish, swish, swish across the rug.
“Nerves,” said Mike. “We just need a few more minutes.”
A warm hand clapped against Derek's shoulder, and the runnels of tension cutting through his bones felt like they were carting ice water. “This again?” Mark said. The deep scent of his cologne eclipsed everything else as he looked over Derek's shoulder into the mirror, eyes sparkling with confident mirth. “She loved you without the hair, man. Of course, you'll work out.”
You'll mess up. Messupmessupmessup.
Derek yanked at his tie. It wasn't straight. It just wasn't straight, and it needed to be. Why? Why-- He let out a shuddering breath that could have been a laugh, were he more relaxed. He shrugged away from Mark and peered at Mike in askance. “They're not betting on our divorce, are they?”
Mike grinned. “No,” he said as he jarred Derek around again and yanked Derek's hands away from his neck. “Relax. Just due dates.”
“I'm in for Meredith's fifth year of residency. April 15th,” Mark said. He crossed his arms, and his frame puffed up. “I figure you'll be celebrating pretty hot and heavy when she finishes her fourth year and Webber selects her for chief resident in July.” He shifted forward with a grunt as Mike's shoulder slammed against him.
“Due...” Derek stuttered as he forced his fidgety hands to stop and stay at his side. “Oh.” Ticktock. Ticktock. Ticktock. “Do you have the rings?”
“Right,” Mark said. “I'll go tell them we need a few more minutes. Fashionably late is out of style, anyway.”
~~~
“Izzie, I'm not nervous,” Meredith assured her friend, but Izzie continued to babble away as she wandered around Meredith in a frenetic circle, adjusting this curl, fixing that eyelash, smoothing this wrinkle, tilting that bow to the precisely correct angle. She'd taken the maid of honor job very seriously, and apparently felt it was her duty to keep Meredith calm and sedate on this most auspicious day. Except Meredith was already fine, so she resigned herself to watch Izzie buzz about like an upset bee.
“See,” Izzie jabbered, “The thing you have to remember is that he loves you enough to move the world for you.”
Meredith sighed. “Izzie...”
“I mean, if he were Superman? He probably would literally. Move. The world. And you already dealt with massive hospital trauma, so you know he's not going to die on you.”
“Izzie, shut up,” Cristina snapped. “She's not nervous.” She lay behind them on a puffy, lacy love seat, sprawled with her knees over the arm, hands behind her head as she pondered the ceiling, un-ladylike and uncaring.
Meredith nodded, trying not to laugh at Izzie's confused look. “I'm not,” Meredith said.
“She's not?” Izzie asked, looking at Cristina instead of Meredith, as if Meredith weren't a reliable source of information on her own feelings.
Cristina tilted her gaze to the pair of them and rolled her eyes. “Nope.”
Izzie turned back to Meredith. “Why?” Izzie demanded.
“I don't know,” Meredith said, shrugging. “I'm just... not. I should be. I really, really should be. I mean... Look at me. I'm...”
She was unable to stop her hand from tracing her outline in the mirror. Her hair had been pulled up into a modified French twist, tight blond curls spilling out the top like waterfall. Her gown hugged her body in a swath of simple elegance, its narrow flare at the floor emphasizing the hour-glass of her hips and breasts. A small line of diamonds circled her neck, courtesy of Susan.
Izzie sighed, her breath accompanied by a high-pitched sound of glee. “Gorgeous.”
The couch squeaked as Cristina stood up and joined them at the mirror. “He'll like it,” she said, her voice flat and begrudging.
Izzie shoved her.
“A lot,” Cristina corrected.
“Love,” Izzie enunciated, glaring at Cristina. “He'll love it.”
Meredith grinned as her heart began to throb. Cristina sighed. “McMarried,” Cristina said.
“Yeah. I'm not sure I believe it either,” Meredith replied.
“She has a sick, twisted idea that she's found true love,” Cristina explained. “Of course she's not nervous.”
Izzie brushed a hand down Meredith's arm, smoothing more fabric as she resumed her buzz, buzz, buzzing routine.
“I really kind of think I have,” Meredith whispered as she watched her body sway in the mirror. Except she really didn't think. She knew. She knew, and it felt...
A smile stretched her lips, blush crept across her cheeks, and her eyes started to water.
“Oh, my god,” Izzie shrieked. “You can't cry! I spent an hour doing your eyes!”
Cristina gripped Meredith's shoulders and lay her head against her friend while Izzie ran for the touch-up kit. “Mere?”
Meredith sniffed. “What?”
“Sometimes, I envy you.”
They were married.
Meredith Grey found herself stuck, rewinding and pausing on that thought enough that were it a cassette, she would have probably rubbed it down into dust by then. Married, married, married. It had a nice ring to it. A... ring. A round-and-round, dizzy sort of ring that didn't make any sense.
Her skin felt hot and alive with crackling energy, and she couldn't help but blink and giggle softly. Married. She twirled her index finger in the hair at the nape of his neck, let the ring on her fourth finger rub against his skin. His body tensed, his sure step skipped, and an adorable hitching moan got stuck against his Adam's apple like a clot of confectionery that he couldn't quite swallow.
A shiver of excitement squeezed her heart for a beat, two beats, three.
“What?” Derek murmured, his eyes widening as he collected himself.
People. There were still people there, she had to remind herself, blinking away the thrill and the constant amazement that she barely had to move to drive him crazy.
She grinned, peering over his shoulder at the bellhop just behind them. The concierge had departed with the camera, saying he'd have the pictures for them when they checked out, but the bellhop still remained. Waiting. Well, not exactly waiting. Still being productive, thus not entirely deserving of her annoyance. But still. Go away, she wanted to yell. I want to be alone with my husband.
Husband. Mine. How did that happen to someone like her? At this point, she didn't quite care. Husband. I-really-did-it.
The thought brought another face-splitting grin ripping across her face.
Bellhop Man winked as he placed the last suitcase in a stack on the luggage tray by the closet. Winked. As if he knew exactly what was going on here. As if he had a clue. “Just wondering when you're going to put me down,” she said. “We are over the threshold, you know.”
“Sir, ma'am, your bags are here. Please feel free to dial the front desk if you should need--” Bellhop Man droned, but Derek, from the looks of him, wasn't paying any attention. None at all. His gaze lingered on her face, his blue eyes hooded but unblinking. She watched his throat ripple as he swallowed again.
“Oh, I have plans,” Derek said, his voice rough with... Something.
She rubbed his neck again. “Plans?”
Derek's eyes narrowed as he nodded. Her breath stopped as he absorbed the sight of her, and his gaze glazed with a hint of desperation. His fingers tightened, and she shifted. “Mmm,” he decided. “Plans.”
“Have a pleasant evening,” Bellhop Man continued, his eyes were twinkling with a sort of mirth. He turned to leave. It wasn't until she caught sight of her purse sitting on top of the pile of suitcases that she realized. Stupid. Stupid honeymooners. Wanted to be alone, and all thought processes beyond, “Married! Woo!” had simply ceased. Oops. She forced herself to focus. Just for a moment.
“Plans that include tipping the bellhop?” Meredith prodded. Bellhop Man paused halfway into the hall, turned, and smiled politely. She flexed her knee, and her foot shifted in the air.
Derek blinked. A small breath escaped, almost like a cough, but not quite. “Oh,” he said. “Yes. Forgot at check-in.”
The room shifted as he tried to get at his wallet, and the world became a juggling act. She would have laughed. Would have. But he seemed almost unwilling to let her go for some reason, and that? That was the sort of thing she could relate to. She leaned into his shirt and sighed, inhaling the spicy scent of his aftershave.
Derek gave up after a few minutes of juggling, and he set her down on the side of the bed so gently it made the breath seize in her lungs as she sank against the mattress. She clutched at the bedspread, letting the harsh weave of the fabric crumple in her palms as she sat there. The ring on his finger flashed, or maybe she had imagined it. The flash. Not his finger. His palm slipped behind the curtain of his black tuxedo and came back with a thin black billfold in tow. Money crumpled as it exchanged hands.
“Thank you, sir,” Bellhop Man said. She vaguely heard the door shut followed by distant thuds as he disappeared down the hallway.
A deep sound rumbled through Derek's chest. He pivoted on a foot, staring at her.
“Derek,” she said. His name felt like silk in her throat. She resisted the urge to say it again and again and again. She would save that for later.
His body seemed to seize with tension, as though hearing his name had snapped him back to reality. The world moved as though it were caught in one of those stupid six-million-dollar-man moments, where everything slowed to a crawl in order to denote super speed. She'd never really understood that, why they couldn't have things just zip around like they were supposed to.
The rumble-roar of Derek clearing his throat yanked her into the room again in a blink, and she found herself staring at the sleek back of his tuxedo. The door creaked open as he fumbled with the knob. The plastic privacy tag didn't seem to want to grip the handle, but even after his struggle went silent, and he shut the door again, Derek didn't turn around for a long, stretched, fat moment. That was when her quiet ease began to falter. What was... What? Was she doing something wrong?
Her fingers tightened against the bedspread, and her gaze found its way to her shoes. Cute shoes. One-hundred-twenty-dollars worth of cute, strap-y little heeled things that could technically be considered instruments of torture. Another reason why she hadn't protested when he'd insisted on gifting her with a reprieve from gravity.
They'd been checking in, and then the world had tilted back with a whirl. She'd laughed at first. “What on earth are you doing?” she'd said with a throaty chuckle as the room had swayed. But he'd insisted, and she'd wilted under his determined look. He'd humored her about so many things, so she'd relented, and the further he'd carried her, the more she'd settled in to enjoy the ride against him.
The ride, ride... Riding. Naughty. Bad thoughts. But wasn't that the point?
This was their wedding night. Their wedding night. I-really-did-it!
In less than a breath, she wasn't sitting there staring at her shoes, wondering why something was weird. He'd throw her down on the bed like a romantic hero in the midst of a torrid affair. Kyrian. Now. The dress would come flying off despite his insistence that it would be difficult. She'd heave and pant like an appropriate, heavily-busted romantic heroine. And then everything would melt away. Oh, yes. Yes, yes, yes. She liked that plan. That was a good plan. She wondered when he'd--
Derek inhaled, and the sound of it ripped through the quiet room as though he were the gale, the thunder, and she were the woman caught out in the middle of the woods in the rain. He fiddled with the door handle, staring at it, and then he turned. His eyes narrowed as he stared at her, wantonly letting his gaze roam from her toes to her face, but then it all disappeared. He stood at the door, unmoving, but... She swore she could detect a fine shimmer of movement. His hair...
The top two buttons of his tuxedo shirt had come undone as the evening had worn on and he'd presumably wanted to relax a bit more. Just a hint of his alabaster chest peeked out. The ends of his bow tie dangled from the breast pocket of his jacket. His coiffed hair had fallen loose out of impeccable style. An unruly curl swept down over his forehead.
When she stared at it, she could see it. He shook.
Something inside her broke apart when she realized. And then nothing mattered. She wanted to shove him against the door and... go. Go, go, go. Because this was... They were married. They'd been good for two months. She was hungry. And she loved him.
“Well, there's a bed,” he said, breaking the expanse of silence. His breath whuffed with quiet laughter. But he didn't move away from the door, and when she searched for the playful sparkle in his eyes, it wasn't there.
“Mmm,” she purred, trying to imitate her favorite sound of his, trying to... It's okay, she wanted to say. It's okay. You're perfect to me. You're perfect, and you're mine, and I love you. Instead, she merely agreed with a nod and a sly, “And walls.”
He ran his fingers through his hair and swallowed deeply. “Yeah,” he said. His eyes had found the bed. He watched it. Stared.
“Derek,” she said when he couldn't seem to tear his eyes away. “I love you.”
His frame wilted against the door, and he took a deep breath. “I don't want to mess this up.” His breath hitched. “I don't want to...”
She stood, stepped forward, and he stilled. The spicy scent of him wafted against the back of her throat. His body thumped against the back of the door. She slipped her palms against the cotton of his shirt, underneath his jacket, and slid them against his body. Shifting in her arms, he groaned. “Mere.”
“You won't mess this up, Derek. If you mess this up, there's really no hope for me, is there?” she said.
He leaned over her shoulder and his nose found her neck. He breathed against her. His knee nudged hers, as if he were trying to spread her apart, trying to find her center. He rubbed against her, his breath becoming a low purr. “You're perfect, Mere,” he assured her, as if the mere suggestion of her being without hope was an abomination. “You're... You can't...”
“If I'm perfect, I can't be wrong. Right?”
“I guess not.” He chuckled. “Is this okay?”
She nodded. “This is okay, Derek.”
She found him sprawled on a reclining lawn chair on the dock by the lake, but the chair had been turned away from the water toward a muddy bank of land on the left. His head had tilted to the side when he'd fallen asleep, as if he'd simply nodded off while staring absently at the reeds and the edge of the water and... Their house. Well, what would be their house.
A small plank of wood with a spray-painted orange stripe at the top sat embedded in the mud. The contractor had visited the day before with a pack of surveyors, and it had been weird. Weird but thrilling. Thrilling to discuss their final thoughts on the blueprints she and Derek had slaved over with the designer. Discussing final thoughts, all while she had swapped her stare between Derek and the big gray bird things that darted in and out of the reeds. Herons, she corrected herself. Derek had said they were herons.
She left him alone at first, instead choosing to dart past him and turn around, trying to frame what he'd been looking at in her mind. She felt a little silly holding out her fingers like a square in front of her, but it made the world seem... Quaint. Like a postcard from a small village on the water. Idyllic. Which brought her to the problem at hand. Where in the post-card-y idyllic world would she be in May? She couldn't repress the smile that tore across her face as she tiptoed up behind him.
“So, where do you want to go?” she asked as she leaned over his shoulder and slid her hands down his chest.
“Hmm,” he purred as his eyes slid open. His palm found her chin, and he leaned up and kissed her throat. As he pulled away, his lips parted in a small yawn, and two blinks took the blear of sleep away, which relaxed his face into a pleased but awake grin. “Go?”
“On our honeymoon,” she replied. “You said we could go anywhere, but you can't tell me you don't have any idea where you want to go. Don't you have a list? I'd always wanted to go to France. Except I already went, so, no great desire for French anymore, but--”
“Stop,” he said with a laugh, reaching for her. She skipped back, only to have his other arm ensnare her. The world tilted as he tripped her over the handle of the chair, and she landed with a squeak in his lap. His stare grew dark with hunger. “You're just making me think about planes,” he said.
“As in sex-on-a-plane, or grr, arggh, flying?”
His lip twitched, but otherwise he ignored her. “I really don't have any idea where we should go, Mere. We agreed on a beach.”
“We did.”
“Beaches, and I...” His voice hitched. He coughed, his gaze growing darker still, and she felt the fingers of his left hand flex around her shoulder, more firm than a gentle touch, but not harsh. When he spoke again, the words were raw to their bones. “You were so hot against the wall in that--”
Sex-on-a-plane, then.
“How about Key West?” she blurted.
“Okay,” he whispered as he dipped his head into the juncture of her shoulder and her neck. Something soft and wet touched her, something... tongue. He was licking--
“It's close!” she snapped as she flinched away. Hot. She looked up to find that the sun still wasn't out. A thick layer of gray hovered overhead, masking a bright circle to the west. Why was it so hot? Hot and-- “Close-ish,” she corrected. The murky, earthy scent of the water and reeds and mud melted behind a curtain of his musk, and she resisted the urge to let him-- To-- “Close-ish to Connecticut, so you wouldn't be stuck in a plane forever,” having sex! “and--”
A soft breath of his laughter laved her skin, and she sighed. Do not relax. Do not relax, she swore to herself. Do. Not. No! No relaxing! Be good!
~~~
Stop, he told himself. Stop, stop, stop. Be good. Despite the fact that she was curled in his lap, rubbing up against his--
“Mere, I can deal with a plane trip,” Derek murmured. “Especially if--” You're there. Close. Closer. “I mean. If you want Italy or Greece or something half a day away, I'll live. Don't pick something on home soil just because--”
“And there's Hemingway's house,” she babbled. Her tiny frame jerked restlessly against his, as if she wanted to move but was forcing herself to hold still and not aggravate the situation further. He closed his eyes and tried to relax as he listened to the cadence of her voice. “You could see all the polydactyl cats with seven toes, and see where the Bell Tolled for Whom, and all that stuff.”
He snorted. “Cats.”
“Yes, cats,” she confirmed, as though they were discussing the fact that yes, the sky? Gray. He kept his eyes closed, but was unable to stop his index finger from tracing the line of her spine. She sighed and shifted. Closer. The lake fell away from his awareness, and he breathed, breathed, breathed. Lavender. Heartbeats. Just her.
“Meredith...”
“What?” she gasped.
He let his eyelids drift open, and found her soft, gray pupils inches from his own. She licked her lips, and the raw desire staring back at him made him fall apart. “I want you,” he said. He pushed into her, jouncing her on the chair. She squeaked and swallowed. She had a long, pale, delicate throat that he wanted to ply. To touch. To...
A groan rumbled out of his chest as her face reddened, and she looked down.
“No sex!” she scolded his lap, as though his brain had nothing to do with it. “Stop! Focus.” She sighed, agitated, and shifted in his lap again, which didn't help. At all. He slid his eyes shut and inhaled. One, two... Three. Thre-- no, four. Four, right? He found her frowning when he looked at her again. “Sorry,” she whispered, and then her pitch rose into a rant. “But we should have figured this out ages ago. Why do we keep putting it off? I mean, honestly. Is it that hard to figure out what location in the world we want to spend having magic sex until we can't walk?”
Sex. Sex. Se--
“It's been two weeks since...” he managed.
Her fingers tightened against his neck. “And it's supposed to have been two months!” she snapped. He felt his hair getting pulled and tangled and twisted. Except it felt good. Not painful. She did that when they were making love. Or kissing. Or... He wanted more. And more. He took a deep, cleansing breath, but it didn't seem to help.
“I don't care where we go, Meredith,” he snarled, unable to stop himself. “I just want you.” Now. Two weeks without was torture. Pain. Awful. Needed it to end. “I want you on the beach, and in the bed, and on the balcony like I promised, and--”
His words drowned in her mouth when she kissed him.
“I want you, too,” she whispered when she pulled away. Millimeters. Millimeters between him and more.
He stared. “Please.”
“Derek, no,” she said, her voice soft. Not scolding. She wanted this. She really... “No, we can't, we--”
“Key West is fine,” he replied, leaning against her. She tasted good. Like strawberries. He breathed, nosing through her hair. He found the small spot behind her ear that was ticklish.
“Key West,” she said. “Derek...”
No, his inner voice wailed. He wanted to touch her more. But... Magic. You're supposed to give her magic. On her wedding night. Stop. Stop it, now. Right now. You don't want to mess this wedding up before it even starts. Right?
Right. Stop.
“I'm stopping,” he whispered.
Her nails traced runnels in his hair. “No, you're not.”
“I'm not,” he confessed.
“I'm not either.” She sighed, and the soft touches ceased. Her frame hitched as she breathed deep. “On three.”
“One, two, and then stop?” he murmured. “Or stop after...”
“After,” she confessed as she leaned in for one last taste. “We get one extra... second.”
“Mmm,” he agreed as she collapsed into him, a whirlwind of touching and tasting. He let the seconds pass. Their counting was glacial.
When she pulled away, panting, he was okay. He was okay, because later? On their night? He would definitely give her magic.
Fandom: Grey's Anatomy
Pairing: Duh. (Mer/Der)
Rating: M
Timeline: Post Time After Time.
Well, here we are. At the end. It's been a long, long journey. I want to thank everyone who's stayed with me despite the hiccups. I hope you got as much enjoyment out of reading this story as I did writing it. I want to extend a huge thank you to my beta readers. SSBR, who's been there from the beginning. SSSB, who joined late, but has been no less valuable. Finally, Super Special Last Minute Beta SSLMB. Without all your help and encouragement, this story never would have been completed.
_________________
Meredith stared through the latticework of the gazebo where she and Derek had gotten married, but no one in the moving sea of reception-goers stared back. The gazebo had been buried in ivy and floral arrangements, making its thick, foot-wide latticework slats into the walls of a lavender-scented fortress. She found the obscurement a comfort, because she could watch and listen and be while she tried to let her racing mind slow down a little.
Ellen's backyard was... Something. Sarah and Kathy had done a beautiful job with it.
Floating, twinkling lights dangled from invisible wires over the dance floor, and the four corner pillars holding up the tent stood up against the pinkish, purpling twilight sky, just like the tree trunks by the-- She saw a light wink on and off over the grass to her right. Another answered it. To the left. And another, and another, and another. Fireflies. She found the resemblance to that night on Derek's land uncanny, and Meredith wondered if Derek had confessed to his sisters about it.
Sarah and Kathy seemed to have a serious toehold into his psyche at times. And they were excellent interrogators. What would be the perfect way to set up the back yard for the wedding? He probably would have gushed about that night if they had tortured him with just the right sort of leverage. What would Meredith like? It has to be perfect for Meredith, you know.
Fireflies in the dark were perfect.
She closed her eyes and found the memory behind her eyelids, lambent, everlasting. Fireflies, a water-colored sunset, and a glittering, gurgling pond. She and Derek had made love for an hour under a canopy of stars and a pocked, pie-plate moon.
Her breath stopped as a familiar tightness rippled in her groin, deep within. Only a rush of laughter from the crowd compelled her back into the present, compelled her to remember that there were people. Stewart making jokes. Cristina drinking booze. People. All around. People who had watched her get married. Married! She scrunched her fingers tightly against the white latticework, forcing the ghost of Derek's palms running up her thighs to cease, beating down the whorl of sighs and touch and taste. People. All around. Ivy and lavender crinkled under her fingertips as she listened to the breeze and the movement of bodies.
People watching. It seemed like a weird thing to do when, theoretically, this was supposed to be her event. She was the people that people were supposed to be watching. Right? Except she felt ready to burst with the pent up sex and the I-really-did-it of it all, and if she watched, she felt less crazy, less like she'd hooked herself up to an intravenous line of espresso and overdosed. Less caffeinated was good. Less crazy was even better. So, she watched.
Izzie had dragged Alex onto the floor with her, but she stared mostly at George, who had paired off with Callie. Weird. Cristina and Burke and John and Kathy intermingled in Meredith's line of sight as they crossed paths. Meredith resisted a giggle at Cristina's bored expression. Cristina. Slow-dancing. It seemed wrong. She was more of a punk bouncer than anything else. Mike and Melinda Weller seemed to be cut off from their surroundings, staring into each other's eyes, as though they were buried in memories of their own wedding. Susan and Thatcher. Mark and Ellen. Sarah and... Wait.
It wasn't until Meredith's gaze drifted to Stewart that she frowned. He hopped up onto the platform on the deck where the disc jockey, who looked affronted to be sharing his space, sat behind a wall of speakers and electronics. Stewart grabbed the microphone in a brash act of thievery that left the disc jockey flailing, tapped it once, twice, three times, and cleared his throat. The people on the dance floor stuttered to slow halts and turned to look at him after the current tune screeched into silence, leaving only the whine of interference leaking from the speakers.
“Hello there, tonight,” Stewart said in a low radio-announcer voice that just made it seem comical. Several people chuckled.
He paused to tip the lip of a beer can back to his lips. Beer. From a can. When they'd spent a ton of money on really good champagne. And crystal champagne flutes. Where had he gotten that?
“It seems we have a problem,” he continued. “We're missing two very important people at this wedding.”
Meredith bit her lip. Which two people were missing? She couldn't think of anyone not already on the dance floor except... Her fingers tightened. She'd lost sight of Derek. Where was--
Two arms slipped around her waist. Her heart jackhammered and she resisted the urge to shriek as a low, breathy voice whispered next to her ear, “I get it. This is payback.”
“Payback?” she managed. She turned to find Derek smirking at her. How did you find me, wanted to tumble out of her mouth, but it halted with his look.
I know you, his sparkling eyes said. He winked. Winked! Which tossed her heart into overdrive. Hello, caffeine. Everything she'd worked to push down roared back, and she bit her lip.
“You want me to slave over the buttons tonight,” he said, his voice a low growl. “Because of the garter toss.” I know you. I know you. I know you.
“Derek and Meredith?” Stewart said across the crowd. “Anyone seen our two blissful trouble-makers anywhere?”
She quirked an eyebrow, settling into Derek's embrace. “The garter toss?”
His gaze wandered down. “You almost kicked me when I slipped my finger past--”
“Yeah,” she said. “I mean no, it’s just…”
She'd disappeared. She'd disappeared after their first dance together, after watching him with his mother, after all the special spotlight dances, barely breathing, relaxed, quiet, ready. She'd disappeared to change into the white sun dress she'd bought. The one she had intended to wear after the wedding while they were on the way to the hotel, because it was a bit more comfortable. Easy to get into and out of. Easier to freaking pee in. But she'd gotten into the bedroom to change, crazy caffeine had hit, and she hadn't been able to do it. Hadn't been able to hold still so Izzie could start picking her way through the buttons.
Meredith had stared in the mirror, at the gown she was only going to wear once in her life, on the day that would only happen once in her life, and she hadn't been able to bring herself to take it off. Not then. The sun dress lay unused on the guest room bed, and she still wore her wedding dress, but it certainly hadn't been to torment him.
Derek crushed her up against him, breathing softly into her hair near her ear. “It’s okay, Mere. I know. We made it. And I get that you want to keep your princess feeling.” I know you. I know you. “I get… Just…”
She petted the lapel of his tuxedo. He smelled so nice. She wanted to stand there forever. “What, Derek?”
“I don’t think you’ll ever lose it, to me.”
Her breath halted, and she stepped back to peer at him. He had a quirky grin on his face, though his stare pierced her more sharply than a scalpel. Like he knew he'd said something incredibly corny but he also knew he meant it from the beginnings of each syllable to the wispy ends of them, and so he'd leave it there, hanging in the air. Joke fodder for anyone who happened across it. Because he didn't care if it was corny as long as he said it, and she heard it.
“I love you,” she said. “I really, really do.”
“All right,” Stewart said. “I see drastic measures will be necessary. Behind the bench Knicks tickets to whoever can locate our perfect pair. It'll be very hard for them to drive off into the sunset for their honeymoon if they can't be located.”
“I love you, too,” Derek said as he pulled her with him into the shadow of one of the gazebo pillars. Flowers and latticework and frilly curtain things blocked them from the view of distant onlookers.
“Stewart's looking for us,” she murmured. “He probably did something horrible and cute to our car, and he wants to see me cringe.”
“Let them look,” Derek replied, and she relaxed. Relaxed like a wave settling on the beach in his arms. Because she wanted to stay there for a moment. Stay there in this place where they'd gotten married. Stewart was the tide that would pull them back out into the crowd, but he hadn't found them yet, and they were safe. Safe to stop and breathe and... Just be.
Derek started to sway with her, and she laughed. “We already did the bride groom dance thing,” she said.
He shrugged. “So what?”
She caught the mischievous look in his eyes only seconds before he dipped her backward.
~~~
When he'd found her standing alone in the gazebo still in her wedding dress, his heart had pinched with worry. Her soft fingers had been rubbing the wood of the gazebo almost... forlornly. What was wrong? What was-- But then she'd turned to face him, the worry had slipped away, and his heart had squeezed for an entirely different reason. Hopeful brightness had clouded her gaze. Not forlornness.
The moment. She'd been relishing the moment. A moment that involved him and only him, and she'd been relishing it. Something had closed his throat up, but he'd managed to punch his way through and form syllables.
Teasing. It seemed to be the only way he could communicate. Teasing. Because if he stopped finding humor in the situation, if he let himself pause, he'd think about that awe all centered on him from her, and thoughts wouldn't form coherently anymore.
It's on you. It's you. You. You can't mess this up.
You can't.
“Can I convince you to lose the dress, now?” he murmured as he pulled her spindly body back to him. Her face flushed, and she breathed hard, just like she did after she finished, which brought him to a different kind of pause. Jesus.
He blinked as she laughed and swatted at his shoulder. “Derek…”
“Sorry, had to try,” he said. His voice sounded rough and forced. Didn't it? “You’re very lucky I’m a surgeon.”
“And why is that?”
His palm wound its way up her spine, and he felt each little bump pass underneath his fingertips. Buttons. In his way. “If I wasn’t, we’d never get to the sex tonight.” Sex. Oh, god. How was he going to-- She wanted magic, and he could barely talk to her.
“It does take dexterity,” she replied, nodding. “Up to the task, Der?”
He coughed, trying to clear his throat as she stared at him, mischief wavering in her crystalline, gray gaze. His heartbeat slowed as he stared at her. Calm. You can be okay. “How did you turn this around on me?” he asked.
The corner of her lip quirked. He wanted to kiss it, wanted to lick, wanted to do... things. Sex. Sex. Sex. Her fingers wound against his neck. He tried not to watch the world spinning around as they spun around because he knew it would make him dizzy. “Turn what around?” she said.
“I was consoling you, and now you’re teasing me.”
“How is talking about getting rid of my dress consoling me?”
He paused, and their dance came to a jarring halt. They breathed. “I’ll be able to ravish you quicker that way,” he said.
“You’re a confident man,” she replied. They started to spin again. “You sure you’re not rusty?”
“Oh, I’m confident.” Not. “I’m very confident.” Not, not, not. “It’s like riding a bike.”
“A sexy bike.”
He slid his hand down. Low, low, lower, past the buttons. Her muscles tightened, which only made him want to rut like a fool, right then. Except rutting? Not magic. Not hardly. He swallowed. “Bikes need not wear dresses with one-hundred twenty-two buttons, you know.” He cleared his throat again.
She frowned, concern finally interrupting her sparkling glow. Damn it. “Derek…”
He shuddered. “I’m sorry, Mere. I’m so sorry.” He panted as he rested his forehead against hers, tried to breathe her in. It always used to calm him down before, and now he just felt more wired. More wired and ready for... Sex! Not. Not ready. He couldn't make it perfect for her if he couldn't even speak. “I don’t think I’m making this very magical for you. I feel so-“
She kissed him, and the gazebo wall hit his back with a crunch as she rubbed up against him. She pulled away, his lower lip caught between her teeth. Release. He couldn't move. “Horny?” she whispered. Kiss. “Aroused?” Kiss. “Lusty?”
Kiss.
He moaned. “You’re not helping.” This is what happened when he took two months off from sex. This. Oh, god. He couldn't make this perfect when he wanted to rip everything off right there and--
She sighed, pressing up against him. The gazebo latticework dug against his spine, but he didn't care. “It’s… caffeine,” she mumbled.
The world spun. “What?”
She grunted. Her palm waved as she tried to find the words, and he couldn't help but grin, even in the whirlwind of him, feeling, lusting. “The magic thing,” she decided on. “It’s happening, Derek. Don’t worry. It wouldn’t be us without the innuendo stuff, would it?”
He snorted, leaning forward. Lavender. Sprigs of it. Hanging from the ceiling of the gazebo. Buried in the depths of her perfume. Everywhere. He breathed. “I guess not.”
“And we’ve tortured each other for two months,” she said. “Why stop at the finish line?”
“This isn’t really a finish line, Mere. This is…”
His world came to a stuttering halt when he heard her sniffle. “We really did make it didn’t we?” she said, pausing to look at him. The sick, twisting relief in her eyes, her quivering lower lip, and the salty tears plopping against the lapel of his tuxedo drove everything out of his head except her. He could deal with his nerves later. He could deal with...
He shifted, reaching for her chin with his palm. He tilted her face toward him and stared at her. She blinked. “We did,” she moaned. “Oh, god, we did. And now we’re…” Married. Finished. Just starting. New. “We’re…”
He kissed her, nudged into her with his nose, and then he took her. Ravished her exactly like he said he would. Nerves gone. For a moment. She needed this. They spun around. Twigs snapped as he shoved her into the gazebo wall and tilted her head back for more. His fingers raked her neck, and he felt her. His belt loosened. “Mmm,” he purred as he took a breath. “We are. We did.”
She panted. A zipper screamed. “Karma can kiss my princess ass,” she growled.
“Mmm,” he agreed, and he found himself babbling like a thesaurus. “Karma. Fate. Destiny.” He couldn't think of anything else. She tasted like wine. Her tongue rubbed against his.
And then it all stopped.
“All right, you two, break it up,” Stewart rumbled. “This is public indecency. And you're scheduled for your theatrical exit in five minutes. Exits don't involve coming. They involve going.”
The world felt like it was falling out from under his feet. His head spun. He wanted her. Two hours, and they would be alone in a hotel room. Two hours. Nobody would interrupt them. And it would be all on him.
His nerves came rushing back as Meredith put herself back together. Perfect, except one strand of hair that refused to be swept up. Only her flush remained. Somehow, he managed to tuck his shirt in. Somehow, he found his zipper. Even if none of it made sense. He fumbled with his belt. Somehow, somehow, somehow.
“Excellent,” Stewart said, his fingers forming a stiff, O.K. salute. “No one will know. Well... No one will know for sure.”
“Oh, shut up,” Meredith growled. “We were good for two freaking months.”
“And I commend you,” Stewart replied with a wink.
“We were!” she insisted.
“Yep,” Stewart agreed as he clasped her shoulder with a big, splayed palm and directed her back toward the waiting crowd. He buckled slightly as Meredith shoved him with her hip, and then he cackled. “Okay, okay. But you'd think if you could make it two months, you could make it until you're in a hotel room, when bodice-ripping is an acceptable form of foreplay. I mean, really.”
“We wanted magic, damn it,” Meredith explained fruitlessly while Stewart laughed. “It's a thing.”
“Magic,” Derek muttered. “Right.”
“A magic thing!”
“Uh huh,” Stewart agreed. “You said it. Not me.” The crowd converged around them in a riot of well-wishers and cheers as they returned to the tables and the dance floor and the music, and Derek could only blink at the sudden onslaught.
Meredith slipped up beside him, wrapping her arm around his waist. “I think we'll manage,” she told Derek with a wink. He swallowed as the pounding nerves threatened to bury him.
“Definitely,” he replied. Barely.
Magic. All on you.
Despite the way her svelte frame reached over five-foot-six, Meredith Grey was a tiny person. He could easily encircle her wrist with just his thumb and pinky. He had long since mapped the paths he could meander up her slender neck with his mouth, though the choices always seemed infinite when in the process. His palm formed a vast expanse when he splayed it against the small of her back and followed the curve of her spine. When he spooned against her after sex, or just because he wanted her warmth, he felt massive. Strong. Virile. She had never felt heavy to him. Never, except in the days following his surgery when a bluster of wind or a light shove would have cowed him. And yet, as he shuffled down the hallway of the Algonquin, buried in the waterfalls of her body over his arms, feeling the light scrunch of her willowy fingers toying with the hair at the nape of his neck, he felt like he held the world in his arms, and the weight stunned him.
“Are we there yet?” Meredith murmured into his neck. Her knee tightened over the crook of his elbow as she flexed her leg. Her syllables hit the spot where his chin connected to his neck like a wave, and he felt her nails dip underneath his shirt collar, sensual, ready, waiting, needing.
“We're there already,” he said, locating his voice in the din. He felt hot and cold, still and moving.
A flash went off in his face. His fingers tightened, and the dim, narrow hallway seemed to darken further as the fuzzy blackness and sharp angry white smears faded. The camera whirred, and the concierge in front of them slowly rematerialized in the haze. Derek blinked, lips parted, feeling slightly slow, slightly high, slightly…
“Smile,” said the concierge - a tall man dressed in a sharp uniform, smiling, endlessly smiling - and the flash went off again.
Squeaks. Behind him. Wheels. The leather of their suitcases moaned as the luggage dolly came to a stop. The door to their suite opened as if by magic. The bellhop that had barely been in Derek's peripheral awareness began unloading the luggage, but it was just that. Peripheral.
All Derek could think was that when he flexed his fingers, he felt it sitting there, wrapped around his left ring finger. It pressed against the bone whenever he squeezed her. It. The ring. Platinum. Never to part. Never to…
I mean it this time, he swore silently. And I’m not screwing it up. Not ever. He found himself seeking the soft silk of her hair against his cheek.
“You really don’t have to carry me all the way,” Meredith said. She looked up at him, eyes glittering. He caught the flicker of his face against her pupils. He looked shell-shocked, white, and shaky. Stunned. How did I manage to get here? But not in a bad way. Not in a… His heart palpitated.
“I do,” he replied, swallowing at the sudden blockage in his throat. “First threshold. Tradition, you know.”
Her white satin dress shimmered as she shifted in his arms. World-heavy. But light and fragile like a dandelion seed at the same time. Paradox after paradox hugged everything into a tight little ball, and he didn’t quite think he could get much beyond the fact that her skin was millimeters away from him, but he wanted it closer, and there were at least one-hundred twenty-two pea-sized obstacles in his way. And the bell hop. And the concierge. And… everything. Everything. Before, he’d had words, but now, the adrenaline was settling, and everything else formed a halo around the fact that they were there. Now.
He swallowed, wanting to reach for the silk bow tie that should have been at his neck, but was dangling from his breast pocket instead. Meredith weighed his arms down enough to stop him, but the nervous desire continued, and the memory in his muscles wouldn't go away.
No matter what Derek did, he couldn't get his tie straight. “Do you have the rings?” he asked as he struggled with his fingers.
“Yeah,” Mike Weller answered from somewhere behind him. But Derek barely heard the syllable, eclipsed as it was by a roar.
Was it fingers over the loop? Or under? Or how did that go again... He should know this. He had an MD. Smart people knew how to tie bow ties. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
A vice grip squeezed his shoulders and wrenched him away from worrying at the mirror. The reflected world slipped out of view, and the real world spun until he found himself staring at Mike's chiseled, clean-cut face.
Mike stared intently at Derek's tie. “Let me get this before you choke yourself,” he said, the corners of his mouth twitching with a restrained, buried smile. His tongue slipped between his lips as he stared at his dire task.
Derek swallowed, felt his best man's fingers at his throat. Thanks, he should have said, but other words commandeered his mouth. “What about Quin? Are you sure you and Melinda are okay taking Quin for two weeks? He's very--”
The tie jerked, and Mike inched closer. His face blushed, and the smile he'd tried withhold earlier escaped into a grin. “Derek, we're fine. Mel loves dogs to pieces. You need to breathe, or you won't need the tie to choke yourself.”
“I know. I know. It's just...”
“The whole hospital has a betting pool on you two,” Mike informed him. “Not about any ifs. Just whens.”
Derek frowned, turning back to the long body-length mirror. He sighed and watched the way his tuxedo settled around him. He looked thin and pale. Shaky. His right hand found his hair and wandered back along his scalp, pausing over the c-shaped indentation in his skull as he grimaced at himself. “None of them know me, Mike.”
Mike stepped up behind him and met his eyes through the mirror. “I think I do.”
Time seemed to stop and settle in that moment. Derek's breaths came soft and slow. Mike Weller had saved his life. There was a level of intimacy in that sort of connection that no other experience in life could duplicate. In that brief ticktock, ticktock of seconds, Derek found some peace, but then it slipped away again.
Meredith had done more than save his life. She'd saved his soul. He'd never been more certain of anything. Panic burbled out of his mouth, unrestrained. “What if I--”
“Derek,” Mike bit out, cutting off the messup messupmessupmessup that had gotten stuck in Derek's head and on his lips. “Nothing will go wrong.”
Success. He wanted. But... Notafailure.
Knocks thundered against the door. “Okay, we're approaching fashionably late,” a familiar voice said. “What's going on?” Footsteps. Swish, swish, swish across the rug.
“Nerves,” said Mike. “We just need a few more minutes.”
A warm hand clapped against Derek's shoulder, and the runnels of tension cutting through his bones felt like they were carting ice water. “This again?” Mark said. The deep scent of his cologne eclipsed everything else as he looked over Derek's shoulder into the mirror, eyes sparkling with confident mirth. “She loved you without the hair, man. Of course, you'll work out.”
You'll mess up. Messupmessupmessup.
Derek yanked at his tie. It wasn't straight. It just wasn't straight, and it needed to be. Why? Why-- He let out a shuddering breath that could have been a laugh, were he more relaxed. He shrugged away from Mark and peered at Mike in askance. “They're not betting on our divorce, are they?”
Mike grinned. “No,” he said as he jarred Derek around again and yanked Derek's hands away from his neck. “Relax. Just due dates.”
“I'm in for Meredith's fifth year of residency. April 15th,” Mark said. He crossed his arms, and his frame puffed up. “I figure you'll be celebrating pretty hot and heavy when she finishes her fourth year and Webber selects her for chief resident in July.” He shifted forward with a grunt as Mike's shoulder slammed against him.
“Due...” Derek stuttered as he forced his fidgety hands to stop and stay at his side. “Oh.” Ticktock. Ticktock. Ticktock. “Do you have the rings?”
“Right,” Mark said. “I'll go tell them we need a few more minutes. Fashionably late is out of style, anyway.”
~~~
“Izzie, I'm not nervous,” Meredith assured her friend, but Izzie continued to babble away as she wandered around Meredith in a frenetic circle, adjusting this curl, fixing that eyelash, smoothing this wrinkle, tilting that bow to the precisely correct angle. She'd taken the maid of honor job very seriously, and apparently felt it was her duty to keep Meredith calm and sedate on this most auspicious day. Except Meredith was already fine, so she resigned herself to watch Izzie buzz about like an upset bee.
“See,” Izzie jabbered, “The thing you have to remember is that he loves you enough to move the world for you.”
Meredith sighed. “Izzie...”
“I mean, if he were Superman? He probably would literally. Move. The world. And you already dealt with massive hospital trauma, so you know he's not going to die on you.”
“Izzie, shut up,” Cristina snapped. “She's not nervous.” She lay behind them on a puffy, lacy love seat, sprawled with her knees over the arm, hands behind her head as she pondered the ceiling, un-ladylike and uncaring.
Meredith nodded, trying not to laugh at Izzie's confused look. “I'm not,” Meredith said.
“She's not?” Izzie asked, looking at Cristina instead of Meredith, as if Meredith weren't a reliable source of information on her own feelings.
Cristina tilted her gaze to the pair of them and rolled her eyes. “Nope.”
Izzie turned back to Meredith. “Why?” Izzie demanded.
“I don't know,” Meredith said, shrugging. “I'm just... not. I should be. I really, really should be. I mean... Look at me. I'm...”
She was unable to stop her hand from tracing her outline in the mirror. Her hair had been pulled up into a modified French twist, tight blond curls spilling out the top like waterfall. Her gown hugged her body in a swath of simple elegance, its narrow flare at the floor emphasizing the hour-glass of her hips and breasts. A small line of diamonds circled her neck, courtesy of Susan.
Izzie sighed, her breath accompanied by a high-pitched sound of glee. “Gorgeous.”
The couch squeaked as Cristina stood up and joined them at the mirror. “He'll like it,” she said, her voice flat and begrudging.
Izzie shoved her.
“A lot,” Cristina corrected.
“Love,” Izzie enunciated, glaring at Cristina. “He'll love it.”
Meredith grinned as her heart began to throb. Cristina sighed. “McMarried,” Cristina said.
“Yeah. I'm not sure I believe it either,” Meredith replied.
“She has a sick, twisted idea that she's found true love,” Cristina explained. “Of course she's not nervous.”
Izzie brushed a hand down Meredith's arm, smoothing more fabric as she resumed her buzz, buzz, buzzing routine.
“I really kind of think I have,” Meredith whispered as she watched her body sway in the mirror. Except she really didn't think. She knew. She knew, and it felt...
A smile stretched her lips, blush crept across her cheeks, and her eyes started to water.
“Oh, my god,” Izzie shrieked. “You can't cry! I spent an hour doing your eyes!”
Cristina gripped Meredith's shoulders and lay her head against her friend while Izzie ran for the touch-up kit. “Mere?”
Meredith sniffed. “What?”
“Sometimes, I envy you.”
They were married.
Meredith Grey found herself stuck, rewinding and pausing on that thought enough that were it a cassette, she would have probably rubbed it down into dust by then. Married, married, married. It had a nice ring to it. A... ring. A round-and-round, dizzy sort of ring that didn't make any sense.
Her skin felt hot and alive with crackling energy, and she couldn't help but blink and giggle softly. Married. She twirled her index finger in the hair at the nape of his neck, let the ring on her fourth finger rub against his skin. His body tensed, his sure step skipped, and an adorable hitching moan got stuck against his Adam's apple like a clot of confectionery that he couldn't quite swallow.
A shiver of excitement squeezed her heart for a beat, two beats, three.
“What?” Derek murmured, his eyes widening as he collected himself.
People. There were still people there, she had to remind herself, blinking away the thrill and the constant amazement that she barely had to move to drive him crazy.
She grinned, peering over his shoulder at the bellhop just behind them. The concierge had departed with the camera, saying he'd have the pictures for them when they checked out, but the bellhop still remained. Waiting. Well, not exactly waiting. Still being productive, thus not entirely deserving of her annoyance. But still. Go away, she wanted to yell. I want to be alone with my husband.
Husband. Mine. How did that happen to someone like her? At this point, she didn't quite care. Husband. I-really-did-it.
The thought brought another face-splitting grin ripping across her face.
Bellhop Man winked as he placed the last suitcase in a stack on the luggage tray by the closet. Winked. As if he knew exactly what was going on here. As if he had a clue. “Just wondering when you're going to put me down,” she said. “We are over the threshold, you know.”
“Sir, ma'am, your bags are here. Please feel free to dial the front desk if you should need--” Bellhop Man droned, but Derek, from the looks of him, wasn't paying any attention. None at all. His gaze lingered on her face, his blue eyes hooded but unblinking. She watched his throat ripple as he swallowed again.
“Oh, I have plans,” Derek said, his voice rough with... Something.
She rubbed his neck again. “Plans?”
Derek's eyes narrowed as he nodded. Her breath stopped as he absorbed the sight of her, and his gaze glazed with a hint of desperation. His fingers tightened, and she shifted. “Mmm,” he decided. “Plans.”
“Have a pleasant evening,” Bellhop Man continued, his eyes were twinkling with a sort of mirth. He turned to leave. It wasn't until she caught sight of her purse sitting on top of the pile of suitcases that she realized. Stupid. Stupid honeymooners. Wanted to be alone, and all thought processes beyond, “Married! Woo!” had simply ceased. Oops. She forced herself to focus. Just for a moment.
“Plans that include tipping the bellhop?” Meredith prodded. Bellhop Man paused halfway into the hall, turned, and smiled politely. She flexed her knee, and her foot shifted in the air.
Derek blinked. A small breath escaped, almost like a cough, but not quite. “Oh,” he said. “Yes. Forgot at check-in.”
The room shifted as he tried to get at his wallet, and the world became a juggling act. She would have laughed. Would have. But he seemed almost unwilling to let her go for some reason, and that? That was the sort of thing she could relate to. She leaned into his shirt and sighed, inhaling the spicy scent of his aftershave.
Derek gave up after a few minutes of juggling, and he set her down on the side of the bed so gently it made the breath seize in her lungs as she sank against the mattress. She clutched at the bedspread, letting the harsh weave of the fabric crumple in her palms as she sat there. The ring on his finger flashed, or maybe she had imagined it. The flash. Not his finger. His palm slipped behind the curtain of his black tuxedo and came back with a thin black billfold in tow. Money crumpled as it exchanged hands.
“Thank you, sir,” Bellhop Man said. She vaguely heard the door shut followed by distant thuds as he disappeared down the hallway.
A deep sound rumbled through Derek's chest. He pivoted on a foot, staring at her.
“Derek,” she said. His name felt like silk in her throat. She resisted the urge to say it again and again and again. She would save that for later.
His body seemed to seize with tension, as though hearing his name had snapped him back to reality. The world moved as though it were caught in one of those stupid six-million-dollar-man moments, where everything slowed to a crawl in order to denote super speed. She'd never really understood that, why they couldn't have things just zip around like they were supposed to.
The rumble-roar of Derek clearing his throat yanked her into the room again in a blink, and she found herself staring at the sleek back of his tuxedo. The door creaked open as he fumbled with the knob. The plastic privacy tag didn't seem to want to grip the handle, but even after his struggle went silent, and he shut the door again, Derek didn't turn around for a long, stretched, fat moment. That was when her quiet ease began to falter. What was... What? Was she doing something wrong?
Her fingers tightened against the bedspread, and her gaze found its way to her shoes. Cute shoes. One-hundred-twenty-dollars worth of cute, strap-y little heeled things that could technically be considered instruments of torture. Another reason why she hadn't protested when he'd insisted on gifting her with a reprieve from gravity.
They'd been checking in, and then the world had tilted back with a whirl. She'd laughed at first. “What on earth are you doing?” she'd said with a throaty chuckle as the room had swayed. But he'd insisted, and she'd wilted under his determined look. He'd humored her about so many things, so she'd relented, and the further he'd carried her, the more she'd settled in to enjoy the ride against him.
The ride, ride... Riding. Naughty. Bad thoughts. But wasn't that the point?
This was their wedding night. Their wedding night. I-really-did-it!
In less than a breath, she wasn't sitting there staring at her shoes, wondering why something was weird. He'd throw her down on the bed like a romantic hero in the midst of a torrid affair. Kyrian. Now. The dress would come flying off despite his insistence that it would be difficult. She'd heave and pant like an appropriate, heavily-busted romantic heroine. And then everything would melt away. Oh, yes. Yes, yes, yes. She liked that plan. That was a good plan. She wondered when he'd--
Derek inhaled, and the sound of it ripped through the quiet room as though he were the gale, the thunder, and she were the woman caught out in the middle of the woods in the rain. He fiddled with the door handle, staring at it, and then he turned. His eyes narrowed as he stared at her, wantonly letting his gaze roam from her toes to her face, but then it all disappeared. He stood at the door, unmoving, but... She swore she could detect a fine shimmer of movement. His hair...
The top two buttons of his tuxedo shirt had come undone as the evening had worn on and he'd presumably wanted to relax a bit more. Just a hint of his alabaster chest peeked out. The ends of his bow tie dangled from the breast pocket of his jacket. His coiffed hair had fallen loose out of impeccable style. An unruly curl swept down over his forehead.
When she stared at it, she could see it. He shook.
Something inside her broke apart when she realized. And then nothing mattered. She wanted to shove him against the door and... go. Go, go, go. Because this was... They were married. They'd been good for two months. She was hungry. And she loved him.
“Well, there's a bed,” he said, breaking the expanse of silence. His breath whuffed with quiet laughter. But he didn't move away from the door, and when she searched for the playful sparkle in his eyes, it wasn't there.
“Mmm,” she purred, trying to imitate her favorite sound of his, trying to... It's okay, she wanted to say. It's okay. You're perfect to me. You're perfect, and you're mine, and I love you. Instead, she merely agreed with a nod and a sly, “And walls.”
He ran his fingers through his hair and swallowed deeply. “Yeah,” he said. His eyes had found the bed. He watched it. Stared.
“Derek,” she said when he couldn't seem to tear his eyes away. “I love you.”
His frame wilted against the door, and he took a deep breath. “I don't want to mess this up.” His breath hitched. “I don't want to...”
She stood, stepped forward, and he stilled. The spicy scent of him wafted against the back of her throat. His body thumped against the back of the door. She slipped her palms against the cotton of his shirt, underneath his jacket, and slid them against his body. Shifting in her arms, he groaned. “Mere.”
“You won't mess this up, Derek. If you mess this up, there's really no hope for me, is there?” she said.
He leaned over her shoulder and his nose found her neck. He breathed against her. His knee nudged hers, as if he were trying to spread her apart, trying to find her center. He rubbed against her, his breath becoming a low purr. “You're perfect, Mere,” he assured her, as if the mere suggestion of her being without hope was an abomination. “You're... You can't...”
“If I'm perfect, I can't be wrong. Right?”
“I guess not.” He chuckled. “Is this okay?”
She nodded. “This is okay, Derek.”
She found him sprawled on a reclining lawn chair on the dock by the lake, but the chair had been turned away from the water toward a muddy bank of land on the left. His head had tilted to the side when he'd fallen asleep, as if he'd simply nodded off while staring absently at the reeds and the edge of the water and... Their house. Well, what would be their house.
A small plank of wood with a spray-painted orange stripe at the top sat embedded in the mud. The contractor had visited the day before with a pack of surveyors, and it had been weird. Weird but thrilling. Thrilling to discuss their final thoughts on the blueprints she and Derek had slaved over with the designer. Discussing final thoughts, all while she had swapped her stare between Derek and the big gray bird things that darted in and out of the reeds. Herons, she corrected herself. Derek had said they were herons.
She left him alone at first, instead choosing to dart past him and turn around, trying to frame what he'd been looking at in her mind. She felt a little silly holding out her fingers like a square in front of her, but it made the world seem... Quaint. Like a postcard from a small village on the water. Idyllic. Which brought her to the problem at hand. Where in the post-card-y idyllic world would she be in May? She couldn't repress the smile that tore across her face as she tiptoed up behind him.
“So, where do you want to go?” she asked as she leaned over his shoulder and slid her hands down his chest.
“Hmm,” he purred as his eyes slid open. His palm found her chin, and he leaned up and kissed her throat. As he pulled away, his lips parted in a small yawn, and two blinks took the blear of sleep away, which relaxed his face into a pleased but awake grin. “Go?”
“On our honeymoon,” she replied. “You said we could go anywhere, but you can't tell me you don't have any idea where you want to go. Don't you have a list? I'd always wanted to go to France. Except I already went, so, no great desire for French anymore, but--”
“Stop,” he said with a laugh, reaching for her. She skipped back, only to have his other arm ensnare her. The world tilted as he tripped her over the handle of the chair, and she landed with a squeak in his lap. His stare grew dark with hunger. “You're just making me think about planes,” he said.
“As in sex-on-a-plane, or grr, arggh, flying?”
His lip twitched, but otherwise he ignored her. “I really don't have any idea where we should go, Mere. We agreed on a beach.”
“We did.”
“Beaches, and I...” His voice hitched. He coughed, his gaze growing darker still, and she felt the fingers of his left hand flex around her shoulder, more firm than a gentle touch, but not harsh. When he spoke again, the words were raw to their bones. “You were so hot against the wall in that--”
Sex-on-a-plane, then.
“How about Key West?” she blurted.
“Okay,” he whispered as he dipped his head into the juncture of her shoulder and her neck. Something soft and wet touched her, something... tongue. He was licking--
“It's close!” she snapped as she flinched away. Hot. She looked up to find that the sun still wasn't out. A thick layer of gray hovered overhead, masking a bright circle to the west. Why was it so hot? Hot and-- “Close-ish,” she corrected. The murky, earthy scent of the water and reeds and mud melted behind a curtain of his musk, and she resisted the urge to let him-- To-- “Close-ish to Connecticut, so you wouldn't be stuck in a plane forever,” having sex! “and--”
A soft breath of his laughter laved her skin, and she sighed. Do not relax. Do not relax, she swore to herself. Do. Not. No! No relaxing! Be good!
~~~
Stop, he told himself. Stop, stop, stop. Be good. Despite the fact that she was curled in his lap, rubbing up against his--
“Mere, I can deal with a plane trip,” Derek murmured. “Especially if--” You're there. Close. Closer. “I mean. If you want Italy or Greece or something half a day away, I'll live. Don't pick something on home soil just because--”
“And there's Hemingway's house,” she babbled. Her tiny frame jerked restlessly against his, as if she wanted to move but was forcing herself to hold still and not aggravate the situation further. He closed his eyes and tried to relax as he listened to the cadence of her voice. “You could see all the polydactyl cats with seven toes, and see where the Bell Tolled for Whom, and all that stuff.”
He snorted. “Cats.”
“Yes, cats,” she confirmed, as though they were discussing the fact that yes, the sky? Gray. He kept his eyes closed, but was unable to stop his index finger from tracing the line of her spine. She sighed and shifted. Closer. The lake fell away from his awareness, and he breathed, breathed, breathed. Lavender. Heartbeats. Just her.
“Meredith...”
“What?” she gasped.
He let his eyelids drift open, and found her soft, gray pupils inches from his own. She licked her lips, and the raw desire staring back at him made him fall apart. “I want you,” he said. He pushed into her, jouncing her on the chair. She squeaked and swallowed. She had a long, pale, delicate throat that he wanted to ply. To touch. To...
A groan rumbled out of his chest as her face reddened, and she looked down.
“No sex!” she scolded his lap, as though his brain had nothing to do with it. “Stop! Focus.” She sighed, agitated, and shifted in his lap again, which didn't help. At all. He slid his eyes shut and inhaled. One, two... Three. Thre-- no, four. Four, right? He found her frowning when he looked at her again. “Sorry,” she whispered, and then her pitch rose into a rant. “But we should have figured this out ages ago. Why do we keep putting it off? I mean, honestly. Is it that hard to figure out what location in the world we want to spend having magic sex until we can't walk?”
Sex. Sex. Se--
“It's been two weeks since...” he managed.
Her fingers tightened against his neck. “And it's supposed to have been two months!” she snapped. He felt his hair getting pulled and tangled and twisted. Except it felt good. Not painful. She did that when they were making love. Or kissing. Or... He wanted more. And more. He took a deep, cleansing breath, but it didn't seem to help.
“I don't care where we go, Meredith,” he snarled, unable to stop himself. “I just want you.” Now. Two weeks without was torture. Pain. Awful. Needed it to end. “I want you on the beach, and in the bed, and on the balcony like I promised, and--”
His words drowned in her mouth when she kissed him.
“I want you, too,” she whispered when she pulled away. Millimeters. Millimeters between him and more.
He stared. “Please.”
“Derek, no,” she said, her voice soft. Not scolding. She wanted this. She really... “No, we can't, we--”
“Key West is fine,” he replied, leaning against her. She tasted good. Like strawberries. He breathed, nosing through her hair. He found the small spot behind her ear that was ticklish.
“Key West,” she said. “Derek...”
No, his inner voice wailed. He wanted to touch her more. But... Magic. You're supposed to give her magic. On her wedding night. Stop. Stop it, now. Right now. You don't want to mess this wedding up before it even starts. Right?
Right. Stop.
“I'm stopping,” he whispered.
Her nails traced runnels in his hair. “No, you're not.”
“I'm not,” he confessed.
“I'm not either.” She sighed, and the soft touches ceased. Her frame hitched as she breathed deep. “On three.”
“One, two, and then stop?” he murmured. “Or stop after...”
“After,” she confessed as she leaned in for one last taste. “We get one extra... second.”
“Mmm,” he agreed as she collapsed into him, a whirlwind of touching and tasting. He let the seconds pass. Their counting was glacial.
When she pulled away, panting, he was okay. He was okay, because later? On their night? He would definitely give her magic.