The Effect of James Whistler, Chapter Six
Title: The Effect of James Whistler, Chapter Six
Author: domfangirl
Starring: Lincoln, Jane, Sara and some spies :-)
Category: : Multi-chapter (part of The Effects Series)
Rating: : NC-17 (for teh_sex)
Summary: : It was S3 with Jane added to the mix. Now it’s still set in S3, but it takes into account S4 in various ways.
Author’s Notes: To start from the beginning, go here. I think there's some good humor in this chapter. It was loads of fun to write.
Lincoln heard the report back to Gates from Johnson, but the sudden ringing in his ears made him wonder if he’d dropped dead and just didn’t know it yet.
Sara.
Alive.
Sara was alive. And Jane was bringing her back to the warehouse.
He had a moment where he totally blacked out, because one moment he was standing at the planning table next to Gates, and then he was on the floor and she knelt beside him, her hands gently slapping his face. “Hey, there you are,” she said, her voice calm and somehow soothing. “It’s okay.” When he attempted to push himself upright, her hands on his shoulders were quite strong. “You just stay here for a few minutes, make sure the blood is circulating everywhere. You’ve had quite a shock.”
So he lay on the floor, staring up at the rafters of the warehouse, contemplating that not only had Jane made it out alive, but she was somehow bringing his brother’s dead girlfriend back with her.
He’d be embarrassed about the fainting later, he was sure, but for the moment the only thing he felt was uncontainable relief. So much so that he felt his throat and eyes fill with tears, and he fought against the emotion, because he knew that would be even more embarrassing for him than the falling over part had been.
He thought about Michael, standing with a gun in his hand, looking right at Susan while she insisted she hadn’t killed Sara. They’d both said the word liar, though Michael had screamed it while Lincoln spat it at her with all the venom he could muster. Maybe, Lincoln remembered musingly, he’d called her a lying bitch.
In the end, they didn’t know if it had been Michael’s bullet, or one that had erupted from behind her, announcing the arrival of her back-up team. She’d been dead, and LJ had been injured, and they’d gotten the hell out of there as quickly as they could, miraculously escaping with minor scrapes and bruises. He’d tried not to think of that day very much simply because the image of LJ bleeding so profusely had been the most terrifying experience of his life.
Susan had been telling the truth, at least that one time. Why she’d lied about Sara’s death to Lincoln to begin with would probably forever remain a mystery, but it didn’t really matter. Sara’s living, breathing body mattered.
He’d already reached into his pocket for his cell phone before deciding against calling his brother. Once he saw Sara, then he would let Michael know. Once he knew for sure, with his own two eyes, and touched her. Then, he would somehow find a way to tell his brother without bawling like a baby.
It was the agony of telling Michael she was dead that horrific day at Sona combined with a jubilation that not everyone-not every woman-he knew had died because of him in some direct-or indirect-way. He could hardly whoop with joy because the mother of his child and his high school sweetheart were still dead, and there would be no magic discovery of them somewhere, but even with that heaviness that he could not escape, this was a moment of lightness. This was one time where it hadn’t gone as bad as it could possibly have gone.
He was beginning to feel hope again, and that was a pretty startling proposition after months of bleakness. The sudden colorization of his life meant that Jane hadn’t just been a distraction he would regret for the rest of it.
His only regret now could come in the form of screwing it up somehow.
Funny, how that idea didn’t scare as much as it once would have. He had the feeling now that as long as Jane could punch him when he needed a little humbling, there wouldn’t be much he could do to chase her off.
*
Jane had wanted to bring Tehaney’s body back with them, so while Johnson, Wilcox and Truman created a stretcher for Sara from the various plant life at their disposal, she and Farrelly used some ferns as wrappings for the body of her ex-partner.
Once he was properly bagged, or at least as sufficiently as he could be in their present circumstances, Farrelly, who had worked closely with James on several assignments as well, asked if he could carry the body. Jane joined the other three in transporting Sara as comfortably as possible, and they began their journey back to the warehouse.
It was no more than three miles, which had been the point when Sucre had helped Jane locate the warehouse in the first place. They made the trip quickly, even with the extra weight. Sara slept the entire time, because once she had relaxed enough to realize Jane and her team were there to help, the exhaustion of her body had finally overtaken her mind.
Wilcox was a medic and she’d made it clear to Jane that Sara would survive; she was in no immediate danger, but she was dehydrated, and the abuse she had suffered certainly left room for infection to bloom. The best thing was to get her back to the warehouse where Wilcox could pump her full of saline and treat her wounds.
When there was less than a mile to go, Jane re-established radio contact with Gates. “We’ll be there in 10, maybe 15 minutes,” she announced. She was winded, though not terribly so. They’d kept up a steady jog, but they weren’t as efficient as they would have been without their bounty. Farrelly followed close behind them, James’s body slung over his shoulder.
“I’ve set up the back room with a cot. Burrows even found some old blankets in one of the upstairs trunks. Says they’re clean.”
“Good,” Jane responded. “Over and out.”
At the mention of Lincoln, Jane finally let herself think about him again, and she felt a flood of warmth in her chest when she imagined how relieved he must be about this news. She wondered if he’d called Michael yet.
Upon their arrival, she saw him standing just outside the door, obviously waiting for them. He walked out towards them, not running, but definitely walking briskly. It was Sara he was most interested in seeing, and Jane felt no jealousy over that fact. She did put her free hand on his arm though, when he reached out to touch Sara. “Let us get her cleaned up, okay?”
“Is she unconscious?” he asked anxiously.
“No, she’s sleeping. She’s been through hell; she was tired.” They started to move forward again and Jane continued, “Come on, let us get her inside.”
He stood between her and Truman, looking down at the pale, blood-stained figure Sara made upon her bed of leaves and ferns. “Can I?” he asked, bringing his gaze up to Truman’s. “Can I take your place?”
Truman gracefully stepped back, allowing Lincoln to move into her position and wrap his strong fingers around the edge of the makeshift stretcher. Jane felt her throat constrict as they walked into the shadow of the warehouse. Soldiers deserved respect, and Jane knew Lincoln was paying Sara some of what she deserved.
Once they were inside the building, things moved quickly. They took Sara to the back room, but after Wilcox got an IV started in Sara’s left arm, she insisted everyone leave except Jane. “She’s a woman, and she needs her privacy,” Wilcox said when Lincoln protested. Jane watched him bite his tongue, quite literally, but then he backed off.
Their eyes connected and she said softly, “I’ll come find you when she can have visitors, okay?”
He nodded, but then paused, gesturing back towards where Farrelly had stopped to set down his load. “Is that Whistler?” he asked.
Jane’s eyes moved over his shoulder, and though she couldn’t see the body, something about it finally penetrated her brain. James was dead, and with him most of the questions she’d hoped to find answers to would never come to fruition. Sudden tears burned her retinas. “Yes,” she replied. “He was already dead when we got there.”
“He saved my life.”
Sara’s voice surprised all of them, and Lincoln physically moved Jane out of his way to get to her. He knelt next to the cot and took one of Sara’s hands in both of his. “Are you all right?” he asked, which irritated Jane a little. They had given him the diagnosis already, and she thought he believed her.
“I’ve been better,” was Sara’s dry reply. “But I’m alive, which I hear is more than you and Michael thought possible.”
“I’m so sorry,” he said, and Jane felt a lump form in her throat. Poor Lincoln. He’d lost too many people to be comforted by the few brief words Wilcox had given him.
“It’s all right,” Sara said softly. “I don’t know much about him, but James saved me. They were just going to leave us there, they were packing up to abandon us, I guess because Gretchen was killed?”
“Gretchen? Who’s Gretchen?” Lincoln asked.
“I believe you knew her as Susan, Linc,” Jane said, moving to stand next to Lincoln’s kneeling form. Sara glanced up at Jane, her brown eyes tired but full of concern as they turned back to Lincoln.
Briefly nodding, he prompted Sara to continue by repeating, “They were just going to leave you there?”
Stoically, she said, “At the last minute, one of them decided he should just kill us-that’s what Gretchen would have wanted, he said. James insisted that that wasn’t true, that Gretchen would have killed us herself if she’d wanted us dead. He pleaded with them, but they wouldn’t listen. They sprayed the room with a machine gun, and he dove over me.”
“Oh, God,” Lincoln breathed unsteadily.
“I still don’t understand how I wasn’t hit. But he bled to death on top of me-there was nothing I could do, my hands and feet were tied,” her voice broke at the end, and Lincoln leaned forward, one of his big hands lifting up to cup her head gently.
He tipped her head forward until their foreheads met. “Of course you would have helped him if you could,” he said, his voice uncharacteristically soft. It wasn’t the decibel that surprised Jane, but the tone. She’d never heard him sound so kind, not even when he’d calmed LJ down over the phone. “You’re gonna be okay, Sara,” he soothed. “Tomorrow, we’ll catch up with Michael. He’ll take good care of you.”
She murmured something Jane couldn’t hear, and then Wilcox, who had been watching the proceedings closely said, “I’m sorry to break this up, really, but she needs to rest, and I need to tend to her wounds.”
Sara nodded, and Lincoln released her, albeit very reluctantly. “She’s right,” Sara murmured. “Infection would be very bad.”
Jane looked at Lincoln’s face just as a slight smile broke over his features. “That’s right, Doc,” he quipped, and Jane remembered that Sara was a doctor herself.
He stood up, his hand still holding on to Sara’s. “You get cleaned up, and rest some, and then we’ll call my brother, okay?”
The tears reappeared in her eyes and she nodded vigorously. “Okay,” she agreed.
Lincoln turned to Jane, his hand wrapping around her elbow in a familiar way. “I’ll wait for you outside.”
She nodded, expecting him to leave with everyone else. He hesitated a moment, causing Jane to look at him more closely. Then he leaned into her, brushing her mouth with his very softly.
He didn’t say anything as he exited, and Jane was speechless herself, so surprised by the gesture she barely restrained herself from lifting a hand to cover her lips in disbelief. Then she heard Wilcox laugh softly as she seated herself on a box next to Sara’s cot so she had a good advantage at tending to the lacerations on the patient’s arms and legs. “You lucky bitch,” she muttered good-naturedly, giving Jane a wink and a smile.
The small grin that blossomed of its own accord on her face made her forget for a short moment that James Tehaney was dead, and that she somehow would have to mourn him all over again.
*
Lincoln went outside, heading back to where he’d camped out the day before when he and Jane had argued so viciously in front of everyone. It seemed like a lifetime ago; in fact, everything felt so disjointed, he wondered if his life could ever make sense again. He had to believe that once they met up with Michael, Sofia and LJ in Mexico, things might start to feel normal again, but on the other hand he knew he would have to tell Sofia that Whistler was dead, and he dreaded that.
And he’d died protecting Sara. That somehow made him a hero, when Lincoln couldn’t help but think he’d caused all the problems to begin with. Just like so many of the steps along the way, he knew it was just one more thing he wasn’t going to know for certainty. It was like him and Michael burying their father on the side of the road just north of the Mexican border. There was no answer, really. It just was.
It was still the darkest part of night, but dawn would soon be upon them, and then they could make plans to get the hell out of Panama once and for all. Sitting on the wooden palettes that had been deserted long ago, he was lost in thoughts of Michael’s reaction to the news when Jane approached.
“Sure is dark out here, isn’t it?” Her voice startled him at first, but then he reached a hand out, and told her to follow the sound of his voice. There was hardly any light at all, though he could vaguely remember being able to see her better the day before when they’d talked here. There had been a light overhead somewhere, but it must have burned out. That seemed like a odd tribute to Whistler’s sacrifice. Her hand found his fingers, and they gripped each other tightly. Lincoln got to his feet so he could hug her, and the soft warmth of her body pressed to his brought on other tactile memories of her bare skin, and her perfect breasts, and her amazing ass.
Funny, how quickly he could move from wondering how freaked out his brother would be when faced with news he’d never expect to dwelling on the desire that flowed so freely in his veins whenever Jane was in the vicinity. He supposed he had at one time wanted Veronica as fiercely as he wanted this blonde-haired warrior, but at the moment he couldn’t really recall a time. Things with Veronica had always been gentler.
He’d never headbutted Vee. And he’d known her for almost 10 years before he’d ever touched her sexually. Things were very different with Jane. Faster. Volatile. Scary as hell.
“How are you?” she asked.
Lincoln’s hands moved over her camouflage-covered back, the heavy-duty button-up shirt and cargo pants she’d put on before she’d left for the jungle reminding him that no matter what he thought of her, she’d seen and done things he could only imagine. “I’m fine,” he said, running his hands downward cautiously. He really wanted to cup her ass in his palms, but he thought, from her tone, right now might not be the time to make a move like that. “What about you?” he asked, practicing great restraint.
Her head was tucked into his neck, her arms securely around his waist. She rubbed her cheek against him and he heard her sniff. “I’m sad,” she answered honestly.
“Oh, baby,” he breathed, lifting one hand to cup her head firmly against his body.
“I mean…I’m glad we found Sara. I’m so happy for your brother. But-I really wanted my chance with James. I wanted to understand. Now I don’t know what to think. He did a brave good thing for her, but what about everything else?” She sighed, the sound even sadder than her voice. “It’s all so messed up.”
Her confession seemed to be the catalyst for all the emotions she’d kept inside and he felt her chest shudder against his and then she was crying, and her fingers dug into the small of his back as her grief found its outlet. He held her more tightly, unsure if that was really what she needed. He was pretty much helpless as to how to handle it. Her tears surprised him; not because he thought she'd never cry, as strong as her personality was, he was certain she felt everything intensely, but up until now she’d been good at controlling it.
Suddenly, he was not. Well, really, he'd never been one for self-control, but it was Jane's wet face against his neck that made him need to give up the fight. He let go of all the things he'd clung to over the last six days. All the reasons he’d ever denied her, and himself, of the closeness they both craved. In the pitch blackness, in the shadow of an old decrepit building, he crossed over.
His lips stopped the flow of words, her explanation as to why she shed tears over James Whistler’s death evaporating in the warm air between them. Cupping her face in his hands, he tipped her head back, slanted his mouth over hers and kissed her deeply. If his intent was not obvious from the passion in his kiss, his hands quickly unfastening her camo button up shirt brought her up to speed, and he knew the exact moment when she realized what he was doing, because her fingers were there too, on the buttons of her own shirt, helping him get his hands to her flesh more quickly.
She dragged his palms upward from the last button and pressed them over her breasts. The soft mewling that rose up in her throat and sounded against his tongue made his urgency increase stratospherically so that as he shoved her bra out of his way, he was also leaning down to clamp one arm around her bottom to hoist her up so that he could find the soft mounds with his mouth. As his tongue divided its time equally between her pert, aroused nipples, his name broke desperately from her lips and he thought the confinement of his jeans might be all he needed to prove she reduced him to nothing more than a walking orgasm.
He mumbled against her sweet tasting skin-he told her how much he wanted her, how much he needed her, but he was sure she couldn't hear him because his mouth was too full of her rounded flesh to be audible. He knew she understood though, because he felt her loose-fitting camo pants flap against his legs as she shimmied her way out of them.
Her fingernails gently scored the back of his head and down his neck as she whispered his name again, and then he heard her gasp, "Your belt-I can't reach it! Your bel-oh, God, yes, please," but that was in response to his jean-clad knee sliding between her legs, the rough denim hitting in all the right places. He could feel her heat and all he wanted was to be there, and to be there now, to not have anything between them anymore.
In the end he found his way a few steps to the right so that he could press her against the warehouse wall, and her knees fit snugly around his hips, holding him securely, though her feet were helplessly tangled in her pants and underwear. It didn't matter because they made do with how it was, and as he jerked the front of his jeans open, tugging them down and almost hurting himself in the process, all the awkwardness was forgotten as he slid inside her. The inferno that had erupted between them from the moment his forehead connected with her bottom lip reconverged right then and he dropped his head forward on a groan, the tight, wet warmth of her almost more than he could bear.
Her lips brushed at his forehead, gently, reverently, and though she said nothing, he knew she was relieving that first moment as well. It had been inevitable. He should have known then that the only way it could go would be just as it was happening right here and now.
In less than three months everything had changed. He was no longer a dead man walking, and with his cock deep inside Jane Phillips, he thought perhaps he was more alive than he had ever been before. She urged him on, the sounds she made in response to each plunge of his hips made him think it would be the last one, but just as the rush of it overtook him, her hands framed his face, and their mouths came back together. Moaning feverishly in total harmony, he pushed one more time and she stiffened in his arms, and they dove over as one.
*
Jane’s heart thundered against her ribcage, and she thought if there’d been any light at all, she would have seen stars circling over her own head.
Boy. She’d known it would be heavenly, but she still felt overwhelmed, and unprepared, and the tears that had started because of James continued to flow because of Lincoln; because of the intense way he made her feel, like everything in the world was suddenly newer, brighter, sharper.
She inhaled deeply, still trying to calm her own pulse, and stop the sobs shuddering through her body. The aftermath was sweet with his forehead resting on her shoulder, and his hands still holding her thighs around him while his thumbs gently stroked the outer edges of her legs.
Her own hands traveled the length of his neck, the soft skin there as delicate and fine as a baby’s though it was exposed to the sun every day since he barely had any hair. She suddenly wondered what he would look like if he grew his hair out.
His lips moved over the skin just inside the collar of her shirt, which hung open, but had somehow remained on her shoulders. She was glad because if any of her team came looking for them, at least her shirt was long enough to cover the major parts she had exposed for their mutual pleasure. When he finally lifted his head, his own breath finally returning to normal, he said heavily, “I didn’t intend for it to be like this.” Shifting her slightly, he hopped a little, and though Jane knew she wasn’t overly heavy for her size, she imagined her fully sated body must feel like a ton of bricks to him. “This wasn’t as-“ he paused, and because of the darkness, she couldn’t see his expression.
Jane filled in the blank herself. “Romantic?” she offered.
He chuckled a little, his hands squeezing her thighs warmly. “I was actually going to say ‘sanitary.’”
“Oh, right,” she said, sharing the laughter with him. With his help, she eased her legs from around him, and got her feet back on the ground. “I was thinking about the dirt the whole time.”
“Longest five minutes of your life, huh?” he asked self-deprecatingly, and she could hear the smile even though she couldn’t see it.
She found his waist in the darkness and wound her arms around him, hugging him tightly. “Best five minutes, anyway,” she said sincerely.
Again, his lips descended, finding her mouth quite accurately considering how low the visibility was, as well as keeping her from saying anything further. While he kissed her thoroughly, his hands covered her exposed bottom, sliding up under the shirt tales that had been between her bare skin and the building wall. He kneaded her ass while his lips and tongue moved languidly over hers, and the combination made Jane wish very much that they had a more sanitary environment, just for the sake of a place to lay down and start all over again-not because she wouldn’t do him repeatedly against a wall, but because she was exhausted, and they could hardly think their privacy would last long.
When he came up for air a moment later, she whispered, “I wish this could last forever.”
He didn’t respond immediately, but his hands continued to move over her body as though he was trying to memorize everything about her. “Maybe it can,” he whispered back.
Her heart started thudding heavily again because he meant something different than she did, and she didn’t expect him to be willing to acknowledge it quite yet. “I meant this being half-naked stuff. We have to go back inside. And I think Sara needed to place a phone call, remember?”
“Oh,” he said, and she could hear the embarrassment in his tone. “Right.” They both reached down to pull her pants back up at the same time and their heads clunked together.
Jane started laughing, a little too loudly considering it was the dead of night and she didn’t want to draw attention to their location anyway. Holding her head with one hand, she tugged her pants up with the other while Lincoln helped, and he shushed her, though his own chuckles erupted at the same time. “That was just perfect,” she wheezed a moment later, as she put her head against his chest.
Lincoln’s hands were deftly refastening her bra, which impressed her greatly as it was a front closure and he was doing it all by touch. When his thumbs took a sidelong route over her nipples, she pushed him away and said, “Don’t start it when you can’t finish it.”
She began buttoning up her shirt as he wrapped his arm around her shoulder and started walking them both back to the door of the warehouse. “Trust me, I can finish it. Any time, any place, baby.”
“Did you zip up your pants?” she asked, passing her hand over the front of his jeans.
“Yes,” he said, grabbing at her hand and jerking it away. “Don’t start something you can’t finish,” he retorted.
“You have no idea what I’m capable of. Just wait.”
He pulled her tight against his side as they got to the door. “I’m counting the minutes, believe me.”
As she opened the door and a little light poured out on them, she stood up on her tiptoes so she could reach his mouth. “Thanks for keeping your promise,” she said, smiling against his mouth.
As they got through the door, Gates was standing nearby. “What promise was that?” she asked nosily.
Jane shrugged her shoulders, intending to leave her co-worker in the dark about what she meant, but the arm around her shoulder moved and Lincoln’s hand clamped over her mouth as he said, “Oh, she made me swear I’d have sex with her if she made it out this whole thing alive.” Gates’ mouth dropped open, her eyes rebounding from Jane’s face to Lincoln’s. “I’m a man of my word,” he added cheekily.
Chapter Seven
Author: domfangirl
Starring: Lincoln, Jane, Sara and some spies :-)
Category: : Multi-chapter (part of The Effects Series)
Rating: : NC-17 (for teh_sex)
Summary: : It was S3 with Jane added to the mix. Now it’s still set in S3, but it takes into account S4 in various ways.
Author’s Notes: To start from the beginning, go here. I think there's some good humor in this chapter. It was loads of fun to write.
Lincoln heard the report back to Gates from Johnson, but the sudden ringing in his ears made him wonder if he’d dropped dead and just didn’t know it yet.
Sara.
Alive.
Sara was alive. And Jane was bringing her back to the warehouse.
He had a moment where he totally blacked out, because one moment he was standing at the planning table next to Gates, and then he was on the floor and she knelt beside him, her hands gently slapping his face. “Hey, there you are,” she said, her voice calm and somehow soothing. “It’s okay.” When he attempted to push himself upright, her hands on his shoulders were quite strong. “You just stay here for a few minutes, make sure the blood is circulating everywhere. You’ve had quite a shock.”
So he lay on the floor, staring up at the rafters of the warehouse, contemplating that not only had Jane made it out alive, but she was somehow bringing his brother’s dead girlfriend back with her.
He’d be embarrassed about the fainting later, he was sure, but for the moment the only thing he felt was uncontainable relief. So much so that he felt his throat and eyes fill with tears, and he fought against the emotion, because he knew that would be even more embarrassing for him than the falling over part had been.
He thought about Michael, standing with a gun in his hand, looking right at Susan while she insisted she hadn’t killed Sara. They’d both said the word liar, though Michael had screamed it while Lincoln spat it at her with all the venom he could muster. Maybe, Lincoln remembered musingly, he’d called her a lying bitch.
In the end, they didn’t know if it had been Michael’s bullet, or one that had erupted from behind her, announcing the arrival of her back-up team. She’d been dead, and LJ had been injured, and they’d gotten the hell out of there as quickly as they could, miraculously escaping with minor scrapes and bruises. He’d tried not to think of that day very much simply because the image of LJ bleeding so profusely had been the most terrifying experience of his life.
Susan had been telling the truth, at least that one time. Why she’d lied about Sara’s death to Lincoln to begin with would probably forever remain a mystery, but it didn’t really matter. Sara’s living, breathing body mattered.
He’d already reached into his pocket for his cell phone before deciding against calling his brother. Once he saw Sara, then he would let Michael know. Once he knew for sure, with his own two eyes, and touched her. Then, he would somehow find a way to tell his brother without bawling like a baby.
It was the agony of telling Michael she was dead that horrific day at Sona combined with a jubilation that not everyone-not every woman-he knew had died because of him in some direct-or indirect-way. He could hardly whoop with joy because the mother of his child and his high school sweetheart were still dead, and there would be no magic discovery of them somewhere, but even with that heaviness that he could not escape, this was a moment of lightness. This was one time where it hadn’t gone as bad as it could possibly have gone.
He was beginning to feel hope again, and that was a pretty startling proposition after months of bleakness. The sudden colorization of his life meant that Jane hadn’t just been a distraction he would regret for the rest of it.
His only regret now could come in the form of screwing it up somehow.
Funny, how that idea didn’t scare as much as it once would have. He had the feeling now that as long as Jane could punch him when he needed a little humbling, there wouldn’t be much he could do to chase her off.
*
Jane had wanted to bring Tehaney’s body back with them, so while Johnson, Wilcox and Truman created a stretcher for Sara from the various plant life at their disposal, she and Farrelly used some ferns as wrappings for the body of her ex-partner.
Once he was properly bagged, or at least as sufficiently as he could be in their present circumstances, Farrelly, who had worked closely with James on several assignments as well, asked if he could carry the body. Jane joined the other three in transporting Sara as comfortably as possible, and they began their journey back to the warehouse.
It was no more than three miles, which had been the point when Sucre had helped Jane locate the warehouse in the first place. They made the trip quickly, even with the extra weight. Sara slept the entire time, because once she had relaxed enough to realize Jane and her team were there to help, the exhaustion of her body had finally overtaken her mind.
Wilcox was a medic and she’d made it clear to Jane that Sara would survive; she was in no immediate danger, but she was dehydrated, and the abuse she had suffered certainly left room for infection to bloom. The best thing was to get her back to the warehouse where Wilcox could pump her full of saline and treat her wounds.
When there was less than a mile to go, Jane re-established radio contact with Gates. “We’ll be there in 10, maybe 15 minutes,” she announced. She was winded, though not terribly so. They’d kept up a steady jog, but they weren’t as efficient as they would have been without their bounty. Farrelly followed close behind them, James’s body slung over his shoulder.
“I’ve set up the back room with a cot. Burrows even found some old blankets in one of the upstairs trunks. Says they’re clean.”
“Good,” Jane responded. “Over and out.”
At the mention of Lincoln, Jane finally let herself think about him again, and she felt a flood of warmth in her chest when she imagined how relieved he must be about this news. She wondered if he’d called Michael yet.
Upon their arrival, she saw him standing just outside the door, obviously waiting for them. He walked out towards them, not running, but definitely walking briskly. It was Sara he was most interested in seeing, and Jane felt no jealousy over that fact. She did put her free hand on his arm though, when he reached out to touch Sara. “Let us get her cleaned up, okay?”
“Is she unconscious?” he asked anxiously.
“No, she’s sleeping. She’s been through hell; she was tired.” They started to move forward again and Jane continued, “Come on, let us get her inside.”
He stood between her and Truman, looking down at the pale, blood-stained figure Sara made upon her bed of leaves and ferns. “Can I?” he asked, bringing his gaze up to Truman’s. “Can I take your place?”
Truman gracefully stepped back, allowing Lincoln to move into her position and wrap his strong fingers around the edge of the makeshift stretcher. Jane felt her throat constrict as they walked into the shadow of the warehouse. Soldiers deserved respect, and Jane knew Lincoln was paying Sara some of what she deserved.
Once they were inside the building, things moved quickly. They took Sara to the back room, but after Wilcox got an IV started in Sara’s left arm, she insisted everyone leave except Jane. “She’s a woman, and she needs her privacy,” Wilcox said when Lincoln protested. Jane watched him bite his tongue, quite literally, but then he backed off.
Their eyes connected and she said softly, “I’ll come find you when she can have visitors, okay?”
He nodded, but then paused, gesturing back towards where Farrelly had stopped to set down his load. “Is that Whistler?” he asked.
Jane’s eyes moved over his shoulder, and though she couldn’t see the body, something about it finally penetrated her brain. James was dead, and with him most of the questions she’d hoped to find answers to would never come to fruition. Sudden tears burned her retinas. “Yes,” she replied. “He was already dead when we got there.”
“He saved my life.”
Sara’s voice surprised all of them, and Lincoln physically moved Jane out of his way to get to her. He knelt next to the cot and took one of Sara’s hands in both of his. “Are you all right?” he asked, which irritated Jane a little. They had given him the diagnosis already, and she thought he believed her.
“I’ve been better,” was Sara’s dry reply. “But I’m alive, which I hear is more than you and Michael thought possible.”
“I’m so sorry,” he said, and Jane felt a lump form in her throat. Poor Lincoln. He’d lost too many people to be comforted by the few brief words Wilcox had given him.
“It’s all right,” Sara said softly. “I don’t know much about him, but James saved me. They were just going to leave us there, they were packing up to abandon us, I guess because Gretchen was killed?”
“Gretchen? Who’s Gretchen?” Lincoln asked.
“I believe you knew her as Susan, Linc,” Jane said, moving to stand next to Lincoln’s kneeling form. Sara glanced up at Jane, her brown eyes tired but full of concern as they turned back to Lincoln.
Briefly nodding, he prompted Sara to continue by repeating, “They were just going to leave you there?”
Stoically, she said, “At the last minute, one of them decided he should just kill us-that’s what Gretchen would have wanted, he said. James insisted that that wasn’t true, that Gretchen would have killed us herself if she’d wanted us dead. He pleaded with them, but they wouldn’t listen. They sprayed the room with a machine gun, and he dove over me.”
“Oh, God,” Lincoln breathed unsteadily.
“I still don’t understand how I wasn’t hit. But he bled to death on top of me-there was nothing I could do, my hands and feet were tied,” her voice broke at the end, and Lincoln leaned forward, one of his big hands lifting up to cup her head gently.
He tipped her head forward until their foreheads met. “Of course you would have helped him if you could,” he said, his voice uncharacteristically soft. It wasn’t the decibel that surprised Jane, but the tone. She’d never heard him sound so kind, not even when he’d calmed LJ down over the phone. “You’re gonna be okay, Sara,” he soothed. “Tomorrow, we’ll catch up with Michael. He’ll take good care of you.”
She murmured something Jane couldn’t hear, and then Wilcox, who had been watching the proceedings closely said, “I’m sorry to break this up, really, but she needs to rest, and I need to tend to her wounds.”
Sara nodded, and Lincoln released her, albeit very reluctantly. “She’s right,” Sara murmured. “Infection would be very bad.”
Jane looked at Lincoln’s face just as a slight smile broke over his features. “That’s right, Doc,” he quipped, and Jane remembered that Sara was a doctor herself.
He stood up, his hand still holding on to Sara’s. “You get cleaned up, and rest some, and then we’ll call my brother, okay?”
The tears reappeared in her eyes and she nodded vigorously. “Okay,” she agreed.
Lincoln turned to Jane, his hand wrapping around her elbow in a familiar way. “I’ll wait for you outside.”
She nodded, expecting him to leave with everyone else. He hesitated a moment, causing Jane to look at him more closely. Then he leaned into her, brushing her mouth with his very softly.
He didn’t say anything as he exited, and Jane was speechless herself, so surprised by the gesture she barely restrained herself from lifting a hand to cover her lips in disbelief. Then she heard Wilcox laugh softly as she seated herself on a box next to Sara’s cot so she had a good advantage at tending to the lacerations on the patient’s arms and legs. “You lucky bitch,” she muttered good-naturedly, giving Jane a wink and a smile.
The small grin that blossomed of its own accord on her face made her forget for a short moment that James Tehaney was dead, and that she somehow would have to mourn him all over again.
*
Lincoln went outside, heading back to where he’d camped out the day before when he and Jane had argued so viciously in front of everyone. It seemed like a lifetime ago; in fact, everything felt so disjointed, he wondered if his life could ever make sense again. He had to believe that once they met up with Michael, Sofia and LJ in Mexico, things might start to feel normal again, but on the other hand he knew he would have to tell Sofia that Whistler was dead, and he dreaded that.
And he’d died protecting Sara. That somehow made him a hero, when Lincoln couldn’t help but think he’d caused all the problems to begin with. Just like so many of the steps along the way, he knew it was just one more thing he wasn’t going to know for certainty. It was like him and Michael burying their father on the side of the road just north of the Mexican border. There was no answer, really. It just was.
It was still the darkest part of night, but dawn would soon be upon them, and then they could make plans to get the hell out of Panama once and for all. Sitting on the wooden palettes that had been deserted long ago, he was lost in thoughts of Michael’s reaction to the news when Jane approached.
“Sure is dark out here, isn’t it?” Her voice startled him at first, but then he reached a hand out, and told her to follow the sound of his voice. There was hardly any light at all, though he could vaguely remember being able to see her better the day before when they’d talked here. There had been a light overhead somewhere, but it must have burned out. That seemed like a odd tribute to Whistler’s sacrifice. Her hand found his fingers, and they gripped each other tightly. Lincoln got to his feet so he could hug her, and the soft warmth of her body pressed to his brought on other tactile memories of her bare skin, and her perfect breasts, and her amazing ass.
Funny, how quickly he could move from wondering how freaked out his brother would be when faced with news he’d never expect to dwelling on the desire that flowed so freely in his veins whenever Jane was in the vicinity. He supposed he had at one time wanted Veronica as fiercely as he wanted this blonde-haired warrior, but at the moment he couldn’t really recall a time. Things with Veronica had always been gentler.
He’d never headbutted Vee. And he’d known her for almost 10 years before he’d ever touched her sexually. Things were very different with Jane. Faster. Volatile. Scary as hell.
“How are you?” she asked.
Lincoln’s hands moved over her camouflage-covered back, the heavy-duty button-up shirt and cargo pants she’d put on before she’d left for the jungle reminding him that no matter what he thought of her, she’d seen and done things he could only imagine. “I’m fine,” he said, running his hands downward cautiously. He really wanted to cup her ass in his palms, but he thought, from her tone, right now might not be the time to make a move like that. “What about you?” he asked, practicing great restraint.
Her head was tucked into his neck, her arms securely around his waist. She rubbed her cheek against him and he heard her sniff. “I’m sad,” she answered honestly.
“Oh, baby,” he breathed, lifting one hand to cup her head firmly against his body.
“I mean…I’m glad we found Sara. I’m so happy for your brother. But-I really wanted my chance with James. I wanted to understand. Now I don’t know what to think. He did a brave good thing for her, but what about everything else?” She sighed, the sound even sadder than her voice. “It’s all so messed up.”
Her confession seemed to be the catalyst for all the emotions she’d kept inside and he felt her chest shudder against his and then she was crying, and her fingers dug into the small of his back as her grief found its outlet. He held her more tightly, unsure if that was really what she needed. He was pretty much helpless as to how to handle it. Her tears surprised him; not because he thought she'd never cry, as strong as her personality was, he was certain she felt everything intensely, but up until now she’d been good at controlling it.
Suddenly, he was not. Well, really, he'd never been one for self-control, but it was Jane's wet face against his neck that made him need to give up the fight. He let go of all the things he'd clung to over the last six days. All the reasons he’d ever denied her, and himself, of the closeness they both craved. In the pitch blackness, in the shadow of an old decrepit building, he crossed over.
His lips stopped the flow of words, her explanation as to why she shed tears over James Whistler’s death evaporating in the warm air between them. Cupping her face in his hands, he tipped her head back, slanted his mouth over hers and kissed her deeply. If his intent was not obvious from the passion in his kiss, his hands quickly unfastening her camo button up shirt brought her up to speed, and he knew the exact moment when she realized what he was doing, because her fingers were there too, on the buttons of her own shirt, helping him get his hands to her flesh more quickly.
She dragged his palms upward from the last button and pressed them over her breasts. The soft mewling that rose up in her throat and sounded against his tongue made his urgency increase stratospherically so that as he shoved her bra out of his way, he was also leaning down to clamp one arm around her bottom to hoist her up so that he could find the soft mounds with his mouth. As his tongue divided its time equally between her pert, aroused nipples, his name broke desperately from her lips and he thought the confinement of his jeans might be all he needed to prove she reduced him to nothing more than a walking orgasm.
He mumbled against her sweet tasting skin-he told her how much he wanted her, how much he needed her, but he was sure she couldn't hear him because his mouth was too full of her rounded flesh to be audible. He knew she understood though, because he felt her loose-fitting camo pants flap against his legs as she shimmied her way out of them.
Her fingernails gently scored the back of his head and down his neck as she whispered his name again, and then he heard her gasp, "Your belt-I can't reach it! Your bel-oh, God, yes, please," but that was in response to his jean-clad knee sliding between her legs, the rough denim hitting in all the right places. He could feel her heat and all he wanted was to be there, and to be there now, to not have anything between them anymore.
In the end he found his way a few steps to the right so that he could press her against the warehouse wall, and her knees fit snugly around his hips, holding him securely, though her feet were helplessly tangled in her pants and underwear. It didn't matter because they made do with how it was, and as he jerked the front of his jeans open, tugging them down and almost hurting himself in the process, all the awkwardness was forgotten as he slid inside her. The inferno that had erupted between them from the moment his forehead connected with her bottom lip reconverged right then and he dropped his head forward on a groan, the tight, wet warmth of her almost more than he could bear.
Her lips brushed at his forehead, gently, reverently, and though she said nothing, he knew she was relieving that first moment as well. It had been inevitable. He should have known then that the only way it could go would be just as it was happening right here and now.
In less than three months everything had changed. He was no longer a dead man walking, and with his cock deep inside Jane Phillips, he thought perhaps he was more alive than he had ever been before. She urged him on, the sounds she made in response to each plunge of his hips made him think it would be the last one, but just as the rush of it overtook him, her hands framed his face, and their mouths came back together. Moaning feverishly in total harmony, he pushed one more time and she stiffened in his arms, and they dove over as one.
*
Jane’s heart thundered against her ribcage, and she thought if there’d been any light at all, she would have seen stars circling over her own head.
Boy. She’d known it would be heavenly, but she still felt overwhelmed, and unprepared, and the tears that had started because of James continued to flow because of Lincoln; because of the intense way he made her feel, like everything in the world was suddenly newer, brighter, sharper.
She inhaled deeply, still trying to calm her own pulse, and stop the sobs shuddering through her body. The aftermath was sweet with his forehead resting on her shoulder, and his hands still holding her thighs around him while his thumbs gently stroked the outer edges of her legs.
Her own hands traveled the length of his neck, the soft skin there as delicate and fine as a baby’s though it was exposed to the sun every day since he barely had any hair. She suddenly wondered what he would look like if he grew his hair out.
His lips moved over the skin just inside the collar of her shirt, which hung open, but had somehow remained on her shoulders. She was glad because if any of her team came looking for them, at least her shirt was long enough to cover the major parts she had exposed for their mutual pleasure. When he finally lifted his head, his own breath finally returning to normal, he said heavily, “I didn’t intend for it to be like this.” Shifting her slightly, he hopped a little, and though Jane knew she wasn’t overly heavy for her size, she imagined her fully sated body must feel like a ton of bricks to him. “This wasn’t as-“ he paused, and because of the darkness, she couldn’t see his expression.
Jane filled in the blank herself. “Romantic?” she offered.
He chuckled a little, his hands squeezing her thighs warmly. “I was actually going to say ‘sanitary.’”
“Oh, right,” she said, sharing the laughter with him. With his help, she eased her legs from around him, and got her feet back on the ground. “I was thinking about the dirt the whole time.”
“Longest five minutes of your life, huh?” he asked self-deprecatingly, and she could hear the smile even though she couldn’t see it.
She found his waist in the darkness and wound her arms around him, hugging him tightly. “Best five minutes, anyway,” she said sincerely.
Again, his lips descended, finding her mouth quite accurately considering how low the visibility was, as well as keeping her from saying anything further. While he kissed her thoroughly, his hands covered her exposed bottom, sliding up under the shirt tales that had been between her bare skin and the building wall. He kneaded her ass while his lips and tongue moved languidly over hers, and the combination made Jane wish very much that they had a more sanitary environment, just for the sake of a place to lay down and start all over again-not because she wouldn’t do him repeatedly against a wall, but because she was exhausted, and they could hardly think their privacy would last long.
When he came up for air a moment later, she whispered, “I wish this could last forever.”
He didn’t respond immediately, but his hands continued to move over her body as though he was trying to memorize everything about her. “Maybe it can,” he whispered back.
Her heart started thudding heavily again because he meant something different than she did, and she didn’t expect him to be willing to acknowledge it quite yet. “I meant this being half-naked stuff. We have to go back inside. And I think Sara needed to place a phone call, remember?”
“Oh,” he said, and she could hear the embarrassment in his tone. “Right.” They both reached down to pull her pants back up at the same time and their heads clunked together.
Jane started laughing, a little too loudly considering it was the dead of night and she didn’t want to draw attention to their location anyway. Holding her head with one hand, she tugged her pants up with the other while Lincoln helped, and he shushed her, though his own chuckles erupted at the same time. “That was just perfect,” she wheezed a moment later, as she put her head against his chest.
Lincoln’s hands were deftly refastening her bra, which impressed her greatly as it was a front closure and he was doing it all by touch. When his thumbs took a sidelong route over her nipples, she pushed him away and said, “Don’t start it when you can’t finish it.”
She began buttoning up her shirt as he wrapped his arm around her shoulder and started walking them both back to the door of the warehouse. “Trust me, I can finish it. Any time, any place, baby.”
“Did you zip up your pants?” she asked, passing her hand over the front of his jeans.
“Yes,” he said, grabbing at her hand and jerking it away. “Don’t start something you can’t finish,” he retorted.
“You have no idea what I’m capable of. Just wait.”
He pulled her tight against his side as they got to the door. “I’m counting the minutes, believe me.”
As she opened the door and a little light poured out on them, she stood up on her tiptoes so she could reach his mouth. “Thanks for keeping your promise,” she said, smiling against his mouth.
As they got through the door, Gates was standing nearby. “What promise was that?” she asked nosily.
Jane shrugged her shoulders, intending to leave her co-worker in the dark about what she meant, but the arm around her shoulder moved and Lincoln’s hand clamped over her mouth as he said, “Oh, she made me swear I’d have sex with her if she made it out this whole thing alive.” Gates’ mouth dropped open, her eyes rebounding from Jane’s face to Lincoln’s. “I’m a man of my word,” he added cheekily.
Chapter Seven