It Happens, Chapter Three
Title: It Happens, Chapter Three
Author: domfangirl
Starring: Paul Kellerman and Sara Scofield
Category: Multi-chapter (*facepalm*) I think it will be short though, three four chapters tops, hopefully.
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Where there’s sparks, there could be fire, you know.
Author’s Notes: I just had a thought. No disrespect to Michael’s memory, it’s been six years by the timeline I use. Sara is only human. This story picks up with the inference that Michael and Sara married before he died, but does not take into account any of the *leaked* storyline for the straight-to-DVD movie. I don't intend to ever watch that, thus it will never be part of my canon. Chapter One Chapter Two
Additional A/N: Okay, I've been trying to finish this all week, but due to time constraints and Paul and Sara's verboseness I am posting this knowing I have to finish writing it at some later point. Hopefully sooner rather than later!
Sara had always been pretty traditional when it came to sex. She liked being on the bottom, not because she tended to be submissive, but because she loved to feel the weight of a man on top of her. In her brief time with Michael, they'd slept like that more often than not after making love. With him on top of her, usually still inside her, she had felt protected in the most basic sense.
Paul, while about the same height as Michael, was smaller in other ways. His shoulders weren't as broad, and his wiriness allowed him to move quickly, spinning her around, out of the kitchen and down the hall, and before she could gasp for new oxygen after their first kiss, she was laid horizontally on her bed. He stripped all her clothes off with such speed and dexterity she felt a little chagrined at having thought him slow moving at all. He’d even managed to remove the rubber band holding her hair up on the back of her head.
She lifted her hands to cover her breasts as he released the front catch of her bra. The exposure happened too quickly, and she couldn't process the moment fast enough to feel comfortable. His fingers wrapped around her wrists, pulling her arms away from her body. "No," he whispered. "Let me see."
Sara swallowed audibly and felt her whole body flush, the blood snaking to the surface of her skin, making her nipples throb just from the touch of his eyes. Reaching up, she unfastened the two top buttons of his Hawaiian shirt, and with his help, tugged it over his head until it flew across the room, out of sight and out of her way. Then, as if reading her mind, he covered her body with his, his mouth caressing hers in a teasing and wholly erotic manner while the soft hair on his chest rasped against her breasts in the way that God, in all his wisdom, must have intended when he designed Paul Kellerman. Sara moaned, the sound crowding up her throat to linger on her tongue and then find its way into his mouth when he stopped the teasing touches and kissed her as though he were already deeply inside her.
She forgot to be self-conscious then, or to protect herself in anyway. She simply wanted, and she followed every whim of her heart. Her hands moved greedily over his back and then down, sliding into the back of his shorts to cup his ass and pull him tight against her. The heat emanating from his skin made her palms prickle, and the sound he uttered as she cupped his buttocks took away any lingering insecurities. His desire for her enabled her own heady lust to flame to the utmost level.
She decided that she wanted to burn bright and all-consuming. She didn't want the slow drift that would bring everything together at some point in the near future. She wanted to burst into mindless fornication, lungs heaving and limbs tingling. She tried to tell him, her hands dragging ferociously at his remaining clothes, her lips gasping his name, and things like, "Now, please, now," and "I need..." and "I want..." but it seemed the more she said, the slower he moved. Even when his lips released hers to slide down to maraud her nipples and then even further south, his tongue was direct but painstakingly thorough. Nothing she communicated made him move faster. Instead, his agenda became apparent because he kissed every inch of her, his fingers moving along her legs as though he was sculpting her from malleable clay, his lips curving up in smiles she couldn't see, but could feel on the inside of her thigh, or below her navel or on the underside of her breast. His tongue danced over her skin until she gripped his hair with two fists, dragging him back up so that their faces were together. Then she pushed him over on to his back and straddled him, stripping him of the khaki shorts and the tighty whities she would tease him about later.
She thought she would just climb up and slide down on him, take what she so badly needed, but the details of his body captured her attention, drawing her focus away from her immediate desire to the fact that she could now make him beg and plead and keen. His chest and shoulders had just enough curvature to them to reveal that he visited a gym fairly regularly, but he wasn't bulked up to a ridiculous size. The smattering of hair over his pectoral muscles was perfect, both in amount and placement, but there was one small patch in the center that seemed irregular. "Burn mark," she murmured, her fingers trailing over his sternum in silent apology, but he seemed unaware of where her mind had gone. "Sara," he gasped, and she couldn't help herself from leaning over him, trailing her hair over his stomach until she had slid down his body and the main event bobbed in front of her face.
"Paybacks are a bitch," she murmured, humming her lips over the head of his cock until he cried out, a sound that made her feel they were somewhat even. Torturing him this way had never occurred to her, would never have occurred to her most likely, but now in the moment, she felt more powerful than at any other time in their shared history.
She wanted this feeling to last, the rush of it reminiscent of something she had put behind her years ago. Flicking him with her tongue, she felt the victor's smile spread over her face as his hips lifted urgently off her down comforter. Then she was ready, ready to put them both out of their miseries, or at least extend the torture so they were both experiencing the same portion of it.
In the moment right before she took him into her body, his hands reached for hers. Their fingers entwined and he worked with her, accepting her possession with the same intensity, making what they both gave equal in some harmonious way. Sara took, but was taken, gave, but received.
They had a meeting of bodies, and minds, and whatever either of them had thought it was, it was more. It was better. It took her by surprise, robbing her of other memories, at least during that white hot flash. She rode him for a long time, but ultimately, he took control, rolling them both over so that she lay beneath him. When she finally came, she cried his name, more aware of whom she cradled inside her than she wanted to be, and then she began sobbing.
*
Paul had never been much of a ladies' man. For him, sex had been relatively clinical in most cases, or totally unnecessary. The thrill of the hunt, or the success of a covert operation had always been more likely to give him a hard-on than a woman. He'd fancied himself in love with Caroline Reynolds for a long time, too, and he'd told himself he didn't feel sexual desire for anyone else because it was all for her, though she never took him up on his multi-layered devotion.
But in the moments following his pulsing orgasm inside Sara Tancredi-Scofield, he realized he'd never felt anything like this before, because there had never been anyone worthy of this type of surrender. In the aftermath, she cried against his shoulder, her tears hot and plentiful, and their meaning caused his own eyes to sting in sympathy. He felt like crying-sobbing hysterically even-too, but for an entirely different reason. The minute he'd met Sara, he'd wanted a new life, though it had taken him six years to fully understand what kind of different life he could have. The idea of having this-having her-on a regular basis consumed his mind so strongly, he probably would have been plotting how to make it happen, no holds barred, except that her convulsive weeping forced him to focus on her instead of them.
He found himself murmuring soft things like, "You're okay," and "I'm here," and "Shhhhh," while rocking her gently. He rolled off of her, pulling her with him, and she climbed on top of him, her desperation to disappear inside him obvious in the way she clung to him. It went on for quite a while, and just when he started to think nothing he could do or say would comfort her, she began to calm down. Her breathing slowed, and the tears stopped flowing. Her face rested against his neck, the puffs of her exhalations creating a rhythm on his skin that lulled him into a very relaxed state.
He didn't allow himself to fall asleep though; he waited, wondering if she'd want to talk, but she went to sleep, and he decided that was probably for the best. She'd been through so much, and he suspected a lot of things hadn’t been explored until he’d arrived. He curled his arms securely around her, holding her close, and hoped that when she woke, she wouldn't take him up on his earlier offer to toss him out.
The stress this idea brought made sleep impossible, so he lay quietly, memorizing every nuance of her sated body lying on his, the sound of her breathing, the thud, thud of her heart beating against his chest. He'd told himself that all the times he'd imagined this very thing, that if it only happened once, he would make it be enough. Of course, theorizing about such things made ridiculous promises like that possible, but now, faced with the impending doom of it all, he had to accept it for what it might become: the single greatest moment of his life. Not just because he'd had sex with a woman he loved, but because he'd been able to be as close to her emotionally as he supposed anyone had in six long years. He'd broken through something that he could only hope would help her in the long run. Whatever it meant for him had to be of very small significance.
He suddenly understood Michael Scofield in a way he’d never wanted to.
He lost track of time, content to lie there until the sun set and came up again, but Sara stirred against him a short while later. Her body stiffened and then relaxed again in a matter of moments and her fingers began combing through his chest hair in soft caresses.
“You okay?” he asked, only because he couldn’t stand the silence knowing she was awake.
Her head moved, and a small whispery sound of “I think so,” accompanied the nod.
He didn’t shift her off of him though he very much wanted to look into her face; instead he counted it good fortune that she stayed in his arms willingly and when she ran her fingernail lightly over his nipple, it caused a reaction throughout his body. “I’m sorry,” he said, trying to focus on the matter at hand, not the physiological reactions he experienced with every breath she took.
“It wasn’t your fault he died,” she said, her voice very quiet. “It’s not your fault that I haven’t really ever thought about moving on. It is your fault that I’m here, now, though. I’m a little torn on what to blame on you, exactly, but for now, I’ll say that I wish that awful shirt had made me find you unattractive.”
Paul pondered that for a moment. “So, I’m guilty of being attractive?” he asked, a grin curving his mouth.
“Mmm-hmmm,” she said, and her lips brushed against his throat.
He could have howled in triumph, because this felt like the exact opposite of throwing him out, but he restrained himself. She moved, pushing herself up so her face was over his and her hair fell around them in a soft, red curtain. Their lips met in gentle kisses that made his chest ache and his groin tighten. It was all new to him, and he almost felt virginal, though he didn’t like the implication of innocence on his part. Novice, maybe, but virtuous, no. Sliding both hands into her hair, he held her head in place so he could slip his tongue into her mouth. “You are so beautiful,” he said when he disengaged a moment later. “Beautiful, and amazing, and you make my blood boil, and I never thought this would really ever happen.”
Sara looked at him seriously then, her expression somber. “I was sort of mad,” she confessed. “But now I’m really glad you came. And I’m really glad you stayed..” Her lashes dropped down over her eyes and then she exhaled which caused a full-body caress that made his heart start pumping harder. “Although I am curious about how you knew about my son, and Michael’s death.” She returned her gaze to his, and waited for a response.
Paul could have spun anything at that point; he could have come up with something that would have made his watching out for her look really protective and sweet as opposed to creepy and stalkerish. But lying now seemed counter-productive. He wanted her to want him to stay for real, not be lulled into a false sense of security, so he tried to keep it simple. “I heard Michael died-it just came up through the channels because he was still on the radar because it had only been a few months since The Company had gone down. There had been some speculation that it had been a hit, but medical records proved that to be untrue. So then, I just wanted to keep an eye on you. Make sure you were okay. So I had someone detailing you every few months.”
She looked speculative, but not repulsed when she asked, “You already knew what killed Michael when you asked me about it earlier?”
He shrugged, his movement jostling them both. “I’m a bastard; we already established that.”
She laughed softly and then dropped her head down so her nose nuzzled into his ear. “It took you six years to come here, Paul. You’re not nearly the bastard I’d like you to be.” She pressed her lips to his earlobe. “Mikey won’t be home until Sunday,” she said, and he’d actually already considered that because he’d listened intently to the little boy’s message on the answering machine.
“I can make sure I’m gone before he gets home,” he offered.
“Linc usually brings him back around 1 in the afternoon.”
Paul grimaced. “Yeah, I’d definitely like to be gone before Burrows shows up.”
Sara lifted her head and smiled knowingly. “That would probably be wise.”
“Speaking of being wise…” he began, a silent flogging starting in his head. “I actually had three condoms in my wallet, but I didn’t use a one of them.”
“I’m on the Pill. Not that that’s any guarantee,” she said; it sounded like an afterthought, but he felt himself get more excited by the random idea.
“Maybe we should use the condoms too, then?” he asked, even though he really just wanted to throw them out altogether.
“That would also be wise,” she said, pressing her lips to his. “At least until we run out…”
*
Sometime after the third condom was disposed of, they fell asleep for several hours, and when they awoke Saturday had dawned bright and clear. Sara got up to take a shower while Paul offered to make breakfast.
“If you can whip something up from box cereal and milk, more power to you,” she said as she walked into the bathroom.
“You have something against eggs?” he asked.
She paused, looking over her shoulder at him, only to catch him staring at her ass. “No, but I don’t know if I’ve got any eggs. There might be a few.”
“I’ll snoop around,” he said, finally dragging his eyes up to her face.
“You do that,” she said, smiling.
Twenty minutes later, she emerged from the bedroom to hear him singing along with one of her CDs, and cooking up quite a storm. “If God is a DJ, and life is a dance floor, Love is a rhythm; you are the music…If God is a-“ he cut himself off as he spied her coming across the floor, blushing when their eyes met.
Sara rubbed a towel at the ends of her hair and looked at him with laughing eyes. “You like Pink, huh?”
He looked back to the mushrooms he’d been cutting up as she sidled up to him at the counter next to the stove. “She’s all right,” he said.
Unable to help herself, Sara leaned into him and kissed his mouth-too quickly for him to really respond-and she realized it was latent affection that she hadn’t experienced in a very long time. “You’re a funny guy, Paul Kellerman.”
“Am I?” he asked, scooping the mushrooms up in his hands and tossing them into the frying pan with the eggs.
“Not funny: ha-ha. Well, funny: ha-ha in some ways, I guess, but mostly, funny: you make no sense. Or maybe this makes no sense, us being here together, and I’m trying to pin it all on you.” During her shower she’d avoided thinking too deeply about what had passed between them; instead she’d focused on the visceral, tactile memories, and the fact that he was an excellent lover. It wasn’t just that she had gone without for so long. He’d made her come hard multiple times, and they had been mind-blowing explosions that ricocheted throughout her body. She felt sore, rubbery, and well used in all of her muscle groups this fine morning (well, this fine noon hour), and she couldn’t say she regretted a bit of it.
Moving away from the stove to toss her towel over the back of one of the chairs at the table, Sara pushed the sexual thoughts aside, and went back to the refrigerator to pull out the orange juice. “Or maybe it makes a lot of sense, but you’re not ready to see it that way,” he said.
She looked at him as he continued to move the items cooking on the stovetop around with a spatula. Pulling two glasses from the overhead cupboard, she said, “Maybe.” At this point anything was possible and she didn’t know what to think. “Did you have anything special you wanted to do today?” she asked, pouring juice into both glasses. When she looked up from her chore, he was watching her intently, but he didn’t seem inclined to answer the question. “You come to Mexico frequently?” she asked, though from the heat in his gaze, she thought she knew what tourist attraction he was most interested in.
“Never,” he said, the word brisk and tight.
“Oaxaca City is really beautiful. I could show you around,” she offered. She handed him one of the glasses of OJ.
“I’d rather just stay here,” he said, pausing slightly. “Unless you’d rather go out?”
Sara sipped from her own glass, her eyes meeting his. “No,” she said. “We can stay here.” Feeling like a guilty traitor would not be any easier to bear alone, so her reasons for keeping him there were two-fold. The predominant reason though overcame them both in the extension of the invitation and Paul set his glass of juice and the finished eggs aside so that they could eat them after they saw to a more immediate need.
Author: domfangirl
Starring: Paul Kellerman and Sara Scofield
Category: Multi-chapter (*facepalm*) I think it will be short though, three four chapters tops, hopefully.
Rating: NC-17
Summary: Where there’s sparks, there could be fire, you know.
Author’s Notes: I just had a thought. No disrespect to Michael’s memory, it’s been six years by the timeline I use. Sara is only human. This story picks up with the inference that Michael and Sara married before he died, but does not take into account any of the *leaked* storyline for the straight-to-DVD movie. I don't intend to ever watch that, thus it will never be part of my canon. Chapter One Chapter Two
Additional A/N: Okay, I've been trying to finish this all week, but due to time constraints and Paul and Sara's verboseness I am posting this knowing I have to finish writing it at some later point. Hopefully sooner rather than later!
Sara had always been pretty traditional when it came to sex. She liked being on the bottom, not because she tended to be submissive, but because she loved to feel the weight of a man on top of her. In her brief time with Michael, they'd slept like that more often than not after making love. With him on top of her, usually still inside her, she had felt protected in the most basic sense.
Paul, while about the same height as Michael, was smaller in other ways. His shoulders weren't as broad, and his wiriness allowed him to move quickly, spinning her around, out of the kitchen and down the hall, and before she could gasp for new oxygen after their first kiss, she was laid horizontally on her bed. He stripped all her clothes off with such speed and dexterity she felt a little chagrined at having thought him slow moving at all. He’d even managed to remove the rubber band holding her hair up on the back of her head.
She lifted her hands to cover her breasts as he released the front catch of her bra. The exposure happened too quickly, and she couldn't process the moment fast enough to feel comfortable. His fingers wrapped around her wrists, pulling her arms away from her body. "No," he whispered. "Let me see."
Sara swallowed audibly and felt her whole body flush, the blood snaking to the surface of her skin, making her nipples throb just from the touch of his eyes. Reaching up, she unfastened the two top buttons of his Hawaiian shirt, and with his help, tugged it over his head until it flew across the room, out of sight and out of her way. Then, as if reading her mind, he covered her body with his, his mouth caressing hers in a teasing and wholly erotic manner while the soft hair on his chest rasped against her breasts in the way that God, in all his wisdom, must have intended when he designed Paul Kellerman. Sara moaned, the sound crowding up her throat to linger on her tongue and then find its way into his mouth when he stopped the teasing touches and kissed her as though he were already deeply inside her.
She forgot to be self-conscious then, or to protect herself in anyway. She simply wanted, and she followed every whim of her heart. Her hands moved greedily over his back and then down, sliding into the back of his shorts to cup his ass and pull him tight against her. The heat emanating from his skin made her palms prickle, and the sound he uttered as she cupped his buttocks took away any lingering insecurities. His desire for her enabled her own heady lust to flame to the utmost level.
She decided that she wanted to burn bright and all-consuming. She didn't want the slow drift that would bring everything together at some point in the near future. She wanted to burst into mindless fornication, lungs heaving and limbs tingling. She tried to tell him, her hands dragging ferociously at his remaining clothes, her lips gasping his name, and things like, "Now, please, now," and "I need..." and "I want..." but it seemed the more she said, the slower he moved. Even when his lips released hers to slide down to maraud her nipples and then even further south, his tongue was direct but painstakingly thorough. Nothing she communicated made him move faster. Instead, his agenda became apparent because he kissed every inch of her, his fingers moving along her legs as though he was sculpting her from malleable clay, his lips curving up in smiles she couldn't see, but could feel on the inside of her thigh, or below her navel or on the underside of her breast. His tongue danced over her skin until she gripped his hair with two fists, dragging him back up so that their faces were together. Then she pushed him over on to his back and straddled him, stripping him of the khaki shorts and the tighty whities she would tease him about later.
She thought she would just climb up and slide down on him, take what she so badly needed, but the details of his body captured her attention, drawing her focus away from her immediate desire to the fact that she could now make him beg and plead and keen. His chest and shoulders had just enough curvature to them to reveal that he visited a gym fairly regularly, but he wasn't bulked up to a ridiculous size. The smattering of hair over his pectoral muscles was perfect, both in amount and placement, but there was one small patch in the center that seemed irregular. "Burn mark," she murmured, her fingers trailing over his sternum in silent apology, but he seemed unaware of where her mind had gone. "Sara," he gasped, and she couldn't help herself from leaning over him, trailing her hair over his stomach until she had slid down his body and the main event bobbed in front of her face.
"Paybacks are a bitch," she murmured, humming her lips over the head of his cock until he cried out, a sound that made her feel they were somewhat even. Torturing him this way had never occurred to her, would never have occurred to her most likely, but now in the moment, she felt more powerful than at any other time in their shared history.
She wanted this feeling to last, the rush of it reminiscent of something she had put behind her years ago. Flicking him with her tongue, she felt the victor's smile spread over her face as his hips lifted urgently off her down comforter. Then she was ready, ready to put them both out of their miseries, or at least extend the torture so they were both experiencing the same portion of it.
In the moment right before she took him into her body, his hands reached for hers. Their fingers entwined and he worked with her, accepting her possession with the same intensity, making what they both gave equal in some harmonious way. Sara took, but was taken, gave, but received.
They had a meeting of bodies, and minds, and whatever either of them had thought it was, it was more. It was better. It took her by surprise, robbing her of other memories, at least during that white hot flash. She rode him for a long time, but ultimately, he took control, rolling them both over so that she lay beneath him. When she finally came, she cried his name, more aware of whom she cradled inside her than she wanted to be, and then she began sobbing.
*
Paul had never been much of a ladies' man. For him, sex had been relatively clinical in most cases, or totally unnecessary. The thrill of the hunt, or the success of a covert operation had always been more likely to give him a hard-on than a woman. He'd fancied himself in love with Caroline Reynolds for a long time, too, and he'd told himself he didn't feel sexual desire for anyone else because it was all for her, though she never took him up on his multi-layered devotion.
But in the moments following his pulsing orgasm inside Sara Tancredi-Scofield, he realized he'd never felt anything like this before, because there had never been anyone worthy of this type of surrender. In the aftermath, she cried against his shoulder, her tears hot and plentiful, and their meaning caused his own eyes to sting in sympathy. He felt like crying-sobbing hysterically even-too, but for an entirely different reason. The minute he'd met Sara, he'd wanted a new life, though it had taken him six years to fully understand what kind of different life he could have. The idea of having this-having her-on a regular basis consumed his mind so strongly, he probably would have been plotting how to make it happen, no holds barred, except that her convulsive weeping forced him to focus on her instead of them.
He found himself murmuring soft things like, "You're okay," and "I'm here," and "Shhhhh," while rocking her gently. He rolled off of her, pulling her with him, and she climbed on top of him, her desperation to disappear inside him obvious in the way she clung to him. It went on for quite a while, and just when he started to think nothing he could do or say would comfort her, she began to calm down. Her breathing slowed, and the tears stopped flowing. Her face rested against his neck, the puffs of her exhalations creating a rhythm on his skin that lulled him into a very relaxed state.
He didn't allow himself to fall asleep though; he waited, wondering if she'd want to talk, but she went to sleep, and he decided that was probably for the best. She'd been through so much, and he suspected a lot of things hadn’t been explored until he’d arrived. He curled his arms securely around her, holding her close, and hoped that when she woke, she wouldn't take him up on his earlier offer to toss him out.
The stress this idea brought made sleep impossible, so he lay quietly, memorizing every nuance of her sated body lying on his, the sound of her breathing, the thud, thud of her heart beating against his chest. He'd told himself that all the times he'd imagined this very thing, that if it only happened once, he would make it be enough. Of course, theorizing about such things made ridiculous promises like that possible, but now, faced with the impending doom of it all, he had to accept it for what it might become: the single greatest moment of his life. Not just because he'd had sex with a woman he loved, but because he'd been able to be as close to her emotionally as he supposed anyone had in six long years. He'd broken through something that he could only hope would help her in the long run. Whatever it meant for him had to be of very small significance.
He suddenly understood Michael Scofield in a way he’d never wanted to.
He lost track of time, content to lie there until the sun set and came up again, but Sara stirred against him a short while later. Her body stiffened and then relaxed again in a matter of moments and her fingers began combing through his chest hair in soft caresses.
“You okay?” he asked, only because he couldn’t stand the silence knowing she was awake.
Her head moved, and a small whispery sound of “I think so,” accompanied the nod.
He didn’t shift her off of him though he very much wanted to look into her face; instead he counted it good fortune that she stayed in his arms willingly and when she ran her fingernail lightly over his nipple, it caused a reaction throughout his body. “I’m sorry,” he said, trying to focus on the matter at hand, not the physiological reactions he experienced with every breath she took.
“It wasn’t your fault he died,” she said, her voice very quiet. “It’s not your fault that I haven’t really ever thought about moving on. It is your fault that I’m here, now, though. I’m a little torn on what to blame on you, exactly, but for now, I’ll say that I wish that awful shirt had made me find you unattractive.”
Paul pondered that for a moment. “So, I’m guilty of being attractive?” he asked, a grin curving his mouth.
“Mmm-hmmm,” she said, and her lips brushed against his throat.
He could have howled in triumph, because this felt like the exact opposite of throwing him out, but he restrained himself. She moved, pushing herself up so her face was over his and her hair fell around them in a soft, red curtain. Their lips met in gentle kisses that made his chest ache and his groin tighten. It was all new to him, and he almost felt virginal, though he didn’t like the implication of innocence on his part. Novice, maybe, but virtuous, no. Sliding both hands into her hair, he held her head in place so he could slip his tongue into her mouth. “You are so beautiful,” he said when he disengaged a moment later. “Beautiful, and amazing, and you make my blood boil, and I never thought this would really ever happen.”
Sara looked at him seriously then, her expression somber. “I was sort of mad,” she confessed. “But now I’m really glad you came. And I’m really glad you stayed..” Her lashes dropped down over her eyes and then she exhaled which caused a full-body caress that made his heart start pumping harder. “Although I am curious about how you knew about my son, and Michael’s death.” She returned her gaze to his, and waited for a response.
Paul could have spun anything at that point; he could have come up with something that would have made his watching out for her look really protective and sweet as opposed to creepy and stalkerish. But lying now seemed counter-productive. He wanted her to want him to stay for real, not be lulled into a false sense of security, so he tried to keep it simple. “I heard Michael died-it just came up through the channels because he was still on the radar because it had only been a few months since The Company had gone down. There had been some speculation that it had been a hit, but medical records proved that to be untrue. So then, I just wanted to keep an eye on you. Make sure you were okay. So I had someone detailing you every few months.”
She looked speculative, but not repulsed when she asked, “You already knew what killed Michael when you asked me about it earlier?”
He shrugged, his movement jostling them both. “I’m a bastard; we already established that.”
She laughed softly and then dropped her head down so her nose nuzzled into his ear. “It took you six years to come here, Paul. You’re not nearly the bastard I’d like you to be.” She pressed her lips to his earlobe. “Mikey won’t be home until Sunday,” she said, and he’d actually already considered that because he’d listened intently to the little boy’s message on the answering machine.
“I can make sure I’m gone before he gets home,” he offered.
“Linc usually brings him back around 1 in the afternoon.”
Paul grimaced. “Yeah, I’d definitely like to be gone before Burrows shows up.”
Sara lifted her head and smiled knowingly. “That would probably be wise.”
“Speaking of being wise…” he began, a silent flogging starting in his head. “I actually had three condoms in my wallet, but I didn’t use a one of them.”
“I’m on the Pill. Not that that’s any guarantee,” she said; it sounded like an afterthought, but he felt himself get more excited by the random idea.
“Maybe we should use the condoms too, then?” he asked, even though he really just wanted to throw them out altogether.
“That would also be wise,” she said, pressing her lips to his. “At least until we run out…”
*
Sometime after the third condom was disposed of, they fell asleep for several hours, and when they awoke Saturday had dawned bright and clear. Sara got up to take a shower while Paul offered to make breakfast.
“If you can whip something up from box cereal and milk, more power to you,” she said as she walked into the bathroom.
“You have something against eggs?” he asked.
She paused, looking over her shoulder at him, only to catch him staring at her ass. “No, but I don’t know if I’ve got any eggs. There might be a few.”
“I’ll snoop around,” he said, finally dragging his eyes up to her face.
“You do that,” she said, smiling.
Twenty minutes later, she emerged from the bedroom to hear him singing along with one of her CDs, and cooking up quite a storm. “If God is a DJ, and life is a dance floor, Love is a rhythm; you are the music…If God is a-“ he cut himself off as he spied her coming across the floor, blushing when their eyes met.
Sara rubbed a towel at the ends of her hair and looked at him with laughing eyes. “You like Pink, huh?”
He looked back to the mushrooms he’d been cutting up as she sidled up to him at the counter next to the stove. “She’s all right,” he said.
Unable to help herself, Sara leaned into him and kissed his mouth-too quickly for him to really respond-and she realized it was latent affection that she hadn’t experienced in a very long time. “You’re a funny guy, Paul Kellerman.”
“Am I?” he asked, scooping the mushrooms up in his hands and tossing them into the frying pan with the eggs.
“Not funny: ha-ha. Well, funny: ha-ha in some ways, I guess, but mostly, funny: you make no sense. Or maybe this makes no sense, us being here together, and I’m trying to pin it all on you.” During her shower she’d avoided thinking too deeply about what had passed between them; instead she’d focused on the visceral, tactile memories, and the fact that he was an excellent lover. It wasn’t just that she had gone without for so long. He’d made her come hard multiple times, and they had been mind-blowing explosions that ricocheted throughout her body. She felt sore, rubbery, and well used in all of her muscle groups this fine morning (well, this fine noon hour), and she couldn’t say she regretted a bit of it.
Moving away from the stove to toss her towel over the back of one of the chairs at the table, Sara pushed the sexual thoughts aside, and went back to the refrigerator to pull out the orange juice. “Or maybe it makes a lot of sense, but you’re not ready to see it that way,” he said.
She looked at him as he continued to move the items cooking on the stovetop around with a spatula. Pulling two glasses from the overhead cupboard, she said, “Maybe.” At this point anything was possible and she didn’t know what to think. “Did you have anything special you wanted to do today?” she asked, pouring juice into both glasses. When she looked up from her chore, he was watching her intently, but he didn’t seem inclined to answer the question. “You come to Mexico frequently?” she asked, though from the heat in his gaze, she thought she knew what tourist attraction he was most interested in.
“Never,” he said, the word brisk and tight.
“Oaxaca City is really beautiful. I could show you around,” she offered. She handed him one of the glasses of OJ.
“I’d rather just stay here,” he said, pausing slightly. “Unless you’d rather go out?”
Sara sipped from her own glass, her eyes meeting his. “No,” she said. “We can stay here.” Feeling like a guilty traitor would not be any easier to bear alone, so her reasons for keeping him there were two-fold. The predominant reason though overcame them both in the extension of the invitation and Paul set his glass of juice and the finished eggs aside so that they could eat them after they saw to a more immediate need.