Silly isn't it, to be scared of a little thing like knocking on the door to a man's room?  Especially this particular man.  He was an old family friend....  Someone I'd known forever.  Someone who'd known me forever.  Someone who knew me before I was a woman.... before braces and breasts and boys.  And still, just the idea of what might happen when I knocked on his door had my head spinning and my heart in my throat.    

As I walked down the hall towards his room, a hundred memories flitted through my mind.  How he used to tell me these embarrassing stories about his childhood that made me laugh.  How easy it was so easy to talk to him.  How we used to go walking together because he always had too much energy and could hardly ever keep still.  How we used to play cards- this cutthroat game of double solitaire where the action was fast and furious and he thought absolutely nothing of slapping my hand down with a big cheesy grin to get his card there first...... or how I'd watch him and my brother washing his black Camero on Friday nights before they hit the town.  How he'd always want me to make him a triple-decker sandwich when I was making a regular one for myself.  How his face would look when he talked about good beer.  How he'd tease me about being the first guy to buy me one when I turned twenty-one.

He didn't, you know.  Buy me one, I mean.  A different man did.  He'd fallen out of my life by the time I was nineteen.  Moved away... drifted away... I guess that's just how things go sometimes.  The rudeness of life, he calls it.     

And then one day, he just drifted back again straight out of the blue.  Friend of a friend of a friend.  You know how it goes.  I'd jumped at the chance to start this business venture with Uma.  Everyone in my family thought I was nuts.  A pub?  What do you know about running a pub?  You can't even balance your checkbook....  Believe me, I've heard it all by now.  But I gave it a go anyway and then one day he just walked through the doors like he'd been coming there for years.

He knew Terry... who knew Uma... who knew me.  Small world, hey?

I was just so shocked at first that I didn't even go say hi.  It wasn't that I was embarrassed or shy, really.  More like curious.  I think it was getting to see him as a man.  Seeing that part of him he'd been so careful to keep from me.  The adult who moved in adult circles and did adult things.  Like flirt and drink and swear.  Oh, he'd flirted with me back in the day.  Playfully.  And I'd seen him drink.  In those days I was forever bugging my mom when she went shopping to be sure we had his favorite beer on hand for when he came to visit.  And, well, the swearing.... yeah, 'Video games and car maintenance- two things you can't do without cussing.' he used to say to me, eyes twinkling as he mucked around under the car with my brother.

I remember this one time.... he pulled a pan out from under the engine.  It was filled with some dark fluid that had chunks in it.  He was cursing so hard.  Didn't even rein it in when I came up over his shoulder.  He smelled of soap and man and cars and I remember feeling arousal bloom down deep in my belly for the very first time.  It was heady stuff, the awareness that my body had responded to his in a sexual way.  He was oblivious.  I think.  He just gave me a look, pointed to the pan and said... "I fuckin' thought so.  Well, there's what's left of first gear....."

As for the first gear, I could have cared less... except that the transmission had been dying for ages and made this annoying ticking noise.  After he spent any time in the car, he would always echo the sound subconsciously, sitting at the table in our kitchen or screwing around with my brother out in the garage.  Tick, tick, tick... under his breath, really quiet.  To tell you the truth, I was glad when that thing finally busted.  I got so sick of hearing him make that noise.  I used to sass him back.  Throw something at him to get his attention and mutter tick, tick, tick.  Have I mentioned how much fun it is to see him blush?

That was the year where there was this subtle little shift between us.   He started asking my mom if it was okay before he took me walking and every now and then I would catch him looking at me, and the stories he'd always told me about his past started getting more adult in theme.  Not really sexy stuff, usually... more like things he'd wrestled with that had tested his honor or judgment or both.

I remember he took me swimming that year.  No place special... just the little country lake where we all swam.  We floated around lazily and he told me about how he once got caught in the act by his parish priest, of all people.  Father McKenna had come by to talk to his mother and interrupted him doing the dirty deed with his girlfriend.  With a grin, he'd told me how he'd stood there at the door, so sure the guy knew exactly what he'd been up to... but that he'd brazened it out, cocky as ever.  I still remember how his eyes sparkled when he told that story.

It was years later when I realized he was kind of testing the waters with me in the most subtle of ways.  Admitted to me in a roundabout way that he'd been sexually active at sixteen.  I'd been sixteen when he'd told me that story.  Coincidence?  At the time, I thought nothing of it, but all things look different with time and distance.  And yet, it was all so very innocent.  He never said or did anything improper.  I never felt pressured or uncomfortable.  It just felt good to be with him.  And it was the softest, most wonderful way to grow up and learn about what makes a good man good.

A couple of years later, I lost my virginity to him at college.  It was unexpected.  And really, really nice.  Not like love, exactly.  It was.... well, I think there was always some part of me that hoped it would be him.  I wouldn't have wanted it to be anyone else but him and when he showed up unexpectedly one afternoon, it was like I just somehow knew.  Later we got drunk.  Funny, he didn't buy me my first drink at twenty-one but he did at eighteen.  He was more quiet than usual.  We were both buzzed and somehow it just happened, sitting there side-by side on the floor of my apartment.

I touched his foot.  He touched my cheek.  And then we both touched a hell of a lot more than that.  One moment we were just hugging each other so tight... and it seemed like the next moment I was under him on my bed, naked and trembling, holding him close as we made love.  Softly.  Slowly.  Sweetly.      

It was only that once.  Only that one night, I mean.  It was more than once.  A lot more.

And after?  Well.... it was just... easy.  A door shut on that time and it was almost like it never happened.  We somehow just slipped right back into friendship, keeping in touch with letters and calls that grew less frequent until they stopped altogether.  Just before I graduated, I found out that night we'd spent together had happened not long after he lost someone very important to him.  Her name was Genoma.  She died and it wounded him deeply.  I think maybe all soldiers, especially the really tough ones, feel that drive to come home when they're hurting.  Someplace safe.   

I never did ask him why he came to me that night- and by the time I'd pieced together the story, he'd been swallowed up by the rudeness of life.  Just gone.  Now, I knew I could always send a letter to his parents and it would probably find its way to him... but something always stopped me from sending one.  I guess mostly I just figured if he wanted me in his life, he would have kept in touch.

I never pined for him.  I did miss him though, as we miss those friends dear to our hearts as the years pass.  I would think of him from time to time.  Birthdays.  Holidays.  I would sometimes wonder where he was.  What he was doing.  If he was happy.  And I wondered how the years had changed him.  Had the lines in his handsome craggy face deepened?  Was he still lean and wiry?  Had he started to go gray at his temples yet?  Did he ever wonder about me?  More than a decade had passed since that night.  I was almost thirty now and forty had come and gone for him.

And then one night, he walked into the Pub and for just a moment, I was that giddy girl again, half expecting him give me that little grin and ask for a triple-decker peanut butter and jelly sandwich like he always did.  I didn't hide or anything, but I didn't rush over to him and make my presence known, either.  I just kind of watched him.  Enjoyed seeing the camaraderie he had with Terry, whom I had met recently and also adored to bits.  Enjoyed watching that quiet way he has of appreciating women.  I watched his eyes move over the room and I smiled to myself as they lingered where they always had... on the curvaceous ones with long dark hair and cute butts. 

I'd known about that preference for years.  Even a naïve sixteen-year-old could figure that one out.  Back then, I hadn't understood the appeal.  I did now.  Of course, I'd discovered a few preferences of my own over the years, no doubt shaped and influenced by his presence in my formative years.  Is it any wonder the old soldiers get me straight in the heart every damned time?

He looked good.  The years had only made him more handsome in this rough, weathered sort of way.  Bet he'd still slap my hand down if we played cards though.  He shrugged out of his jacket and eased down into a stool, smooth as ever.  Long legs in black jeans sprawled out and then he bent one up and hooked his heel on the bottom rung of the barstool.

I suddenly became aware of my own appearance, jeans and a simple racer-back tank top.  For a moment, I had this sudden reaction to him as a woman, not a platonic friend, and I ran a hand nervously through my hair and wished I was wearing some cute little number like Uma always wore.  She's the real glitter in this place.  The spark.  I hate the spotlight.  Always have.  We both work hard here but I prefer to do the majority of the behind the scenes stuff and leave the rest to her.  We're well suited that way. 

It reminds me of that nursery rhyme... Jack Sprat could eat no fat... His wife could eat no lean... And so, between them both, you see, they licked the platter clean.  Or maybe it's just the licking imagery was particularly apt for this Pub?  I sure wasn't that naïve little girl anymore.  Though hardly promiscuous, I had had a handful of lovers since the night a lost soldier introduced me to passion. 

Most recently one John Forbes Nash.  I'm not really sure how to describe something that was less than a romance and not quite a fling... but wasn't cheap or tawdry either.  More than sex but less than love?  Affection?  Maybe you could just say that we both have the same affinity for eroticism not bounded by society's conventions.  Yes, I think that would safely cover it.  There is a reason I prefer being the silent partner, you know.  But that is neither here nor there.

So, while I had my frantic moment wishing I was all tarted up to make a good impression on him, it was overridden by our long history and the rush of happiness I felt at seeing an old friend.  This was a man who'd not only seen me at my worst... but had seen me at my worst with a bad perm.  Heh. 

I laughed aloud at that memory and his head snapped up.  Our eyes met.  For a moment his expression was unreadable and then he smiled.  Not widely.  Not cheezily.  Warmly.  Like you do with family.  I squeezed around Uma (who was watching the exchange with interest, I might add) and moved down the bar to him. 

He did that thing he always did, that little cock of his head and eyes downcast before they flicked up to bore into mine.  I grinned at him, hating the way my cheeks flushed and I laughed.  "So, you finally remembered you still owe me a drink, huh?"

He laughed too and with a soft, "C'mere, you," he pulled me in for a big hug, but I noticed the tips of his ears got a little red, which was actually kind of nice.  I also noticed his fingers brushed over the thin strip of skin at the small of my back just before he let me go.  It could have just been a hug, but it seemed like they lingered just a moment more than they always had before.  But then again, it could have just been wishful thinking, or maybe he just didn't have to be so careful anymore now that people wouldn't look at us and assume he had a predilection for jail bait. 

We did the usual song and dance.  How've you been?  What you been up to?  Explanations to Terry and Uma and a few of the regulars who happened to be sitting close by.  It was just so good to see him again.  We'd always had this thing, this way of falling right back into where we'd left off, like it hadn't been months since the last time he'd dropped in on our family.  It was like that now too, even though it had been more than a decade.  We just seemed to pick up right where we'd left off.  No awkwardness, just that old comfortable familiarity.

Well, except I did see his eyes flick over me subtly, touching on my face and hair.  It was longer than he would have remembered.  His eyes rested on my breasts too.  Not overlong.  And not rudely.  Just this sort of acknowledgement of me as a woman.  I wished for the hundredth time that I'd worn something different- at least something with a bra... but I was also comfortable with myself now in a way I hadn't been as a girl on the threshold of womanhood.  Still, I think it's only natural to wonder what other people who know us well make of the way we change as we get older.

It wasn't just the physical that had changed; longer hair, thinner body, contacts not glasses.  It was other things too.  More grace and confidence.  Better fashion sense.  I cringe at some of the frumpy stuff he'd seen me in!  My father had done his best to hide my shape in fugly bulky sweaters and the most non-trendy clothes a girl could imagine.  A barrage of the bad Christmas gifts I'd received (and therefore HAD to wear) paraded through my brain.  Plaid jumpers and pink velcro sneakers and penny loafers exactly like his.....  Fathers!

I guess it was just that in the last decade, I'd really found the me who I was without everyone else telling me who that person should be and I couldn't help but wonder if Dean would like her.  I wanted him to.  I liked the person he'd become.  He'd mellowed a little.  Talked less and listened more.  And I didn't get from him that feeling I used to... like there was something growling low and wild inside him trying to get out, always prodding him to keep moving.  I guess we'd both grown up. 

We chatted down in the pub for a while but in that breezy way Uma has, she sent us packing- up to the roof with a bottle of good red and some privacy.  I owed her bigtime for that one.  And I have no doubt she will find some way for me to work off my debt. 

Dean and I, we killed the bottle.  And another as well, talking the night away as we caught up on each other's lives.  The stars were fading and the sky was beginning to lighten when we finally called it a night.  It was as intimate as ever- and just as platonic; just two old friends who'd been out of touch too long.  It seemed like we talked about everything but that one passionate night we'd shared so long ago. 

There was no doubt in my mind that he remembered.  It was there in the subtle nuances of his body language.  He had come in my arms, and I in his... and that's not something you can just wipe away as if it never happened... but somehow, it wasn't as important as all the other things we'd been to each other for so much longer.  He didn't bring it up and neither did I.  And that really didn't bother me.  I was attracted to him.  I had been since I was old enough to feel attraction, but he was first and foremost my friend and I'd missed that.  I'd missed him. 

We snuck quietly back down the stairs that morning, not wanting to wake any of the others.  He grinned at me and without any shame at all, asked me to make him a triple-decker sandwich.  I did.  We shared a simple breakfast.  I felt all of sixteen again.  The years seemed to fall away from him too, right up until the last moments when he gave me a hug and told me he was going to shove off but that he'd be back now that he knew where to find me again.    

He cocked his head at me in the way that he does and simply said, "I never forgot about the drink, Heather.  And that isn't all I owe you."  And then he kissed the top of my head in this brotherly sort of way, gave me a hug and disappeared out into the early morning light. 

And so, that's how it began.  We spent a lot of time together after that.  Always platonic.  Well, there were hints of a fire that had been banked for a long time... but we'd sort of always had that.  At least as long as I'd been old enough to inspire it in a man and to feel it in myself.  Mostly we just hung out.  Did all the same old stuff we used to do, only the details had changed.  We walked in the city instead of the country.  I had wine instead of Coke when we talked late into the night.  He still slapped down my hand when we played cards.  It was all very sweet.

At first, that was really all I thought it ever would be.  We both went out on dates with other people.  Sometimes we'd talk about them over coffee on Saturday mornings.  Assuming, of course, he'd actually returned by then.  Sometimes he didn't.  He never shared the little intimate details with me, nor I with him... neither of us are that kind of person, but I knew enough to know I was far from being the only woman in his life.  Not that I expected that.  In a way, I think he let me in more because we weren't having sex.  He wasn't trying to impress me or woo me or anything.  With me he was just Dean O'Leary.  Nothing more.  Nothing less. 

A woman always knows though.  He still had never once done anything improper.  Oh, he'd said some truly scandalously suggestive things, of course.  But it was always just in fun.  I think he'd probably explode if he didn't crack wise.  But every now and then, a glimmer of something other than brotherly affection would shine through.  Some wild spark struck off each other unexpectedly.  A look.  A touch.  Awareness.         

Like we got sucked into this movie one rainy afternoon when we were too lethargic to go out.  I made popcorn and we sat on my couch and watched some Meg Ryan flick whose title we missed because we were throwing popcorn at each other.  It was the one she'd done recently that made waves because of some racy scenes or something.  He grumbled that blonds weren't his thing, especially ones with no T&A (he stressed the 'and A' bit of that- he is such a butt-man!) but of course, just like a man, he was still willing to watch.

And despite the appearance (of both actors involved- the guy was no prize either) the scene in question actually turned out to be more erotic than we'd imagined.  Of course, it took a while to get to it.  First there was a scene where she masturbated- he hooted like a teenager and tossed popcorn at the screen while making rude puerile remarks.  And there were a few other scenes where we both made fun.... but then there was this scene where they're in bed after he's licked her to orgasm and they have this intimate discussion about who taught him to give head like that.  First times....

It was like someone had sucked all the air from the room.  

I swear to God, it felt like I was watching it with my parents or something.  It was that squirmy.  That time, no popcorn flew at the TV.  The man on the screen spoke about spreading her legs and licking her so softly.  My face flamed and when I finally looked over at Dean, he wasn't watching the screen.  He was watching me.  And he had an erection.  Neither of us said anything but my heart was beating very fast in my throat and it felt like the temperature had jumped about a hundred degrees.

We watched the rest of the film as if nothing had happened.  We were adults.  And as far as sex in movies goes, it wasn't really graphic.  But it was enough.  Dean covered his discomfort as he always does- with humor.  His wisecracks got more rude and more frequent, but they were somehow less lighthearted than they were before.  More forced.  He left shortly after the film finished.  Said he'd been too lazy and had to get up and do something.  Go for a run or something.

Or something.

Fine.  Whatever.  I know an excuse when I hear one.  He left.  I ran a hot bath, threw in my favorite sex toy and masturbated to orgasm three times, imagining the two of us in those erotic scenes we watched and reliving the night he taught me how to give and receive love made with lips and tongues.   

Of course, the next day it was like it hadn't happened.   We'd both had a lot of years of practice at ignoring those kinds of moments with each other.  It was just easier that way, I guess.  He never made a move and neither did I.  I think it was partly fear of rejection and partly fear of losing what we had if we took a shot at something more.

Weeks slipped by one after the other.  Unremarkable in their sameness.  Thoughts of him kept me up at night until I finally couldn't stand it a moment longer.  Or maybe it was knowing that on that particular night, he was just down the hall from me.  He'd taken a room in the pub that evening.  Alone.  He'd stayed after closing, shooting the shit with Terry back in the kitchen.  The weather was nasty and instead of cabbing it back across town in the icy rain, both of them just decided to get rooms upstairs.

Part of me was glad.  I liked having both of them around and God knows, the pub sure could use the money.... but knowing he was in a room - in a bed - just down the hall from me was the last straw.  After lying there and watching the clock on my nightstand read 11:34 and then 12:51 and then 1:17- I finally couldn't take it anymore.

With my heart in my throat, I threw on some clothes and made my way down the hall.  It seemed so very much longer than usual.  I stood there for a long time outside his door, afraid to knock... but then some sound spurned me on.  I knocked, nervous about getting caught in the hall hanging around his door like a fool.  It just figures though- Uma came up from downstairs carrying a basket of laundry and she stopped dead when she saw me standing there.  No doubt because she knew all about how I'd twisted myself into knots over him and I'd all but begged her to make sure I didn't do something exactly like this....

Of course, at that moment, the door opened and there he was, in all his rumpled glory- worn jeans, barefoot, shirt untucked and open at his throat.  He smiled and me, looked over my shoulder at Uma, nodded to her, invited me in and then said: "Your timing sucks," after he closed the door.

Well..... yeah.  I knew that.  I nodded and we fell back into the familiar pattern of good buddies.  He just cocked his head at me, appearing totally unruffled by my presence in his room at this hour.  "What's up?"  Asking me in the same tone he'd use if Terry knocked on his door at one in the morning.... only there was something unreadable in his eyes.

I swallowed hard and made myself speak the truth.  "I want to stay here tonight."  I thought it would come out in a tumbling rush.  It didn't.  It came out a whisper, soft and slow.  Something warm flared to life in his eyes and he reached his hands out in invitation, palms up.  I took them in mine, smiling at the latent strength I felt in the gentle touch and moved into his arms, resting my head on his chest and tucking my face under his chin.  "I want to stay with you," I whispered again and I felt the tremor that ran through him.  

If life had been a movie, at that moment the score would have risen up in a swelling overture.  In reality, the rain beat a wet patter on the window and blended softly with the uneven rhythm of our breathing.  His presence seemed to fill up the small space, leaving me feeling overwhelmed by him, by his masculinity.  And by the way he wielded it with such exquisite tenderness.

His hands swept down my body and pulled me closer.  One settled on the small of my back, the other on the nape of my neck.  And he kissed me.  Everything changed, just like that.  Friends to lovers within the space of a single heartbeat.  Camaraderie became passion.  Brotherly affection became a sweeping domination of me.  I had not forgotten the mastery of his lovemaking.  I'd been little more than a girl that first time, unprepared to meet him on equal footing, unable to be the partner he needed.

This time, it was different.  I gloried in it.  In the way he made me feel.  Deep down, he is a quiet man, gentle.  Tender.  He's also an incredibly dominant lover.  He's a chameleon, too.  He can be anything.  Confident enough to lead- or to follow.  Sure enough to not be threatened by a woman's power.  And man enough to let a woman know what he wants without reservation.  But down, deep down, it is his true nature to take control.  To lead.  And it's my nature to follow.   

The kiss was wet and deep and slow.  He bent me back, easily holding my hips pressed to his with the hand he had at my back.  The palm against my nape slipped closer until the back of my head was cradled in the crook of his elbow and I was at his mercy.  And then he did this thing that is just so Dean.  He lifted his head, smiled a little shyly and looked away, ducking his head a bit even as he made this soft noise in his throat and his mouth worked, opening slightly as we panted quietly in the golden glow of the lamp by his bed.

His jaw clenched.  I trembled against him in want.  And then it was like all we'd been waiting for to set the unstoppable into motion was that one kiss.  It burned away the shyness and the decade of 'what ifs' and all sense of propriety.  Without pretense, we pulled each other toward the bed.  I couldn't get him inside me fast enough.  Slow lazy lovemaking would come later.  We'd waited far too long for this moment. 

I pulled at his clothes, opening his shirt as he stripped me of mine and tugged down my pajama bottoms and panties with one hurried downward swipe of his hand.  We fell onto the bed.  It felt so soft and giving under me.  He felt so hard and imposing over me.  I whimpered for him to hurry.  Hurry.

He smiled, planted his hands on either side of my head, knocking the pillows every which way, and kissed me.  Hard.  Licking into my mouth until I couldn't taste anything but him.  He moved over me, straddling my hips with his long lean legs and then he sat back with this little smile.  He had what I wanted.  What we both wanted.  He was in charge.  And he knew it.  Enjoyed it.  Enjoyed drawing it out for those few seconds he just spent watching me, flushed and panting on my back under him.  Craving the feeling of his body inside mine.

His hands swept over me but it was my face he watched.  His eyes were hot and hungry.  I reached for him, sliding my hands over the worn denim and up his thighs to hook my finger in his belt loop possessively.  A lifeline.  My eyes dropped from his face to his groin and he groaned softly when I cupped the hard ridge of his erection in my hand and rubbed my palm over the sensitive tip.  He was so hard.  It felt like a broomstick under rough denim.

I stroked him through his pants, enjoying the erotic picture of my hand on his body but the fire he'd touched off in my blood was too hot.  I arched up under him in frustration and writhed, dying to feel him without any barriers between us.

"Dean, please...."  I moaned his name softly, my fingers clutching at him.  "Hurry... inside.... I have to feel you inside...."  He groaned and kissed me again, hard enough to leave my lips bruised and kiss swollen before he wrenched himself away long enough to rip open his belt and shuck off his pants, kicking them away as he crawled back over me.  I pulled at him, his arms and shoulders and threaded my fingers into his wild red hair as I opened my legs for him.  "Hurry.... hurry...."

He caught my legs and pushed them up to my chest, grunting his pleasure at the crude display before him.  Cursing at the few seconds he lost rolling down the condom before he fell over me.

"Haveta keep you safe..." he murmured and then he shoved in fast and hard, giving us what we both wanted.  What we both needed.  I cried out at the blunt burning stretch and tightened my thighs on his lean hips.  It didn't matter.  He wasn't about to pull out.  We were both exactly where we wanted to be.   Wrapped up safe.

Time seemed to slow, and for all our hurried drive to get to that one exquisite moment, we were content to just stay there, locked together in the most intimate of embraces.  I could feel his heartbeat in two places.  His heart beat strong and steady in his chest, pressed tight against my breasts.  And I also felt it in the swollen distended flesh stretched tight around his considerable girth; a throbbing that was impossible to ignore.  It seemed to be beating this driving message into both of us.  Inside.  Inside.  Inside.  Harder.  Deeper.  Faster.

And still we remained motionless, him braced above me on powerful arms.  Me spread and receptive, pierced on the hard point of his desire.  I smiled at him.  He smiled back, a mixture of shyness and want and then he dropped his head and licked at the seam of my lips.  We kissed and it quickly became wild and hungry.  He shuddered above me and groaned into my hair, "I have to move."

I nodded, aware he was experiencing the male counterpart to my driving desire to be filled.  He needed to fill.  To thrust.  To take me.  Funny how they call it that.  Taking- when it's really giving.  Giving himself to me the same way I give myself to him.  He pulled out to thrust back in and I pushed at him, reaching between us to strip off the condom he'd hastily donned.  He shivered as I peeled it away and tossed it aside, arching up at him in invitation as I stroked him.

"You sure?"  I nodded and we both groaned softly when he pushed in deep.  Slow this time, to feel every inch as my body enveloped his and sent sparks of incendiary pleasure firing along his nerves and screaming into his brain.  This time, he didn't stop.  We moved together smoothly, easily settling into a familiar rhythm.  My body- my heart- it knew this man.  Intimately.  And this time, it was perfect.  I wasn't too young and he wasn't too hurt and we were just two people who were finally ready to give something real and lasting a shot.

We were both too far gone for it to be slow.  I whimpered out to him to fuck me.  More.  Harder.  Faster.  And I simply clung to him when he did.  He grunted with the force of his lovemaking.  I gasped his name.  We licked and bit and held each other so tight that it was hard to breathe.  He drove my pleasure before his own, needing the satisfaction of feeling me come around him before he would let himself go. 

Desire ran.  Sweat trickled.  Toes curled.  Our bodies heaved and juddered.  My orgasm was powerful, strong and gripping.  Sound broke from my mouth in a throaty cry that he swallowed down into his own lungs before giving me one of his own in return.  A soft cry of the most exquisite agony against my lips as his body throbbed out its release deep within mine.      

His shy smile was back, full of the warmer notes of intense sexual satisfaction.  His weight, no longer supported on knees and elbows, pressed me deeper into the soft mattress and I sighed contentedly, pulling him closer still.  There are few things so fine in life as breathing with the weight of a well-loved man on your chest. 

I looked at the clock and giggled.  Less than ten minutes had passed since I'd left my room.  Talk about your mind-blowing experiences.  Sometimes it amazes me how the most life altering moments can just happen so fast and change the course of your future forever in less time than it takes to get a cup of coffee.

"Whoa."  I hummed out my pleasure and nuzzled the sweaty stubbly skin of his throat and jaw. 

He chuckled into my hair, all smug lover and satiated man who hadn't quite yet returned to earth.  His expression was still a little dreamy.  It made me smile.  "Yeah, I am good, aren't I?"  I giggled and nodded.  He pretended to look thoughtful.  "Might even hit the ten minute mark one of these days...."  He sighed happily and pulled me closer and the moment shifted from light and playful to achingly heartfelt.  Looking down into my face, he touched his mouth to mine and relaxed against me utterly, holding me tighter still. 

It felt like coming home. 

There was a moment where we both shivered as he slipped from my body and a gush of semen followed that neither of us hurried to mop up.  I think he liked seeing and feeling it there.  I know I did. 

What followed after that was one of the best nights of my life.  We held each other and just talked more candidly and openly than we ever had before.  The wall that had stood between us for the better part of the last two decades had come crumbling down in a few wild cathartic moments and left us bare to each other.  He shared things with me that night he'd kept locked inside for years.  Let light shine on places inside him that had been dark and barren since Gen died.

The next time we made love it was slow and tender.  We'd had several hours of languid foreplay first, absently stroking and caressing each other while we spoke.  He was curious about Uma.  Or more specifically Uma and Terry.  Wanted to know if anything was going on there.  That made me smile.  A man never gives up anything about his close friends to a woman unless he's in it for the long haul.  That is so Dean.  He's always been one to show how he feels rather than say it outright.

"Uma said anything to you about it?"  

I shook my head.  "Not really- but I have eyes."

He laughed.  "Me too.  But you never know with him.... he keeps his feelings close to his chest."  Like Dino doesn't do that himself?  And then he smiled wider.  "The only thing stopping them is themselves...."  He met my eyes and the look in his was soft and vulnerable.  "What is it about that?"

I smiled back.  "Well, here's to hoping it doesn't take them a decade to work it out."  

Seriousness replaced the teasing glitter in his eyes as he rolled me under him.  "You needed that time."  He kissed me softly and raised my leg to push inside.  "I did too."

I gasped at his slow entry.  "And now?"

He twined our fingers together and started moving slowly.  "Now I know not all life is rude, honey.  Sometimes it hands you the lemonade not the lemons.... and that's one drink I've been needing for a long, long time." 

And drink of it he did...

Which is the long and short of how I wound up on the phone with him the morning after the Pajama Party.  I was a pathetic wreck.  Partly hung over.  Partly still a little tipsy from the night before.  I'd woken up under a blanket on the floor, surrounded by empty glasses and bottles and a frightening array of sex toys.  My body was stiff and sore and I couldn't decide what I wanted more... a hot bath, a soft bed or a hard man.  I settled for crashing down on my bed, rolling to my back and putting my feet up on the wall with my head hanging off the edge of the bed while I fought my foggy memory for the number to Dino's cell.  Bath.  Bed.  Man.  Two out of three's not bad.

He was laughing when he picked up.  "You alive, honey?"

I think I grunted a 'no' at him.  

"Have fun?" He sounded so annoyingly chipper.  I had to laugh, though.  I love how he's not the least bit threatened by things like the PJ party.  In fact, he kind of likes it that I kick up my heels like that.

"Well.... yeah.... course I did.  Alcohol, sex toys, lingerie and good conversation.  What's not to love?"

He snickered.  "Sounds like a recipe for a good time to me, baby.  Especially if 'Mmmm.....  Dean... more!' counts as good conversation."

"Heh.  Perve."  He didn't even bother to deny it.  "How are you?"

"Good.  Bugged out with the old man last night after Uma sank the mic.  Went for drinks."  Typical Dino.  He wasn't the hovering sort.  He wouldn't have felt the need.  He's a dominant partner, but not like that.

"Yeah?  How'd that go?  You get anything out of him?"  He and Uma were perfect for each other.  Everyone can see it.  So of course they're the last two people in the world to actually get a clue.

"No juice.  Well, nothing more than the usual crap."  He snorted.  "I finally gave up on his sorry ass and left him crying in his beer."  I snickered.  They never stop razzing each other.  More like he left Terry getting chatted up.  I heard him playing with his lighter and wondered what was going through his mind.  "I left the car at the pub last night.  You wanna take a cab home to me?"

Home. 

That's new.  He's so careful with words.  It's more than his job.  It's his nature.  That he uses that word with respect to us says it all, I think.  He's not one given to effusive romantic declarations and they're all the more powerful when he does say them for that very reason.  He shows how he feels instead. 

I smiled at the ceiling and wiggled my feet on the wall in pleasure.  "You sure you don't just want me to drive it back?"

"Yes.  Absolutely."  Why was he so smug?  "I was thinking maybe we'll take a cab back together later?"

I sat bolt upright and eyed the phone warily, remembering what I'd said about my fantasy in a taxi.  Oh, God....  Bastard!  He is so going to get it.  "Well, Maximus said I could share his...."  Take that!

He cursed.  Loudly.  Colorfully.  Playfully.  I giggled, imagining him spouting off like that at work.  "Where are you?"       

"In the kitchen downstairs." He shot that one straight back.  I freaked.  "Well, actually... no... I'm on the stairs..."  The door to my room opened.  "Well, lookee here...."

I still had the phone in my hand stupidly.  He looked far, far too good; a long dark coat thrown over jeans and a moss green button up shirt that set off both his eyes and his hair.  It was so unfair.  And here I was in rumpled lingerie with morning hair.  His eyes traveled down my flushed cheeks, over the red of the satin lace-up corset.  He quirked an eyebrow.  I was wearing underwear.  As if I'd have gone to the party sans panties like how I usually sleep?  Get real! 

Usually for him I just wore the corset, the gloves and the shoes.  He likes the way the laces at the small of my back dangle down and tease the valley between my naked cheeks, and the way the heels elongate my legs.  He leaned against the door jamb and cocked his head.  Pulled a hand from behind his back and tossed me something.  A single red rose.

"Dino's special hangover cure, honey."                          

Awww..... he's so sweet.  Tries to pretend he's not a romantic- but he so is.

And then he smiled wickedly and tossed something else at me.  The pair of red high heels I'd lost sometime during the night.  I wasn't wearing much, but I suddenly felt too hot.  His smile got dirtier as he tossed a coat at me.  It was long, like his.  Soft and dark. 

"Don't change.  Just wear that over it."  My mouth went dry.  "We have a cab to catch...."