letterstonorah

Title: The Plasma of Excruciating Kisses
Author: letterstonorah
Rating: NC17
Characters/Pairings: Kara/Lee
Word Count: 5500
Summary: AU set on Caprica, in which there is hot frakking and art and sex.
Warnings: smut like whoa, a tad bit of angst,
Spoilers: Hmmm, nothing in particular? It's pretty AU, but pilots are still pilots, and the Twelve Colonies are still the Twelve Colonies.

This was betaed by the most lovely and brilliant wicked_sassy, who is pushing me to be less awful, something I greatly appreciate. Her criticisms and praise are always thoughtful, and she straight up WROTE a couple of sentences in here.

Please, if you read, comment! It's so very nice to hear from you lovely folk, even just a couple of words.

The title comes from the poem "Poison" by the lovely Romanian poet Ruxandra Cesereanu.

The Plasma of Excruciating Kisses

A star is an absolutely immense, incandescent sphere consisting primarily of hot plasma, the fourth state of matter. Unlike gases, liquids, and solids, plasma is ionically charged, meaning it sparks like electricity.

A waiter offers Kara a single glass of ambrosia; she reaches over and takes the entire bottle instead.

Holding the green glass in her palm, angling it upward, she reads the calligraphic writing on the label: "Ichor"—the blood of the gods. This brand talks quite a big game.

"Behave tonight," says Kara's agent, before walking off to chat up Caprica City's wealthiest art connoisseurs.

But Kara never behaves, and she isn't about to start now. She turns the bottle up to her mouth and lets the liquid trickle down her throat, like spilling paint.

The tangy-sweet liquor on her tongue tastes blessedly familiar. She swallows deeply, casting a defiant glance over to her agent, already gently buzzed. She's intoxicated from sense memory alone, the bitter taste of the alcohol accompanied by an onslaught of memories.

Ichor. She remembers now. This is the brand her mother drank. Kara would tuck the bottles under her coat and sneak them to school, enticing friends to play her own version of Spin the Bottle during the lunch period at her junior high school. A group of early teens, shaggy-haired, pimple-faced, teeth newly-straightened from braces—circled up around the Ichor, laughing quietly and nervously.

The rules were—if the bottle landed on one of them, in addition to a kiss, they had to take a shot of the ambrosia. The image of her younger self, grinning drunkenly before making out with a Year 8 named Nikole, heats Kara up even more than the liquor.

Bottle in hand, she mills about the gallery, observing her displayed artwork: dark, sullen oil paintings ranging from completely abstract shapes and patterns to impressionistic cityscapes.

The images represent the best and worst of her childhood—dreams and nightmares, lost memories and pocket watches, twisting alleyways, crumbling brownstones.

"Beautiful," she hears someone say, a pale woman with dark hair slicked into a tight bun.

Kara stifles a smile before moving on. Her paintings are not beautiful. According to the reviews, they are "moody", "brooding", "menacing." Sounds about right.

Aaron Mathias, art critic for the Fish Tail Review, says of her work: "Like stepping into a maelstrom, whether you want to or not."

Kara doesn't disagree.

The gallery owner, Michael Rhys, approaches Kara from the other side of the room, waving as he walks.

She likes him, likes the space he's created even more. The gallery is little more than a renovated, oversized barn, with exposed beams and pipes, bare brick walls, and a scuffed wooden floor. Huge light fixtures hang from the ceiling, illuminating Kara's paintings brilliantly. The smell of turpentine and linseed oil, bitter and sweet, hangs in the air, and it reminds Kara of the loft where she does most of her work.

"Ready to sell some paintings?" Michael asks, once he's in hearing range. He's drinking a cocktail—a martini, it looks like—and holding a plate filled with crab tartlets, crostini topped with duck confit, and cherry tomatoes.

"I can't believe you're asking 15,000 cubits for some of these," says Kara.

"I'm doing it as a favor to you. You said they were worth seventy-five grand to you, right?" says Michael.

"Right, and you take 50%," says Kara. "I definitely get it. It's just—is there anyone stupid enough to pay that much?"

She tries to sound incredulous, dubious, skeptical. Instead, she's pretty sure the whole thing comes out as insecure and needy, the last thing she wanted.

"There are people smart enough to pay that much," Michael says, reaching over to squeeze her shoulder reassuringly. "Don't you know you're the hottest thing on the art scene right now?"

Kara smiles. "I'm the hottest thing period."

"Very true," says Michael, sipping from his martini. "Is the ambrosia good?"

"The ambrosia is always good," she says, taking another swig from the bottle. The flavor of it is anxious tongues, overzealous teeth, a boy's hand in hers, his thumb caressing her palm.

"Maybe the booze will make you loosen up enough to say a little something? You know how much these people love to hear from the artist."

"I wouldn't hold your breath on that," says Kara. She snatches one of the crab tartlets off of his plate and takes a bite, walking off before he can guilt her into speaking.

Only a half an hour has passed since the beginning of the art opening, and already people crowd the gallery. Kara is careful not to bump into the strange conglomerate of socialites, up-and-coming visual artists, and old men on the prowl for young, artsy women—preferably with a drug problem they can exploit.

What a world. Kara has never fostered any illusions about what it would be like to finally make it—she's always been too much of a realist to idealize the grass on the other side of the fence; but the industry of buying and selling art, surprisingly, quite repulses her. Not that the alternative is any better. She is done with the sky, learned her lessons from it. The stars welcomed her sweetly into their midst, fulfilling every promise and then some, showing her that she is as worthwhile as anyone else, as loved as much as the gods love all their children, despite mankind's sins and shortcomings.

She does miss it, surging into the throat-black night. The sensation of being swallowed. Being one with the fabric of all things. But during her time in the fleet, the words of one of her art professors stayed with her, "What is the basic article of faith? That this is not all that we are."

For Kara, the images she paints are explosions of her darkest feelings and beliefs bound to canvas. They connect her to the Divine. Her work is without narrative, structure, or arc, yet seeks to make sense of the fractured pieces of her life.

So why not just do art as a hobby, Starbuck? Are you really gonna leave the fleet? – a fellow pilot had asked her once.

Kara doesn't do hobbies. She's always been the type to go all in; and while the superficiality and pretention of Caprica's art world sometimes disturbs her, Kara does spend most of her days doing something she loves.

She'll have to remember that—those exact words—for her upcoming interview with The Art Journal.

Kara smiles politely at anyone whose eyes she meets, but always looks away quickly. Some attendees recognize her as the artist; some don't. Those who do attempt to engage her, but Kara is an expert at dodging any and all atempts at conversation.

The hors d'oeuvres table becomes her home base, and as long as she's sipping from her bottle of ambrosia and eating snacks, people leave her alone—thank the gods.

She's carrying a small handbag, no bigger than her palm, and inside is her cell phone, a cigarette case, matches, her car keys, and maybe—if she remembered (please say she remembered)—a deck of cards.

Yes, there it is. She feels the slick edges of the laminated card stock box, torn and worn around the edges. While a game of strip triad is what she's really after, that would involve other people, solitaire will have to do.

She could scurry off to the handicap bathroom, find a secluded bench in the lobby—but she doesn't give a damn if anyone sees her. Kara moves a tray of appetizers, brushes crumbs to the floor, and clears a space to play cards. She lays them out in the proper assortment of stacks, ignoring those around her.

"Glad someone here is just as bored as I am," says a man nearby. He's dressed in slim-fitting dark blue slacks a jacket and a white shirt buttoned to the chest. He fills a plate with slices of bruschetta and hummus, smiling warmly at her.

Kara gets a good look at him, and okay, frakking finally—tonight has just gotten very interesting. He's familiar in some way, but she knows she hasn't met him before. She'd remember this face. Light blue eyes that are both warm and penetrating, perfectly sculpted jawline. Narrow nose.

His skin has the uneven, glowing tan of someone who spends a lot of time in the sun. The same is true of his hair, light brown strands streaked with gold. Waves of it fall just over his ears, giving the style a windblown effect. Oh, hello, Adonis. Is that you?

The man clears his throat, and Kara has the decency to blush at her blatant scrutiny of him.

"Excuse me," says Kara, smiling warmly at the stranger. "You caught me a little off-guard."

"Didn't mean to sneak up on you," he says. "Sometimes I get a little ahead of myself. See, I've been watching you for, hmmmm, at least the past fifteen or twenty minutes. Had a dozen scenarios worked out for accidentally bumping into you or maybe refilling your drink—but," he says, gesturing to her half-full bottle of ambrosia, "looks like you've got that taken care of."

Kara smiles, and the drunken merriment that had previously only been sense memory is now a result of the here and now.

"You," the man continues, taking a sip of dark, red wine, "are even lovelier than the art I came here to see."

Laughing, Kara takes a long swig from her bottle and slams it down on the table, enjoying the rush of sensation from the alcohol and the man's obvious flirting. She is hot and tingling, hoping, already, to both consume and be consumed. "What do you think of it?" she asks. "The art, I mean? You don't like it?"

He shrugs and moves so that he's leaning next to her against the table, his hip adjacent to hers. She's positioned forward, facing the food, and he the opposite direction, looking at the gallery.

"I do like it," he says, turning his gaze from Kara to the display. "A lot, actually, though this isn't my typical scene. My father dragged me here. He's apparently very close with the artist, and I must admit, I got curious when he told me more about him—the painter, that is. A viper pilot turned artist? I thought—hey, that's something I might like to see."

Kara stifles a snort. Of course, the man would assume the artist is male. She's known professionally as 'K. Thrace' for this very reason—so people will fill in her first name as Kevin or Karl or Kenneth. It certainly helps her sell more art.

"Well, what do you think?" Kara asks.

"Think of what?"

"The viper pilot turned artist. You said that's something you just had to see. Well, here I am, Kara Thrace. Am I all you hoped and more?"

He turns to her, smiling, his eyes brows raised up in surprise. "You?"

"Me," she says. She licks her lips expectantly, waiting for his reply.

He leans in closer, near enough that Kara can feel his breath, every subtle movement of his hands, hips, legs.

"Well, then," he says, "you have surpassed anything I could've possibly imagined, and I mean that in the best of ways."

His eyes fix onto hers, unyielding, drawing her in. And is it her art or this man that's supposed to be the maelstrom?

"Who is your father, exactly?" she asks, averting her eyes, pretending to look over the people strolling the gallery. She takes a swig of ambrosia to settle her nerves, but it has the opposite effect, riling her up, making her nerves buzz eagerly.

"Bill Adama," says Lee.

"The Commander's here?" she asks, this time her smile unrelated to the man in front of her.

"He was here," Lee corrects. "I'm afraid he had to leave. Something rather important came up. He did look for you, though."

Kara frowns but masks it quickly. "So that would make you…Zak?"

He smiles, "No. No, I'm Lee."

"Ah," says Kara, eyeing him carefully, the older Adama son nothing like she had imagined. More complex, maybe, than she foresaw? She'd had him pegged for a self-righteous goody two-shoes. The man in front of her definitely does not conform to the image she had in her head.

"So you're the Prodigal Son," says Kara. "The Old Man is always grumbling about how you're off saving the world."

Lee rolls his eyes. "Hardly. I enjoyed my time serving in the military—more than I ever wanted to or thought I would, but there's more to life than flying vipers and planning ops."

Kara picks up her bottle, "I'll drink to that—"

"—so what very important thing did your father have to run off to? He better believe I'm going to track him down and give him a stern talking-to about walking out on my opening, even if we do see each other often."

"Zak," Lee says simply. "And I'm the supposed prodigal son."

He's joking, but Kara thinks it comes out more bitterly than he probably intended. "He's drunk somewhere, as usual, stranded. Since our mom died last year he's been compete wreck," says Lee. "Dad and I always have to pick up the pieces."

"I didn't realize you and your father were close at all," Kara says.

Lee shrugs, sips his wine. "Not close. Just allies in the war against Zak's downward spiral."

He smiles and turns to her again. "Look at me, being a complete ass. Why would I talk about them when there's a beautiful and fascinating woman in front of me whom I don't know at all. I have to say—you're not at all what I expected."

He's crowding her space again, moving nearer to her, interrogating her with his eyes. "Dad said you're the best pilot he's ever seen, maybe the best there's ever been, period. But you mustered out. Why?"

"One thing you'll learn about me, Lee, is that I'm not any one thing."

He's facing her now, only a half-head taller, but he feels bigger, somehow. He's reducing her to her barest parts, stripping off her paint. "Do you have secrets, Kara?" he asks, leaning down so that his breath is hot on her ear.

She swallows loudly, licks her lips, keeps her eyes steady on his. "Everyone does."

"Then tell me something. Now. Something you've never told anyone. Let's skip over the boring beginning part and get to the skeleton of things." He sets down his plate and glass, his hands locking onto her arms. The gesture is desperate rather than affectionate, but Kara finds herself moving toward rather than away from him, compelled by his sudden unabashed sincerity.

"Here?"

Lee's eyes are on hers, goading her on—and Kara is surprised again at how different he is from what she'd imagined. Yes, he is calculating and meticulous, but only because he's trying to control something darker within himself.

"Here. Now," he says.

"And you?" asks Kara.

"I'll do the same."

Kara looks around the gallery. More than a few people are chancing glances at her and Lee.

"Come on," she says, grabbing his wrist and pulling him forward. She snatches her purse and drapes it around her shoulder, abandoning her food, cards, and liquor on the table.

They make it out to the lobby of the gallery.

"Outside," says Lee.

Kara nods and drags him farther, picking up her pace so that she's almost jogging. She's glad that she'd nixed the idea of heels, instead sticking with her boots. They're not her tallest pair, only reaching up to her mid-calf, but the lace ups are sleek and comfortable, perfect for spontaneous rendezvous.

"So tell me a secret," Lee says. It's hot outside, the Caprican summer oppresively humid. Kara doesn't stop moving. She leads Lee to the back side of the gallery, empty of people and glowing street lights.

In the distance, a car alarm blares, and couples laugh as they wait for taxis. Despite the bright lights of the downtown skyscrapers, the glint of the stars illuminates the city, the sky a spectacle of shimmering, faraway dots. Kara's foot crunches over discarded cigarette butts, the remnants of a beer bottle, a soda can. This night is simultaneously holy and profane.

Kara presses Lee against the brick of the gallery's exterior and grabs his arms, the definition and hardness of his muscles apparent through his shirt and jacket. She bites her lip and looks at him, wanting to devour him.

"I'm gonna frak you tonight," says Kara. "That's something I've never told you before."

He smiles and grabs her waist, yanking her close, his palms and fingers digging in, marking her. His hard cock pushes through his slacks, and she can feel him nudging against her. "That, I already knew," he says, "even if you didn't say it aloud."

She licks her lips and inhales a breath, enjoying the feel of letting go. "It still counts. Now it's your turn. Go."

He brings his hands up her sides, under the fabric of her blouse, along her back, and pulls her in. His voice is dark and low, and his fingers draw circles on the skin of her shoulders. He leans in, his mouth at her neck, his tongue licking a path up her jawline to her ear. He takes the skin into his mouth, sucks and bites. "My secret is—I can already tell you're going to be the death of me, Kara," says Lee, "and I must be pretty frakked up because that only makes me want you more."

She moans at the feel of his tongue lapping at her skin, working from her ear, to her neck, to her cheek, to her mouth. Their lips meet, hot and anxious, and waste no time opening up for each other.

Lee grabs Kara and spins her around so that now she's against the wall. He's as strong as he looks. She crashes hard into the brick, scraping bare skin and barely feeling it. Lee's tongue slips into her mouth, insistent and agile.

Kara shucks up her skirt farther, revealing her breasts, looping up her leg around Lee's waist so that she can rub herself off against him. Lee moves a hand to her thigh, rough and calloused, palming the flesh hard. His grip loosens and his fingers caress the skin of her legs, working towards her panties. He lingers for entirely too long just out of reach as he teases her, occasionally letting one finger drag along the wet silk of her underwear.

"I want to taste you," he says, and it comes out as a moan. "Please?"

Kara nods and raises her skirt more, pushing down her panties with her free hand. Lee bites her lips gently before moving down, working his tongue on the front of her neck down to her collar bone, biting and sucking, leaving little purple marks in his wake. Vaguely, Kara thinks she's going to have a hard time explaining those tomorrow, but the thought disappears as his tongue continues its course over her skin.

He drops to his knees and Kara mewls in anticipation, spreading her legs apart, looking down at him as his cheek rests against her thigh, breathing in her scent.

Her underwear is gathered at one ankle, and Lee lifts her foot so that he can remove them completely. He takes the material and begins to rub it against her cunt, over her clit.

Kara grabs his wrist and presses his hand into her for more pressure, jerking his fingers just right. Lee stills and pushes her hand away. "Let me do this, Kara," he says, and she loves the way he speaks her name, like he's known her for years and they're old friends.

He takes her panties and stuffs him into his pocket, holding her gaze as he does it. "Souvenir," he states simply, kissing her inner thighs, moving up until his lips are hot and firm against her wet slit. His tongue flicks back and forth as he unbuckles his belt, unzips his trousers, takes his cock in hand and begins to jerk himself.

Kara watches him, his face buried between her legs, his tongue moving deliciously fast against her cunt. She can't help it—she's already beginning to lose it—and she grabs a fistful of his hair and forces him closer. She bucks her hips to meet the movements of his tongue as she draws him in harder, faster.

She throws her head back against the brick wall, her body lost in the exquisite sensations, the throbbing and buzzing between her legs better than anything she's ever felt. His tongue is on her clit, licking her off, and he uses his free hand to reach around and grab her ass, pressing her into his mouth.

He stops for a moment, sitting down from his knees, lying back on the ground. "Come on," he says, begging. He rubs his cock quickly, almost manically, and the sight of him bare like that, getting himself off, almost makes Kara come. She pushes off the wall and gets down, straddling Lee, moving up his body until she's over his mouth. She feels his hands grip her waist, pulling her cunt down into his tongue, and she starts to frak his face.

She's trying to control herself, to let him breathe, but he feels too good between her legs. She grinds herself wildly into him, so close to release. Her hands rest on the concrete as she pushes up and down against Lee's mouth, and all at once, she's losing it on top of him, coming.

Lee doesn't let her rest, pulls her down his body so she's hovering over his cock. He pushes up into her, hard and thick, stretching her. "So tight," he says. Kara barely hears. She's riding Lee's cock, thrusting her hips up and down on top of him, a slave to the feeling of his length moving in and out of her, filling her up, setting off every nerve in her body. Her fingers dig hard into his shoulders as she gains leverage, frakking him hard and fast

She comes again, shorter this time, but harder, and Lee, too, is letting himself go inside her. They hold on to each other, completely spent, breaths quick and jagged, their sweaty bodies coalescing into one.

Lee follows her back to her place because he doesn't really have a choice. He already knows he'd go with this woman anywhere. Hell, she could say she knew the way to Earth and he'd believe her, fly her wing all the way there.

He's like Caprica rotating around Helios Alpha—Kara his own private star. Planets spin because they are born spinning—hunks of matter spit forth from the mouth of the cosmos, forced into step with a sun.

What a pleasant notion, to revolve one's self entirely around unfathomably hot, plasmic light.

Kara's loft is in one of Caprica City's trendiest districts, but she lives on the rougher side. Lee parks and hops out of his car, watching her do the same. Gods, she's stunning. He'd meant it before when he told her he'd been watching her. Once he caught sight of her, those wickedly devious eyes—he couldn't turn away.

A summer breeze grabs hold of her long hair, whisking it up and away. At any moment, Lee's sure the blonde strands will dislodge from her scalp and carry themselves off like uprooted tumbleweeds. Standing there before him, impossibly gorgeous, her clothes and hair blowing languidly in the wind—she looks almost otherworldly, like an angel, like his personal savior; and gods know, he needs saving.

She smiles and leans back against the door of her transport, her short skirt revealing long, muscular legs. She's perfect and wild, and he wonders briefly if she's not an angel but a siren. Surely Kara Thrace will make him drown.

"Won't they miss you back at the gallery?" Lee says, walking up to her.

"Do I look like the type of person who cares when people miss me?"

No—Lee thinks. She decidedly does not look like the type of person who cares.

"Love 'em and leave 'em then?" Lee asks, affecting nonchalance, though he's really feeling something closer to please gods, don't leave me. And gods he really is crazy, because they're not even together. He barely knows this woman.

He places his hands on either side of her head against the window of her truck. He's already hard for her again, the scent of her still stained to his skin, reminding him of how good she tastes. He leans in and bites her neck hard, making her yelp, before flicking his tongue gently over the skin.

"Mmm," she says. Her breaths become heavy as she wraps her arms around his waist and tugs him into her.

"No," he says, though it takes every ounce of resistance in his body to do so. "I want to frak you properly. On a table or a couch or a bed. Want to hear you scream and beg. Want to see you completely naked so I can enjoy it fully when your body shakes from me frakking you so hard."

"Can't I at least get a preview?" she asks.

Lee smiles at Kara's eagerness.

"A preview? So then you want me to tease you? Okay. Just remember that when my fingers are inside you and you're begging for my cock. I'll say, 'this is just a preview, Kara. That's what you wanted, right?' Or when you're sitting on top of your desk or table or whatever, your legs spread for me, your thighs slick and wet, my tongue just centimeters away from your clit, flicking against your cunt."

She laughs, the sound of it wanton, promising trouble and pleasure.

"Fine. No preview. Follow me," she says. Kara pushes him, palms on his chest then walks past him. Lee's entranced with the movement of her hips and ass and legs, and he can't wait to touch her again, to be inside her again.

The space she lives in is huge and beautiful, sparsely decorated except for her paintings—vibrant, wild, and confrontational. The furniture is mostly antique, a dark red couch with clawed feet, a brown, wooden coffee table, some old chairs.

Large, curtainless windows reveal the night sky, and Lee thinks it must be nice to live on such a high floor, no buildings across the street with potential voyeurs.

"Nice," he says, looking around.

"Being a big deal has its perks sometimes," Kara says, smiling, heading into the sprawling kitchen. She grabs some glasses and a bottle of whiskey, meeting Lee at the cluttered coffee table. She rearranges stacks of books, notebooks, and newspapers before creating a bare space on which to set the drinks. She sits down on the couch, beckoning him with her hand. "So you're a lawyer or something, right?"

"A judge now, actually," says Lee, smiling. "Family court."

"Aren't you a little young for that?" she asks, filling up both glasses, handing one to him.

"Youngest in the district at thirty-three," says Lee, and he hopes it doesn't come off like he's bragging—though maybe he is a little. He wants to impress her, wants her to know that he's his own man, that he can handle her.

"Well, aren't you the dog's bollocks," she says.

"What?" says Lee, choking a little on his whiskey.

"Just something we say back on Picon, my home planet," she says.

"Ahhh, you're bridge-and-tunnel, I see."

"Oh, Lords, here we go," she says, "another Caprican who thinks this planet is the center of the Universe. You'd be surprised to find that there are a whole eleven other Colonies, and some of them are kind of nice, too.

"Doubtful," he says, "though I did get my law degree in Virgon."

"Right," says Kara, "and I bet you have a maid from Aerilon, and one of your best friends is Sagittaron."

Lee blushes and laughs. "I don't have a maid," he says. "And my best firend is Caprican, thank you very much. Because people from Caprica are just better. Period."

"Better than me?" she asks, setting down her glass, edging over to him on the couch.

"Maybe you're an exception," he says, or at least that's what he thinks he says. He can hardly form thoughts, let alone words. Gods, who is this woman?

She takes one of her legs and throws it over his so that she's straddling him. Slowly—impossibly slowly—she unbuttons his shirt, takes it off, moves her hands along his bare chest, stomach.

Next she unzips his slacks, pulls down the elastic of his briefs, and takes out his cock. He groans at the feel of her warm palm tightening over him. She sits up a little, adjusting herself so that her still-naked cunt can slide up against his length. Holy frakking frak.

She moves her hand and begins to pulse her body against him, and she's wickedly wet and hot.

He grabs her face and presses her lips to his, tasting her mouth. It seems that she wants him just as much as he wants her, and if she keeps bucking her hips like that, he's not going to last that long when he's inside her.

He should wait. Should rub her off—or lick her again—gods know, he wants to. But he remembers how tight and perfect she felt wrapped around his cock, and he can't put it off any longer. While his lips are still locked to hers, he grips her waist and moves so that he can push himself into her.

Kara takes the hint and adjusts accordingly, sliding down so that he's buried into her.

Kara makes a sound in the back of her throat, leaning forward, her teeth sinking into the skin of his shoulder.

They set a slow place, luxuriating in the feel of each other. He thumbs her clit as he thrusts up into her. "Take off your shirt," he says.

She wordlessly obeys, and while she's at it, strips off her bra—then her skirt, pulling it over her head. She's naked on top of him, looking godly and flawless, her pale skin contrasting against the dark pink of her hard nipples.

He wants to keep moving slowly, to make this last forever, but both of them are having trouble holding back. She begins to bounce on top of him more quickly, using his shoulders as leverage. She throws her head back and arches her chest out, and this is an image straight out of his fantasies. He rocks into her faster and faster as he circles her clit, and hopes to gods she's close. He can't hold it for much longer, and the sound of her rasping moans, the look of her bouncing breasts—he can't take this.

Good thing, because he feels her body stiffening, feels her tighten and clench over his cock as she orgasms.

He comes inside of her, and for a blissful few seconds he is absolutely euphoric.

They collapse into each other, exhausted. Her bare skin is hot and wet against his, and it's absolutely lovely. He kisses her cheeks, neck, shoulders. Enjoys the taste of her. Wants to stay like this forever, even though he knows it's about to be over.

"You can stay the night," she says, still trying to catch her breath. "But I'm making no promises about breakfast."

He closes his eyes, and rests his head against hers. "I can sleep in your bed?"

She pauses, hesitating to answer. "I don't mind," she says finally.

That's as generous as she's going to be, and honestly, it's more than Lee was expecting. He said before that she'd be the death of him, and it's the absolute truth. She's already reeled him in, and Lee wonders when she'll spit him out. Never, he hopes.