Fic: Infinite Little Actions
Title: Infinite Little Actions
Author: ed_84
Pairing: Sheppard/Weir
Summary: The mattress proves warm where she vacated it, coated with her scent, and John moves in on the territory with a possessiveness that has nothing to do with the fact that this is technically his side of the bed anyway.
Warnings: R, sexual situations. PWP.
Spoilers: none.
Author's note: Weeks back, I took prompts from my flist for fic. I have since lost those prompts, but I'm fairly sure this fic fits one of them. I just don't remember which one, or which one of my flisters gave it to me. Whoops? Anyway, this story is born out of several conversations I've had about why John Sheppard is not the type to ever say "I love you." Ever. (Um, sorry IR! I know you can't read smut right now. Forgive me for the timing!)
He’s been half awake since seven, but it’s technically the weekend and John knows better than to roll out of bed when they have the opportunity of sleeping in. Elizabeth is tucked against him fast asleep, curled up along his back with a leg thrown haphazardly over his. The warmth of her breath is a steady exhale against his neck, and her hand is an equally heavy presence across his back.
They rarely get to do this - just sleep in. Ever since they landed in the Pegasus, he doesn’t think he’s ever seen her take a day off. Seven days a week - weekends be damned - but since they started sharing a bed, there’s been a few occasions where he’s convinced her to stay in as late as nine. Sometimes even ten.
A glance at his digital alarm tells him its 0730, and just like clockwork, nature calls. Elizabeth mumbles in heavy protest when he starts to pull away, but she never stirs awake when he finally extracts himself from their tangled limbs. It’s a delicate process, especially without rousing her, but John thinks he’s finally getting the hang of it after all these months.
He uses the toilet and then drops the lid back down because - God help him - Elizabeth’s actually trained him well on that point. When he peeks his head out of the bathroom briefly, spying to see if he woke her up with all the noise, he finds no worries. She’s still fast asleep, and he’s immediately sidetracked by her black tee nightshirt (his own that she’d stolen weeks back). It’s ridden up her torso to expose a tantalizing strip of skin, pink panties and toned naked legs that stretch onwards for what seems like miles.
He grins wolfishly, but Elizabeth is still fast asleep so he steps back into the bathroom and rummages through the medicine cabinet. Halfway through digging passed some hand cream, a box of tampons and two bottles of Midol, he starts wondering exactly when Elizabeth moved her feminine products into his space. This may be his quarters, but it’s turned as much hers as it is his. He switched to a full-size bed to accommodate her; her clothes cover nearly half his closet; her paperwork is resting on the corner nightstand. Despite the fact that Elizabeth’s room is bigger and has the better view, he’s not quite sure why they always invariably end up back in his cramped little room that’s barely big enough for one grown man.
It’s one of those mysterious of their relationship - the ones they don’t analyze too much because in the beginning this had supposedly been about sex and comfort, and now it’s evolved into so much more. Of course, they still can’t verbalize any of it. He sucks at talking about things, and Elizabeth - thank god - doesn’t press him on those issues. He thinks that’s probably because she just understands him so well. Freakishly well.
By the time he reemerges back into his bedroom, Elizabeth’s completely claimed his side of the bed for herself. John scratches idly behind his ear, studying her astutely while planning his next move. He could wake her up… but several reasons pop into his mind that immediately stop him from going down that track.
One - she’s too damn adorable like this for him to risk waking her. He’d never admit it out loud, but he can count on one hand the number of women he’s ever watched sleep. Elizabeth’s the only one of them that’s ever really mattered.
Two - she needs the sleep. The city can survive in their absence without self-imploding for a few more hours. Hopefully. Besides, there’s a running bet on how late in the morning Dr. Weir will ever risk walking into the Control Room. A smart man lays his money on no later than 10:30; John has twenty bucks down on eleven, and he plans on collecting it one day.
And last but not least, three - one of the things he’s learned about Elizabeth over the many months they’ve been sleeping together is that her favorite thing to do in the morning is to wake him up - not the other way around.
And who is he to argue with the woman’s preferences?
He rounds the mattress, dropping heavily onto the left side of the bed so he can spoon against her back. They’ve switched places - him on her side and her on his. Seconds lull into minutes, and with her steady heartbeat near his, John closes his eyes and he thinks that - maybe - he falls asleep at some point. He can’t really tell. He’s on the edge of that moment of slumber, the cusp of it tugging against his consciousness, when the mattress dips slightly and Elizabeth stirs awake.
He nestles against her warmth, getting a whiff of that familiar fragrance of her shampoo, before stretching alongside her.
“John,” she whispers. “Move for a sec, John.”
It’s his turn to mumble in protest when she pulls free of their bed and uses the bathroom. Despite the fact that he was wide-awake a mere half-hour ago, John’s blinking back the grogginess now. The mattress proves warm where she vacated it, coated with her scent, and John moves in on the territory with a possessiveness that has nothing to do with the fact that this is technically his side of the bed anyway.
He stretches out lazily on his stomach, with his head basically face-planted into her pillow. The sounds of water running and Elizabeth moving about his place register vaguely, but it’s so familiar that it lulls him even further into sleep. But when the mattress dips and he feels the weight of her legs straddling the back of his thighs, John’s lips curl faintly into a smirk of anticipation.
She really likes to wake him up.
“John,” she breathes in amused voice, “I know you’re up.”
Not yet, but he'll get there.
He mumbles something incoherent - even he doesn’t know what. When she presses a kiss to the nape of his neck, dragging her hand across his scalp, she knows what that does to him. He knows that she knows it, because it’s his weakness - one of many. Elizabeth scrubs her fingers up and back down the spikes of his hair, playing a little with the short strands that rest at the base of his neck. The touch is soft and electric, and John’s almost wants to hate being manipulated so easily.
“John,” she whispers into his ear, bent over his form, “If you turn around, I’ll make it worth your wile.”
He grunts, because there’s interest, but honestly there’s more interests in what she’ll do if he doesn’t turn around. Elizabeth is sexy as hell when she sets her mind to something.
Elizabeth pulls back and there’s the sound of clothes rustling before he spies her black tee crumble on the ground nearby. Apparently, Elizabeth is naked behind him, straddling his thighs. John’s eyes peek open, but all he can see is the pillow and the side of the bed, and the idea of naked Elizabeth is almost enough for him to rethink this whole thing of having-her-seduce-him thing.
Naked Elizabeth is usually enough measures of seduction for him. More than enough.
Before he can act, her teeth scrap against the side of his neck, moving down over his shoulder blade, and the sensation makes him shudder. Her fingernails glide across his back, sharp pressure points that are just right, just heavy enough, to leave John groaning.
She moves down to his boxers, palming the waistband and tugging down. John has to turn over now, but it’s more for the chance to look at Elizabeth than to really help with the maneuver of undressing him. She tugs the material fully free and he idly - almost lazily - tucks his hands behind his head and peers up at her.
“We have to hurry,” she says. “A meeting at ten, two debriefs and I want to be there for the diagnostic tests on the desalination tanks all before noon.”
He almost groans. “You've gotta stop scheduling these things for the weekend.”
“This isn't so bad,” she defends herself. “We don’t have to go in until ten.”
“Normal people don’t work on a Sunday.”
“Since when are we normal?” Elizabeth argues, then wastes no time as she bends over, starting with his throat with a slight bite.
"Hey," he mutters. "How am I ever supposed to win an argument like this? You're fighting dirty."
She latches on, sucking hard enough to leave a mark and John fights a moan. They haven’t done this too many times - not since that time he’d marked Elizabeth so blatantly with a hickey that she’d had to wear a turtleneck in the dead of summer for three days straight. She uses the novelty to her advantage now, leaning over him with her fingers curled around the bedpost for support.
He fights for self-control, when every impulse in his body has already declared unqualified defeat to Elizabeth’s seductions. It’s a little pathetic that she’s been working on him for less than a few minutes and his willpower is already circling the drain, but he can’t really focus on that when Elizabeth is using her mouth so … expertly.
She pulls back, smirking, and the only way to wipe that smug, knowing look off her face is to kiss her. So he does, avidly. He stretches up, fingers clenching around her hair and tugs her down for the type of kiss he knows does her in every time. She responds with that sound in the back of her throat - that specific one that often worms its way into his daydreams in the middle of those never-ending debriefs. He tugs her to the side and under him.
They maneuver around each other familiarly, easily. Give and take - that’s always them.
The thing about Elizabeth - the thing that keeps them anchored together despite all the ways this relationship could spell disaster - is that she fits. The adage of opposites attract has never been more plainly obvious to him, but despite the superficial contrasts, the truth is, he has more in common with Elizabeth than they have differences. They disagree about a lot of things - a lot of things - but they always end up on the same square. The same position. The same mindset.
She knows what he’s thinking almost before he does.
Up and over, she turns. On her hands and knees, he watches as she anticipates his desires without any words needed. He anchors her by sliding hands up her sides, pressing fingers into her hips until they indent white pressure marks. Her backside pushes back against him, and desire flares harshly as Elizabeth moves just so - body aligned - and spots of colors dance before his eyes as he slams them shut.
“Fast,” she reminds him in a breathless whisper. “Got a busy morning.”
He almost pouts. “Fast?”
“You like everything fast,” she accuses cheekily, and mostly she’s right.
“There’s exceptions to every rule,” he argues, dropping his voice into that tone that he only reserves for her, when they’re like this, “and I happen to like certain things slow.”
He drops his head forward, pushing aside tangled curls to kiss the nape of her neck. His fingers glide - up and down, up and down - across her hips. He slides a hand down between her thighs, forcing her into broken sobs with well-familiar moves. He rubs against her with deliberate slow strokes.
“See?” he teases, low in his voice. “Slow.”
“John,” she protests, half broken. “God, I’m… can’t. I… need-”
“Shh,” he soothes her down. “Shh, baby.”
Except her fingers soon glide down to join his, and together he guides a digit inside, then two. The scent of her covers the air, and John holds her body against his as she works up an orgasm and then breaks apart under it, shuddering.
“Fuck,” he breathes, because verbal faculty is always the first thing to go out the window for him. It’s just as well, because Christ knows what he’d say - what he’d admit - if he ever said anything real during sex. Though, sometimes he wonders if bedtime confessions will be the only way they’ll ever actually talk about their feelings.
Damn if they both don’t excel at bottling up and repressing.
He works against her, pushing into her from behind, and soon the rhythm between them is agonizingly right. He plants his hands on her hips, guiding their movements as harsh breathing hangs heavy in the air. Sweat breaks out across her body - over his own - and he can see every freckle, every inch, and every small indent on her body with the crisp morning daylight streaming into their room. It affords him the opportunity to study her, memorize her dips and curves, the heavy swell of lust and affection making her the perfect specimen of the female body.
It’s more than just sex, though. The thick undercurrent of emotion is undeniable.
She reaches her peak with his name on her lips, the choked voice almost too soft for him to hear. He thrusts into her a few more times before he comes, suddenly spent and body draped over hers. There's a moment afterwards - nothing more than a few seconds of silence and stillness where they catch their breath - but John thinks he's beginning to like this part almost more than any other.
He knows what this is; what this relationship is becoming. He... thinks that she knows it, too. (For everything he knows about this woman, he's never remotely understood why she let him into her life, much less her bed. It's probably that whole self-deprecation thing, but he doesn't particularly think he's being thick-headed when he says she could do so much better.)
He cradles her in his arms as they reposition alongside each other on the mattress. She stretches a little, wincing as her knees pop and John soothes her down with mindless murmured words. Elizabeth takes a moment to slant a look back at him, and something must be written on his face because she stills. Though her face still flushed with the haze of post-coital bliss, her eyes grow serious and she lifts an eyebrow.
“What?” she asks, bewildered and still slightly breathless.
For a moment, he almost says it. Almost admits it. That four-letter word that begins with “L” and - usually for him - ends with pain. Previous relationships have never gone well after he’s said those words. Some of those times he hadn’t even meant them. But it’s been John’s experience that once the words are out, it’s a whole new ballgame. This… thing he has with Elizabeth is too important to risk like that. He can’t screw it up.
But the words are so deafening in his head that he swears he can actually hear himself say it aloud. Instead, he swallows something in the back of his throat - something that feels too much like cowardice for man that isn’t afraid of much.
“C’mon,” she breathes, restless in his arms as they spoon together. “We should get up now.”
Instead of letting her go, he just tugs her closer. He tucks his chin against her shoulder, and breathes in her scent, and after a while Elizabeth relaxes into his arms. It isn't a complete surrender; he knows in a few moments she's gonna start protesting again. Still, he'll press his advantage while he's got it.
He knows not admitting things isn’t the same thing as not owning up to them. Chances are Elizabeth can already read this... thing like an open book just like she can read everything else about him. If she can tell when he’s ticked off about something with just a casual glance in his direction, then of course she would be able to pick up on his intentions and affections, right? That would be a neon sign to her.
Besides, he may not say much, but he’s always been a man of action anyway. In this case, it's just infinite little actions that give him away.
“In a while,” he mumbles, and pulls her tighter against his chest.
--
fin
Author: ed_84
Pairing: Sheppard/Weir
Summary: The mattress proves warm where she vacated it, coated with her scent, and John moves in on the territory with a possessiveness that has nothing to do with the fact that this is technically his side of the bed anyway.
Warnings: R, sexual situations. PWP.
Spoilers: none.
Author's note: Weeks back, I took prompts from my flist for fic. I have since lost those prompts, but I'm fairly sure this fic fits one of them. I just don't remember which one, or which one of my flisters gave it to me. Whoops? Anyway, this story is born out of several conversations I've had about why John Sheppard is not the type to ever say "I love you." Ever. (Um, sorry IR! I know you can't read smut right now. Forgive me for the timing!)
He’s been half awake since seven, but it’s technically the weekend and John knows better than to roll out of bed when they have the opportunity of sleeping in. Elizabeth is tucked against him fast asleep, curled up along his back with a leg thrown haphazardly over his. The warmth of her breath is a steady exhale against his neck, and her hand is an equally heavy presence across his back.
They rarely get to do this - just sleep in. Ever since they landed in the Pegasus, he doesn’t think he’s ever seen her take a day off. Seven days a week - weekends be damned - but since they started sharing a bed, there’s been a few occasions where he’s convinced her to stay in as late as nine. Sometimes even ten.
A glance at his digital alarm tells him its 0730, and just like clockwork, nature calls. Elizabeth mumbles in heavy protest when he starts to pull away, but she never stirs awake when he finally extracts himself from their tangled limbs. It’s a delicate process, especially without rousing her, but John thinks he’s finally getting the hang of it after all these months.
He uses the toilet and then drops the lid back down because - God help him - Elizabeth’s actually trained him well on that point. When he peeks his head out of the bathroom briefly, spying to see if he woke her up with all the noise, he finds no worries. She’s still fast asleep, and he’s immediately sidetracked by her black tee nightshirt (his own that she’d stolen weeks back). It’s ridden up her torso to expose a tantalizing strip of skin, pink panties and toned naked legs that stretch onwards for what seems like miles.
He grins wolfishly, but Elizabeth is still fast asleep so he steps back into the bathroom and rummages through the medicine cabinet. Halfway through digging passed some hand cream, a box of tampons and two bottles of Midol, he starts wondering exactly when Elizabeth moved her feminine products into his space. This may be his quarters, but it’s turned as much hers as it is his. He switched to a full-size bed to accommodate her; her clothes cover nearly half his closet; her paperwork is resting on the corner nightstand. Despite the fact that Elizabeth’s room is bigger and has the better view, he’s not quite sure why they always invariably end up back in his cramped little room that’s barely big enough for one grown man.
It’s one of those mysterious of their relationship - the ones they don’t analyze too much because in the beginning this had supposedly been about sex and comfort, and now it’s evolved into so much more. Of course, they still can’t verbalize any of it. He sucks at talking about things, and Elizabeth - thank god - doesn’t press him on those issues. He thinks that’s probably because she just understands him so well. Freakishly well.
By the time he reemerges back into his bedroom, Elizabeth’s completely claimed his side of the bed for herself. John scratches idly behind his ear, studying her astutely while planning his next move. He could wake her up… but several reasons pop into his mind that immediately stop him from going down that track.
One - she’s too damn adorable like this for him to risk waking her. He’d never admit it out loud, but he can count on one hand the number of women he’s ever watched sleep. Elizabeth’s the only one of them that’s ever really mattered.
Two - she needs the sleep. The city can survive in their absence without self-imploding for a few more hours. Hopefully. Besides, there’s a running bet on how late in the morning Dr. Weir will ever risk walking into the Control Room. A smart man lays his money on no later than 10:30; John has twenty bucks down on eleven, and he plans on collecting it one day.
And last but not least, three - one of the things he’s learned about Elizabeth over the many months they’ve been sleeping together is that her favorite thing to do in the morning is to wake him up - not the other way around.
And who is he to argue with the woman’s preferences?
He rounds the mattress, dropping heavily onto the left side of the bed so he can spoon against her back. They’ve switched places - him on her side and her on his. Seconds lull into minutes, and with her steady heartbeat near his, John closes his eyes and he thinks that - maybe - he falls asleep at some point. He can’t really tell. He’s on the edge of that moment of slumber, the cusp of it tugging against his consciousness, when the mattress dips slightly and Elizabeth stirs awake.
He nestles against her warmth, getting a whiff of that familiar fragrance of her shampoo, before stretching alongside her.
“John,” she whispers. “Move for a sec, John.”
It’s his turn to mumble in protest when she pulls free of their bed and uses the bathroom. Despite the fact that he was wide-awake a mere half-hour ago, John’s blinking back the grogginess now. The mattress proves warm where she vacated it, coated with her scent, and John moves in on the territory with a possessiveness that has nothing to do with the fact that this is technically his side of the bed anyway.
He stretches out lazily on his stomach, with his head basically face-planted into her pillow. The sounds of water running and Elizabeth moving about his place register vaguely, but it’s so familiar that it lulls him even further into sleep. But when the mattress dips and he feels the weight of her legs straddling the back of his thighs, John’s lips curl faintly into a smirk of anticipation.
She really likes to wake him up.
“John,” she breathes in amused voice, “I know you’re up.”
Not yet, but he'll get there.
He mumbles something incoherent - even he doesn’t know what. When she presses a kiss to the nape of his neck, dragging her hand across his scalp, she knows what that does to him. He knows that she knows it, because it’s his weakness - one of many. Elizabeth scrubs her fingers up and back down the spikes of his hair, playing a little with the short strands that rest at the base of his neck. The touch is soft and electric, and John’s almost wants to hate being manipulated so easily.
“John,” she whispers into his ear, bent over his form, “If you turn around, I’ll make it worth your wile.”
He grunts, because there’s interest, but honestly there’s more interests in what she’ll do if he doesn’t turn around. Elizabeth is sexy as hell when she sets her mind to something.
Elizabeth pulls back and there’s the sound of clothes rustling before he spies her black tee crumble on the ground nearby. Apparently, Elizabeth is naked behind him, straddling his thighs. John’s eyes peek open, but all he can see is the pillow and the side of the bed, and the idea of naked Elizabeth is almost enough for him to rethink this whole thing of having-her-seduce-him thing.
Naked Elizabeth is usually enough measures of seduction for him. More than enough.
Before he can act, her teeth scrap against the side of his neck, moving down over his shoulder blade, and the sensation makes him shudder. Her fingernails glide across his back, sharp pressure points that are just right, just heavy enough, to leave John groaning.
She moves down to his boxers, palming the waistband and tugging down. John has to turn over now, but it’s more for the chance to look at Elizabeth than to really help with the maneuver of undressing him. She tugs the material fully free and he idly - almost lazily - tucks his hands behind his head and peers up at her.
“We have to hurry,” she says. “A meeting at ten, two debriefs and I want to be there for the diagnostic tests on the desalination tanks all before noon.”
He almost groans. “You've gotta stop scheduling these things for the weekend.”
“This isn't so bad,” she defends herself. “We don’t have to go in until ten.”
“Normal people don’t work on a Sunday.”
“Since when are we normal?” Elizabeth argues, then wastes no time as she bends over, starting with his throat with a slight bite.
"Hey," he mutters. "How am I ever supposed to win an argument like this? You're fighting dirty."
She latches on, sucking hard enough to leave a mark and John fights a moan. They haven’t done this too many times - not since that time he’d marked Elizabeth so blatantly with a hickey that she’d had to wear a turtleneck in the dead of summer for three days straight. She uses the novelty to her advantage now, leaning over him with her fingers curled around the bedpost for support.
He fights for self-control, when every impulse in his body has already declared unqualified defeat to Elizabeth’s seductions. It’s a little pathetic that she’s been working on him for less than a few minutes and his willpower is already circling the drain, but he can’t really focus on that when Elizabeth is using her mouth so … expertly.
She pulls back, smirking, and the only way to wipe that smug, knowing look off her face is to kiss her. So he does, avidly. He stretches up, fingers clenching around her hair and tugs her down for the type of kiss he knows does her in every time. She responds with that sound in the back of her throat - that specific one that often worms its way into his daydreams in the middle of those never-ending debriefs. He tugs her to the side and under him.
They maneuver around each other familiarly, easily. Give and take - that’s always them.
The thing about Elizabeth - the thing that keeps them anchored together despite all the ways this relationship could spell disaster - is that she fits. The adage of opposites attract has never been more plainly obvious to him, but despite the superficial contrasts, the truth is, he has more in common with Elizabeth than they have differences. They disagree about a lot of things - a lot of things - but they always end up on the same square. The same position. The same mindset.
She knows what he’s thinking almost before he does.
Up and over, she turns. On her hands and knees, he watches as she anticipates his desires without any words needed. He anchors her by sliding hands up her sides, pressing fingers into her hips until they indent white pressure marks. Her backside pushes back against him, and desire flares harshly as Elizabeth moves just so - body aligned - and spots of colors dance before his eyes as he slams them shut.
“Fast,” she reminds him in a breathless whisper. “Got a busy morning.”
He almost pouts. “Fast?”
“You like everything fast,” she accuses cheekily, and mostly she’s right.
“There’s exceptions to every rule,” he argues, dropping his voice into that tone that he only reserves for her, when they’re like this, “and I happen to like certain things slow.”
He drops his head forward, pushing aside tangled curls to kiss the nape of her neck. His fingers glide - up and down, up and down - across her hips. He slides a hand down between her thighs, forcing her into broken sobs with well-familiar moves. He rubs against her with deliberate slow strokes.
“See?” he teases, low in his voice. “Slow.”
“John,” she protests, half broken. “God, I’m… can’t. I… need-”
“Shh,” he soothes her down. “Shh, baby.”
Except her fingers soon glide down to join his, and together he guides a digit inside, then two. The scent of her covers the air, and John holds her body against his as she works up an orgasm and then breaks apart under it, shuddering.
“Fuck,” he breathes, because verbal faculty is always the first thing to go out the window for him. It’s just as well, because Christ knows what he’d say - what he’d admit - if he ever said anything real during sex. Though, sometimes he wonders if bedtime confessions will be the only way they’ll ever actually talk about their feelings.
Damn if they both don’t excel at bottling up and repressing.
He works against her, pushing into her from behind, and soon the rhythm between them is agonizingly right. He plants his hands on her hips, guiding their movements as harsh breathing hangs heavy in the air. Sweat breaks out across her body - over his own - and he can see every freckle, every inch, and every small indent on her body with the crisp morning daylight streaming into their room. It affords him the opportunity to study her, memorize her dips and curves, the heavy swell of lust and affection making her the perfect specimen of the female body.
It’s more than just sex, though. The thick undercurrent of emotion is undeniable.
She reaches her peak with his name on her lips, the choked voice almost too soft for him to hear. He thrusts into her a few more times before he comes, suddenly spent and body draped over hers. There's a moment afterwards - nothing more than a few seconds of silence and stillness where they catch their breath - but John thinks he's beginning to like this part almost more than any other.
He knows what this is; what this relationship is becoming. He... thinks that she knows it, too. (For everything he knows about this woman, he's never remotely understood why she let him into her life, much less her bed. It's probably that whole self-deprecation thing, but he doesn't particularly think he's being thick-headed when he says she could do so much better.)
He cradles her in his arms as they reposition alongside each other on the mattress. She stretches a little, wincing as her knees pop and John soothes her down with mindless murmured words. Elizabeth takes a moment to slant a look back at him, and something must be written on his face because she stills. Though her face still flushed with the haze of post-coital bliss, her eyes grow serious and she lifts an eyebrow.
“What?” she asks, bewildered and still slightly breathless.
For a moment, he almost says it. Almost admits it. That four-letter word that begins with “L” and - usually for him - ends with pain. Previous relationships have never gone well after he’s said those words. Some of those times he hadn’t even meant them. But it’s been John’s experience that once the words are out, it’s a whole new ballgame. This… thing he has with Elizabeth is too important to risk like that. He can’t screw it up.
But the words are so deafening in his head that he swears he can actually hear himself say it aloud. Instead, he swallows something in the back of his throat - something that feels too much like cowardice for man that isn’t afraid of much.
“C’mon,” she breathes, restless in his arms as they spoon together. “We should get up now.”
Instead of letting her go, he just tugs her closer. He tucks his chin against her shoulder, and breathes in her scent, and after a while Elizabeth relaxes into his arms. It isn't a complete surrender; he knows in a few moments she's gonna start protesting again. Still, he'll press his advantage while he's got it.
He knows not admitting things isn’t the same thing as not owning up to them. Chances are Elizabeth can already read this... thing like an open book just like she can read everything else about him. If she can tell when he’s ticked off about something with just a casual glance in his direction, then of course she would be able to pick up on his intentions and affections, right? That would be a neon sign to her.
Besides, he may not say much, but he’s always been a man of action anyway. In this case, it's just infinite little actions that give him away.
“In a while,” he mumbles, and pulls her tighter against his chest.
--
fin