Shiver-2/2
Author: BlueSuede
Title: Shiver
Rating: NC17
Genre: Romance/Angst
Universe: Arrow
Pairings/Characters: Oliver/Felicity
Summary: Trapped in hazardous conditions, Felicity and Oliver have to find a way to keep warm, but unfortunately cross the boundaries of their friendship to do so.
Warnings: smut, screw or die trope
Read Part I Here.
-2-
"Digg! I think I found them!"
"It's not another deer, is it?" Digg's voice was eager but full of worry.
"I don't think so! It's bigger! Yeah, look! Up there! That's gotta be Oliver's parachute!"
Something was gnawing at the back of Oliver's brain, trying to wake him up, like a mosquito bite that wouldn't stop itching. He wished Roy and Diggle would shut up.
His eyes flew open. Roy and Diggle. "Felicity," he murmured, finding speech difficult. His whole body was aching and stiff, and although it was nothing to last night, the morning air beneath their haphazard shelter was cold against his back. "Felicity," he repeated and he heard her groan, burrowing deeper into him, obviously not eager to lift her face from the warmth of his chest.
"How did they get up there?" Diggle was saying. The snow must have drifted in the night, making the climb appear more difficult.
"FELICITY! OLIVER!" Roy cupped his hands around his mouth, praying for a response.
"Felicity," Oliver shook her gently. "Can you get up?"
"I…think so…" Felicity said numbly, her voice raw.
Slowly, muscles creaking in protest, she started to push away from Oliver, who felt a sudden pang in his chest, feeling the gap between them acutely. Their eyes met for a brief instant before hers flickered away and he saw her skin flush pink with embarrassment.
"FELICITY!" Digg was the one shouting up to them this time. "OLIVER?" He looked to Roy. "They might be hurt. If I give you a boost do you think you can make it up there?"
"No problem.
Oliver cupped Felicity's cheek in his hand, but she didn't lean into it the way he expected. Instead she looked flighty and nervous. "Hey," he said. "It's okay."
She nodded, biting her lip before managing to stand. He draped her coat around her shoulders and pulled on his own before tugging at one of the arrows in the rock wall to loosen the parachute. Following his lead, Felicity grabbed the other, cringing when the parachute slackened and she felt the snow it had been supporting hit her back through the material. She dropped it like she'd been bitten, wrapping her coat around her.
"It's them!" Roy shouted from below, nearly toppling off of Diggle's shoulders.
Felicity waved timidly down to them. "Hi," she squeaked out roughly. God, it felt like she would need about a year's worth of tea to bring her voice back.
"Can you guys get down from there?" Diggle grunted. "Or do you need Roy to come get you?"
Oliver waved him off, signaling that they could make it down. He coughed and cleared his throat before attempting speech. "I'm-" he coughed again, "I'm gonna come down. Then Felicity," he added looking to her to make sure she was okay with this plan. She nodded mutely.
He pressed a swift kiss to her forehead but didn't wait to see her reaction before slowly lowering himself down, groaning with the effort from his frozen, protesting muscles.
Felicity watched him vanish, the spot on her forehead tingling where his lips had touched it. This…this was going to be all kinds of complicated. Or was it going to be a relatively simple matter of pretending it had never happened? And which one of those made her more upset, she wondered warily.
"Okay, Felicity!" Roy called up to her, and she leaned over the edge to see that Oliver had landed and was waiting to help-pointlessly, given that both Roy and Diggle were in far better condition to assist her.
She slipped her arms into the sleeves of her coat, testing her jeans briefly, but, seeing that the bottom six inches were frozen stiff, she gave them up. Clumsily, she tugged her boots on-which felt equally frozen-and began lowering herself down, cringing as she felt cold rock and ice cutting into her hands.
As she neared the bottom, she felt familiar hands grasp her hips, and an instant later, she was altogether too close to Oliver, pressed against his chest when she dropped to the ground and lost her balance slightly, and she forgot how to breathe.
"Thank God," Diggle muttered beside them, everyone pretending not to notice the way Oliver was looking at her. "Let's get you two home. There's blankets in the chopper."
Felicity groaned longingly and dropped her head against Oliver's shoulder, who, without asking, swept her up into his arms and looked to Diggle and Roy expectantly, waiting to follow their lead.
"Uh…right," Roy said, "this way," he jerked his thumb behind his back.
Oliver nodded and they all followed Roy, who, Oliver noticed, was wearing a pair of goggles with red lenses pushed onto his forehead. Diggle had them, too.
"Is that how you found us?" he asked Digg as they trudged along, his bones growing more weary with each step. "Heat vision?"
Diggle eyed him, part of him inclined to take Felicity from Oliver's arms to prevent him from collapsing, but he refrained. Something told him that Oliver would refuse to let go of her. She appeared to have fallen asleep in his arms from exhaustion. "Yeah," he said, "Got 'em from Lyla. They worked like a charm…minus the part where we confused you for a couple of dear and a small, hibernating bear before we finally found your parachute. Smart move using that for shelter, by the way."
Oliver nodded.
"I'm just glad neither of you were injured," Roy pointed out as the helicopter came into sight. "And…y'know…not dead. That was some fall blondie took." He shook his head.
Oliver's eyes widened as the memory of Felicity's body tumbling out of the helicopter-the look of stunned horror in her expression-flooded back to him, and he briefly lost all the oxygen in his lungs, face pale. He'd been so close, so close to losing her, and this was the first moment he'd actually thought about it. At the time, he had reacted on instinct, knowing that whatever happened, she was never going to die because she'd gotten involved with him. That was something he thought on a regular basis. He would never forget telling Diggle the day they brought Felicity on board, "We can protect her." He'd taken an oath that day, he realized, that when Felicity died, it would be comfortably of old age, years and years from now. It would not be because of him. So last night, it had been as natural as breathing to grab that parachute and fling himself out of the helicopter after her.
Whatever else happened, whatever battles they won and lost, he knew one thing: Felicity lived.
"Oliver…man, let me take her, okay?" Diggle said finally as they reached the helicopter.
Oliver blinked, taking a moment to understand that Diggle was trying to help pass Felicity's sleeping form to Roy in the helicopter. "Right," Oliver muttered, feeling the instant relief in his muscles as Diggle shifted her weight away from him and they dropped to his sides. His muscles might be relieved, but he didn't like having her away from him at the moment. He watched with hawklike eyes as Diggle passed her body to Roy, who situated her in the copilot's seat, throwing blankets over her. She stirred, the commotion waking her, and Oliver saw Roy smile at her, muttering something. The faint sound of her weak laughter reached his ears, and Roy's grin broadened, and he bumped his forehead against hers affectionately. He felt a swift stab of jealousy that the two of them had such a comfortable relationship.
"Oliver."
Again Oliver blinked, realizing that Diggle had already climbed aboard, and was reaching a hand out for him. Grasping it, he accepted his friend's help, hauling himself into the helicopter and gladly accepting more of the wool blankets as he wearily settled himself into a corner, his eyes trained on Felicity the entire time.
And so the four of them returned to Starling City, Diggle updating them on the success of the mission, how Felicity's information had gone through right before her fall, and the appropriate authorities were already taking action, all thanks to the four of them.
Oliver listened with one ear, his mind still replaying the events of the previous night over and over again. Felicity falling. His jump. Snatching her body from the maws of death in midair. Reaching the ground. Tramping through the snow. Covering them with the parachute. Kissing her. Touching her…
Oliver swallowed tightly, wondering where they should go from here.
The trouble was, he wasn't sure what to do. His feelings about being with her-that it wasn't safe for her-hadn't changed, but now that they'd crossed that line, whatever the circumstances, he was having a lot more trouble convincing himself to stay away.
Felicity took a very deep breath, settling into her chair at the office. It was their first day back at work, and she had carefully avoided Oliver ever since they arrived back in Starling and she insisted Roy take her home because he was heading that direction anyway.
She was exhausted from the whole experience, both physically and emotionally, and worse still, she couldn't stop reliving the night before with Oliver, his lips against hers, his tongue on her breasts, his hands…
"Shit," she cursed quietly, licking her lips. This was going to be a very long day.
And it was. It was full of accidentally bumping into him, of embarrassment at being caught watching each other, of unnecessary apologies, and of uncontrollable thoughts of all the places they'd recently held one another.
Business itself, however, was business as usual, and they both worked late into the evening, Felicity helping Oliver catch up on the details that had piled up in their absence. Long after everyone else had left for the day, she and Oliver were sorting through papers and e-mails and graphs, trying to figure out how things always got so out of control. Felicity was leaning over a spreadsheet at Oliver's side while he sat at his desk, her hand resting on the desktop for support, keeping a careful distance from him when something happened. His hand came to rest beside hers, pinky finger just barely resting on top of hers, enough to tell her it was deliberate. But then, as far as Felicity knew, Oliver never touched her in a way that wasn't deliberate. She froze, pausing mid-sentence.
"Felicity…can we talk?"
Pulling her hand away, Felicity started stacking the papers in front of them, obviously deciding they weren't going to get any more work done. "There's nothing to talk about, Oliver," she said, collecting them and heading for the door.
"I think we both know that's not true. You can't even look me in the eye."
Defiantly, Felicity, stopped, turning to fix a look on him. He was right, though. She couldn't hold it, and immediately looked up at the ceiling. "Look, I'm sorry. I'm acting all weird," she closed her eyes. "It's just…weird. I know you've noticed even if you are really, really good at pretending you haven't, but there's always kind of been this…thing…between us, and it really didn't help that time last year that you had to tell me you loved me to trick Slade. Not because I don't know that you were pretending, but because it's hard to un-hear something, y'know? Well this is like that. I couldn't look you in the eyes for a week then, either. It's gonna take a while for things to go back to normal. I mean, I get it, don't worry. It wasn't emotional. It was just…what it was."
But Oliver was shaking his head, crossing the room to her. He didn't know what he planned to say, but he gently reached out for her arm. He himself had assumed that he was going to say something to her, not lay one on her, so he was as surprised as she was when he pulled her into him, leaned in, and kissed her. It was the second time now that he'd kissed her without thinking about it. He wondered vaguely whether it was going to be a habit.
Felicity made a noise of surprise as her hands flew to his chest, but she didn't pull away, so he cupped her face in his hand and deepened the kiss, part of him thinking vehemently, How's this for 'It wasn't emotional?'
He slowly drew back, sucking on her bottom lip lingeringly as he went, then kissing her again, once, twice, finally resting his forehead against hers. "Felicity," he said, now that he had her full attention and had successfully stopped her distressed speech. "It was emotional. There were lots of emotions. Most of them being that I love you-" she exhaled in shock, "-and I felt like I was crossing a line with you, which is why I felt guilty and we didn't talk about it." He searched her eyes, hoping for a response, but she just looked stunned. "Felicity, I just didn't want to hurt you. But I don't think I can keep doing this."
"Doing what?"
"Staying away from you."
Felicity wasn't sure how to react. There was an embittered voice in her head that couldn't help wanting to ask whether there were cameras in the room or a syringe in his hand that she should be aware of.
Seeing her hesitation, Oliver stroked her cheek with his thumb. "What do you need to hear? What do I have to say to you?"
"I don't know, Oliver," she said tiredly, looking away. "Try wanting to be with me sometime when our lives aren't on the line."
She didn't see it, the tiny twitch at the corner of his mouth that always happened when she made him want to smile. He leaned in to whisper in her ear. "I thought that's what I was doing." The brush of his lips against her ear sent a shiver down her spine and her mouth parted in surprise. Her hands, still resting on his chest, tensed, gripping his shirt. "Look outside," he said softly, his lips trailing down her throat. "The city isn't crumbling. The sun is setting just like any other day. We're not in danger, not freezing to death…or anything else that could only happen to us," he chuckled, brushing a soft kiss against her collar bone, so nicely exposed by the neckline of her dress. "And I still want a million things with you, starting with kissing you again, followed by taking you against the wall of this office and any other suitable surface we can find in here." She gasped at his words and involuntarily pressed closer to him. "And ending with taking you home every night and making love to you. Because I do. Love you," he added, pausing his path to her shoulder and looking up to make sure she'd understood.
She was looking at him with an unreadable expression, her lips pressed together firmly.
"What?" he prompted, but she shook her head. He kissed her lips pliantly, trying to will it out of her, needing some sort of answer. "What?" he repeated, the corners of his mouth tugging upward slightly when she moaned a little.
"If I start talking," she said breathlessly, "I'll start babbling, and you were doing so well, I don't want to ruin it."
Oliver smiled. That was his girl. In a moment, he had her pressed against the glass wall behind her, hands traveling over her body, prepared to make good on all the things he'd just finally admitted he wanted. "Felicity," he commented, "I love it when you babble."
Title: Shiver
Rating: NC17
Genre: Romance/Angst
Universe: Arrow
Pairings/Characters: Oliver/Felicity
Summary: Trapped in hazardous conditions, Felicity and Oliver have to find a way to keep warm, but unfortunately cross the boundaries of their friendship to do so.
Warnings: smut, screw or die trope
Read Part I Here.
-2-
"Digg! I think I found them!"
"It's not another deer, is it?" Digg's voice was eager but full of worry.
"I don't think so! It's bigger! Yeah, look! Up there! That's gotta be Oliver's parachute!"
Something was gnawing at the back of Oliver's brain, trying to wake him up, like a mosquito bite that wouldn't stop itching. He wished Roy and Diggle would shut up.
His eyes flew open. Roy and Diggle. "Felicity," he murmured, finding speech difficult. His whole body was aching and stiff, and although it was nothing to last night, the morning air beneath their haphazard shelter was cold against his back. "Felicity," he repeated and he heard her groan, burrowing deeper into him, obviously not eager to lift her face from the warmth of his chest.
"How did they get up there?" Diggle was saying. The snow must have drifted in the night, making the climb appear more difficult.
"FELICITY! OLIVER!" Roy cupped his hands around his mouth, praying for a response.
"Felicity," Oliver shook her gently. "Can you get up?"
"I…think so…" Felicity said numbly, her voice raw.
Slowly, muscles creaking in protest, she started to push away from Oliver, who felt a sudden pang in his chest, feeling the gap between them acutely. Their eyes met for a brief instant before hers flickered away and he saw her skin flush pink with embarrassment.
"FELICITY!" Digg was the one shouting up to them this time. "OLIVER?" He looked to Roy. "They might be hurt. If I give you a boost do you think you can make it up there?"
"No problem.
Oliver cupped Felicity's cheek in his hand, but she didn't lean into it the way he expected. Instead she looked flighty and nervous. "Hey," he said. "It's okay."
She nodded, biting her lip before managing to stand. He draped her coat around her shoulders and pulled on his own before tugging at one of the arrows in the rock wall to loosen the parachute. Following his lead, Felicity grabbed the other, cringing when the parachute slackened and she felt the snow it had been supporting hit her back through the material. She dropped it like she'd been bitten, wrapping her coat around her.
"It's them!" Roy shouted from below, nearly toppling off of Diggle's shoulders.
Felicity waved timidly down to them. "Hi," she squeaked out roughly. God, it felt like she would need about a year's worth of tea to bring her voice back.
"Can you guys get down from there?" Diggle grunted. "Or do you need Roy to come get you?"
Oliver waved him off, signaling that they could make it down. He coughed and cleared his throat before attempting speech. "I'm-" he coughed again, "I'm gonna come down. Then Felicity," he added looking to her to make sure she was okay with this plan. She nodded mutely.
He pressed a swift kiss to her forehead but didn't wait to see her reaction before slowly lowering himself down, groaning with the effort from his frozen, protesting muscles.
Felicity watched him vanish, the spot on her forehead tingling where his lips had touched it. This…this was going to be all kinds of complicated. Or was it going to be a relatively simple matter of pretending it had never happened? And which one of those made her more upset, she wondered warily.
"Okay, Felicity!" Roy called up to her, and she leaned over the edge to see that Oliver had landed and was waiting to help-pointlessly, given that both Roy and Diggle were in far better condition to assist her.
She slipped her arms into the sleeves of her coat, testing her jeans briefly, but, seeing that the bottom six inches were frozen stiff, she gave them up. Clumsily, she tugged her boots on-which felt equally frozen-and began lowering herself down, cringing as she felt cold rock and ice cutting into her hands.
As she neared the bottom, she felt familiar hands grasp her hips, and an instant later, she was altogether too close to Oliver, pressed against his chest when she dropped to the ground and lost her balance slightly, and she forgot how to breathe.
"Thank God," Diggle muttered beside them, everyone pretending not to notice the way Oliver was looking at her. "Let's get you two home. There's blankets in the chopper."
Felicity groaned longingly and dropped her head against Oliver's shoulder, who, without asking, swept her up into his arms and looked to Diggle and Roy expectantly, waiting to follow their lead.
"Uh…right," Roy said, "this way," he jerked his thumb behind his back.
Oliver nodded and they all followed Roy, who, Oliver noticed, was wearing a pair of goggles with red lenses pushed onto his forehead. Diggle had them, too.
"Is that how you found us?" he asked Digg as they trudged along, his bones growing more weary with each step. "Heat vision?"
Diggle eyed him, part of him inclined to take Felicity from Oliver's arms to prevent him from collapsing, but he refrained. Something told him that Oliver would refuse to let go of her. She appeared to have fallen asleep in his arms from exhaustion. "Yeah," he said, "Got 'em from Lyla. They worked like a charm…minus the part where we confused you for a couple of dear and a small, hibernating bear before we finally found your parachute. Smart move using that for shelter, by the way."
Oliver nodded.
"I'm just glad neither of you were injured," Roy pointed out as the helicopter came into sight. "And…y'know…not dead. That was some fall blondie took." He shook his head.
Oliver's eyes widened as the memory of Felicity's body tumbling out of the helicopter-the look of stunned horror in her expression-flooded back to him, and he briefly lost all the oxygen in his lungs, face pale. He'd been so close, so close to losing her, and this was the first moment he'd actually thought about it. At the time, he had reacted on instinct, knowing that whatever happened, she was never going to die because she'd gotten involved with him. That was something he thought on a regular basis. He would never forget telling Diggle the day they brought Felicity on board, "We can protect her." He'd taken an oath that day, he realized, that when Felicity died, it would be comfortably of old age, years and years from now. It would not be because of him. So last night, it had been as natural as breathing to grab that parachute and fling himself out of the helicopter after her.
Whatever else happened, whatever battles they won and lost, he knew one thing: Felicity lived.
"Oliver…man, let me take her, okay?" Diggle said finally as they reached the helicopter.
Oliver blinked, taking a moment to understand that Diggle was trying to help pass Felicity's sleeping form to Roy in the helicopter. "Right," Oliver muttered, feeling the instant relief in his muscles as Diggle shifted her weight away from him and they dropped to his sides. His muscles might be relieved, but he didn't like having her away from him at the moment. He watched with hawklike eyes as Diggle passed her body to Roy, who situated her in the copilot's seat, throwing blankets over her. She stirred, the commotion waking her, and Oliver saw Roy smile at her, muttering something. The faint sound of her weak laughter reached his ears, and Roy's grin broadened, and he bumped his forehead against hers affectionately. He felt a swift stab of jealousy that the two of them had such a comfortable relationship.
"Oliver."
Again Oliver blinked, realizing that Diggle had already climbed aboard, and was reaching a hand out for him. Grasping it, he accepted his friend's help, hauling himself into the helicopter and gladly accepting more of the wool blankets as he wearily settled himself into a corner, his eyes trained on Felicity the entire time.
And so the four of them returned to Starling City, Diggle updating them on the success of the mission, how Felicity's information had gone through right before her fall, and the appropriate authorities were already taking action, all thanks to the four of them.
Oliver listened with one ear, his mind still replaying the events of the previous night over and over again. Felicity falling. His jump. Snatching her body from the maws of death in midair. Reaching the ground. Tramping through the snow. Covering them with the parachute. Kissing her. Touching her…
Oliver swallowed tightly, wondering where they should go from here.
The trouble was, he wasn't sure what to do. His feelings about being with her-that it wasn't safe for her-hadn't changed, but now that they'd crossed that line, whatever the circumstances, he was having a lot more trouble convincing himself to stay away.
Felicity took a very deep breath, settling into her chair at the office. It was their first day back at work, and she had carefully avoided Oliver ever since they arrived back in Starling and she insisted Roy take her home because he was heading that direction anyway.
She was exhausted from the whole experience, both physically and emotionally, and worse still, she couldn't stop reliving the night before with Oliver, his lips against hers, his tongue on her breasts, his hands…
"Shit," she cursed quietly, licking her lips. This was going to be a very long day.
And it was. It was full of accidentally bumping into him, of embarrassment at being caught watching each other, of unnecessary apologies, and of uncontrollable thoughts of all the places they'd recently held one another.
Business itself, however, was business as usual, and they both worked late into the evening, Felicity helping Oliver catch up on the details that had piled up in their absence. Long after everyone else had left for the day, she and Oliver were sorting through papers and e-mails and graphs, trying to figure out how things always got so out of control. Felicity was leaning over a spreadsheet at Oliver's side while he sat at his desk, her hand resting on the desktop for support, keeping a careful distance from him when something happened. His hand came to rest beside hers, pinky finger just barely resting on top of hers, enough to tell her it was deliberate. But then, as far as Felicity knew, Oliver never touched her in a way that wasn't deliberate. She froze, pausing mid-sentence.
"Felicity…can we talk?"
Pulling her hand away, Felicity started stacking the papers in front of them, obviously deciding they weren't going to get any more work done. "There's nothing to talk about, Oliver," she said, collecting them and heading for the door.
"I think we both know that's not true. You can't even look me in the eye."
Defiantly, Felicity, stopped, turning to fix a look on him. He was right, though. She couldn't hold it, and immediately looked up at the ceiling. "Look, I'm sorry. I'm acting all weird," she closed her eyes. "It's just…weird. I know you've noticed even if you are really, really good at pretending you haven't, but there's always kind of been this…thing…between us, and it really didn't help that time last year that you had to tell me you loved me to trick Slade. Not because I don't know that you were pretending, but because it's hard to un-hear something, y'know? Well this is like that. I couldn't look you in the eyes for a week then, either. It's gonna take a while for things to go back to normal. I mean, I get it, don't worry. It wasn't emotional. It was just…what it was."
But Oliver was shaking his head, crossing the room to her. He didn't know what he planned to say, but he gently reached out for her arm. He himself had assumed that he was going to say something to her, not lay one on her, so he was as surprised as she was when he pulled her into him, leaned in, and kissed her. It was the second time now that he'd kissed her without thinking about it. He wondered vaguely whether it was going to be a habit.
Felicity made a noise of surprise as her hands flew to his chest, but she didn't pull away, so he cupped her face in his hand and deepened the kiss, part of him thinking vehemently, How's this for 'It wasn't emotional?'
He slowly drew back, sucking on her bottom lip lingeringly as he went, then kissing her again, once, twice, finally resting his forehead against hers. "Felicity," he said, now that he had her full attention and had successfully stopped her distressed speech. "It was emotional. There were lots of emotions. Most of them being that I love you-" she exhaled in shock, "-and I felt like I was crossing a line with you, which is why I felt guilty and we didn't talk about it." He searched her eyes, hoping for a response, but she just looked stunned. "Felicity, I just didn't want to hurt you. But I don't think I can keep doing this."
"Doing what?"
"Staying away from you."
Felicity wasn't sure how to react. There was an embittered voice in her head that couldn't help wanting to ask whether there were cameras in the room or a syringe in his hand that she should be aware of.
Seeing her hesitation, Oliver stroked her cheek with his thumb. "What do you need to hear? What do I have to say to you?"
"I don't know, Oliver," she said tiredly, looking away. "Try wanting to be with me sometime when our lives aren't on the line."
She didn't see it, the tiny twitch at the corner of his mouth that always happened when she made him want to smile. He leaned in to whisper in her ear. "I thought that's what I was doing." The brush of his lips against her ear sent a shiver down her spine and her mouth parted in surprise. Her hands, still resting on his chest, tensed, gripping his shirt. "Look outside," he said softly, his lips trailing down her throat. "The city isn't crumbling. The sun is setting just like any other day. We're not in danger, not freezing to death…or anything else that could only happen to us," he chuckled, brushing a soft kiss against her collar bone, so nicely exposed by the neckline of her dress. "And I still want a million things with you, starting with kissing you again, followed by taking you against the wall of this office and any other suitable surface we can find in here." She gasped at his words and involuntarily pressed closer to him. "And ending with taking you home every night and making love to you. Because I do. Love you," he added, pausing his path to her shoulder and looking up to make sure she'd understood.
She was looking at him with an unreadable expression, her lips pressed together firmly.
"What?" he prompted, but she shook her head. He kissed her lips pliantly, trying to will it out of her, needing some sort of answer. "What?" he repeated, the corners of his mouth tugging upward slightly when she moaned a little.
"If I start talking," she said breathlessly, "I'll start babbling, and you were doing so well, I don't want to ruin it."
Oliver smiled. That was his girl. In a moment, he had her pressed against the glass wall behind her, hands traveling over her body, prepared to make good on all the things he'd just finally admitted he wanted. "Felicity," he commented, "I love it when you babble."