XxXxX Chapter Eight XxXxX I was alone on a vast beach. The salted sea breeze whipped my long skirt against my legs while the ocean tickled my ankles, its white surf swirling in and out with the tide. I curled my cold toes into the sand even as it slipped out from under me. Eyes closed, I listened to the rhythmic rush of the waves and the chatter of the sea gulls overhead. Their cries grew closer, more angry and raw, until they weren't birds at all but human screams. I gasped as my eyes flew open. Silence. There was no beach and no screams. Just my bedroom, draped in shadows, and Mulder's heartbeat creating the ocean sounds beneath my cheek. I released a slow breath as my pulse dropped back to normal, wrapped safe in the covers with Mulder. His tee-shirt was soft and sleep-warm against my bruised cheek, and I closed my eyes again, listening to the rain pattering against the windows outside. I drifted as the seconds slowed. Mulder sighed in his sleep, his legs mingling with mine as his faint breath stirred my hair. Blinking sleepily, I stretched with care and my sore joints registered their immediate protest. All traces of my dream faded as the dull ache of reality began throbbing at the back of my head. I rolled from Mulder and slipped free of the heavy quilt, staggering in the semidarkness toward the door. The floorboards were cold and smooth beneath my feet, the first gray haze of dawn making long shadows on the wall. In the bathroom, I swallowed a pair of Tylenol tablets with the lights still off and then shivered back to bed. Mulder stirred under my added weight, squinting at me in the fuzzy, indigo light. "Hey," he said in a hoarse whisper. I shifted to face him. "Go back to sleep, Mulder. It's still early." "Mmmm." His fingers threaded through my hair, touching my scalp lightly. "How's your head?" I closed my eyes under his gentle massage. "Okay." His fingertips smoothed in rhythm from my crown to my temples, easing the ache until I was near purring with pleasure. The backs of my ears grew warm and tingled. After a few more glorious seconds, he slipped his hand down to palm the curve of my face. I nuzzled my cheek against him in answer before covering his hand with my own and drawing his arm back under the covers. He hid a large yawn in his pillow, and I realized that the rocky night had taken its toll on him as well. His hair stood up on one side and his eyes were bleary from lack of sleep. "Thank you, Mulder," I said, giving his fingers a slight squeeze. He answered with a slow blink. "For what?" "For being here. For taking care of me." He rolled over on his back, withdrawing his hand from mine. We stared at the ceiling together for several long moments while the wind swept sheets of rain against the window. "I had a book," he said at last, speaking more to the ceiling than to me -- whispered words meant only for this strange, expansive time between night and day. "On cancer." My skin rippled in fear at where the conversation would lead, places inside that burned too bright to look, wounds too raw to touch. Words of my own tumbled forth but I kept them closed and secret, waiting with shallow breaths to see how far Mulder would go. He tilted his chin at the ceiling. "It had things you were supposed to do to help if...if you knew someone with cancer. Like recipes for special foods and stuff to bring to the hospital. But I couldn't see any way for me to do those things. It never said..." He stopped short and shook his head. "I don't know why I bought it." "Mulder..." I reached out to touch his arm but he didn't seem to feel it. "So white and brittle," he whispered. He twisted on the pillow, his black eyes boring into mine. "Like if I touched you, you would shatter into a million pieces." I could not speak. All at once, I realized how different it had been for Mulder, how vast was our separateness on this matter. I'd kept the cancer close to me, deep inside where it lived and grew away from sympathetic, prying eyes. I had told Mulder first, had thought he understood how much it meant to me that he knew and that he shared in my fight. My partner in all things. Only now, in the absence of my desperate tunnel vision, could I see how far away he had been, and how hard he was still struggling to catch up. "It's okay now," I murmured, pulling him to me. He came willingly, like a sleepy child, and I folded him in my arms. His breath whispered against my neck as I stroked his long, lean back. "It's okay." I thought about telling him the number of times I had called him from my bed during those awful days, paralyzed under the weight of my headache or gripped in the claws of nausea. The words, "Mulder, come over," had hovered on my lips, and I'd imagined him sitting with me, cool cloth in hand as he distracted my pain with gentle chatter. But to relent to that need would have cost me my equality, forcing Mulder to choose between pushing me harder or pulling me back. And I'd needed to be pushed more than held. I wondered if he had sensed that need and disregarded his own, letting me set the terms of our relationship even when there was so much left unsaid. I ran my hands up and over his shoulder blades and tangled my fingers in the silky spikes of his hair. "Mulder," I said, "you did the best thing possible. You never let me get complacent. You showed me how much there was left to do and let me shoulder my share of the work. You...you let me see you waiting on the other side of this illness, making sure there would be something left for me to return to when it was over." I brought my lips down to his forehead, kissing him fiercely. "And Mulder, it is over. You've got to believe that." He squeezed me hard and buried his face in the curve of my shoulder. "For now," he said, muffled. "But what about the next time?" "We have no reason to think it will come back," I answered, relieved to hear that my voice did not belie my own nagging worry. "I'm not talking just about the cancer, Scully," he said as he pushed himself up to look into my eyes. "It could be anything -- another illness, a stray bullet...maybe they'll just blow up the basement one day and take care of both of us all in one shot." "Mulder, stop it." "No," he insisted, still pinning me to the mattress with his considerable weight. I squirmed to get away, but he trapped my arms in his. "Listen to me, Scully. You told me once you wouldn't change a day. Maybe you still believe that, even now. But one day it will change, one day it will be too much and you'll regret it." I frowned. "Is that the voice of experience talking, Mulder?" "Maybe." He sighed. "I just don't want to be here when that day comes for you, Scully. I don't want to be part of your regret." His expression was sad and open, letting me see the truth behind his words. I tightened my lips together to keep my chin from trembling. "That would never happen," I whispered finally, and he dropped his forehead down to mine. My hands slid around his ribcage, seeking more contact. Our breathing slowed as Mulder relaxed into me once more. I stroked the soft hairs at his nape. "Mulder, four years ago you made it clear that I was not going to stand in the way of your search for answers. I can't be the reason you stop now." He pulled away again. "Just for a little while," he whispered, fingering the hair by my cheek. "I didn't realize how fast the years have been. I never expected..." "What?" I asked, breathless. He hesitated, then ducked his head. "I never expected to stop and find you here." My heart quivered in my chest as I caressed his stubbly cheek. "Where I've always been, Mulder," I told him in a cracked whisper. He pressed his lips to my palm, my wrist, my neck, and I brushed my fingertips over the shell of his ear, our lips so near they merged in the space of one breath. The rain rustled the trees outside while we remembered each other with kisses, slow and soft. I curled my legs and arms around him like a loving vine. I ached to bring him inside my heart, where he could see the place carved for him over the years by moments of sharp terror and melting sweetness. "We shouldn't." Mulder broke away, lips swollen around his parted mouth. "You're hurt." "No, it's fine," I murmured, hands sloping down his shoulders. He jerked his hips, and I parted my legs further, welcoming the press of his erection through our thin layers of clothing. He closed his eyes and met my gentle rhythm. Arousal was a pleasant ache, a languid river that lapped at my edges until I was wet and open. "Please," I said, and used both hands to guide his mouth down to mine, holding him in place for my lips and tongue. He hummed with pleasure and I vibrated to my toes. "Slow," he cautioned when we paused for breath. "We have to go slow." I signaled my agreement with another lingering kiss, and he opened my pajama top one-handed, the other hand still threaded in my hair. As the last button slipped free, satin slithered to my sides and Mulder brushed warm fingers on my breast bone. He dropped light kisses on my face while stroking long lines down to my belly button. "Oh!" I gasped when he found my nipple, his tongue soft as he licked it, fat and swollen in his mouth. I touched his cheek, the littlest finger sliding down to graze his lips. He pulled me in with a wet moan, and my eyes slipped closed, my jaw open as he rubbed my fingertip and nipple in concert. My hands restless, I stroked him everywhere I could reach -- the slippery skin of his ribcage, the sleek muscles under his shoulder blades, the slight peach fuzz at the small of his back. Squirming downward, I teased my fingers there along the elastic waistband of his boxers, then slipped down inside to hold him stiff and curved in my palm. "Oh, God." He squeezed his eyes shut, his upper lip curled in concentration. I closed my fingers around him, watching the pleasure play across his face as I stroked him root to tip. Our previous encounters had been too frenzied for me to notice the fine arch of his neck, the sheen of his brow, the perfect "O" of his mouth. The front of his boxers grew damp, Mulder hot and hard in my hand. He choked on a breath. "Enough...enough. I can't stand it." I stopped my rhythm but kept my fingers pressed against him, tangled in his underwear. He kissed me again, mouths open wide as his tongue slipped in for deep, soft licks. I felt him tugging on the waistband of my pajama bottoms. "Ever wonder," he breathed as he worked, "what it would've been like to have just this? What would've happened if we'd met somewhere besides a dirty basement?" I lifted my hips to oblige him. "Like where? On the street, or some social event? Somehow I don't see it, Mulder. You would have spent all your time chatting up the leggy brunette in the corner." "Hmmm," he said, planting tiny kisses along my throat. "You may have a point. Then I guess we'll have to meet at the bar, when we both go for refills at the same time. What are you having?" I smiled into his shoulder, pleased at the warmth in his words and the certainty behind them. This was one place I was willing to follow Mulder into fate. "Ah..." I shivered as he stroked me through my cotton panties, my fingers biting into the strength of his upper arms. "Um...kahlua and cream." "Ah, there's my opening, then." He slid my underwear down to my knees, and I wiggled until I could toe them off. "I would want to know why a no-nonsense type woman such as yourself was drinking such a sissy drink." "Very funny." My eyelids fluttered closed, my lips parting as he slipped nimble fingers along my folds. "I...uh, what...what are you wearing?" "Huh?" "At the bar," I said, licking my lips while trying to picture it. "When you're hitting on me, what are you wearing?" "Oh. Why?" He added a little more pressure to his caress. I opened my eyes and smiled at him. "Because I have to decide whether I should go back to Raoul from Puerto Rico or keep talking to you." "I see. Well, what would you say if I told you I was wearing jeans and a black tee shirt?" I closed my eyes again as he added his thumb between my legs. "I would say, 'Don't knock it 'til you've tried it.'" "Hmmm. But what if I don't want the whole thing? What if I just want..." He leaned down and licked my ear. "...a taste." "I think...that could be...arranged." My mind spun fantasies of us necking like mad in a shadowed corner of the bar, mixing with the feel of Mulder's touch between my thighs. I felt hot, needy -- the beginnings of a breathless spiral I recognized. I hadn't expected to come, not with my aches and pains, but all of a sudden I was right on the edge. "Mulder." I reached for him, pulling him over me, needing him inside. He tugged off his boxers and climbed over me once more. My hips jerked with anticipation as his erection brushed the skin of my inner thighs. He slipped over me several times before finally pressing inside. We clutched each other, murmuring nonsense, as he slid the full length into me. When he moved, I felt a pinch of pleasure deep inside and gasped as it melted white-hot between my legs. "Close?" he breathed, the word fanning hot across my face. I nodded and arched against him. He shifted to ride higher against my body, giving me access to the salty skin of his neck. The pressure of his penis sliding inside me and its slippery caress against my clitoris soon had me moaning into the curve of his shoulder. I felt tight and lightheaded at the same time. "Mulder," I blurted, surprised that it was happening so fast. He kissed my temple as the orgasm began in earnest. I shook and panted for long moments while he pumped with my slowing rhythm. After a few moments of dizzying recovery, I stroked my hands down the length of his back, cupping his ass and encouraging him to move again. He moved to thrust hard and deep, holding me close as his breaths tickled my cheek. When he went rigid in my arms, I moaned with him at the wracking pleasure. We lay in a quivering tangle for several long minutes. "Scully," he said at last, sounding both dazed and reverent. "You okay?" Actually, my head was throbbing in time with my heartbeat and there was pain shooting down my arm from my elbow. "I'm fine," I said, meaning every note of it. I hugged him tight. A few minutes later, he rolled to his side, bringing me with him. He smoothed the hair from my eyes and smiled. "So who's this Raoul guy?" "Nobody you have to worry about," I answered, snuggling closer. His hand smoothed up and down my arm. "Mulder..." "Mmmm?" I hesitated, toying with his fingers. "I love that you're so sure about this...that you believe it was meant to be so much it would have happened no matter what the circumstances." He shifted so he could see my face. "Scully, whatever else I've doubted, whatever questions I might still have...none of it's to do with you. You must know that." "I do." I held his face in my hands, rubbing my thumbs along his cheeks. "But I can't be everything, Mulder." He turned away, and for a moment I thought he might leave. But instead he lay down beside me again, tucking me into the warmth of his body. I slept. XxXxX The phone yanked us both awake with a jolt at seven-thirty. Mulder sat up, rubbing his eyes, as I fumbled for the receiver. "Hello?" Silence. Mulder frowned and I tried again. "Hello?" "Agent Scully? It's Lee-Lee. Lee-Lee Centara?" "Of course. What can I do for you?" Mulder made a questioning gesture and I shrugged at him. "Um, I need to talk to you about the fires," Lee-Lee said, sounding like she might bolt at any moment. I climbed out of bed. "I can meet you right now." "No! No, I can't. Meet me later, behind the diner at eleven-thirty, okay? That's my break." "Eleven-thirty, got it." I paused. I could not quite believe she was my attacker, with her thin frame and demurring demeanor. But still -- best to let her know she wouldn't be taking another whack at me, if that was what she had planned. "Agent Mulder and I will see you there." "Okay, but..." "But?" "Don't bring my brother," she said in a rush, then hung up the phone. XxXxX Continued in Chapter Nine. Thanks as always to my tag team betas, busy with their own lives but still managing to help me out from time to time. This week's chapter brought to you by the number "2" and the letter "J." Thank you Jerry and Jintian! Hello? Anybody still out there? :-) Feedback welcome at syn_tax6@yahoo.com Gone to California. See you on the other side.