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Breathe
By tremblingmoon

 

Rachel just can't stop thinking about her. It's that simple. She's tried and maybe it's time she cuts her losses.

It's four in the morning and she has to get out of bed. Heck was breathing hard down her neck in his sleep, but he smiles in a way that makes Rachel's heart ache when he nuzzles into the empty pillow she's left behind. God, he loves her. And she, well…she loves being loved by him. A sweet man. An honest man. Her best friend.

Every night for a week, she's woken to thoughts of Luce. Intense thoughts made even more so by her attempt to quell them. So tonight she's decided to get them out of her system, and she moves quietly into the living room and sinks into the welcome creak of the old leather sofa.

Letting her mind wander, Rachel quickly realizes that she was wrong about the intensity of her earlier thoughts; they were nothing compared to the images her mind conjures up when it's given free rein.

Luce's hands on her abdomen, and then moving up to press against her diaphragm, her fingertips grazing the underside of Rachel's breasts, maybe by accident, but it doesn't matter because all Rachel can think is breathe, breathe, breathe. What would have happened, Rachel wonders, if she had just turned right then, turned and kissed Luce breathlessly on the lips. Luce would have kissed her back, she's sure—she's never been so sure of anything in her life. Luce would have kissed her back and it would have been perfect. As perfect as Luce's smile or her hair or her eyes. Rachel would kiss Luce and Luce would kiss her back, her hands pressing hot into Rachel's back, inching low on her hips, pulling her in. And then the whole stadium disappears from her fantasy, and Rachel imagines Luce on top of her on the leather sofa, her sofa, their combined weight making the leather sigh and squeak.

Rachel throws a blanket over herself and slides down until she's totally submerged by the sofa's ochre warmth and lets her hands wander down over her hips, past the satin of her nightgown. If she's going to do this, get these thoughts out of her system, she might as well allow herself to enjoy it a little…

"Rachel?"

Heck's groggy, questioning voice rings out from the bedroom, effectively shattering Rachel's fantasy.

"Sorry, Heck. Couldn't sleep," she calls back, eyes sliding shut and face clouding with guilt and shame, before she rolls herself off the sofa with some effort and walks softly and slowly back into her husband's waiting arms.

The End

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