DISCLAIMER: CSI Miami, Cold Case and their characters are the property of Jerry Bruckheimer and CBS. No infringement intended.
SPOILERS: Minor for the last episode of season 5 for Cold Case.
ARCHIVING: Only with the permission of the author.
Pushing Back the Dark
By racethewind10
“Hey, Scotty, you hear me? Hey.”
Scotty was coming. It would be fine.
But it wasn’t fine.
The world exploded around me and it was suddenly too bright, and too dark, and there was pain and blood and I was cold: so cold. And then there was nothing.
The boss told me to take time off and get some rest but I couldn’t. I hurt too much.
It wasn’t the old, familiar ache of distant memories; the phantom twinge of loved ones long laid to rest. This pain was new and bright and sharp. Like shards of glass on the floor of my home they cut, and I can’t seem to clean them up, no matter how many times I try.
In the end I leave. Some might call it running but I don’t care. I have to get out, away from the steel and glass and dull grey chill of my city; away from the memories, regrets and guilt lurking in places that had been innocent of such things before the actions of one man cast a darkness across my world that I can’t seem to escape.
I couldn’t face that darkness anymore. Even the shadows -- the palest imitation of night that once held only shade -- hovered like accusations, making me flinch. So I went hunting the sun, and found myself in a place where it seems closer to the earth somehow; richer. The light in Miami has a different quality. It’s stronger, more welcoming: warmer. Even the shadows are bright in Miami.
Paradoxically though, once I’m there, I find myself avoiding the sun. It’s too bright. I sleep in the day and venture out at night, torn between a desperate wish to wrap myself in the light again and the deeper, more dangerous and insidious desire to just let go and lose myself in the darkness.
And in the middle of my painful struggle, somewhere on the edge of morning between grief and numbness and my third scotch, I met her.
To this day, I have no idea what drew me to her. Maybe it was her frail beauty, standing out in the smoky bar like a white rose among brambles. Maybe it was the way she stared at her glass -- with a mixture of need and loathing. It was an expression I’d seen on my father’s face. It was a look I’d worn myself.
Maybe it was simply that her pain was palpable, and I was tired of thinking about my own.
I don’t remember everything. Not because I was drunk -- though I was a little -- but because some quality of the night and my exhaustion combined to take me outside myself to a place where time didn’t mean as much and tomorrow is just a theory.
I remember her eyes, wary and wounded, and yet all I could think was how incredibly blue they were.
I remember her hand, the delicate sculpture of bone seemingly fragile beneath my own fingers.
And I remember her lips against mine, brief and tentative and sending a shiver through my body, snapping me back inside myself as a pit of desire opened within me.
Somehow, we aren’t in the club anymore. I recognize a decent, if completely impersonal, hotel room. I remember her hand on mine, bringing me with her. I had no intention of resisting.
As if she senses my return, she pulls back suddenly. Our bodies just inches apart, we stand frozen, eyes searching and uncertain yet unable to pull away from each other. The flush of arousal stains her alabaster skin and her eyes are hooded, dark and glittering. I can taste her on my lips -- scotch and velvet and steel and loneliness.
The only sound is our breathing, harsh and rasping and I find myself suddenly torn. The cushion of rum and darkness is no longer there and I feel a rising instinct to flee.
She tenses, just a fraction, and I know she senses my conflict. There is a moment of stillness and while I’m trying to figure out what the hell I’m doing, my hand reaches out -- seemingly of its own volition -- to tuck a wisp of hair behind the delicate shell of her ear. My finger traces her jaw, and her eyes flutter closed, and suddenly I’m kissing her again.
I’ve never kissed a woman, not like this anyway. I’ve always found women beautiful to look at -- something in the curves and lines, strength and softness of their bodies has always been appealing -- all those inherent contradictions both beautiful and fascinating, but it never went beyond sight, or past appreciation.
So this? The corn silk of her hair in my fingers, the hot, slick satin of her mouth, the feel of her hands, sure and gentle across my back… I have never known this.
My fingertips trace the elegant column of her throat and she rolls her head back, opening herself to me. This too is something I’ve never experienced: this trust, this dual surrender. It lights a fire I thought long dead: lights it, and sets it to blazing. I feel the desire washing over me, and when she says my name, brokenly, I give myself over to her.
“Calleigh.”
Her name escapes from lips, a plea, a benediction, I don’t know. All I can feel is her hands on me. All I want to feel is mine on her.
She’s gentler than I imagined, taking her time undressing me, and there is a wonder and a hunger in her gaze that makes me weak. Her fingers are steady though, and they move across my body, tracing patterns of intricate detail and infinite possibility.
Even in the dim light of the room I can see the color of her eyes -- somewhere beyond the simple spectrum of blue and green -- like the ocean on a perfect day, and then her lips return to mine and I don’t need to see. I don’t need to see because the light is everywhere, filling me with brightness so intense I don’t know how I can hold it in.
As her body presses against mine, I realize that it’s impossible and I’m not meant to, so I slide my hands into her hair and kiss her with everything I am. We turn and tumble onto the bed and as her golden hair fans on the pillow like a tousled corona, for a time at least, the darkness I’ve been trying to escape is banished.
She is so beautiful: such a fragile body to hold such a depth of spirit. My lips caress the still raw scar on her shoulder but I don’t ask. There is no room for questions in this moment, they would be inadequate. I see the light of warmth and hunger flash in her eyes, and it's enough. She reaches for me and those elegant hands move across my body. She steals my breath and as it escapes, it draws a single word into the forgiving darkness.
“Lilly.”
The End