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The on-call room smelled of recycled air and someone else's coffee, and Samira had approximately twelve minutes before her pager would go off again.
She knew this because Jack had checked the board before following her in, and because he had that particular quality of attention he got when he had already decided how this was going to go. He locked the door. The click was very small in the quiet.
"Twelve minutes," she said.
"I know."
He crossed the room without hurry, and she found herself stepping back before she had consciously decided to, a giddy, prey-like thrill moving through her.
This was not like the men she had known from med school, all urgency and guesswork. This was Jack. He knew what she wanted, and he had the patience to give it to her. The backs of her knees found the edge of the cot. He stopped close enough that she had to tip her chin.
"Hi," she said, which was not her most competent sentence.
The corner of his mouth moved. He brought one hand up and tucked a loose strand of hair back from her face, his thumb trailing along her cheekbone after.
That was the thing about Jack that she still had not fully accounted for, three months in. The way he touched her like he was noting it down. Like he was making sure.
"You look tired," he said.
"You say that every time."
"Every time it's true."
His thumb pressed lightly beneath her jaw, tipping her face up, and he kissed her unhurried and thorough, like there was no question of being interrupted. She felt his exhale against her mouth. The slow release of a bad case he’d had today.
She pulled back, enough to look at him through her eyelashes.
He was already looking at her.
"We're at work," she said.
"I'm aware."
"Someone could come in."
"They could."
He said it with such complete tranquillity that she almost laughed. His hand had found the hem of her scrub top, fingers spread warm against the skin of her lower back, and her next objection lost its fight before she found it.
"Jack—"
"I hear you," he said, and kissed her again.
She got her hands under his collar and felt him relax into her. She savoured the effect she had on him, and threaded her fingers through his curls, and kissed him back. His hand pressed flat against her spine and drew her in until there was no distance left between them.
Outside, the department moved on without them. A trolley rattled past in the corridor. Someone called a name, it sounded like Santos yelling at Whittaker, which was not unusual at this stage of the shift. Samira was aware of all of it in the distant, cataloguing way she was aware of most things, and then Jack's mouth moved to her jaw and the awareness became somewhat theoretical.
"Lie back," he said against her throat.
She sat back onto the cot and he followed, one knee between hers, and she looked up at him and felt the familiar vertigo of being looked at like that; like he was taking stock of something he still found slightly unbelievable.
"Hi," he said again, lower this time.
"Hi," she said. Her voice had done something embarrassing.
He reached for the hem of her scrub top again and looked at her once, a question. She lifted her arms and let him pull it over her head, which he set aside on the chair beside the cot with a tidiness she found absurdly characteristic. His own shirt stayed on. She had long since stopped pointing out the imbalance.
He pressed his mouth to her collarbone and worked slowly downward, and when his hands moved to the waistband of her scrub bottoms she lifted her hips wordlessly and let him draw them down and off along with her underwear, leaving them in a pile on top of her discarded top. He knelt between her legs for a moment, his rough hands moving slowly from her knees up to her hips, just looking at her.
"Jack."
"Mm."
"We actually have got—"
"I know what we have," he said, and pressed his lips to the soft skin below her navel. "Stay still."
She stifled a sound that was almost a laugh.
He looked up at her, briefly, with an expression that suggested she had not been as still as she believed.
She put her hands flat on the cot. Jack Abbott, between her legs. Three months ago she would have called that a diagnostic hallucination.
He took his sweet time. She had stopped being surprised by it and started being undone by it. He pressed his mouth to the inside of her hip, the jut of bone there, the soft skin of her thighs. One arm draped across her lower stomach, one hand moving slowly along the back of her thigh. He bit down, gently, on her inner thigh and held it long enough to leave small indents. She felt the heat bloom sharp and slow and bit her own lip to keep the sound from carrying.
"Easy," he murmured against her skin.
"You did that on purpose."
"Yes." He pressed his lips once to the small mark he had left. "Stay quiet, before I bite harder."
She exhaled through her nose.
His hands moved to her hips, thumbs pressing in slightly, not quite immobilising, just holding her steady. Then his mouth was on her and the ceiling of the on-call room became the most important fixed point in the universe.
Her hand flew to her mouth as his tongue settled into that ruthless, familiar rhythm.
He was unhurried, deliberate, his tongue tracing what he had learned she needed. After a moment one hand moved from her hip, and she felt the tip of a finger trace slowly along her entrance. Lightly circling, teasing her and feeling the wetness that he caused. She exhaled hard against her palm.
"Jack—"
"I hear you," he said against her, and did not move his hand.
She made a sound she would not be able to defend. His mouth stayed where it was, his tongue mercilessly circling her clit, and his finger pressed a little closer, barely breaching, drawing back before she could have it. Her breath hammered hard in her chest.
"Please—"
"Please what?" His voice was very calm. She felt it vibrate against her skin, his mouth still glistening with her arousal.
"You know what." Half a whisper, half a plea.
"Tell me."
Outside, two voices passed the door, close enough to make out tone if not words. Samira went rigid.
Jack stilled, but his eyes flickered to the door momentarily, ready to barricade it if needed. His hand remained exactly where it was, the slow, deliberate pace of his tongue changed: shorter now, repetitive, precise, the particular rhythm he had learned her body responded to most.
"—already in CT," one voice said, receding. Gone.
Samira breathed. Her chest was damp with sweat and her heart was somewhere up in her throat.
His finger pressed in slowly, just enough to feel full, and at the same time his mouth increased in pace further, and she turned her face hard into her own forearm and made a sound that was muffled but only barely.
"There," he said quietly, against her. "Nice and quiet."
She was not being quiet. She was trying to be quiet, which she suspected he understood the difference between and was exploiting deliberately.
When she couldn’t stop wriggling from the overstimulation trying to break free of his grasp, only then did he let up.
He continued slowly, his mouth, his hand, reading every response and adjusting for it. Samira breathed through her nose and focused very hard on the ceiling until focusing stopped being a strategy she had access to.
Her fingers found his hair.
He added a second finger, unhurried, and curled them slightly, and whatever she had been about to say became nothing at all.
"Jack—"
"Stay with me." Almost a murmur. "You're alright."
She was not, particularly, alright. She was shaking slightly, her free hand gripping at his hair, trying very hard not to make a sound in a room with walls that were not especially thick. Her body was making the decision entirely without her.
"I can't—"
"You can," he said. "Come for me. You can, I know you can."
The fingers and his mouth together took apart every defense she had left, and he knew it, and the knowing was evident in the patient, relentless precision of what he was doing. His other hand pressed flat across her lower abdomen and she felt the difference it made and stopped being able to think in complete sentences. She pressed the back of her hand against her mouth and breathed against her own knuckles, until even breathing became unreliable.
"Jack, please—"
"I know," he said. "Go on."
She turned her face hard into the pillow and came with her teeth clenched, her hand white-knuckled on the cot rail, the sound she made swallowed by cotton and willpower that had exhausted itself, her hips pressing against him despite every instruction to stay still.
He didn't stop immediately. He held her there, his eyes locked with hers over the length of her, and she felt entirely exposed and couldn’t look away.
He eased, gradually, his fingers slow and his mouth soft, drawing it out until she reached down and pushed weakly at his shoulder and even then he took his time withdrawing, pressing his lips once to the inside of each of her thighs before he straightened.
“There you go,” he said, almost under his breath. “That’s it. You needed that one didn’t you?”
Samira was still catching her breath, but nodded.
The room was very quiet after.
He looked at her. That expression again — the patient one, the one she had no defence against.
"You're going to be insufferable about this," she managed.
"Almost certainly," Satisfaction was all over his face. And so was she.
She sat up, which required more coordination than it should have. He steadied her with a hand at her elbow.
"Come here," he said, as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
She looked at him. Her pulse had not returned to anything resembling normal. "We should get back—"
"I know," he said. "Come here."
She stood.
He turned her gently, one hand at her hip and one at her shoulder, until her back was against the wall beside the cot. The plaster was cool against her bare skin. She felt his hands settle at either side of her, and became aware of how much he wanted her, the fact of it pressed hard through his scrubs.
"Still worried about being heard?" he said, low, close to the shell of her ear.
"Yes."
"Good," he said. "Then stay quiet."
He pulled his shirt over his head, then shoved his scrub bottoms down. She looked at him the way she had not let herself look the first time — Orlando's room, Jack shirtless, a bullet graze on his back and a swab in her hand and somewhere more professional to put her eyes. She had managed it then. Barely.
She was not managing it now.
He was lean in the way that came from use rather than intention — broad through the shoulder, chest hair going slightly grey at the centre. The prosthesis below his right knee. The arms she had been carefully not looking at across too many night shifts.
He looked back at her with an expression that said he knew exactly what she was doing.
She lifted her chin. "Are you going to stand there or—"
He lifted her.
His hands were firm at her hips and the wall met her back and she gripped his shoulders and waited and he made her wait — the blunt heat of his cock pressed against her but not moving, not yet.
"Are you going to be good for me?" Low, into her neck.
"Yes." Immediate. Undignified.
He didn't move.
"Jack—"
"Yes what?"
She felt heat climb her face. "Please."
A pause. His thumb pressed once into her hip, deliberate.
"Please what?"
"Jack." A warning with no teeth left in it.
Then, quieter, his mouth at her ear: "I'm going to make you ache for the rest of your shift."
She opened her mouth and he pressed into her before the sound could form. Controlled and deliberate, inch by inch, giving her no choice but to feel all of it. The stretch made her inhale in with her mouth agape. Her thighs tightened around him involuntarily. Her fingers dug into his shoulders.
His eyes stayed on her face the entire time.
"Fuck," Samira breathed.
"Yeah," he said softly, when he was fully seated. "There you go."
He didn't move immediately. Let her feel it. Let her adjust. She was still sensitive from before and the fullness of him was almost too much, her body caught somewhere between overwhelmed and desperate for more. She shifted her hips without meaning to.
He made a low grunt. "Still."
She stilled.
Then he began to move, unhurried at first, long slow rolls of his hips that she felt all the way through her, each one drawing back before pressing in again with a precision that suggested he had thought about this.
She had not expected today. But Langdon and McKay had both called out, and Robby had needed cover, and here Jack was.
Her head fell back against the wall. He adjusted his grip, hands firm under her thighs, and changed the angle slightly and she made a sound that was definitely audible.
Her hand shot out sideways and found the corkboard to her left, fingers closing around the edge of it, notices and rosters crackling faintly under her palm. Something fluttered to the floor. She did not care.
"Just like that," Samira ground out through closed eyes. "Yeah, just — just like that."
"Easy," he said against her collarbone, her breasts bouncing against his chest with every thrust. "Nice and quiet for me."
She pressed her mouth to his shoulder and breathed through her nose and tried. His rhythm built steadily, each thrust pressing her higher against the wall, and she could feel the drag and press of him with every movement, could feel exactly where she was still raw from before and how much she didn't want him to stop.
"Jack—"
"I hear you." His mouth moved to the hinge of her jaw, then her throat. "Stay with me."
"I'm — I can't—"
"You can." Quiet. Certain. A statement of fact. "You're going to come for me, aren't you? Yeah?"
Her free hand found his back and her nails dragged down his shoulder blades to the base of his spine, and he exhaled hard against her neck, his rhythm stuttering once before he steadied it.
"That's fair," he said roughly.
She did it again. He bit down on the curve of her neck in answer, just enough to pin her in place, and she turned her face into his hair and gripped the corkboard hard enough to pull a pin loose.
He released his bite and pressed his forehead to hers, his breath uneven now, and she could feel the effort of his control in the set of his jaw, in the way his hands held her like he was concentrating on it.
That he wasn't untouched. That she did this to him.
"Jack. Fuck, I’m so close."
"I know." His hand moved from the wall to her jaw, tipping her face up. His eyes were dark. "I've got you." A hard thrust. "Go on." Another. "There you go. That's it, good girl. Good girl."
His mouth came back to hers and she came apart against it. The wall solid behind her, his hand firm at her jaw, his hips still moving through it, drawing it out longer than was reasonable. Her cunt pulsed around him as she came. She could feel that she was affecting him, his thrusts uneven now, his breathing deepened. Her nails went deep into his back again and she felt him shudder and follow a moment after, his forehead dropping to the wall beside her head, the sound he made low and quiet and entirely undone.
Then they were both still.
Her legs were still around him. The corkboard had lost at least two more notices. The radiator ticked. Somewhere beyond the door the department carried on, indifferent.
His forehead stayed against the wall. Her fingers were still resting on his heaving shoulders.
She could feel his heartbeat where his chest pressed to hers, faster than he would ever admit to.
After a moment he eased back, setting her down carefully, and she found the floor with both feet. She reached for her clothes from the chair, pulling her underwear and scrub bottoms on while he sorted himself, the quiet sounds of it very loud in the stuffy room. When she looked up he was watching her, composure mostly reassembled, the exception being his expression, which was too open by his usual standards.
He pressed his mouth to her forehead. Held it there.
She closed her eyes.
"Okay?" he said.
"Yes," she said. Then, because it was true: "Very."
She felt him almost smile against her hair.
He stepped back, redressed and straightened his shirt with that efficient precision she had come to find slightly unfair. Her legs were unreliable. Her hair was a significant problem.
"You have a—" he gestured toward her neck.
"I know."
"Right side."
"You're evil."
"I am," he agreed, without apology.
She pulled her scrub top straight and looked at him.
Her pager went off.
She exhaled.
She unpinned her hair and started a thick braid down the right side of her neck, which was a functional exercise in managing evidence.
He unlocked the door. Checked the corridor through the gap.
"Jack."
He looked back.
She didn't know what she had been going to say. Something related to work, probably, but her brain hadn’t caught up yet.
He crossed back to her anyway.
His hand came to her jaw and he kissed her, deeply, the kind that had nothing to do with the twelve minutes or the corkboard or the department waiting outside. She felt it in her sternum. His thumb brush once against her temple before he pulled back.
He looked at her for a second.
"Four minutes," he said. "Then I need you back on the floor."
He gave her a wink and stepped into the corridor.
Samira leaned against the wall for another moment, in the small warm room with its bad coffee smell and its ticking radiator, and pressed her fingers once against the mark he had left on the side of her throat.
Then she straightened her badge and followed him out.