Respite
Rating: PG
Pairing: Warrick/Sara
Feedback: Makes my day
Disclaimer: If it was in the show, it's not mine.
Archive: At my site Checkmate , Fanfiction.net; anywhere else, please ask.
Summary: A break from the party
Notes: For the LiveJournal Writer’s Choice “Party” challenge. Not sure it quite fits, but there you go!
The garden
is beautifully landscaped and maintained, verdant green bushes in the middle of
the Vegas landscape, and in the middle of the lawn, there is an elegantly
maintained band gazebo, fairy lights twinkling along its trellis, giving the
structure an ethereal glow. Leaning against the barrier, there is a woman, who
has turned her back on the hotel, on the sounds of the party on the lawn, the
celebration at which she is a guest, and while Warrick’s not a big poetry
person, the only words that come to mind when he looks at her is “high and
solitary and most stern.”
He knows
why she’s here though – what else could she have done, being what she is?
“Don’t tell
me you’re out here for a cigarette break,” he quips, though he knows that’s not
the reason, but thinks it’s better to make a joke. His instincts serve him well
when Sara doesn’t jump, but does turn slightly to smile the barest ghost of a
smile at him.
“Just
taking a break,” she tells him. “You know me and parties.”
He nods,
comes into the gazebo beside her, places his glass of champagne on the ledge
beside hers, leans against it, facing her, facing the direction of the party.
“I know you and this party,” he says frankly. “I wasn’t sure you’d come.”
She shrugs,
her lips twisting in something that’s midway between a smile and a grimace.
“Catherine’s my friend,” she tells him. “So is Grissom. Why wouldn’t I come to
their engagement party?” He lifts an eyebrow, because the only obvious answer
is the one that he’s not going to give voice to, and he’s mildly surprised when
she does it for him. “Because I’m in love with Grissom?”
He looks
her in the eye and he does not blink. “Aren’t you?”
She smiles,
this time more genuinely, and she shakes her head. “Once,” she admits, which is
more than she’s ever done in the past. “A long time ago.
But not anymore.”
He tilts
his head curiously. “What happened?”
Another shrug. “I got over him.” She makes it sound so simple, and he can’t quite
believe that it’s that easy, even though he really wants to, especially when she
continues, “And I’m happy for them.” Then it’s her turn to tilt her head, look
up at him almost in challenge. “I thought you might have issues with coming to
this party yourself.”
He feels
himself grinning. “Because I’m supposed to be in love with
Catherine?”
She lifts
an eyebrow, mimicking his earlier expression exactly he notices, and he tries
not to think what emotion might be behind the mimicry, because that would be
too much to hope for. “Want to tell me you weren’t?”
“Attracted,
maybe,” is all he’ll admit to. “But it never went any further than that.”
But Sara’s
not going to let it go at that. “So what brings you out here?”
“I noticed
you’d disappeared from the party,” he tells her. “Was worried
about you. What?” This last in response to the smile
on her face, the little shake and downward tilt of her head.
“I just
didn’t think you’d notice I was gone,” she says quietly, and he smiles softly,
looking her up and down.
“I noticed
Sara,” he tells her. “Believe me, I noticed.” Because he hasn’t been able to
keep his eyes off her all day, the upswept hair and halter necked top exposing
more of the bare skin of her back to his view than he’d ever seen before, the
long skirt swishing along the ground as she walked giving only the briefest
tantalising glance of her legs. That would be enough, but the colour, a
shimmering blue, is doing amazing things to her eyes, to her skin, and he
doesn’t think he’s ever seen her look lovelier, apart from maybe right now,
when she looks down with an unmistakable blush rising up her cheeks, and thanks
to the cut of her dress, he can see that it starts a lot lower than that.
“Matter of
fact,” he says, carefully reaching out a hand to her shoulder, “I’m pretty sure
Cath’s pissed at you… must be bad etiquette to outshine the bride-to-be at a
bash like this.”
Sara chuckles, still looking down. “I don’t know about that,” she demurs, and his
hand moves from her shoulder to her chin, tilting her head up so that he can
look into her eyes.
“I do,” he
whispers, and for a second, he allows himself to wonder how, even when he’s
been entertaining thoughts like this for a while, have things progressed so far
so fast, when he only came out here seconds ago to check up on her.
Then his
lips meet hers in the briefest of first kisses, and he
stops thinking altogether.
A second
that could be a lifetime later, he is looking into her eyes once more, and she
is smiling once more, shakily, but happily, and her hands are on his chest,
playing with the lapels of his jacket. “I’m glad you came out here,” she tells
him, and he grins, in total agreement with her.
“Come on
back to the party,” he says, slipping one arm around her waist, returning to
her her glass of champagne with the other. “I want to
dance with the most beautiful woman in the room.”
Her cheeks
are pink, but she falls into step beside him, and once back at the party,
that’s what they spend the rest of the night doing.