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Jake came to Cassandra in a dream, and he loved her.
And he trusted her.
She couldn’t look at him the next morning, and he was obviously confused, and less obviously hurt, wondering what he had done to make her shy away.
But he didn’t ask, and she didn’t say.
Until they were stuck in a cavernous, palatial room, just the two of them; Zeke had gone ahead and made it through the door on the other side. Before the crevasse had appeared in the middle of the room, who knew why, and now Cassie was afraid. Scared half to death because the crack in the floor was getting wider, and there would soon be nowhere to go, and if she knew Jake at all, he’d sacrifice himself to keep her safe, no matter how hurt he might be at her behavior toward him that morning.
That must not happen. If anyone should be the sacrifice it was her, Cassie, the seer with the thing in her head, not the sweet, gruff man who cared so deeply about people he couldn’t bring himself to trust.
She felt herself slide into the colors of math and the scent of light and under it all she heard Jake swear and mutter something like this one better work, honey, because…
Part of Cassandra thrilled that he was calling her by pet names no matter how indiscriminately he threw that honey around, and part of her wanted just to snuggle deep into the warm arms snaking around her waist to hold her up while she went off into a math trance.
But most of her was Looking-with-a-capital-L, seeing the patterns of the walls and floor and high, high ceiling of the room, noting little inconsistencies and seeming flaws-that-were-really-intentional and then…
…and then…
She could save him, save them both, but he’d have to trust her and she would have to face that her dreams about him were just that: not prophecy, not visions, just the daydreams and night-dreams of a lonely woman with a wild crush. And the world snapped back into focus as Cassandra turned to face Jake.
First she needed to get him to trust her.
“Jake.”
“I’ve got you, sweetheart, I won’t let you fall.”
He sounded so calm and confident, but she could see the pulse just there in his throat, and it was going a mile a minute. He was scared, scared for them both, but he managed to sound cool and calm.
So she had to show him.
“No,” she said, “It’s my turn to not let you fall.”
And she stepped backward off the edge of the crevasse.
~~~
“Cass!” Oh god, she was going to fall, and she was doing it deliberately, stepping off the edge, and…
…and she was standing there, on nothing.
Smiling at him.
“Trust me,” she said simply, and held out a hand.
“Cassie, I… oh god.” Trust you? Like this? Are you kidding me?
But she looked so calm, so confident, and she was standing on nothing, and she had gotten to this point through one of her little spells, which were always reliable. She might be naïve to the point of endangering the team, but the hunches she got during a spell were never, ever wrong.
Even if they were spooky as hell and terrifying to watch.
So Jake stepped to the edge of the crack in the floor and took Cassie’s hand.
And then he took a deep breath and stepped out to her and found himself wrapping his arms around her, pinning hers to her sides and burying his face in her hair. “God, don’t ever do that to me again, Cass, please, I thought…”
Only then did he consciously register that he was also standing on nothing, and he began to shake.
“It’s okay, Jake,” Cassie was saying, the words muffled against his chest. “I can see the generators for the force field bridge along the edges there.” She sounded… happy, for the first time all day, and Jake wondered at it a little. But she had been uncomfortable earlier, so he made himself let go, though he kept a tight hold on her hand.
Jake stepped back just a bit and looked at her. She was… radiant, he decided, just beautiful, and he found himself saying so, his mouth forming the words of its own volition, his voice hoarse.
She blushed, and that was even prettier. “I’m not.”
Okay, now he was confident; this was his field. “You are. Art historian here; I know beauty, and you’re… just…” He trailed off as she got on tiptoe to kiss his cheek and got the corner of his mouth instead.
And he turned his head just slightly and kissed her.
She sort of… melted into him, and Jake found himself standing on air, on nothing, kissing Cassie and being kissed back and… and…
“Oh come on, you pair,” came the voice from the doorway, and then, “Hey, huge crack in the floor. That’s new.”
Jake pulled himself reluctantly away from the soft lips attached to his. “And this isn’t?” He heard himself nearly growling it at the interruption.
“That?” Zeke laughed. “That’s been there for ages. ‘Bout time.”