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Holly, Lockwood, George an I sat in a traumatised and exhausted silence, squashed together in the backseat of a black cab.
I reckoned tonight would probably rank pretty high on our list of worst cases, mainly because of the sheer state we were all in.
We were absolutely covered in foul smelling mud, not a bit of us free from sludge and mulch. All due to a necessary but unfortunate dive from a first floor window into a waiting lake, while trying to avoid a poltergeist’s wrath and battle a bonus, surprise secondary visitor.
Lucky us.
To add insult to injury, the cab driver had made us sit on old rolled out Christmas wrapping paper that he’d rescued from his boot. We were still grateful for him taking us home at all, don’t get me wrong.
He could have made us walk. I would have made us walk, if our roles were reversed.
With the way the cabbie kept the windows rolled down and how he kept gagging from the driving seat, I think he maybe did regret not making us go it on foot actually.
When we finally trundled up to the curb outside Portland row, Holly dejectedly declared she was going to stay on for another few streets in the cab and go straight on home.
Lockwood paid the long suffering cabbie with some dirty, wet notes from his wallet, giving him enough for Holly’s onward journey and a generous tip to boot.
We watched the cab go off and we all stumbled sluggishly up the stairs.
A silent decision was made between us that getting cleaned up was in order, before tea and sandwiches.
We each ambled off to our separate bathrooms, George declaring he was skipping the tea and going straight to bed after his shower.
A sign of how awful the night had been for sure. George never skipped tea and sandwiches.
I showered slowly, my body warming up quickly enough and I washed the grime of the lake out of my hair methodically. I brushed my teeth thoroughly, dressed in clean black sweatpants and some white, oversized fluffy socks that Holly had given me last Christmas.
I couldn’t find a decent pyjama top that was comfy and loose enough, so I tiptoed down to the landing where I knew George had left all the clean, ironed laundry.
I rooted about in the pile for a minute, settling on a plain, loose white t-shirt that I was fairly certain was Lockwood’s. He wouldn’t mind, I was sure.
I headed back up to my room, where I roughly dried off my hair with my hairdryer and I was feeling almost human again in no time.
I went to the kitchen, brewed two cups of tea, choked down a Digestive, and when there was still no sign of Lockwood after a few minutes, I headed back upstairs to find him.
I stopped on the first floor, where I was surprised to see the door to the main bathroom still shut.
I did what I do best and I listened.
I could hear George already snoring from behind his door across the landing, meaning Lockwood must have let him have first dibs on the shower, before using it himself.
I couldn’t hear the shower running anymore, but I could hear Lockwood faffing about in the bathroom, cupboards opening and closing rhythmically, followed by some muffled cursing.
“You alright in there?” It came out a bit garbled, because I had another biscuit wedged between my teeth, unable to carry it because I had a cup of tea in each hand. I kicked the bathroom door lightly with my foot.
“Yes. Yes, I’m quite alright. I’ll be out in just a jiffy,” Lockwood’s muffled voice called out.
I frowned. I knew that voice. He was hiding something. Lying toad.
“Let me in,” My Digestive was dangerously near to being bitten in half. I kicked the door a little harder. “If you’re bleeding to death or something in there, so help me god Lockwood…”
The door wrenched open and suddenly Lockwood was standing there, tall, pale frame filling the doorway.
My own teal green towel was wrapped low around his waist, revealing his trim and toned stomach, a line of dark hair under his naval drawing my eyes. I’d seen him without a shirt a few times now, but it didn’t get any easier for me.
I choked out a breath and fought to keep my eyes on his face.
Lockwood was clutching a piece of wadded up gauze to his side.
“You’ve nicked my bloody towel again,” I said and my voice came out weirdly breathless. “I mean… Are you hurt?”
I shuffled my feet and offered him the mug of tea to hide my embarrassment and he smiled softly at me.
He took the Digestive out of my mouth and took a bite of it.
“That’s had my gob all over it,” I protested.
“I’m half starved, Luce. Needs must,” he smirked at me and polished it off. Dickhead.
“What happened?” I nodded toward the gauze.
“Caught my side on the broken window frame on our fun little plummet down into the lake. Didn’t even realise until I showered. It’s just in an awkward place, can’t seem to get the bandage to sit right,” he reached behind himself to grab the open first aid kit off the side of the sink and he stepped out into the hallway, his bare side brushing my arm. “You can’t exactly talk about stealing people’s things, Luce. Pretty sure that’s not your t-shirt, is it now?”
He crossed the landing in two lanky strides, as if his touch hadn’t just set my every nerve on fire and he disappeared into his bedroom.
I just stood there frozen, my own mug in hand, not really knowing what he wanted me to do.
He poked his head back out of his doorway after long moments, frown on his face.
“Luce, you coming in? I can do it myself if it’s a problem. Honestly, I’ll manage,” Lockwood looked at me like I was being silly and to be truthful, I kind of felt it. I didn’t know what my line was here.
“You want me in your bedroom?” I answered him intelligently.
He promptly went beet red. I could feel my face flaming in response. Lovely. A matching pair.
“If it makes you more comfortable, I’m sure I can make it down to the kitchen table,” He said sincerely, with an awkward scratch of his head thrown in. “Or I’ll go wake George, it’s really no bother.”
“No. God. No. Don’t be daft,” I walked over and practically shouldered him into his room before he unnecessarily took a trip downstairs, all in the name of chivalry.
He’d turned his bedside lamp on, so the room was lit up in a nice, warm, bright yellow glow.
He sat down on his bed, which I noticed he must have made at some point today after getting out of it.
I sat down next to him, mindful of spilling my tea on his nice white bedding. I set my mug on his bedside table to be safe and he took an appreciative sip of his own before doing the same.
He placed the first aid box between us and he turned so that his left side was facing me. His bare left side.
God. I needed to get it together.
He lifted the gauze pad up and I was pleased to see he wasn’t bleeding much. All that remained was a small, sharp, shallow cut of about four inches, marking his pale skin.
I shuffled closer to get a better look at it and he lifted his arm up for me, seemingly subconsciously placing his hand on my shoulder for balance.
I examined his skin, prodded it a little bit, face still feeling all too warm.
Was it hot in here? Perhaps George had left the bloody heating on again.
I plucked up an antiseptic wipe from the box of supplies.
“Going to sting a bit,” I offered quietly.
“That’s ok. I trust you,” Lockwood said softly, and his fingers squeezed my shoulder, reassuring me.
I cleaned the wound with the wipe as best I could without prying it open again, not wanting it to resume any bleeding.
I took my time until I was satisfied it was clean and splinter free. I pulled out the skin closure strips, or as Norrie used to call them, butterfly stitches.
I smiled absently at the wayward thought of my old friend, relieved that thoughts of her now made me smile with fond memories, instead of it feeling like someone had punched me in gut.
I placed the strips tightly across Lockwood’s wound and popped a large sticky gauze pad over the top to keep everything nice and clean, tongue trapped between my teeth as I concentrated hard to place it where it wouldn’t pull on his skin.
I smoothed the edges out, letting my fingers dance over his smooth skin for a bit longer than was probably necessary and I looked up at him triumphantly. Holly’s little first aid lessons had served me well.
When my eyes met his however, I completely froze.
Lockwood was staring down at me with this totally broken look on his face, his mouth hung slightly open and he was breathing a little raggedly, nostrils flaring ever so slightly.
His eyes roamed my face desperately, landing unexpectedly on my lips, before they flicked back up to look me deep in the eyes.
He swallowed and my eyes flicked to his throat and without my permission, my gaze roamed over his strong, bare shoulders.
All at once, I realised how close we were.
Bugger.
He brought the hand down that had been clutching my shoulder and he rested it on the sheet between us.
His thumb flicked out and brushed my hand, touch tentative and barely there. For all that meant for us, for how it felt to me, he may as well have grabbed my thigh.
“Lockwood?” My voice sounded low to my ears and I shifted closer to him.
He stroked his thumb against the back of my hand, this time more purposefully.
Something was different about tonight.
We didn’t do this.
Touch, I mean. Not when we weren’t running for our lives or weren’t actively on a case.
Tonight had been pretty rough though, like I said. Near death situations did funny things to people.
To George, it made him cook extravagant breakfasts.
To Holly, it made her clean everything in sight.
For Lockwood and I. Well. Usually it meant we either held hands or stayed up talking all night at the kitchen table, so we wouldn’t have to face our nightmares alone.
Except, it would seem we had progressed a little on from that.
I could feel this primal need for contact and reassurance coming off him in waves, the need to have something tangible and alive, to feel something. I could see it in his eyes. And I recognised it in its raw form from him, because honestly, I felt it too.
“Luce…” Lockwood’s voice was as rough as grave dirt, dangerously low and my eyes went wide with the sheer amount of want in just that one word.
I shifted uncomfortably on his bed, not even sure what I needed, but very aware that I wasn’t getting it right now.
With a startling clarity, I realised I needed to touch him. I needed him to touch me.
“You know this naked chicken thing…” I said, voice barely a whisper.
“What naked chicken thing?” he grinned at me and it made talking about it easier.
Cocky Lockwood was familiar and reassuring.
“You bloody well know what I’m talking about… This thing we’ve been doing. It… is it just a game? For you?” I gathered my courage but I still looked down at my hands when I said it.
He nudged me with his shoulder.
“No,” he shook his head. “It’s not a game to me, Luce. Not at all. Is that what it’s been for you?”
His honesty was the most attractive thing he could have done at that moment.
“No,” I looked at him, feeling more confident after his confession. “It definitely isn’t a game. Not anymore.”
If I thought he’d looked desperate before, that was nothing compared to how he looked now. I think I broke him.
His dark eyes were like saucers, and his fingers were digging into his exposed thigh where the towel had fallen open, so hard that I was fairly sure he was going to leave finger marks on his skin.
“So,” I swallowed nervously.
“Quite,” he replied, intelligently.
It made me laugh, which was good. So good. Even better because he was laughing with me.
Then neither of us were laughing, because between one guffaw and the next, his mouth was on mine.
He kissed me like he was starving for me and if I’d had any doubts about his feelings toward me previously, the second he licked into my mouth, his strong hands moving into my hair, they flew right out the window.
He tasted like Digestives, Earle grey tea and he smelled like my lavender body wash. He was all the things that reminded me of our home, in a way I wanted to lose myself in over and over.
He pulled back, looking as altered as I felt, breathing hard and I simply didn’t want it to stop.
I followed after him and I kissed him this time. He let out this relieved groan right into my mouth as he sank into me. I wanted to hear that noise from him every day of my life.
I could feel him smiling into the kiss and the familiarity of that just made it a million times better. I felt like I was melting, only his arms keeping me upright.
It didn’t take long until he was kissing my neck, biting the skin there gently, drawing these gasps from me as I tugged on his hair, sounds I’d never made in my life and this was all taking a turn for the absolute better.
Lockwood leaned back apologetically, adjusting his towel, despite my protests. My towel. Our towel. Who knows at this point.
I caught my breath, helpless grin on my face.
“Wow. That was… just wow,” his cheeks were pink and he was looking at me like I hung the moon or something. He reached out and twirled my hair around his finger.
“Wow,” he added again, for good measure. “Luce. I can’t believe… Honestly, that was just incredible… You’re amazing. Wow. Bloody hell.”
Yeah I’d definitely fried his brain, I’d never seen him so lost for words, so inarticulate. I suddenly felt rather powerful.
“Well. Had to do something to put an end to this naked chicken business, didn’t I? I’d say I won… Although, you did bait me by stealing my best towel. Again…” I pointed out and gave the hem a little tug, leaning back on his bed and wigging my eyebrows. “For the record, you were brilliant. Top marks for… erm… Snogging.”
He laughed properly then and I snorted in return. I wasn’t expecting this to all feel so easy. It was just like us, but better. Deeper.
His face morphed into something closer to his normal-self and he scrambled up off his bed to stand in front of me, looking down at me.
“As much as I’d like to give the towel back to you right this instant,” He offered cheekily, hooking his thumbs into the waist of the towel, grinning madly when I didn’t say no. “You can have it back, after you go to dinner with me.”
“Do ham and crisp sandwiches downstairs count?” I asked hopefully. “Or do you mean like a date?”
The way he rolled his eyes at me told me that he picked up on that little reference.
“Not like a date. More than a date. This is the very start of everything, Luce,” He said confidently, smile soft, genuine. Just for me.
He looked so happy and so bloody sure about the entire thing, I was rather inclined to believe him.