Disclaimer: The Sentinel is a Pet Fly Production and all related characters and situations belong to those who hold legal copyright. No money is being made and no infringement is intended.Spoilers: Deep Water
Rating: R (for sexual inuendo)
Author's Notes: > A new Sparrowhawk Sandburg story, slightly risque... hopefully the first in a mini-series of three or four short bits like this one.
Pillow Talk: Deep Water
Part of the The Sparrowhawk Sandburg Series
by
Besterette
Besterette@aol.com
Bedsprings squeaked.
"... mmmm... Jiiiiiim..."
"Oh yeah!"
Sheets rustled. Skin slid against skin.
"That's... ohhh... Beau... so... gooooood..."
The phone rang.
Brown eyes glared incredulously up at blue eyes across the length of a heaving muscular chest.
"... ll' ison." James Ellison managed to pant breathlessly into the receiver. "Naomi... uh, yeah, she's right here..."
Beau Sandburg sat up, straddling him, stared angrily down at him, and took the phone. He leaned back against his pillows and tried to catch his breath. Not trying to listen in on the conversation, but unable to avoid it.
"Mom. I'm right in the middle of... well... Jim, actually."
"Oh! Sorry, why didn't he say something? Nothing important sweetie, I'll call again tomorrow. Have fun. Have good sex."
He couldn't help chuckling a bit, both embarrassed and amused by the relationship Naomi had with her children that she could say something like that. "Only your mother..."
Beau reached over him and tried to put the phone down, off the hook. He replaced it correctly.
"Now. Where were we when I was so rudely interrupted?" she purred teasingly, and pounced. Jim closed his eyes and let his head fall back.
Jim sighed as they shifted, snuggling and cuddling in the warm gleam of afterglow. Beau settled her head on his shoulder and he kissed her temple, tasting the salt sweat there. He sighed deeply, contented.
"Maybe I should do some Burton reading of my own. The Kama Sutra translation," she spoke meditatively.
He made a sleepy discouraging noise. She was adventurous enough for him as it was. Which she reminded him of with her next words.
"Or some Consorting. We haven't played any sensory games lately."
He grunted again, wondering vaguely what she was talking about. Drifting on the fringe of consciousness, relaxed, enjoying the smooth cotton sheets, the soft pillows under his head, the warm women tucked in at his side, and the contented hum of his own sated body.
"Or I could get out that bustier. The sheriff and the dance-hall girl. Would you have liked that better, Jim?"
The question and the tone of voice penetrated. "Mnm. Nothing wrong with tonight."
She sighed against his skin and moved restlessly. "I must have been doing something wrong, I didn't have your full attention."
"No," he countered, feeling ridiculous, but not knowing how else to say it, and wanting to stop this. "It was good for me, you were great."
She lay still beside him, then blew out a sharp breath. "Jim. You answered the phone."
Aw hell. She was hurt. Insulted. She thought he hadn't been into it, enjoying it, and he didn't want to try to explain, he didn't want to think about that now. Didn't want to remind her of what kind of man he was.
"It could have been important," he said lamely, and placatingly nuzzled at the nape of her neck.
She wouldn't be distracted. "Then they'd call back."
He sighed then, and shifted his weight. "If they could."
She moved next to him, a hand coming up to rest on his chest. "You're off-duty, Jim. There are other detectives in Cascade. Not everything requires your personal attention."
He didn't say anything. Tried to send a telepathic message to their son sleeping peacefully in the other room. C'mon Jake. Wake up and cry. I'll buy you a pony when you're old enough for riding lessons. He pretended to be falling asleep. Felt her lean up and brush her lips lightly against his before settling, her hand describing a backward 'C' shape on his bare chest, down toward his stomach.
"There's something... something happened?" she asked tentatively. "Something bad."
They lay there in the dark, until Jim began to hope that she was drifting off and it would be forgotten.
"I can't understand, unless you explain it to me."
He sighed again, shifting in the small bed. She would understand. He just didn't want her to know. But it would keep worrying away at her if he didn't tell. And she'd probably get part of the story from her brother anyway. He'd have to tell her all of it. At least she wouldn't punish him for it. Like her brother, she believed in honesty in relationships and was merely curious about his other lovers and his ex-wife. She was willing to tell him about hers, but he hadn't asked many questions.
Of course, as his Consort, a female guide, she had an advantage. He'd never been to bed with anyone who knew about his senses before. She could drive him crazy without even touching him, blowing warm puffs of air across sensitized skin, like silk scarves trailed teasingly... She knew how his body was wired, could push his buttons. And he had mapped her completely with his senses, knew her as intimately.
Physical intimacy was easy for him. This, this was baring his soul.
He took a deep breath and began. "After I got out of the army, and became a cop... I had an attitude problem..."
"No! Really?" She gave a mocking snort of disbelief and he grinned up at the ceiling.
"I thought I was better than... I was good at the job, but cops were just cops. I was a Ranger, I'd seen things the average uniform wouldn't face in a nightmare. And I had some, what you might call, authority issues."
She snuggled closer. "You were a jerk?"
"I was a big jerk," he agreed. "I hadn't been in Major Crimes long when Simon got bumped up to Captain. He decided I needed a partner, and teamed me up with Jack Pendergast. Now, Jack was a good detective. A real character, drove this old heap, gambled a lot. But he was one of the boys. Everybody knew him, everybody liked him. Guess Simon was hoping some of it would rub off." He closed his eyes. "And I guess it was starting to, when Jack disappeared."
"Oh Jim..." She knew he'd lost a lot of people in his life, to death and disagreements. And she knew that losing a partner was the worst thing that could happen to a cop.
"We were working this kidnapping case. He did some investigating on his own time, probably to distract himself, his girlfriend had just dumped him. He was with the father when the ransom call came in. He went out alone to deliver it... and vanished. People figured... he took off with the cash and the kidnappers killed the Brackley kid. I knew he didn't. But if I'd been there, if I'd've been backing him up like I was supposed to..."
She stroked his chest comfortingly. "Jim, it's not—"
He let out a bitter bark of a laugh. "My fault? Jack called me that night, just before he was killed. I was in bed with his ex-girlfriend. Let the machine get it, but the message was garbled. Only figured it out with your brother's help, couple years ago when Jack's car turned up in the bay with the Brackley kid in the trunk." He held his breath, expecting her to withdraw.
"And that's why you answer the phone?" she asked quietly, thoughtful.
"Yeah. Stupid... but I can't just let it ring..."
She was silent for a moment, drawing aimless patterns on his bare chest with her fingernails. "So what happened? They found Jack's car, and Blair helped you figure it out..."
"They found Jack's car in the water. The college kid was in the trunk. IA figured that was proof Jack was involved... or at least Sheila Irwin did. Hell, even Simon thought Jack had taken off with the ransom then. And then they found the gun Brackley had been shot with. It was registered to me... I'd bought it for Jack, for his birthday... he disappeared before I could get the registration changed, so I just reported it missing. That was all Irwin needed to go after me, she'd had it in for me since back when she worked Major Crimes..."
"Why? What happened when you slept with her?"
"Nothing! I didn't sleep with her, I haven't slept with every woman I've ever met..."
"Oh yeah? Name 'em."
Come to think of it, he did have quite a few notches in the bedpost, didn't he? "Uh... Rhonda. Your mother. Megan... Cassie..."
"Jim? Kidding."
"Duh." He cuddled her closer, and kissed her cheek, grateful for the comic relief, for the fact that she was still here teasing him. "So I figured I'd better go look through Jack's stuff, see if there was anything. Emily, she was Jack's girl, she's married now, she was still paying for Jack's storage locker. So Blair and I went through it, found Jack's datebook. Day he disappeared, was killed, says Dent. 9:30. Well, someone set fire to the building, but we got out all right. At the first hearing, Irwin made it clear she thought I set the fire, to destroy evidence. That's when we found out Jack had called me, she had the phone records.
And then there was the fact that I bought the loft a month later and paid cash. Cash I couldn't account for because it was Covert Ops back pay." He sighed, idly stroking her shoulder. "The way the evidence was mounting up, from the outside it didn't look good. Blair, though, your brother didn't even blink."
"We're a loyal bunch, we Sandburgs," Beau said lightly. "How come you couldn't account for the cash, if it was back pay? Everyone knows about Peru, you were on the cover of News magazine when you were found, they even did a special 'Update' issue."
Jim silently waited for her to work it out.
"... oh... Covert Ops but not Peru. For something still classified? Okay. So Blair helped you figure out what Jack had said?"
"I checked out the car, found evidence of a shotgun blast on the driver's side door. After that, it was a matter of looking at the John Does that washed up downstream. We found Jack. That's when Blair helped me go back and remember the phone call. Jack had been to see Sanford Dent, the Brackley family attorney."
"Mmmm. And the plot thickens," Beau muttered.
"We went to talk to him, but it was too late, the brakes on his car had been tampered with. He was killed in the accident. But he had old man Brackley's wills in his briefcase. The old will left everything to the boy, Philip. The new one, drawn up after the kidnapping, left it to his second wife... if Philip was missing for seven years. I think the kid was in on it, at the beginning, a scam to shake some more money out of his dad, the new will just gave his stepmother a better deal. Her and the company foreman. Confronted them, they started pointing fingers, the usual chase scene, and that was that."
"And the good guys lived happily ever after," Beau murmured sleepily.
"Most of us." Jim swallowed. "We got Jack a decent burial, with full honors."
"Mmn, The truth finally came out. You did that for him." She yawned softly.
"I owed it to him. After... Emily and all... she came over to the loft, to talk, and we..."
"Jim," she interrupted, sounding faintly amused. "She decided she didn't want to be with Jack any more. Told him. Came over to see you. There was chemistry, you spent the night together. There's nothing wrong with that."
"She was my friend's girlfriend... we had a little wine, I probably wouldn't have..."
"It was her decision, and yours. If the two of you had gotten together, and Jack hadn't been killed, that might have been hard for him to take... but whatever they had was already over."
"It doesn't bother you?" he whispered, trying to see himself through her eyes... a man who'd had an ill-timed liaison instead of a selfish bastard who'd betrayed a friend. The culture clash of trying to relate to someone raised by Naomi Sandburg came up at the damnedest times.
She chuckled. "Jim, I didn't think you were a virgin when we met. I might not believe in the paperwork part of marriage, but I believe in the spirit behind it. Responsibility. You're in a relationship, you have to love and trust the person you're with... or else you have nothing. And once it's over you're a free agent again. As long as you're honest."
"Honesty is the best policy, eh?"
"Yup." She cleared her throat. "Jim... if you aren't happy with me, or you meet someone..."
"No... oh no... Beau..."
"... you know you can just tell me. I'll still let you see Jake, I wouldn't..."
"I know, baby. But I'm happy, I love you, I, uh, you're the only woman I want," he reassured her quickly, and they kissed. "I just, I was just being honest."
"As long as you know you can tell me anything." Beau settled down, to go to sleep.
"Anything?" Jim repeated, smiling to himself.
"Anything."
Jim took a deep pensive breath. "Beau... I was in Peru for eighteen months... and a man can get awfully lonely in eighteen months. The Chopec, they recognized me as a sentinel, I was their hero, we brought in a larger kill, conquered enemy raiders... they offered me my choice, any one I wanted, as a reward..." He trailed off, listening to the attentive silence beside him, and sighed deeply. "And it was such a cute llama..."
He laughed, holding up an arm to ward off the pillow she was swinging at his head.
~ End ~
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Page last updated 8/15/03.