Title: Learning Curve Author: Andrea Rating NC-17 Category: MSR, Mulder POV, all things post-ep Disclaimer: All within belong to CC et al. Archiving: I'd be honoured. Notes: Thanks to Aly and Dan for beta reading and to Kell and Angela for much needed encouragement. A very special thanks to Denise, not only for beta reading, but for being an excellent tweaker and a great friend! Feedback: Please send feedback to ardywyn@hotmail.com ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ After I'd covered Scully up with my blanket, I took the mugs back into the kitchen and then went to turn down my bed. When I got back into the living room, Scully was just as I'd left her, sleeping peacefully. I knew that if I left her there she'd wake up with a kink in her neck the size of Rhode Island, so I decided to move her to my bed. Trying not to disturb her, I slid my arms under Scully, and began to carry her to bed, but she started to stir as I carried her across the room. "Wha...what are you doing, Mulder?" She blinked at me sleepily. "I'm putting you to bed." I told her gently. "You're exhausted. You need to sleep in a bed." She nodded slowly against my chest. There was something so beautiful about carrying Scully. It was one of the few times she seemed vulnerable. As I was about to set her down on the bed she spoke again. "I need to stand up for a second, Mulder." "Why?" I was puzzled. "Cause I don't won't to sleep in my clothes," she mumbled. "Right," I said as I set her down. In a matter of seconds she had stripped off her clothes and was climbing into my bed in her bra and panties; her clothes in a heap where they fell. "Well, goodnight, Scully," I said after I'd put my eyes back in my head. "Where are you going?" She asked softly before I'd made it to the door. "To the couch." "Don't be silly. Come to bed." Following Scully's lead, I had stripped to my boxers and was crawling into bed in a matter of seconds. I wasn't sure what Scully had in mind, but anything that happened in my bed while she was in her bra and panties would be fine with me. As soon I laid down, Scully scooted right over next to me. Apparently she really had started looking at things differently--me included. "Um, Scully?" I began. "Shh, Mulder," she interrupted me. Then she began to slide up my body until our faces were level. I was flat on my back, still so unsure of what was going on that I was afraid to move, but I'd turned my head towards her. As her face approached mine, my eyes drifted closed and my lips parted in anticipation of her kiss. I was trying to keep my hands under control, letting Scully take the lead, but as soon as her lips brushed mine, one hand was caressing her ass, the other was tangled in her hair. When her tongue brushed against my lips I opened my mouth further, giving her complete access. There was nothing rushed or desperate about this kiss. Scully was slowly exploring my mouth with her tongue, and I wasn't about to impede her progress. As she kissed me, she let her hand slowly wander over my chest, staying clear of the waistband of my boxers. When she finally broke the kiss, she collapsed against my shoulder. "Know what, Mulder?" Her voice was muffled. "What, Scully?" "I really want us to make love..." she said softly. "But not tonight," I finished her sentence for her. "Is that alright?" she asked as she burrowed against me. "Of course it is," I assured her. "You're right. We're both tired. We should wait until we can do this properly." "Mmm hmm," she agreed drowsily. Unfortunately, there was one part of me that didn't care how tired the rest of me was. As exhausted as I was, it was probably going to be a while before I could get to sleep. I could tell from Scully's breathing pattern, that she was asleep already. This weekend had been rough on her. I was surprised she'd stayed awake long enough to kiss me, but I was happier than I'd ever be able to express. When my clock radio woke me, I was alone in the bed. The spot where Scully had been sleeping was cool--she'd been gone for a while. After jumping out of bed quickly, I checked to see if she was still in the apartment. It didn't take me long to find out that she wasn't. The blanket that I'd covered her with was folded and sitting neatly on the couch. At least she hadn't run out of here like a bat out of hell. I sat on the couch and put my face in my hands. What had happened in the time between that kiss and now to have made her change her mind? Maybe I'd accosted her in my sleep. I peeked inside my boxers. Unless I had cleaned up while I was asleep too, it appeared that nothing had happened. Although it is possible that I was still all over her--I'm sure my unconscious would have been aware that the woman of my dreams was within my grasp. But surely Scully wouldn't have been offended if I'd cuddled a bit last night. It must have been something else, but I had absolutely no idea what. Then I thought I should just call her and ask her why she left, but I didn't want her to think that I was desperate, even if I was. So I sat there debating about whether or not I should call her until my bladder finally won out. After I trudged to the bathroom, I flicked on the light and that's when I saw it. A note! Scully had left me a note. Of course she had, this was Scully. She would have thought that the bathroom would have been the first place I'd go in the morning, so I'd find her note immediately. It would never occur to her that I would run around my apartment like a man possessed, looking for her. And I certainly wasn't about to tell her, either. I pulled the note off of the mirror and read it. Mulder; I'm sorry I left so early this morning, but I really wanted clean clothes to wear to work. If you don't mind, could we go to my place tonight? Assuming that's alright, make sure you bring a change of clothes with you. That way, you won't have to dash off tomorrow morning. Scully P.S. I'll bring some breakfast to the office. Of course! She'd wanted to change her clothes. If I'd put my brain in gear, I'd have realized that. *And* I was being invited to spend the night at her place. She hadn't changed her mind at all. That was my Scully alright! Once she had decided on something, it took an act of congress to change her mind. My mood had suddenly improved dramatically. It didn't take me long to shower, shave, dress and collect up what I would need for work tomorrow. It wasn't until I was in the car and on my way that I realized that I was going to have to spend an entire day at the office with Scully and I wasn't going to be able to touch her. Knowing my luck, the one time I put my hand someplace inappropriate would be the time that Skinner decided to come slumming again. Eight hours in close proximity to Scully, not being able to touch her, now that I was allowed, might put me back into the rubber room. I was going to have to bite the bullet. Being a mature man who'd faced countless evils--monsters that defied description, you'd think that one day without touching Scully would be a breeze for me. Right! I don't know who I was trying to kid because I wasn't even fooling myself. When I got to the office it was still locked. I had beaten Scully to the office. I could count on one hand the number of times that had happened. When I opened the office door the slide projector was exactly where I'd left it. I was busily putting it away when I heard Scully's heels clicking down the hall. Her hands were full when she walked through the door. As soon as she was inside, I closed the door behind her and surprised her with a big kiss. "Mulder!" She gasped as soon as her lips were free of mine. "You know we can't do that at work." "That was my good-morning kiss. If you hadn't snuck out this morning we wouldn't have had to do it here," I informed her. "I said I was sorry, Mulder," she hung her head as she walked to the desk to put down her armload. "You scared the crap out of me, Scully," I said, forgetting that I wasn't going to tell her. "Didn't you get my note?" she asked in surprise. "Eventually...after I ran around my apartment looking for you." I was sucking up big time. "C'mere, Mulder," she held her arms open to me. "I thought you'd go to the bathroom first." "Usually I would, but I panicked," I confessed as I snuggled into her embrace. "I'm sorry," she apologized again before pulling my head down to kiss me softly. "I thought you'd realize what I was doing even without the note," she explained before she kissed me again. "I thought maybe you'd changed your mind," I pouted. "Never, Mulder," she promised and then kissed me again gently. "I'll make it up to you tonight, okay?" "Okay," I agreed, grinning. "Can we eat now, Mulder? I'm ravenous." I gave her one more quick kiss before releasing her from our embrace. "Yeah, I'm hungry, too," I concurred. "And no more of this at work," she said as she reached for her tea. "The last thing we need is to get caught kissing at work. I don't even want to think about where they'd try to send me this time--probably Alaska. As she finished speaking, the office door opened and Skinner strode in. I must be growing into my psychic powers. "Good morning, Agents." "Sir," Scully nodded. Then, as she took a sip of her tea, she raised an eyebrow at me. I knew exactly what she meant. One minute earlier and Skinner would have caught us. "Morning, sir. To what do we owe the honor?" I asked, trying to make it appear like this was a normal morning. As opposed to the morning after Scully had told me that she wanted us to make love. As opposed to the morning that Scully and I had kissed at the office. As opposed to what had turned out to be the best morning I could remember since Christmas 1972. I think that I had Skinner fooled easily. "I came down here to impress upon you the importance of your presence at the department meeting this afternoon. You have only managed to attend one in the past seven years, and I'm tired of trying to explain your truancy to the section chief." Skinner stood with his hands on his hips as he spoke. "I don't care what falls out of the sky or crawls out of the swamp today, you'll both be there. Am I making myself clear?" Scully and I promised Skinner that we would be at the meeting come hell or high water. I hoped that the elevator doors had closed before we both burst out laughing. "I think Skinner takes it on the chin for us regularly, you know, Mulder," Scully mused once we'd regained our composure. "Yeah, I guess," I shrugged. "Well, that blows my idea of trying to sneak out of here early." After setting her tea back down on the desk, Scully walked briskly to the door and locked it. As she moved, I found that my eyes were drawn downward. My God, her ass looked good in that skirt! And as far as I was concerned, I now had a license to ogle her to my heart's content. "What are you looking at, Mulder?" She was walking towards me with a sly smile on her face. "Your ass," I told her, my voice sounding somewhat raspy. "Oh yeah?" Her voice had become even lower than usual. "See something you like?" Her hips swayed seductively as she walked slowly towards me. "Scully, your ass has been near and dear to my heart ever since you let me fondle it on our first case." "Have you been looking at my ass since then?" She asked as she slid her arms around my waist. "Every chance I get," I admitted as I put my arms around her and let my hands settle on the object of our discussion. "I guess we're even then," she chuckled and moved her hands to my ass. "Why, Agent Scully! Have you been checking out my posterior?" "Yup," she nodded as she squeezed said posterior. "I thought we weren't going to do this at the office?" I asked as I was lowering my face towards hers. "Shut up and kiss me, Mulder." Unlike last night, this morning I was taking the lead and doing most of the exploring in this kiss. She tasted faintly of toothpaste and tea, but more of something else--something indescribable, something so *Scully*. My brain was still having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that this was actually Scully that I was kissing. My stomach was flip-flopping like crazy. Then she made a little sound at the back of her throat and rotated her hips against the prominent bulge in my pants. Things had progressed much more quickly than I had thought they would. I thought we would just have a little kiss to tide us over. My body, however, was nowhere close to being satisfied by our kiss. I had to stop this now. Scully was right. We shouldn't be doing this here. The office was no place to make love to the woman I adore. I had often fantasized about having sex with Scully in every possible place in this room and many impossible ones as well. But when I actually got right down to it, I wanted making love with Scully to be more rose petals and soft music than veneer and filing cabinets. "We have to stop, Scully," I panted when I was finally able to will myself to break our kiss. "I never thought it would be this--difficult," she said slowly, her own breathing labored. "You think that this is difficult?" We had stopped kissing, but we were still entwined in each other's arms. "This?" She chuckled. "No, this is easy. It's keeping my lips and hands off of you that's difficult. If I'd known that it was going to be like this, I would have seriously considered waking you before I left this morning." "I'm not sure if that would've helped, Scully. I've only had a tiny taste of you and I can't keep my hands off of you. I can't imagine what it's going to be like when I've experienced all you have to give me." "All I have, Mulder? That could take a very long time." "I certainly hope so," I told her as I nuzzled the top of her head. "Are we going to be able to do this?" Scully asked after a couple of minutes silence. "Do what?" I felt panic setting in. Was Scully having second thoughts? She had given me a glimpse of paradise and now I feared that she was going to slam the door in my face. "Keep our hands off of each other at work," she finally pushed away from me. "I'm usually much more in control of myself, Mulder." "Yeah, I noticed that about you," I grinned. "Mulder, I'm trying to be serious here." "Sorry," I apologized. "I think I know of a way that we might be able to solve this problem." "What's that?" She perked up. "Why don't we book the next couple of weeks off. Then we could go somewhere, and well..." Scully chuckled and snuggled up against me again. "And what, Mulder?" "Well I just think that if we did a honeymoon type of thing, holed up somewhere, that we might not feel the need to be all over each other at work," I explained my theory. "We could just hole up at my place," Scully offered. "That way we won't waste valuable time." "I like the way your mind works," I told her as my mouth descended onto hers again. Our kiss became deep quickly, our tongues caressing each other. When Scully made that noise in the back of her throat again, I reluctantly pulled out of the kiss. She laid her forehead against my chest until she caught her breath. "We just have to make it through today," her voice was muffled by my shirt. "We can do it, Scully. We've overcome bigger obstacles than this," I said, not quite sure if I was trying to convince her or myself. We decided to sit on opposite sides of the desk to eat the breakfast that Scully had brought. When she bit into her bagel, Scully's eyes grew wide. "Something wrong?" I asked, my mouth full of bagel. "I just realized something," she said when she'd swallowed. "I have next to no food at my place. Why don't I run out this morning and get some groceries? Will you cover for me?" "Don't I always?" I grinned. She just snorted. "While you're gone, I'll put in for both of our vacations, okay?" "Do you know my password?" "What incarnation of Queequeg are you up to?" A kid could've hacked Scully's password. "Exclamation mark," she informed me with a huff. She was cute when she was being haughty. So after we'd finished our breakfast, Scully headed out to the market. I figured that this little break from each other would make it a little easier to function. When she was there, she was all that I could think about. Kissing Scully was one of the best things that I'd ever experienced, and if kissing her was so good I hesitated to think about what was in store for me tonight. Apparently I was wrong about this break making it easier to function. Scully was all that I could think about even when she wasn't here. Not that this was a change, she usually filled my thoughts, anyway. The chirp of my cell phone brought me back to reality. "Mulder," I answered it. "It's me," was Scully's familiar greeting. "Miss me already?" I chuckled. "Well, yes, I do, but that's not why I called. I just thought I would pick us up some lunch while I'm out. Is a sandwich okay with you?" Scully had known for quite a while now what I liked and what I didn't. It was one of those things that had made our relationship indescribable. "A sandwich would be fine," I assured her. "Okay, I'll see you in about an hour." "About an hour," I parroted her. As soon as I had hung up, I dialed the Gunmen. Langly picked up and we went through the same rigmarole about taping my conversation that we always do. "It's off, it's off," he assured me, but I knew that stringy-haired nerd was lying through his teeth. "I need a favor, Langly," I was in no position to argue about being taped. "You need us to check your place again?" For a few years now the Gunmen had been checking my apartment and Scully's place for bugs. After last spring, I'd had them check the office on a regular basis, too. "No, I need you to do something else for me." "Are you finally going to let Frohike put that camera in Scully's bedroom?" Langly lowered his voice. "No, Langly! Would you just shut up and listen." "Sorry, man, what do you need?" "I need you to hack something for me," I told him. "I hope it's a worthy hack." I could tell that Langly was puffing out his scrawny chest. "I need you to hack into the FBI's mainframe and put in a vacation request for Scully and me." "Okay, a couple of things, Mulder. The FBI doesn't have a mainframe anymore. They have a LAN. The mainframe wasn't Y2K compliant so they got rid of it last summer." "Oh." The ups and downs of the FBI's computer system is not one the things that I keep track of. "Is that a problem?" "For me, no." I was glad that I could boost Langly's ego. God knows it wasn't about to get boosted any other way. "Was there another problem?" "Not really, I was just wondering why you can't put in for your own freakin' vacation?" "Because Langly," I sighed, " I want it to start tomorrow, and if I put in for it today, Skinner might turn it down. But if it was put in two weeks ago. Skinner will just think that he missed it somehow and approve it." "So how much time do you want me to put in for?" Langly inquired. "Nine days, please." I felt like I was asking for an advance on my allowance. "Say it," Langly tried to sound tough. "Come on, Langly." I couldn't believe that he was going to make me do this. "Say it, Mulder." "Your Kung Fu is the best," I sighed. "There, now that wasn't so hard was it?" "How long will this take?" I was glad Langly couldn't see me rolling my eyes. "It's done, man. Do you want me to bump up your salary, too?" Langly offered. "Shit no, Langly. I don't want to arouse any suspicions." "Okay, whatever you say. Is that all you need?" "Yeah, thanks, Langly. I owe you one." "You owe me more than one, Mulder. And some day I'll come up with a way for you to repay me," he laughed. "I'm sure you will, Langly. Thanks again." As soon as I was off the phone, I logged to check my vacation. There it was, still unapproved after two weeks. That Skinner was such a slacker. I logged back out and then back on again as Scully. Langly had made it look like Scully had booked her vacation the day before me. Trust Langly to make it look genuine. After logging off again, I leaned back in my chair and put my feet up on the desk. I started thinking about the past weekend and how depressed I'd been that Scully hadn't wanted to go to England with me. I thought we'd have a good time and maybe check out some of my old haunts. I never thought that anything would actually happen between us. I knew that Scully still hadn't been ready to start a relationship with me, but we still could have had some fun. Little did I realize that if I left Scully alone, she'd realize what I'd known for a long time now. That we were meant to be together. There had been so many times that I'd grown tired of waiting for Scully and I'd thought up so many ways to make her see our mutual destiny. But every time I came up with some new plan, I chickened out--afraid that I'd end up scaring her off instead. Never had I planned to just leave her alone for a couple of days--who knew? I must have been lost in these thoughts for a long time, because the next thing I knew I heard Scully coming down the hall towards the office. She just shook her head at me when I told her that I hadn't done anything except put in for our vacation while she was gone. Insisting that it would make the time go faster, Scully began to work on the case that I was now calling "The Blair Margarita Project." I pulled out some of our unsolved cases to see if something miraculous might occur to me, but I was far too distracted to accomplish anything. At noon Scully produced the sandwich that she had bought for me and a salad for herself. It was beyond me how she could survive solely on rabbit food. Not that I don't like salad, but if that's all that I ate for lunch, I'm sure I'd collapse by two. But I knew better than to ask her about it. If I did, I'd have to listen to how she wasn't blessed with my metabolism, and in order to keep her weight under control, she had to be very meticulous about what she ate. So I didn't say a word. At 12:45 we headed upstairs to the conference room, hoping to get seats far enough apart that we would be able to concentrate during the meeting. When we got there, however, all of the chairs were full, except for three. Skinner's, at the head of the table, one opposite his, and the other, just around the corner from it. After nodding our hellos, Scully and I sat down. Just as we were getting settled, Skinner walked in. His eyes widened almost imperceptibly when he saw us. "Before we get started, I just wanted to have a quick word with Agents Mulder and Scully," he nodded towards the door. Glancing at each other, Scully and I stood up to follow Skinner. He held the door open for us, and then pulled it closed behind us. "I just wanted to tell you that I approved your vacation requests." "Thank you, sir," Scully smiled. Standing with his arms akimbo, Skinner shook his head. "I don't understand it. I looked first thing this morning and I didn't see your vacation requests. Then right before I left for this meeting, I did my computer rounds again, and there were your requests, dated two weeks ago." I tried to suppress my smile as I saw Scully's eyebrows fly up. Her eyes flicked over at me briefly. "That *is* strange, sir," Scully agreed. I hoped that Skinner didn't hear the hint of amusement in her voice that I did. "I guess your requests were lost on the LAN," he shrugged. "But one thing has me even more puzzled." "What's that?" I asked. "Why neither of you asked for today off?" "This meeting has been scheduled for a month, sir. Neither of us wanted to miss it," I said as sincerely as I could manage. With a skeptical look on his face, Skinner drew a deep breath, but Scully interrupted him. "It's after one, sir. Shouldn't we get back to the meeting?" Judging by the look on Skinner's face, I'd have to say that he thought that Scully and I were up to something, but he had no idea what...if he only knew. "Right," he said curtly and opened the door again. As it turned out, this was one of the most enjoyable meetings I'd ever attended, although I can't recall a single word that was spoken. Scully took the chair at the back of the table and I sat on the side. Skinner had barely begun to read the agenda when I felt Scully's toes making their way up my leg to my lap. When I stole a glance at her, she was leaning back in her chair, her notepad in her lap. No one would be able to tell from the look on her face what she was up to under the table. I should have known from Scully's history that she liked to do the unexpected. I guess I never thought that she'd be doing it with me. Why her stocking feet in my lap should send all of my blood rushing south, I'm not quite sure. Perhaps it was the secret that we were sharing or maybe it was just the intimate nature of what she was doing. When the side of her foot brushed up my erection, her eyes grew wide and she started to take her feet off of my lap. Reaching out quickly, I caught her ankle and held it. Nodding slowly, I started to rub her foot with my free hand. Her eyes closed briefly as I massaged the arch of her foot. After I'd thoroughly massaged her left foot, her calf and the underside of her knee, I moved to her right foot. It felt like I had only just started when I heard Skinner start to wrap things up. Scully pulled her feet off of my lap and I buttoned up my suit coat, very thankful that I'd remembered to bring it. After we made some polite noises to Skinner and the other attendees, Scully and I walked to the elevator as quickly as we could without drawing more attention to ourselves than we normally do. The elevator had cleared out by the time we reached the first floor and we were alone for the ride to basement. Since we were both aware of the newly installed security cameras we kept our distance. As soon as the doors closed behind us, Scully and I made a dash for the office. Once we were inside and the door was closed behind us, I grabbed Scully and crushed her mouth with mine. "Home," Scully panted when we came up for air. "Not time yet," I pointed out, my own breath short. "I don't care," she said defiantly. "I can't take any more of this." "Okay," I nodded, reaching for the door. "Mulder, do me a favor and give me a ten minute headstart." "Why?" "The groceries have been sitting in my trunk too long already and once we get to my place neither of us is going to give a rat's ass about putting them away." "Yeah, I'm pretty sure that groceries will be the last thing on my mind," I agreed, grinning. After Scully left, I paced around the office for fifteen minutes- I know that I drive faster than she does, so I gave her a little extra time. I remember nothing about the drive to Scully's apartment. Before I knew it, I was standing at the front door; one hand holding my overnight bag, the other knocking softly on her door. When she opened the door and smiled shyly at me, my heart began to beat wildly in my chest. Dropping my bag just inside her door, I gathered her into my arms. Our mouths seemed to be drawn together, as if unseen forces were acting on us. Within seconds, similar forces had shut the door, stripped of us our clothes, and moved us to the couch. But when Scully began to lower herself onto me, everything switched from fast forward into slow motion. The feeling of finally being inside of her was overwhelming. It was everything that I had fantasized about and more. As my cock disappeared into her I let my hands roam over her back and her ass, but as soon as I was completely inside of her, I put my hands on her hips to keep her still. "Hang on a second, Scully," I pleaded softly. "What's the matter?" She sounded concerned. "Nothing, I just wanted to talk for a minute, okay?" Leaning in, she kissed me softly. "What did you want to talk about?" "I just wanted to tell you that I can't wait until we can have a lovemaking session," I told her. "Isn't that what we're doing, Mulder?" "No, we're making love and I'm sad to say that it won't be even close to a session. I can already tell that I'm not going to last very long, Scully." "That's okay, Mulder. You'll last longer next time," she smiled and kissed me tenderly. "But not long enough," I shook my head. "That's what I mean." She looked at me with a puzzled look on her face. "I want a session, Scully, not a couple of minutes," I explained. "Probably by our third time, I'll be able to make love to you the way I want to." "How do you want to make love to me, Mulder?" Scully asked, her voice had become lower. "I want to make love to you for a long time. I want to explore your body. I want to find out what you like and what you don't." As I spoke Scully began to move, letting my cock slide slowly in and out of her. "Well, I like it when you talk to me like that," she sighed. Sliding my hands up from her hips, I began to squeeze her breasts as I continued to talk to her. "I want to find out where and how you like to be touched. I want to discover what position you like the best." As I told Scully about my plans for her, I felt her internal muscles begin to clench. "God, Mulder," she groaned. "I want to learn your moods, to know when you want to make love and when you want hot, sweaty sex." Scully groaned again, but she kept her pace very slow, her full lips slightly parted and heavily-lidded eyes locked on mine as I spoke. "I want to memorize how you taste. I want to know the exact location of every freckle you have." "Oh, Mulder," she breathed and then began to swivel her hips as she moved up and down. "God, Scully, I love the way you move," I told her breathlessly. Making a chuckling noise deep in her throat, she continued her slow, rhythmic dance. "I want to find out what all of your sounds mean, and I want to see all of the different ways you come. I can't wait until I can watch you come, Scully." Talking to her was keeping me distracted enough that our first time wasn't going to be over in an instant, but I was hovering right on the brink. "I want to recognize when you want to be in control and when you would prefer me to take the lead." I was panting as I spoke. Covering my mouth with hers, Scully began to kiss me feverishly. My climax had started building as soon as she sank onto me, but now I was beginning to quake as I neared my peak. I had stayed fairly motionless, letting Scully do all of the work. But, as my orgasm started to swell, I began to thrust into her. Initially, I had feared that I wouldn't last long enough for Scully to reach orgasm, but as I was taking my final thrusts I felt her muscles begin to ripple around my cock and I heard her cry out my name, just as I was calling hers. When I came down from my high, I could feel Scully's muscles quivering. She made no move to get off of my lap. "That was beautiful, Mulder," she sighed. "Well, it was mostly you, Scully and I promise that I'll last longer next time." "I meant what you were saying to me, Mulder. You have no idea what it means to me to hear you talk like that," she said softly. "That's what I want, Scully. I want to learn how to really make love to you." "Will I get a chance to learn what you like?" "You *are* what I like, what I love, what I need, what I crave," I assured her as I pulled her close and clung to her tightly. "Somehow I knew that you would be an intense lover, Mulder," she whispered in my ear. "Is that a good thing?" "It would have scared me, even a week ago. But now that I'm sure that this is where I'm supposed to be, your intensity makes me feel secure." "Don't you think that it's strange that all of this was precipitated by me leaving you to your own devices for a couple of days?" "I don't think that was the only factor, Mulder. I think that this has been building for a long time, but we both had things that we needed to deal with before we could really be together. If we'd tried to do this any earlier, I think it would have failed miserably and maybe ruined everything that we already had." "So, you think that this was our time? It was always meant to happen this way?" "Something like that," she nodded. "Sounds like an extreme possibility to me, Scully." "Shut up, Mulder." end please send feedback to ardywyn@hotmail.com