Wish You Were Her

Disclaimer: I do not own Red Eye.

AN: A challenge from the BiP, for great justice. And yes, I was actually at a club once JUST like the one in this fic. They really did serve sushi and s’mores. I thought it was the lamest thing I’d ever seen, and vowed to write about it one day.

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The music was more than deafening, possessed of a rhythm so heavy and loud that it seemed to make his heart match its beat. It was hard to breathe, hard to see, hard to do much of anything but move forward through the press of hot, damp bodies.

Jackson wondered what the hell he was doing here. This wasn’t his scene, not in the slightest. He would have preferred a quiet drink in a local pub or restaurant, some place that served real food instead of chips and pretzels—or as this place did, sushi and s’mores. What the hell kind of club served sushi, anyway? He felt like he was in some wild movie about clubs where the scriptwriter had never actually BEEN to a club. Like whoever wrote the story had never experienced the scene for themselves, and merely made something up that sounded vaguely like what they thought it must be.

Someone screamed to his right. His head snapped over to see two overpierced, underdressed, likely underage girls fling their arms around each other as if they hadn’t seen each other in years. Several boys (Jackson used the word ‘men’ sparingly in this crowd) around them were nearly panting at the too-obvious display of overt lesbianism, but Jackson wasn’t fooled. He saw both girls glance around to see the effect they had. One met his eyes, looked him up and down, her gaze growing shrewd when she realized he had seen through her little display with her friend. He couldn’t suppress a sneer. Real lesbians, he certainly didn’t mind. Fake ones, however, were simply pathetic. He turned away and kept moving toward the bar.

He needed a drink, plain and simple. That’s all he’d wanted. A beer, a scotch, anything alcoholic would do after the night he’d had. This place had seemed likely from the outside, but after having to pay a cover for a DJ he’d never heard of and getting past a bouncer who had looked at him like he was crazy for going in. He certainly didn’t dress like these…whatever they were called. Scenesters? Emo kids? Idiots? Whatever.

By now his head was pounding. All he wanted was something to drink, but people were buying crap here. The vodka was cheap, the beer was cheaper, and whiskey and scotch were just ingredients to other, more colorful, concoctions. He had to nearly shout to be heard, and even then, he wasn’t sure what the bartender handed him in the end. From the taste, it was some kind of Long Island Iced Tea. Wonderful. At least it was recognizable.

One of the pseudo-lesbians bounded past him, jostling his elbow and nearly making him spill his drink. When he turned to snarl at her, the other squeezed past on his other side. He felt her hand on his hip, tracing past his pocket. His own hand snaked out, caught hers in an experienced iron grip. “Don’t,” he growled. “Don’t fuck with me.”

Her smirk turned to fear, and he pushed her away. Stupid kids, he thought, pushing his way back through the crowd. Thought they could pick his pocket. That was a rule they had yet to learn: never con a con man. It was lucky for them that he wasn’t in the mood to punish idiots tonight. He simply wanted to finish his drink and go.

It didn’t seem possible, but the dance floor was even more crowded now. The beat of the music had changed, sped up even as time seemed to slow down. He had to take his drink in gulps instead of sips, lest he spill more of it. Whatever else the bar had skimped on, the tequila was certainly tasty. It overpowered the rest of the ingredients, save one that he couldn’t identify. He shook his head to clear it a little, and downed the rest.

By now, the press of bodies was too great for him to go anywhere. He was stuck on the dance floor, the deep bass thrumming through his head, his chest. It made his head move in time to the music in spite of himself. The DJ really wasn’t half bad, he decided, and put his glass down somewhere so he could really dance.

Time had gone off in its own direction. Jackson got lost in the music, the heat, the overbearing beat and the undulating people around him. He stumbled a little, was caught by someone, kept dancing until his hair was soaked with sweat. It ran into his eyes, made his shirt cling to his skin, but he still kept going and going and going…

Like a vision from God, he saw her. It was as if the crowd opened up to reveal her, then closed again just when it registered what he saw. She was dancing, too, slowly, eyes closed. Of all the people in the club, she was the only one dancing to a different rhythm. He took a step closer, another, and another, sliding past shoulders and elbows that tried to hinder his progress. When he reached her, she had her back to him, and it was easy—so easy!—to slip up behind her, to put his arms forward, to join her in her different dance. She sighed and leaned back against him, the only partner she’d taken all evening, he somehow knew.

God, she smelled so good, warm and moist, the back of her neck damp with perspiration. She had her hair up, but tendrils had escaped and now curled against her skin. Jackson was seized with a sudden desire to taste it; he bent, moving in sync with her, and ran his tongue over the hollow at the back of her neck up to her hairline. She shuddered, gasped, leaned into him more. His arms went around her and he buried his mouth in the crook of her neck.

The beat changed again, but they were still moving to their own. His hands spanned her waist, teased upward, brushed the weighted curve of the bottoms of her breasts. He ground his hips against hers and breathed words of desire into her ear. This whole time, she had yet to face him, and he didn’t care. He didn’t care that she wasn’t who he thought she was. He didn’t want her to ruin the dream of dancing with someone he couldn’t have, someone he really should never even see again, lest she lay him low once more.

But damn if she wasn’t a good substitute. “Come home with me,” he murmured, not really expecting a positive reply, but too far gone to hold the sentiment inside.

Instead, he felt her nod against his chin. “Take me home,” she sighed. He didn’t need to be told twice.

How they got there, Jackson would never know. He only knew that they were in her apartment, mouths sealed together, fingers frantically scrambling to rid bodies of clothes. She fumbled with the buttons on his shirt until he tore her hands away and ripped the edges apart. Buttons pinged against the hardwood floor, the wall, the counter, but they were already on their way to the bedroom. She couldn’t ever be the one he wanted, but she was damn close. A few flicks of his wrist and the pins fell from her hair, sending the curls tumbling down over her shoulders. He dove his fingers deep into the sweat-drenched mass and pulled her face back up to his. He needed to taste her moans, needed to feel her teeth click against his. She swayed; he hooked an arm under her legs and carried her the rest of the way to her room.

Why bother with the light, he thought as he bore her to the bed. She wound her arms around his neck, drew her legs up and apart, opening herself to him. If she was the one he wanted, if she was the girl he wished she was, she would have fought him at this point, would never have allowed him to touch her the way he was now. He sat on the bed, loomed over her, caught at her mouth, her neck, her collarbone in brief, hot kisses. They trailed down over her breast and stopped at the black lace of her bra.

Everything moved, it seemed, everything wavered. He ducked his head again, pushing aside the delicate fabric to reveal an equally delicate nipple. In the dark, it was little more than a darker spot on her pale skin, but when his tongue dragged over it she hissed and arched upward, her body begging for another pass.

His fingers found the crux of her thighs as his mouth closed over her nipple a second time. She gave a wordless cry, her hands clutching at his head and her hips writhing beneath his hand. He pulled the skirt up, thrust the scrap of lace that passed for panties aside, buried his fingers up to the second knuckle inside her. There was nothing like the inside of a woman, he decided. Nothing could replicate the heat, the slick walls, the sweet musky scent. Her breathing changed, much in the way the beat had at the club, signalling a shift in tempo, in mood. Jackson heard it, felt it, knew that this was the right moment.

He returned to her mouth, almost savagely capturing it while he kicked his pants the rest of the way off. Without breaking contact, he moved until he was positioned just so, then he pulled back a hair’s breadth and whispered a name. Not the name of the girl beneath him; he spoke the name of the one he wanted, the one he wished was here now, the one he couldn’t have.

Her body slid over him, over the head of his penis and around its shaft, slowly, tightly, accepting him until he was buried in her as far as he could go. He wanted to weep at the sensation as he always did, how it was so right, so amazing that he fit like this, that there was something in this world created specifically to surround that specific part of his anatomy. It was beautiful. She moved slightly and pulled him in more—was that even possible? He didn’t question it further. All that mattered was that he was very deep inside a woman who could pass for his most secret fantasy, and she was urging him to move.

Every pull was torture. The muscles of her body twitched and constricted around him, and it seemed like sacrilege to leave the warmth even for a moment. Then, however, he got to return, driving home and eliciting a satisfying gasp or moan from her throat. He found the right combination of entry and withdrawal, found her mouth once more, found himself sweating with exertion and growing tense, harder, on some level worried that this would have to end sometime.

Then it didn’t matter. That one moment, the one delicious, perfect moment where time stopped and thought stopped and…

Bliss.

He was gulping for air, arms weak from keeping him at the right angle for so long. The woman beneath him begged him for just a moment more, another moment, she was almost there...they were both clinging to each other, nearly weeping with the release and the effort of what they’d just done. Her body trembled around his, teasing him, though he didn’t have the strength to fuck her again. It was all he could do to keep from collapsing on top of her. Instead he rolled to the side, on his back, one arm outflung while he caught his breath again. She curled against him as women were wont to do, and fell asleep. Jackson tried to stay awake so he could make his escape, but the drink and the sex and the long, long day before it all simply caught up with him.

He slept, and wished it had been someone else.

*****

Morning.

Of course it was fucking morning. Fucking birds, fucking chirping, fucking…Jackson groaned. Haven’t you had enough, he silently asked his lower half, which solidly ignored him and strained against the blanket. His head hurt—the one on his shoulders, that is—and pounded as though he still heard the music from the club even now.

The club. Jackson cursed himself for an idiot, drinking that fucking drink even after the girls had accosted him. The oldest trick in the book, or one of them: distract and drug. He wondered if they had hoped he’d take them up on their little game, or if they were just trying to get even with him for rejecting them outright. It really didn’t matter. He remembered everything far too clearly; the girl, the dancing, the holy-shit-mind-blowing sex and the passing out afterward.

She’d seemed like everything he wanted last night in the darkness. Jackson was almost afraid to look at her. She probably wasn’t even a redhead. He had been seriously out of it last night. What if she was sick, or ugly, or…

Something caught his eye. He’d tried not to look at her as he eased out of bed, but it was hard not to. She was on her back, one arm over her eyes, the rest of her sprawled across the bed. Only half of her was covered by the sheet. The lower half. The upper half was deliciously naked and open to the room, and among the marks he remembered leaving, one very recognizable mark glared up at him.

A scar. Over the right breast.

It wasn’t very dark, not anymore. It had healed white, still visible but little more than a discoloration than anything else. He knew that scar. It haunted him, the symbol of his weakness and his greatest failure.

There was no way. It just wasn’t possible. It was totally inconceivable. She wouldn’t have been in a club like that, she wouldn’t have been wearing those clothes, she would never have let him touch her. It had to be a coincidence.

The thought of what she’d worn brought with it a new wave of plain wanting. He couldn’t help himself; he had to know because he wanted her all over again. Gently, he leaned over and lifted her arm away from her eyes, uncovering her face.

He almost dropped it back into place. Lisa. Leese.

Fuck.

There was only one choice that he could see: get out of bed as quietly as possible and leave before she woke up. If she woke and saw him, she would scream, and then probably fight him. He wasn’t prepared or willing to get into a physical fight with her at the moment. He just wanted to go, to collect his thoughts, to remove himself from her sphere of influence before he acted upon the stray idea that was forming in the back of his mind, the one involving his primed body sinking into her again.

He stood up. Bad thoughts, very fucking bad. He tried to remember where all his clothes were. His pants and boxers were here, but the rest? He had no clue. Scattered somewhere around the path to the bedroom, he supposed.

God, but his head hurt. He buckled his belt and reached for the doorknob, intent upon leaving posthaste.

“Mmm,” a too-familiar voice stopped him, “Owwww.”

Don’t look, his inner voice screamed at him, Don’t look… He looked.

She was sitting up in bed, sheet clutched to her chest as the other hand rubbed at her eyes. The black bra hung from one shoulder, and her hair was in utter disarray. Even from here, he could see her mouth was still bruised from his attentions. She seemed to be having a hard time focusing. “What…owww…what happened?”

In for a penny… “Morning, Leese.” He injected as much wry humor into his tone as he could manage through a pounding headache and the not-good sinking feeling that all hell was about to break loose.

The expression was priceless. Her eyes went round and wide, her mouth forming a perfect O. They stared at each other for several very long seconds, then she spoke again. Very clearly, very calmly, she enunciated each syllable. “What. Are. You. Doing. Here.”

He wanted to pass out until the dizziness was gone and the headache was just a memory. “Visiting?”

Her chest rose and fell too quickly. She was getting hysterical, not a good sign. “What.”

He sighed, rested his weight on one hip. How much longer could he keep up the façade? “I didn’t know it was you,” he tried, “I thought—”

“Out.”

“Leese—”

“OUT!” This time, her voice cracked. Her knuckles had turned white, and he guessed there were little red half-moons in her palms from clenching her fist so tightly. He obeyed, moving fast to dodge the lamp that came flying at his head as he ducked out the door. “OUT! GET THE HELL OUT!”

He thanked whatever god would hear him that he’d already found his pants and shoes; his shirt and jacket were nearby and he grabbed them, pulling them on even as he raced to the door to the hall. Lisa flung open her bedroom door, stalking down the hall after him. He briefly thought about trying to placate her, but then she raised her arm and he saw the horribly familiar field hockey stick she’d once used on him.

“Get out,” she snarled, advancing on him. “Get the hell out of my house you fucking bastard.” She gave each word the same weight, as if she was trying to keep tight rein over her emotions.

Jackson decided not to argue. He reached the door and opened it. “I’ll call you,” he said lightly, then quickly shut it before a vase shattered on the other side. The deadbolt thunked into place, then the rattle of a chain and the scrape of a key told him she was locking everything she could.

Not that he would stay around. That would just be asking for more trouble. It would be best if he retreated for now, and called her later when she could talk and think clearly. When both of them could think, he was reminded when his head began to pound again.

One thing was sure. It would be an interesting conversation.