TITLE: Beneath the Leaves
AUTHOR: Denise Morgen
EMAIL: meadora@hotmail.com
CATEGORY: Angst? Okay, I guess, MAYBE if you wanted to take the most
liberal possible definition of the word. Definite MSR. And oh, is it 
considered RST or UST if they have physical contact but don't have 
sex? Guess I'll have to go to Gossamer and check the definitions...
SUMMARY: Some unexpected closeness derails an attempt to tail a
suspect.
SPOILERS: Wow, my first one without any! Someone call Guinness! Even 
my fluff usually has spoilers! Oh, wait...damn, I lied. TINY one for 
the pilot.
ARCHIVE: Sure. Just drop me a line so I can come visit!
RATING: PG-13 for adult language
FEEDBACK: The quick and easy way to have a shrine erected in your 
honor!
DISCLAIMER: The characters of Mulder and Scully belong to the great
god Chris himself, as well as his compatriots Fox and 1013 Productions. 
I don't have permission to use these characters and no one's paying me 
to do this. It's strictly a labor of love! ;-)
AUTHOR'S NOTE: Okay, see what happens when I let one of my Catholic
friends drag me to church? My spongy little mind soaks up the 
symbolism and all of you poor people are subjected to it via my 
fanfic. So I apologize in advance to those of you that are bothered 
by religious metaphors and assure my well-meaning friends and family 
that no, I am NOT converting.

Visit my Fanfiction; it gets lonely!
http://DennysX.cjb.net

Beneath the Leaves
by Denise Morgen

Mulder didn't know what he'd thought he was doing when he'd whirled 
his partner around and thrust her soft form into a nearby tree with 
his body.  It certainly didn't seem like a move that had a real high 
life expectancy rating for one thing, and for another thing it was 
just too damn hazardous to his state of mind to pressed up against her
like this with legs entangled and bodies joined. But he'd seen their 
suspect threading his way toward them through the sparse crowd of 
weekday park-goers and his body had reacted to provide them a cover 
before his brain could veto the idea.

Scully was marble in his arms, a living statue with flickering 
sapphire eyes round with shock. He knew he had a very limited  
amount of time before she fought off that haze and proceeded to 
rip off his balls and feed them to him for breakfast so he slid his
lips down to her ear and whispered softly in explanation. "Go with 
it, Scully..."

She started in his grasp at the soft words and light contact. She 
didn't move, but he could see the questions in her eyes as he drug
his lips across her cheek before brushing his nose slowly back and 
forth over hers. He tried to reassure her with his eyes before 
dropping his head down to her neck, trailing his nose down the line 
of her chin as he went. He could feel her pulse fluttering birdlike 
beneath his lips as he nuzzled the slender column of her throat. He
felt a momentary pang of guilt for taking advantage of her like this,
even under the guise of a cover, but he quickly pushed it aside. He 
had a legitimate reason for his actions; and besides, he reasoned, 
he'd probably never have another excuse to touch her like this 
again...

Dragging his attention back to the task at hand, he brushed his lips 
against her neck before settling them lightly on her ear. Even as he 
forced his mind onto the case he couldn't escape the rush of longing 
that filled him when she shivered at the touch.

"Johnson's gonna pass us in about two seconds here..." he whispered
seductively as he rubbed her ear with his nose. "Watch him as he goes 
past and then we'll loop around to pick up the trail once he's out of
sight."

Scully nodded slightly as she slid her hands up his arms and wound
her fingers through his hair. Mulder straightened in shock at her 
unexpected move, but Scully simply flashed him her most enigmatic
smile before drawing his face down to hers and treating him to a dose
of the same kind of teasing Eskimo kisses he'd given her before 
pulling him closer. Angling his body away from the tree to afford 
herself a better view, Scully did a little nuzzling of her own as she
tucked her head up under his chin and slid a hand down from his hair 
to lie caressingly over his pounding heart.

Mulder struggled to breath evenly over the flashes of desire that 
thundered throughout his mind and body. He was desperately close
to losing his perspective with her sweet breasts pressed tightly into
his chest and her soft breath warming his skin through the thin 
cotton of his T-shirt. Unconsciously his own hands had migrated to 
places he'd always wanted to touch, settling possessively on her hip 
and tangling in her hair. Scully seemed to sink into him as he buried 
his nose in her auburn tresses and her voice was a throaty murmur 
when she finally spoke.

"He just passed us..." the answering silence was thick and heavy with 
their stilted breaths as he awaited her pronouncement that he was 
gone, dreading to hear that it was time to abandon his new found 
heaven and step away. "He's stopped at the hot dog vender by the 
fountain." Scully burrowed into him more tightly as a pretext to 
change her vantage point and he gasp at the pleasant shock of her 
body coming into full contact with his. Scully's eyes jumped up to 
his momentarily before returning immediately back to her surveillance 
and Mulder felt his face color in embarrassment. From this position 
his reaction to her proximity was, well, blatantly obvious. He fought 
the urge to squirm uncomfortably against her nearness and instead 
loosened his grip on her in an attempt to move back a pace.

The device has yet to be created that could measure his surprise when
Scully aborted his backward movement by wrapping her arm around his
waist and trapping him against her. He couldn't help but gape at her 
in shock, to say that this was not a move he'd expected would've been 
the understatement of the decade. Scully briefly met his questioning 
stare with an amused smirk before whispering, "You're endangering our 
cover. Not stop fidgeting so I can get back to my surveillance."

Mulder was bowled over by the teasing tone in her voice and the
uncharacteristic twinkle in her eyes. She was having fun with this! 
The ever-professional Agent Scully was playing with him! Will wonders 
never cease? Well, far be it for him to rain on anyone's parade! If 
she could enjoy this little compromising situation then he'd be 
damned if she could expected him to let the opportunity go to waste! 
Besides, PlayfullScully was someone who didn't come to visit very 
often and he intended to make full use of her expectantly short 
stay...

He took a deep cleansing breath and made a conscious effort to relax
as he slid into her hold and re-nestled himself against her. Now it 
was Scully who gasped when their bodies met and Mulder found himself
somewhat satisfied to know that he wasn't the only one affected by 
their closeness.  Taking advantage of her preoccupation, Mulder swept 
the hair away from her neck and proceeded to plant soft tiny kisses up 
and down its satin length.

"Muh-Mulder," Scully gasped desperately, "what are you doing?"

"Keeping up our cover," he responded between kisses. "Aren't you
supposed to be surveiling?" He ask huskily as he trailed up her neck.
 Any response she might have made was lost in the small moan that 
escaped her when he took the sensitive lobe of her ear in his mouth 
and caressed it with his tongue. Her arms tightened reflexively 
around him as he nibbled on her pliant flesh, happily soothing away 
the little nips with his tongue as he made the short journey to the 
base of her throat. Dipping his tongue into the hollow at the end of 
that base, Mulder snuck a glance up at his partner. What met his
heavily lidded eyes was a sight he'd seen only in his most lurid
fantasies. Scully's face was a mask of passionate desire. Her head 
was thrown back and her eyes had slipped dreamily shut, all pretext 
of surveillance forgotten by both of them. Her cheeks were flushed 
and her hair spread wildly around her face in stark contrast to the 
tree she leaned against for support. Her mouth had fallen open in a 
small 'o' of surprise as she sucked oxygen in with panting little 
gasps. Her lips were red and swollen as if he had already stained 
them with kisses, and the sight of the tip of her small pink tongue 
snaking out to wet them was more affective than any siren's call.

Before he had time to consider the consequences of his actions, 
Mulder had captured her mouth with his own. He wasn't sure if he 
expected her to struggle against him or not but she pleasantly 
surprised him by immediately parting her lips to accept his kiss. 
Mulder was thrilled to comply with her unspoken invitation and it was
almost a religious experience to dip his tongue into the well of her
mouth. Her taste was an absolution and a benediction to his soul. Like
the cleansing touch of holy water a single kiss washed away the myriad 
'sensible' reasons why they shouldn't do this, shouldn't be together 
this way. All of it faded with the rest of the darkness that was 
banished by the radiant light of their communion. And with this 
sacrament Mulder was converted to worship at the alter of their 
unity. Forever and ever, amen.

Finally they broke apart from each other, regretfully forced to accede 
to the body's demands for air. Gulping in huge open-mouthed breaths, 
Mulder pressed his forehead to hers and struggled to calm his racing
pulse. Scully was in no better condition as she clung to him dazedly
to keep from falling. The sight of her so unhinged because of him 
threatened to overwhelm his battered senses and his eyes slid shut in 
response to the excessive stimulation.

Reality seemed to slide in and out of focus and after a long while it 
occurred to Mulder's scattered mind to wonder why are they pressed up 
against this tree. Suddenly the world came back to him in a blinding 
flash and he knocked Scully to the ground in his haste to locate 
their wayward suspect.

"Mulder, what the hell?" Scully cried out in surprise as she came 
roughly into contact with the ground at her partner's feet.

"Shit, we lost him! Where could he have -" Mulder broke off abruptly
when his eyes swung around to where his partner should be only to 
encounter empty air. Cutting his eyes down, he met her bewildered
annoyance with a sheepish look. "Um...oops?"

Scully was just full of surprises for him today because instead of 
going off on him as he deserved (and he expected) she burst out 
laughing. Mulder's eyebrows came together in confusion. As happy as 
he was to see her really laugh (which he was certain he hadn't seen 
since a rainy graveyard in Oregon), he didn't see anything funny 
about him knocking her on her ass in his muddled preoccupation with a 
case after their first earth-shattering kiss. The corner of his mouth 
twitched slightly as the irony hit him. Okay, so maybe it was funny. 
Pathetic and ironically fitting, but funny. The branches of the tree 
echoed with their laughter and Scully used his now proffered hand to 
pull him down by her side. Still chuckling, they lay entwined beneath 
the leaves...

Fini.

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Laugh like you haven't known sorrow,
Love like you've never been hurt,
and Dance like nobody's watching...
*********************************************************************