PB Fic - Whited Sepulchre
Authors: volatile/becisvolatile
Rating: NC-17
Characters: Kellerman/Sara
Genre: Drama, PWP
Summary: Paul threw down a folded map and turned, his eyes level with her toes as he peered up her body to her face, ‘Do you think a man can be absolved of his sins?’
Disclaimer: Not my sandpit.
Notes: So… written for the pbhiatus_fic 'Let's talk about sex' challenge. What's not to love about a challenge that openly encourages smut?
On a more writerly note, the ‘whited sepulchre’ reference comes from the bible (Matthew 23:27), basically referring to tombs painted white and clean, despite housing nothing but decay and death. Essentially it’s about hypocrisy.
Thanks once more to muldy for stepping up to beta. And thanks for the confidence boost. I needed it. msgenevieve also threw in, because somewhere in her base make-up is a hefty dose of awesome.
Paul’s eyes zeroed in on the fine trickle of blood escaping from her left nostril, on the swelling that blossomed out from her broken nose that made her eyes seem darker, her cheekbones higher. It wasn’t beautiful. But damned if he didn’t find it just that bit too entrancing.
He had been trying so save her. Even that first time, in New Mexico, he had given her an out. Not much of one, but an out all the same.
And then Chicago. Fuck, Chicago, yeah, he’d taken a bullet for her there too. Literally and figuratively.
He had to wonder how fate had twisted so much that he had taken it on as his own personal mission, the feat that held the key to his redemption, to save Sara Tancredi. Though, if he’d known how much it would take to find her in Panama, he’d never have started looking. But he was alive for a reason, he’d taken four bullets to the body and still he breathed. There was a reason and, until something else came along, Sara Tancredi’s life was it.
‘Did they hurt you?’ he asked, as she finally settled down onto the edge of the bed, her head hanging low. She didn’t answer him immediately, instead lifting her eyes to shift around the hotel room.
‘You’re a dead man,’ she finally said.
‘Did they hurt you?’ he repeated, moving to a chair situated at a small dining table by the window.
‘Dead,’ she reminded him.
‘You heard?’
‘You must be a hard man to kill,’ she said, clarity creeping back into her voice.
‘Yeah, I learned from the best. Are you hurt, Sara? Don’t make me repeat myself.’
She almost smiled as she lifted a hand to her face and ran her fingertips over her top lip, not quite brave enough to touch her broken nose, ‘No. Not hurt.’
‘I had to, Sara.’
‘Had to hit me in the face with a closed fist?’
‘Had to make them think I was one of theirs. To get you out. But what I don’t understand is why they even had you.’
‘I honestly don’t know. It’s not like it was stateside, we aren’t running. Not hiding. Lincoln… me… none of us have secrets or information, not anymore. We just want to get Michael out.’
‘How long did they have you?’
Sara looked through the window. ‘What day is today?’
‘April fifth.’
‘A month and two days.’
‘Why?’
Frustration shot through her voice. ‘I don’t know. I heard… God, I heard nothing useful. Nothing that made sense. I heard ‘control’, ‘incentive’, ‘program’. They were keeping me, I think they were using me to bait Michael. Into what, I don’t know.’
‘Not into,’ Kellerman said, after a moment of silence, ‘Out of. They are using you to lure him into escaping.’
‘Out of Sona? This isn’t the nasty little game we were playing in Fox River. This is insane. I don’t understand the stakes here. I don’t-’
‘You need to sleep,’ he cut her off, ‘But you need a doctor first, I’ll call-’
‘Just get me some ice,’ she said as she shrugged out of her sweat soaked jacket, ‘Ice and some towels.’
*****
Sara slept through that night and woke surprised at how easy it had been to sleep with Paul propped against the foot of the bed, pouring through local maps and guides. ‘Why are you here?’ she asked as she blinked away the night’s sleep, wincing at the stretch and pull of her face.
‘I saved you in Chicago,’ he answered, without looking up.
‘You drowned me in New Mexico,’ she countered without missing a beat.
Paul threw down a folded map and turned, his eyes level with her toes as he peered up her body to her face, ‘Do you think a man can be absolved of his sins?’
When Sara didn’t answer, his eyes grew dark before turning back to something in his hands.
A long time passed before she spoke, ‘I hope so. Because I have a few sins of my own.’
*****
Eventually, he ventured out for food. Good rescuers made sure that their wards got three squares a day. This would be the first thing she’d eaten in nearly forty-eight hours. But Paul was happy to settle for being an adequate rescuer.
‘Food,’ he called as he walked through the door, lifting a plain grease-stained brown bag and shaking it.
No one answered, and as he stood in the sickly light filtering through the curtains into the room his stomach dropped. Now was not the time to be losing her. He knew she was anxious to find Scofield, but they had to wait. They had to plan. Surely she’d picked that much up from her boyfriend?
He threw the bag against the far wall with a curse. His hands swept up over his face as he made a wordless noise of frustration.
‘I was hoping,’ said Sara from behind him, ‘to eat that.’
He turned sharply and found her standing in the door way of the bathroom. She’d been there the whole time and at one point in his life he would have known to look there.
‘You didn’t leave,’ he observed.
‘You didn’t force me to stay. I took it as a gesture of goodwill.’
Paul nodded once and crossed the room to retrieve the food, as he crouched to grab the bag he said, ‘You know, whatever else I’ve done, I’m not here to hurt you. Not this time. I have to make things right.’ He peered into the bag and winced. ‘It wasn’t appetizing to start with,’ he said as he held it out to her, ‘But I’m half-sure its edible.’
With a gentle laugh she took it, ‘Right now? Anything is edible.’
After finishing the offering in silence Sara held up her fingers and, deciding she was not in polite company, drew them, one at a time, into her mouth.
Out of the corner of her eye she could see him watching her closely, ‘We have a sink,’ he said. Was his voice hoarse? No. It was the heat… or something.
Pushing that ‘something’ from mind, Sara dropped her fingers from her mouth and moved to the bathroom to wash her hands. He followed her, shrugging out of his jacket and throwing it onto the bed on the way. Left in jeans and a well-worn cotton shirt, just a little tight around the biceps, he lazed in the doorway crossing his arms over his chest as he watched her.
‘Thank you,’ she said as she began to wash her hands. Her eyes focused firmly on the basin, ‘For the food, I mean.’
‘Of course,’ he said, his voice flat, ‘What else could you possibly want to thank me for?’
She turned off the tap, grabbed a small towel and wrung her hands in it, vaguely aware that she was meant to be drying them. Paul stepped a little further into the bathroom.
Sara’s eyes dropped away from him and swept around the bathroom. God, what a miserable little room. Hardly clean, she was sure, and put together with the most miserable color scheme on earth. Tiny brown tiles were packed tightly together on the floor, occasionally giving way to a chipped area, marked by the dark cement underneath. It was a small space, the shower head positioned over the bath, a faded yellow plastic curtain closed around it. Sara smiled, ‘Third world country and we still get a motel room with a bath. Just my luck.’
Paul Kellerman could endure a lot. He was nothing if not tenacious and patient. At least, he was when such qualities were called for. But her words cut deeply. He reached behind his back and nudged the door shut before reaching down to pull his t-shirt over his head.
Instantly, Sara backed away, but the sight of Paul’s naked chest stopped her in her tracks. This was the language that Sara spoke. A lifetime of hurt and wounds and troubles turned to scars and left upon a body as a testament of trials. The iron mark remained central on his chest, but the collection of scars that surrounded it was both terrifying and impressive. Sara knew what wounds left what scars. She knew something of what his body was telling her. Bullet wounds. At least five, three in vital areas. Short sharp gashes, clean wounds from knives. Then others, jagged and rough and marked with imperfect scars – a sure sign of inadequate medical attention. He’d been a soldier, hadn’t he?
‘I don’t,’ he paused as if deciding how to say what he needed to say, ‘I don’t expect you to forget what has happened. What’s done. But this,’ he motioned to his torso, ‘I expect you to respect this. What I’ve been through. What I willingly took on. For you.’
‘I never asked-’
‘That doesn’t mean you can’t shut your goddamned mouth and just take a break from me. I am saving your life. Again.’
She should have walked out of the bathroom. Really, it was the only sensible thing to do. But if she was going to do sensible things, she wouldn’t stop at leaving the bathroom. Because then she’d have to leave the hotel. Leave the country. Just go home. And she wasn’t going to do any of those things.
She quickly moved her hand out to his chest, then stopped, her fingers just above his skin. As she exhaled her hand ran down and over the rough terrain of his body.
‘Half of this isn’t even healed yet,’ she said quietly, ‘Maybe I should-’
He grabbed her hand, squeezing her fingers tightly as he dragged them from his chest. The momentum of that action carried him into his next and he pulled her arm out to the side and tripped her body closer to his, roughly taking her chin with the other hand and clamping his mouth down against her own.
Clearly, Paul Kellerman didn’t quite grasp the selflessness of heroism. He wanted her badly. Wanted her bruised and slight frame pressed up against his while she breathed words of admiration and thanks into his ear. Words mingled with moans of desire and-
He let her go and she stumbled back, looking very much as though she’d like to get her hands on a hot iron.
Out of line, his mind screamed. He’d been hoping for a ceasefire. Instead, he’d found himself pushing for… for what? A morning cuddled up reading the Panama Gazette in bed? Not likely.
‘I’ll go heat the iron up, shall I?’ he muttered as he turned to leave the room.
Behind him the shower curtain hissed as it was opened. He turned back to find her sitting on the edge of the bathtub staring at him. ‘Is that what you want?’ she asked.
‘No.’ Maybe. Yeah. Really.
‘You know what I want?’
‘What?’
‘I want to be back in Chicago. Reaching the three week point in my relationship with a decent guy, a structural engineer. I want to be asking him up to my place for coffee. I want to be secretly wearing new lingerie that I spent three hours finding in anticipation of our date. I want that.’
Paul crushed his lips together and moved to sit beside her on the tub. His toes brushed past his discarded shirt, he contemplated putting it on, but discarded the idea. He’d already put himself on the line and screwed up. He might as well be naked in the literal sense as well as the figurative sense. ‘And you don’t have that,’ he said as he sank down beside her.
‘I have this room. I gave up on my one pair of panties when we got to the room. I have Panama and now… I have you.’
‘Well, that’s depressing.’
‘Yup,’ she sat her hands in her lap as she ran the pad of her thumb over the rough edge of one nail. She had Paul. She had… someone who’d walked into his own death for her.
Actually, she had two men that had done just that. Her mind turned to Michael and she felt conflicting pangs of anger and guilt. He had no right. No right to take the blame for something she had done.
And for what he’d done… she wanted to assert that she owed him nothing. Even if she knew that she owed him everything. She hadn’t asked for it. But she’d taken it and now she wanted him to take his fucking sacrifice back and just be free and living his own life.
With her eyes shut and her mouth burning she turned on the rim of the tub and kissed Paul. He tasted like the same food she’d just eaten and, as his surprise quickly faded, he hauled her closer against his body and tried to gently run his tongue along her bottom lip. Sara gave a frustrated cry and reached up to dig her nails into his arm as she forced and deepened the kiss. This wasn’t about feeling. It was about doing. About actions – even if they were the wrong ones – in the face of impotence and uselessness.
There was something thick and painful in the way they moved, their bones ground and ached with the weight of what they were doing. As Paul reached out to pull her knee over his own, she slid from the tub onto the floor. She reached down and steadied herself against the insidious brown tiles with one hand, twisting until she faced the tub. She braced her hands against the edge and peered down. The white enamel of the bath had worn away in the centre to reveal a streak of black beneath the shiny surface.
…like unto whited sepulchres…
He kneeled behind her, his hands slid up and over her hips, gentle and persuasive, coaxing her back until the curve of her bottom brushed against his hard thighs. She gripped the tub tighter.
She knew better. She knew so much better. But of all the things she knew… had done. It didn’t seem so bad. It wasn’t a needle. Wasn’t a pill. It wasn’t an out.
If anything, she was facing up to… something. Him. She was paying the piper and maybe, maybe if she was willing to admit it to herself, she was punishing a good man for taking responsibility for her own bad actions.
Her head had begun to throb with the force she was using to keep her eyes clamped shut, her hands dropped away from the tub to undo her jeans and tentatively push at them. She didn’t need to do much though, because the moment her intent was clear his hands were there easing the denim down and over her hips until they gathered about her knees. True to her word, she’d given up on underwear.
She wanted it. She did and that was where she hated herself. Michael would be proud. What a neat little action. It served a package of purposes and demonstrated a clarity and efficiency that made sense only to her.
She was punishing Michael.
Rewarding Kellerman.
Ensuring his loyalty.
Punishing Kellerman.
Scratching an overdue itch.
And, of course, punishing herself.
How neat. How clean. How fucking miraculous.
Paul seemed intent on proving something. Proving that he was good and gentle and… just good. His hands began just above the bunched denim behind her knees and smoothed up the back of her thighs, over her arse, around her hips, then down again with torturous care and skill. They skimmed down over the front of her thighs, twisting in to grip their insides before gently easing them wider.
The movement eased the pressure of the tiles against her knees, but only momentarily.
‘We could go to the bed,’ he offered softly.
But she shook her head, ‘Here.’
His hands left her for a moment and she knew it would be unwise to look over her shoulder. She’d upset him. She’d hurt him and damaged something of the man he was. But at least he knew the score, finally. This wasn’t a tender coupling. This was fucking.
The rasp of his fly bit through the air in the bathroom and Sara’s knuckles whitened with the intensity of her grip. She felt a rush, her own body betraying her as a spark shot from her stomach warming her cold limbs and forcing her body into a state of slick readiness and pliancy.
His hands returned to her hips, but this time with a mechanical sort of grabbing that changed the pace and tone of what they were about to do. Suddenly, she felt too hot and reached down to remove her shirt. He waited while she did so, then unfastened her bra for her, merely ordering her to, ‘Take it off.’
She did so and let her hands fall back to the bath. To that thing that had become her anchor. ‘Tell me,’ his voice was hot and harsh in her ear, ‘Is the tub of importance?’ Then, much lower, he finished, ‘You’re drowning again. Aren’t you?’
He moved closer and she could feel his hips and thighs against her behind, his cock tapped urgently against her inside of her thigh and she felt her eyes grow hot. Her stomach turned, then dropped and she knew that whatever else happened, her body wanted this. Badly.
His left hand came up to sweep over and cup her breast. He seemed intent on playing it by the books, even if he had already called the episode for what it was. His other hand moved around her body until it was pinned between the tub and her hip. Rough fingers struck out and swept over her, finding the source of her pleasure and anxiety, parting her and sliding against her, not quite ready to search deeper.
‘Awfully receptive, Sara, considering that you don’t want this,’ his voice was there again as fat tears rolled down her cheek.
‘Please,’ she croaked.
‘You want me to stop?’
‘Please… please don’t stop.’
It was enough for him. This wasn’t the redemptive moment he’d envisioned and he wanted to get it over with. He pulled his hand away, and deftly guided himself into her. With a clean stroke and the sort of precision he prided himself on, he thrust deeply into her. Sara arched back with a hiss and moan, he took his hand away from her chest and planted it between her shoulder blades, forcing her to face into the tub.
He looked to the ceiling in frustration. He thought what he’d done to her in Gila had been damning.
He was wrong.
What he was doing with her now? That was damning.
She used her knees against the tub for leverage to push back against him, deepening their connection and red exploded behind his eyes. It had been a long time since anything had felt this good.
He gripped her hips and resumed with a steadily increasing rhythm. He tilted his wrists, shifting her hips, moving one knee between her own and picking up the pace. Her moans became throaty cries and for each time he thrust up and into her, she pushed back. The still cool air of the small bathroom moved with them and brushed against their sweat-slick skin. Sara shivered underneath him and that was all it took to force one final and powerful cry from her throat as she lost her grip on the tub, falling forward and leaving Paul to finish what he had begun with her delicate, gasping and languorous body. Suddenly she seemed so light in his hands and as he weakly moved within her for those final strokes, control of her body was completely his.
He withdrew and moved from the tub, taking her with him. Trying to get her as far away from it as the small bathroom would allow. His back hit the door and he kicked his jeans from around his ankles, stopping to remove Sara’s too. She didn’t help or hinder him. Finally he came to rest with his back against the door, his knees wide and Sara between them. He held her to his chest, her back feeling every single scar as he wrapped his arms around her and let her sob softly. He dropped a kiss below her ear and smoothed one hand over her hair.
After a while, he repeated a question he’d asked once before, ‘Do you think a man can be absolved of his sins?’
Her voice was thick with tears and hoarse from he screams as she replied, ‘No. But we can hide them.’
The End