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“What are we going to do out here?”
“What do you want to do?”
“I think I want to sleep. For a week.”
###
She’s been laying in the same spot, awake, for a few minutes now. Or, it may be longer. Time has slipped past her, and she can’t tell by the light filtering through the curtains what time of day it is.
But it’s quiet, and it feels safe.
There’s a small click of the door opening, and she reflexively jolts, and then pulls the covers around her as she sits up in the bed.
Coulson, walking in carrying a grocery bag, and setting it down on the small table before turning to look at her. There’s a pile of fast food containers there, stacked up to one side.
“You’re awake,” he says quietly, with a small smile that warms her and makes her self-conscious all at once.
Pushing the hair away from her face, she looks him over, and thinks how strange it is to see him wearing shorts and a local t-shirt.
He slides the aviators off his face, and sets them down on the table, along with his wallet.
“You hungry?”
“Starving,” she realizes. “How long was I asleep?”
His finger points at the cartons on the table, and then opens the bag and lifts another one towards her. “This is breakfast.”
“Guess I needed it,” she says, stretching with a yawn and sliding the covers away, before her feet touch the cool tile floor and she makes her way to the bathroom.
When she comes back out, he’s opened the containers and cleared the table, and made a nice spot for them while he unwraps some crepes.
“Thanks,” she tells him, sitting down in the chair across him. “For this.”
“You needed to get away. I needed to help.”
“Are you heading back to the base soon?” She sprinkles the sugar and cinnamon mix on the crepe and then folds in some bananas and takes a bite.
It’s careful, and not obvious, but she sees the wrinkle between his eyebrows deepen.
“If you want me to.”
“No,” she tells him, reaching out her hand to touch his.
“I don’t.”
###
“How much trouble will you be in?” she asks him.
They’re walking through the market and looking around at the wares in the stalls.
“Does it matter?” he replies, with a smirk.
“Yes, it matters,” she tells him, bumping her shoulder into his and giving him a disapproving look.
“They need you,” he goes on. “The Director will put it in a file, and then forget it.”
“I’m asking about you.”
She stops and inspects a pair of sunglasses with flamingos on the frames, and then slips them on.
“Stunning,” he teases. She turns to the women selling them and asks her how much in Spanish.
It’s improved a lot from working with Joey and Elena, and since she’s a spy and all, it hadn’t hurt to spend her free time brushing up on languages while she was AWOL.
She opens her purse and pays for the glasses, then slips her hand around his arm to turn them back towards the avenue.
“I’ll just have to rely on your benevolence, I guess?” he finally says to her, his eyes sparkling with mischief. “I kidnapped you for a good reason.”
“You didn’t kidnap me,” she laughs, as he stops to look wistfully at hats.
“You kidnapped Lola. I was just a bystander.”
There’s a straw one with a short brim and nice blue band around it. She picks it up and fits it on his head.
“I’m not much of a hat guy,” he tells her with a shrug, like he’s expecting her to agree.
“But you could be,” she replies, as his eyes fix on hers. No one else has ever looked at her quite the way he does. It takes her a moment to wrestle the fear of losing it aside.
The man running the stand interrupts them to talk about giving them a deal, and she finds herself spot checking the street, looking for eyes watching them.
“Hey,” he says, taking the hat off, and setting it back down. “You feel like getting something to eat?”
“I-“ Shutting her eyes, she sighs for a moment. “They’re going to find us. People know who I am now.”
“They do,” he admits. “But they’re probably not expecting Quake to show up here.”
She notices the corner store over his shoulder, and sees the beauty supply sign, and takes his hand to pull him after her.
“C’mon, A.C. I still need your help.”
###
The water washes over the back of her neck, cool and soothing, as his fingers chase after it.
The tiny bathroom feels too quiet.
Her eyes are shut, but she squints them open to see the color wash down along the bottom of the tub towards the drain.
She was okay with coming back to SHIELD, but dealing with the media? That was another thing, entirely. That speech written for her was infuriating. She’s not a PR puppet.
And still trying to piece herself together again after what had happened with Hive, and feeling responsible for so much death. Afraid of it following her.
That it’s here now, in this tiny bathroom.
It’s always felt good to do this, when she’s ready for a change. And this isn’t permanent, but it’s for this moment. To be able to slip by just a little longer.
If you can from those kinds of things.
“I think that’s all of it,” he speaks into the silence.
She reaches back behind her as the towel is wrapped around her head and holds it in place while she gets up from her knees then takes a few steps to the mirror at the sink.
It was supposed to be blonde, but it’s turned out more honey-brown in color. Still, not dark, and that was the whole point.
“Do you like it?” he asks, tilting his head to watch her dry her hair.
“Guess I didn’t leave it on long enough,” she sighs, meeting his eyes in the mirror, and running her fingers through the strands near her face. “Do you?”
“Yes,” he says, stepping closer and picking the comb up off the edge of the sink.
She stills as he draws it along the side to the ends, carefully combing it through, watching his reflection and remembering the last time their eyes met in a mirror.
He had been there to save her.
She shuts her eyes as the teeth of the comb through the back of her scalp down to the nape of her neck and his thumb brushes against the skin of her shoulder and there’s no way of hiding the gooseflesh rising there.
He’s standing close behind her, and it’s not close enough. She wants to feel him against her, like she’s wrapped up in him.
“I’ll let you finish,” he says, suddenly done, and sets the comb down on the sink with a click. “Then we can get some food?”
She nods at him, and notices him fumble with the key to his room in his pocket.
“I’m going to go change,” he tells her, pulling at the front of his shirt. “Got wet. Shouldn’t be too long.”
###
He’s gone way longer than she expected, and it’s beginning to make her feel that whatever this is between them, it’s not what she wants it to be.
Whatever this is. Only that he’s the most important person to her and she can’t lose him.
They’ve never been alone like this. Not having an entire day, just to themselves. Never stood so close to each other, touched each other with such familiarity.
As she dabs the cheap, colorful nail polish she bought at the store on her toes, it starts to become clear that she’s taking part in a familiar, hopeful ritual.
That she wants this moment not to just be for her. But for them.
While he’s probably in his room freaking out about it, wondering if he’s made a mistake coming-
There’s a knock on her door, and she pauses and then stands up.
He usually comes right in, and the feeling starts to build again, that this wasn’t going to last. It can’t.
She yanks at the door and sees him standing on the other side, a little surprised at the force of it swinging open, and the look on her face, which she manages to quickly adjust.
He’s holding a single bright flower in one hand, and a shopping bag in the other.
“What’s that?” she blurts out.
“A dahlia? They didn’t have daisies.”
“Is it for me?”
“Yes?”
She takes it from him, then looks him over, trying to make sense of this. His nice pale blue button down shirt and a pair of jeans.
“You look good,” she tells him, leaning against the door frame. “What’s in the bag?”
“Tacos?” he answers, and looks like he wants to say something more, but he doesn’t.
“We’re not going out.” It’s a statement this time, not a question, and she takes a step closer to him, in his personal space, to test it.
“We can, if you want to?” he replies. His tone sounds like he doesn’t want to.
“I don’t.”
###
The conversation has turned from tacos, to the agave wine they’re both trying for the first time, to toenails.
Somehow, he’s ended up with the polish and her foot in his lap, after she mentioned she didn’t get to finish painting them.
“I’m sorry I took so long,” he says, as he concentrates on her pinkie toe. “I was thinking. About…us.”
“What made you decide?” She draws in a breath, and he stops for a moment and dips the brush back into the bottle on the table.
“To do what?”
“This,” she goes on. “Weren’t you scared?”
“I’m still scared,” he admits, smiling then blowing across her toes.
“You’ve always been there for me. From the first day we met.”
“I’ve tried, and I know I’ve made mistakes, wanting to find different ways to tell myself that I could never let you get this close.”
“And now?” she asks, drawing her foot away from him and standing, moving until she’s in front of him, between his knees, as she reaches to caress his hair while he looks up at her, wide eyed.
His hands land on her hips, in a gentle, comforting, touch and he hugs her against him, resting the side of his face against her dress over her stomach.
“I’m still afraid to lose you,” he says after a moment, glancing up at her. “But I’m more afraid, of never having told you why.”
“Sounds serious,” she answers, touching her fingers along his temple and brushing her thumb against his cheek.
“It’s a nice night,” he says, wrapping his fingers around hers. “Should we go for a walk?”
She backs away as he stands, still holding onto her hand, and peeks between the curtains towards the ocean outside.
“Full moon.”
###
Once they’re in the sand, he sits to roll up his jeans legs, and she can make out the scar there.
She’s trying to recall what she was thinking when that happened.
It wasn’t thinking, it was just a feeling. That she belonged.
And that she didn’t want him to follow her.
“It was my choice,” he tells her, like he’s read her thoughts. “Every time, it was my choice to follow you.”
“I know, and it scares me.”
She holds out her hand and helps him to his feet as they step into the cold surf together and pull on each other as they laugh at the chill.
“High tide,” he says, wrapping an arm around her, and rubbing it to warm her up. “Sif said something to me, once. About tides that you can’t swim against.”
“You think she means us,” she answers, holding onto his middle and kicking up wet sand.
“It sounded like we didn’t have a choice. That all the painful things that have happened were inevitable.”
“I don’t imagine that sitting well with you.”
“It didn’t. Until, you ran. And then I realized that it also brought you near to me.”
“What if it’s what’s in our blood?”
“I was dead, Daisy,” he tells her, turning her towards him. “We could’ve never met.”
“And you would’ve been safer.”
“From what? HYDRA? Hive? You know better. We stopped them. Made a difference.”
“All the people that died, and got hurt.”
“You stand in the darkness so there can be light there,” he tells her, as he holds her head in his hands, as tears slip down her cheeks. “And it’s hard, and painful, but I won’t let you be there alone.”
“Phil-“
“That’s what I choose.”
###
“Stay.”
It’s the first word she’s said since they started the walk back to the bungalows.
She can feel his eyes searching her face, and she puts her hand on the front of his shirt, over his heart. He does like to do things slowly. Maybe with good reasons, she’s starting to think.
But they’re hovering at her door again, and even after all the things he’s said, he may-
He ducks his head to kiss her, tentatively and quick, like he’s still afraid, and pulls back with an expression like he’s a little shocked by his own boldness.
There’s not very much light to go by, but she has the feeling that he’s probably blushing.
Standing up on her tiptoes, she slides her hand up his shoulder to circle his neck, then pulls him down towards her, as she kisses him with intention.
His hands brace his body on the doorjamb to keep from falling forward, and when she leans away, he chases after her mouth.
The hesitation is gone, and he tips her head back and steps into her until her back is against the door and then carefully begins exploring her mouth with his tongue, letting her lead him further along.
She pushes her body up against his, on her toes again, and feels his fingers on her thigh, sliding up her leg beneath her dress, to lift her and drive his hips up against her.
When they moan into each other’s mouths at the same time, he drops her back down to her feet while she fishes out her key, and gets the door open.
###
She likes the way he feels under her.
The confidence in his body and his intentions towards her, the way his hands touch her, once his mind was made up.
If anyone she knew was more a lover than a fighter, it’s Phil Coulson.
When she tells him that, afterwards, while she explores his body with her curious hands, he looks like there’s nothing he’s happier to hear.
It’s definitely made him blush, and she runs her finger along the pink edge of his ear as he groans a little, and grabs her closer for another kiss laced with a smile.
It starts out as a kiss, and turns into something more serious. Words and touches and all the times he knew he was in love with her, but never told a soul.
And it’s not too long after, she wants him on top, when he’s inside her again, to feel his weight against her.
Like she’s wrapped up in him.
(When it happens the third time, she finally lets him have his way, and he gets his face between her thighs.)
###
“Cutting it close there, weren’t you? Three days off the radar. I was just about to call in the Cavalry.”
The Director has his arms crossed but is eyeing them dressed like a pair of tourists with an amused expression.
“Of course,” he says, pointing up at the monitor. “We did have the security footage, of your trip to the corner store?” he explains, as Coulson steps forward and sets down the brown paper bag on his desk.
“What’s that?” he asks, and opens up the bag to check inside.
“That’s because we weren’t hiding,” she explains, annoyed. “We just wanted to be left alone for a few days.”
“Churros,” he says, looking up at both of them. “Seriously?”
“Consider it a peace offering,” Coulson tells him, dryly.
“Mostly, it was too expensive to fuel the plane up,” he cuts in, as he sits on the corner of his desk. “We’d have had to get the car, too, right?”
“We managed to find our way back.”
“In time for your press conference,” she adds. “But I’m not going to read the speech your writers prepared.”
He gives her a hard stare at that. “C’mon, you two. Playtime is over.”
“SHIELD also exists to protect Inhumans.”
“We already talked about this. Some people don’t mind if Agent Coulson takes a trip to The Raft.”
“If you can get through her first,” he says with a curt smile.
When she raises her chin, the Director’s hands go up.
“The President has to sign off on it, bottom line.”
“Do I get to sign off on his?”
“You were supposed to be a good influence on her,” he gestures at Coulson.
“Yeah, it’s funny,” he says, shaking his head. “Never works that way.”
###
“You are a good influence on me.”
“Thanks.”
He’s giving her this cute, sincere smile, and she’s enjoying getting to see this other side of him.
With his guard down because he wants it down.
They’re cloistered on her bunk in the air to D.C. and she’s been up late writing this speech. He looks tired.
“You should go to bed,” she tells him, as he leans his head down against her shoulder.
“Not until this is finished,” he replies, sounding determined, with his body squashed to fit onto the bed, curled around her.
“Or,” she says, closing the laptop. “We can take a break?”
Leaning forward, she gives him a kiss on his forehead, then his nose, as he tilts his head up to let her kiss his lips.
“This is not a good strategy,” he points out, with a tiny, unconvincing frown. “We’re short on time.”
“I was hoping, that you could…inspire me?”
“If you want me to.”
“I do.”