Chapter Text
Mira Shepard darted quickly out of the rain into the bar located directly across from her Vancouver hotel. She had come here every afternoon since arriving in the city on her two-week shore leave, three days ago. It was a small; intimate room with a friendly atmosphere, and surprisingly quite a few people occupied the tables there each day. This time however, the bar was even busier than normal. The rain had drove most people inside. For once, she was grateful for her poker straight, shoulder length black hair. Rain never seemed to affect the style, and she never wore makeup, so she knew she did not have to worry too much about how she looked.
She glanced around the room with growing dismay. This time, it did not seem as if she was going to be able to get a table. Her eyes scanned the area, searching for an empty spot without success. Just as she began to resign herself to the fact she would probably be spending the afternoon sitting in her hotel room instead, she spied another Alliance soldier sitting alone in a booth. She had seen him here each afternoon as well, but the two of them had not spoken or had any contact apart from the usual polite cursory nod of acknowledgement.
Though they had not conversed at all prior, he seemed to understand her current predicament. His eyes caught hers, and he nodded slightly while his eyes flicked over to the still empty bench across the table from him.
Mira smiled in relief and made her way over towards her unknown savior. He looked up as she neared his table. "You're welcome to sit here with me if you'd like," he offered. For some reason, his smile completely disarmed her and she felt her stomach begin to flutter crazily at the sight, "I doubt we'll bother each other since we both seem to be reading anyway."
She could feel his eyes on her as she slid into the seat across from him. "Thanks, I appreciate it." She took a deep breath and flashed him a quick grin. As an engineer in the Alliance, she had seen her share of more than one good-looking man in her time. A well-toned body and a pretty smile never usually affected her like this. She pulled a data pad out of her bag and placed it on the table in front of her. "I thought I was going to have to go back and sit in my hotel room instead for a moment there."
Shepard ignored the unusual case of butterflies she found herself suffering from in this stranger's presence. She quickly decided that because she so out of practice with dating and relationships, that her case of the jitters were simply a passing thing. She was not looking for a relationship, and this was certainly no date, so there was no actual reason for her feel anxious. She reached out across the table and held out her hand in greeting, forcing the feelings aside, "Hi. I'm Mira."
Kaidan reached towards her and took her small, warm hand into his. "Kaidan," he replied introducing himself. Their hands remained together for slightly longer than normal as their eyes locked together. They stayed like that, for the longest possible amount of time that could still actually be called moment, until the waiter approached Mira for her drink order. Neither of them noticed the other had an identical flush to their face as two sets of eyes dropped quickly to the data pads that sat on the table between them.
"If it's not something personal, may I ask what you're reading?" Kaidan asked, his voice curious, once the waiter had placed the two bottles of beer on the table and left.
"An article about omnitool over-clocking actually," Mira replied, her face lighting up with enthusiasm as she spoke. She automatically leant forward as she began talking about one of her favorite subjects. "I'm trying to improve the shield modulation on my old Logic here." She looked down at the offending omnitool now with a frown. "I tried reconfiguring it a few times last night; but I'm just not seeing the improvements I should." Mira stole a glance over at the man sitting across the table from her. To be perfectly honest she was waiting for his eyes to glaze over at her admission, say 'oh, that's nice', or for a quick change in subject.
To her surprise, neither of those things happened. Kaidan instead leant forward, opening his own omnitool and placing it alongside hers. She noted with some enthusiasm that he had the same make and model as she did. His whiskey coloured eyes had widened in delight at her unexpected response to his question. "Did you remember to reset the operating system back to the earlier version they recommended in the article?"
"Please," she snorted indignantly with a roll of her eyes, "of course I remembered." Mira shot him an almost wounded look. That was way too rookie of an error for her to have made. "I'm much better than that."
Kaidan now grinned openly at woman sitting across from him. He always enjoyed it when he got to meet anyone he could really talk technical with, let alone have that someone be as attractive as Mira was. "Well, I managed to finally get mine overclocked yesterday. If you want, we can compare settings and see if we can't get yours to work also," he offered. He was on shore leave currently and had nothing planned for that afternoon except having a few beers and finishing up the article he was reading before heading back to the apartment.
Her eyes widened and her answering smile as she leant towards him was immediate and infectious. "Could we? That would be great! I know it's probably one stupid and simple setting that I'm missing here."
He was surprised, but not unhappy when she slid out of her side of the bench and scooted in the space next to him. Her omnitool fired up before she had finished sliding along the fake leather seating. Her shoulder bumped into him slightly as she slipped in, causing Kaidan to shift and slightly spill his still too full beer onto the table.
Kaidan's stomach summersaulted in response to the apologetic grin that Mira gave as she looked up at him. He had thought she was attractive when he had seen her from a distance each day. Upon closer inspection, she was stunning. Her pale skin was covered with a light smattering of freckles, her rosy pink full lips looked like they were made for kissing, but it was her deep chocolate brown eyes that drew him in. For a second, it was if all the answers in the universe were hidden in there, and deep warmth flowed through his veins as he looked at her. He found himself unable to tear his eyes away.
"Ooops, sorry my bad," she apologized quickly. He continued to study her as she passed him some napkins before reaching back across the table for her data pad once more. Opening it once again to the correct article, she rested her forearm on the table and reactivated her omnitool. This time, she rebooted the device to load into the operating system's command line.
Kaidan shook his head slightly, forcing himself to concentrate on the task at hand. He rested his arm on the table next to hers, also opening his 'tool and restarting it to the same screen. Focus Alenko. He chastised himself quietly, you offered to help her, not hit on her!
Concentration and focus as not coming to him as easily as it normally did, though it had never really been a problem before. He barely remembered the words that were coming from his mouth as they worked together to compare the hundreds of different settings that manually over clocking the system required. The entire time they were working, he was hyper aware of how close she was next to him. He could feel the constant warmth that radiated from her body. He was also conscious at how the side of their legs or arms would sometimes touch depending if either of them moved.
Three hours and several beers later, Mira shouted a small cheer of success. Finally this try, she rebooted her tool, and the shield readings finally began showing the improvement they had been working towards. As they had laughed and talked, the two had unconsciously gravitated closer to each other, slowly moving in proximity until their arms and legs were touching, forearms propped on the table side by side, both leaning over one another checking over various settings on one another's devices.
Mira's pulse began hammering wildly again, as it each time that afternoon, when Kaidan leaned over again and pointed out the final setting that had provided the results she wanted. "Who'd have thought that one option could make that much of a difference?" He turned his head slightly toward her in question as he asked. She studied his expression, as he seemed to realize exactly how close they were now sitting next to one another.
Kaidan's eyes flicked down to her lips, and his stomach flipped as he watched her moisten them with the tip of her tongue. Kaidan was suddenly very aware of every single part of him that was in contact with her and how very, very badly he wanted to kiss her right now. The fact only knew her name made no difference to the situation at all.
The sound of the waiter as he returned to clear the bottles from their table bought the two of them snapping back to reality. Kaidan reached over for his drink, trying to keep his hands occupied doing something menial so they would not reach over and touch her. They only just met for crying out loud. He could not recall having this strong of a reaction to a complete stranger before in his life. He risked sneaking a glance over again at Mira, who now sat staring down at her omnitool. He was not positive, but unless he had his signals completely messed up, he was pretty sure she had wanted to kiss him also.
He watched her eyes widen in alarm as she finally registered that she had missed a call while they were working. She sat up straight, her face now almost twisted in panic. "Shit, shit, shit! Is that the time? Oh crap, I am soo late. Thank you so much for your help with this." To his surprise, she threw back the rest of her beer, leant over toward him, and kissed him lightly on the cheek right. She then almost threw herself out of the booth before grabbing her bag from the opposite seat.
She was moving quickly now, her voice had sped up to match her movements in urgency. Mira threw some credits on the table for her part of the bill, "I'm really, really sorry I have to leave so quickly like this after all the help you gave me. But I am extremely late. Mother's going to shoot me; I should have met her an hour ago."
Kaidan watched her movements in amusement, and before he knew it, she was gone. His hand had wondered up and was touching the spot on his face where her lips had touched his cheek. He was sure he had a stupid look on his face to match. Only seconds passed before he began cursing at his own idiocy. Throwing some more credits on the table, he slid out of the booth and ran out the entrance after her. He scanned quickly in both directions, but she was already nowhere in sight.
Shit, shit shit! He swore at himself, repeating Mira's curse from minutes ago. Kaidan had spent the afternoon with one of the most amazing women he had ever met, and then completely forgot to ask her for her contact information before she left.