Chapter Text
15x01 Under the Skin
Penelope was sitting at her desk, doing a deep dive on the dating website their unsub appeared to be using to hunt down the victims. As much as she hated the fact that once again skinless corpses were parading across her screen, she could admit that she was excited at the possibility of finally catching that bastard Lynch.
Sitting back in momentary frustration, Penelope’s mind wandered back to the baby shower they’d just held for the youngest Simmons baby-to-be. Lisa had once again been conspicuously absent from her and Luke’s shared home; Penelope was starting to think that maybe things had gone downhill and Luke just hadn’t mentioned it yet. After all, Lisa hadn’t been at Rossi’s wedding either. Penelope blushed as she remembered just how much—and how closely—she and Luke had danced that night.
So the handsome agent was growing on her—so what? It was no big deal, she was an adult. She could deal with a minor crush and still remain professional.
Just as she had decided to refocus on the search through the Dating Craze website, a knock sounded at her door. Without looking, she yelled back, “Come in!” as she cracked her knuckles and prepared to get down into the details of these victims.
The soft snick of her office door locking surprised her. Who…?
Penelope spun around just as Luke leaned over her, boxing her in by bracing his arms on her desk. She gasped as he nuzzled the hair away from her ear, nipping lightly at the lobe. “Don’t think I haven’t noticed your change in attitude toward me, Penelope,” he whispered. The soft puffs of breath across the shell of her ear, combined with his proximity, made her shiver.
“Luke, what…” she whispered in a strangled voice.
He was kissing down her neck now, and Penelope’s breath was starting to come in pants. “I think,” Luke punctuated this with another kiss, “You’re finally ready to give into this chemistry we’ve been fighting for years.”
Luke sucked on her pulse point and Penelope let out a light groan as her hands tightened involuntarily on her desk chair.
“There it is,” Luke murmured into her neck. One of his hands left the desk and landed on her knee, smoothing up and down her thigh as he continued his assault of kisses up and down her neck, her jaw—everywhere except her lips, which she was getting increasingly desperate for, despite her better judgment.
Penelope kept her eyes closed tightly, unwilling to open them and confirm that this was, in fact, actually happening. She could feel the callouses on his fingertips as Luke’s hand slid under her skirt, warmly running up her inner thigh before lightly tracing the shape of her pussy through her lace underwear.
She gasped, chest heaving as her breathing became increasingly erratic. Penelope felt enveloped by a strong sense of Luke—the scent of honeyed whiskey and something earthy and green, the warmth of his strong body inches away from her skin, his voice deep and gravelly with arousal as he muttered into her skin.
His hand finally ventured under her panties, and she knew he would find her wet and wanting. “ Penelope,” Luke said reverently, a single finger dipping into her folds and dragging deliciously up over her clit.
Beep!
What…? Luke was just beginning to set a rhythm…
Beep! Beep! Beep!
Penelope sat up with a start, her sheets falling down around her waist as she looked around wildly.
Shit.
She was in bed—she’d been dreaming. About Luke. About Luke finger-fucking her in her office at work.
Goddamn it.
While Penelope had been ready to admit that she’d been warming up to him, she was not ready to admit to anything other than friendship with him. That was most definitely not on the table. And anyway, Luke was still with Lisa. Not that Penelope hadn’t noticed that Lisa hadn’t managed to make anything in ages—not their own housewarming, or Rossi’s wedding, or the baby shower…
But that was not a productive line of thought. They were coworkers; Luke’s relationship status meant nothing to her. She must just be horny—it had been ages since she’d had sex, after all. Maybe she just needed to get laid after they caught Everett and Grace…
15x02 Awakenings
Penelope hated when her family was in the hospital. No one wanted to admit just how close they had come to losing JJ—Spencer had been the only one to think about looking for her in the chaos of the Lynch’s escape. If he hadn’t…
Nope. She wasn’t going there. JJ was ok. She was ok. Penelope had just seen it with her own eyes—had confirmed JJ was alive and breathing and ok and had taken the boys for ice cream so JJ and Will could have a moment to themselves and she could calm her racing heart beat before she had to plaster a smile back onto her face.
Now that she was home, a very large glass of wine was part two to her ice-cream dinner. The sugar and smiles of her god kids had helped, but she most definitely needed some wine before she would be able to sleep and get the image of JJ’s pale face out of her mind.
Penelope had just taken a large sip when her doorbell chimed. Walking over to her door and looking out of the peephole, she was surprised to see a rather tired-looking Luke leaning on one hand against the wall.
“Luke?” Penelope questioned as she opened the door. “What are you doing here?”
“Sorry chica,” he said with a tired smile. “I knew you’d seen JJ and I wanted to hear how she was.”
Penelope’s heart softened a little, remembering just how kind and thoughtful this man could be. Though to be frank, she was confused as to why he couldn’t have just texted. Maybe he wanted to check in on her, too…?
“Yeah, of course,” she said, stepping back. “I just poured myself some wine, do you want some?”
Luke’s smile turned grateful, and Penelope felt her heart skip a beat.
“Yeah,” he said in a low voice, “That would be great.”
Penelope locked the door, and Luke wandered slowly behind her as she swished back into the kitchen, pulling down a second stemmed glass and pouring Luke a generous measure of the open red.
They leaned back against opposite counter tops as Penelope filled Luke in on JJ’s status. She was pretty sure the whole team had heard the nitty gritty, but once she started talking, she couldn’t stop. She told him about how the bullet had hit that one tiny little gap in the kevlar on JJ’s side; how JJ’s heart had stopped at the hospital; how pale she had looked lying back among the tubes and monitors; how scared Penelope got when she was stuck in the office and her family was out in the middle of danger she couldn’t control.
Penelope hadn’t realized that tears were rolling silently down her cheeks until Luke set down his wine glass and stepped up in front of her, cupping her face in his hands and wiping the tears away with his thumbs.
She set her own wine glass down on the counter, trying to tear her gaze away as she hiccuped through the tears.
Luke tilted her head up to look at him, still cupping her face, his thumbs rubbing back and forth slowly as he gazed down at her.
Penelope could see when his eyes dipped to her lips. She couldn’t help but part them in response, lost in the liquid brown of Luke’s eyes.
He leaned down slowly; Penelope only closed her eyes in the moment before Luke’s lips ghosted over hers. One, two, three light kisses—Luke pulled back and looked at her, and Penelope knew that he could read the desperation in her eyes.
When he leaned back in, their kiss turned hungry. Luke licked his way into her mouth, and Penelope groaned around his tongue. She slipped her hands around his waist, and Luke gave his own groan as one of her hands played with the skin between the waistband of his jeans and the spot where his shirt had ridden up against her.
Suddenly, Luke’s hands left her face and wrapped tightly around her ass. He squeezed as he lifted her up on the counter and slotted himself in between her thighs, roughly pulling her dress up around her waist to give himself room.
Penelope groaned as his denim-covered erection ground against the crotch of her panties—Luke swallowed the sound as he continued to devour her mouth.
They were grinding against each other like a couple of teenagers, but Penelope couldn’t remember the last time she’d been so turned on. Luke abandoned her mouth to kiss down her neck, one hand on the swell of her ass and pulling her ever closer to him, the other wandering over her exposed thigh. Slowly, it moved high enough that Luke then slipped it in between their rutting bodies. The first direct brush of his thumb over his clit had her gasping, head thrown back to clash against the cabinets.
“Oh fuck, Luke,” she panted. “Just like that.”
But as Luke’s face left her neck to come back up for a kiss, Penelope felt… A weirdly rough tongue licking her cheek…?
Blinking rapidly, Penelope became aware of a light mewing—fuck. It was Sergio, licking her face and attempting to wake her up now that the morning light was streaming through the curtains.
Giving Sergio an absent pat to mollify him, Penelope buried her face in her pillow with a groan. She was undeniably aroused—she couldn’t remember the last time she’d woken up so horny. Well, not counting a day or two ago when she’d first dreamed about Luke.
Fuck. What was going on with her brain? Sure, Luke was an attractive guy—she’d never been able to deny that, she wasn’t blind—but her antagonism towards him had always been able to completely and totally mitigate any lingering attraction.
But now? Now she was lost in a haze of dream-kisses and the imaginary feel of a rock-hard cock grinding against her clit—and completely unwilling to give in to the urge to finish herself off, given that she’d been dreaming about a totally off-limits coworker.
Goddamn it. It was going to be a long day
15x03 Spectator Showing
While it had been weeks since JJ’s shooting, Penelope was still on edge and more worried for the team than usual. She wasn’t sure if it was the memory of seeing JJ in the hospital, or simply the fact that a bomber could be much more dangerous for the team than your average serial killer—but whatever it was, it had her particularly keyed-up.
So when the hospital Luke had just been tasked with overseeing went on a sudden lockdown and he was completely unavailable and untrackable via phone, Penelope may have freaked out.
She called everyone, and Tara was the first to pick up. JJ walked in soon after, asking if anyone knew what was happening.
“No,” Penelope said frantically, trying not to hyperventilate. “Luke was there, and then everyone started evacuating, and then no one was there but Luke, and I don’t know what happened to him.”
“The hospital’s on lockdown, but there’s no signs of an explosion,” Tara said over the line.
“Emily and Dave should be there by now,” JJ chimed in distantly.
“I’ll let you know if I find anything, you let me know if you find anything, but we need to find something,” Penelope said, trying very hard not to cry as she signed off.
As it turned out, the bomb had been a fake—but it took ages for someone from the team to confirm that Luke was, in fact, ok. And Luke himself? Well, he never checked in.
So while Penelope was glad that her team was ok, she was beyond frustrated that Luke hadn’t returned even one of her bazillion missed calls and texts.
The team had arrived back and headed straight home, avoiding the BAU. Penelope was still steaming, and she wouldn’t be able to sleep until she gave Luke a piece of her mind for failing to check in.
Penelope calculated the time it would take him to get home from the air field, and timed her departure so that she would arrive 5-10 minutes after he did, even accounting for the possibility of picking Roxy up from a sitter.
She knocked on his door firmly, still stewing in her anxiety and frustration.
Luke looked surprised when he opened the door. “Penelope…?” He questioned.
“You,” she growled, pointing her finger toward his chest and poking him repeatedly. “You let us all think you got blown up and couldn’t even bother to check in and let me know you weren’t in a million tiny pieces! ”
“Penelope,” he said, raising his arms and backing up slowly, the door swinging shut behind them. “I…”
“No!” she practically yelled. “I called you how many times and sent you how many texts and you couldn’t check in and let me know you were alive?!”
But Luke, instead of the scared expression he’d been sporting, had started to grin, despite Penelope’s accusatory finger still firmly poking him in the chest.
“So,” he said with a smirk, “You do like me, don’t you?”
Penelope growled, her anger at this infuriating man boiling over. She brought both hands up to his chest and pushed. Luke—not having expected the assault—landed hard on his ass on the couch, staring up at her with a mixture of arousal and bewilderment that was, admittedly, really doing it for her.
She stalked the step or two over to him, slowly leaning down into his personal space. “You need to show me some respect, Agent,” Penelope whispered into his ear, delighting in the slight shiver that ran through him. She crawled onto his lap, suppressing her own moan as her skirt rode up and her panties came into contact with the beginnings of an erection in Luke’s jeans.
Luke was panting as Penelope began rocking her hips against his. She attacked his neck, kissing up and paying special attention to his pulse point, before working on his deliciously stubbled jaw.
“Fuck, Penelope,” Luke said in a gravelly voice, clutching onto her hips tightly.
Penelope groaned as a particularly well-aimed thrust drug down across her clit. Sitting back, she fumbled with the button and zipper of Luke’s jeans she finally managed to undo them, thrusting her hand inside and palming him over his boxers as he threw his head back with a moan.
God, he felt amazing. She couldn’t wait to get him inside of her, and was just about to reach into his boxers to pull out what she was sure was going to be a magnificent dick when…
Beep!
Penelope blinked awake, panting and clenching her thighs together. Goddamn it, it had been weeks since she had woken up to a dream about Luke ravishing her. Well, granted, she had been the one doing the ravishing this time…. But still. She had thought she was over this particular… hangup.
She dug her head further into her bed in frustration, once again clenching her thighs together as she realized she was very much still aroused. This was not good.
Flipping over onto her back so she could shut off the whining alarm, Penelope decided that it couldn’t hurt much to, just this once, get herself off so she could start the day in peace. Running a hand up under her nightie, she was more than a little shocked to find herself already soaking and as sensitive as she could ever remember being.
Gasping as she ran her finger in circles around her clit, Penelope knew that it wouldn’t take much for her to come in this state. Unbidden, the dream of having Luke under her thighs returned with full force. She shuddered as her fingers picked up the pace, thinking about how Luke would feel firm and strong under her, wondering if he would really be as desperate as he’d been in her dream.
Before she knew it, Penelope was coming hard, arching off the bed as the slow circles around her clit drew her orgasm out until she was too sensitive to continue.
Flopping back and panting, Penelope wondered how on earth she was going to make it through the work day without turning into a blushing mess around Luke.
Goddamn it.
15x04 Saturday
Penelope was all in a jumble. The day had been a rollercoaster—it had started with what had promised to be an energizing and entertaining workshop, just to be brought down by Elizabeth’s horrific stalking case. She was inordinately grateful for the help that Luke, JJ, and Tara had provided—Luke, especially, had proven to be far more of a help than she had bargained for.
As much as she liked to rag on him, he had a way of making himself available as a kind and generous presence that always took her by surprise. She hadn’t meant to open up to him about Alexei Stanovich, but some combination of the case and the concern in his face had her spilling the dark corners of her worries that she tried to always keep to herself.
And now? Now, with the stalker caught and the newest Simmons on the way, things were looking up in a way that had seemed completely unachievable just a few hours ago. And Luke was undeniably a huge part of the way the day had ended.
She walked up to where he was sitting alone in the hospital waiting room, idly flipping through a magazine. “Hey, you,” she said softly.
“Moi?” Luke asked in an exaggerated tone.
Penelope took it in stride. “You... took your whole day off to help… Elizabeth,” she said slowly.
Luke just nodded and smirked just a little. “Elizabeth,” he said, and Penelope appreciated that he repeated the lie, at least out loud. It hadn’t been for Elizabeth at all… It had been for her. And that scared her as much as it excited her.
Penelope went on as if they hadn’t just had their little unspoken exchange. “And that was very kind of you,” she said, determined to let her kindness and gratitude show as opposed to her typical knee-jerk obstinance.
Luke seemed to understand everything she had left unsaid, and for once she was inordinately grateful for his profiling skills. “How about this?” he said slowly, almost whispering. “You get a lead on Alexei Stanovich, you keep me on speed-dial.”
Penelope couldn’t help but smile—not just at the statement, but at all its implications. “Deal,” she said.
It wasn’t long before Matt came out to announce the birth of Rose Mary Simmons, and they all were able to go back and meet the little bundle of joy.
As everyone dispersed, leaving the new parents to their littlest family member, Luke trailed slowly along with Penelope as she chattered away about how adorable baby Rose was.
Luke had driven her over to the hospital—they all had carpooled to minimize paying for the ridiculously expensive visitor parking, and he had already offered to take her home afterwards.
They passed the drive companionably, making small talk about the huge brood of Simmons kids, their preference for their own pets over the inevitable lack of sleep of new parents, anything and everything that wasn’t Alexei Stanovich and incel stalkers.
Before she knew it, Luke was pulling up outside her apartment, and Penelope was loath to let him leave. “Come up for a drink?” she asked before she could stop herself. “It’s the least I can do after you helped me so much today.”
Luke was looking at her contemplatively, a small smile on his face. “Yeah, ok,” he said eventually.
They made their way up to her apartment, and Penelope poured them both a large glass of red without asking. As they settled on the couch, facing each other, her mood turned thoughtful.
“You’re a good man, Luke Alvez,” she said.
Luke cocked his head, slightly bemused. “What brought that on?” he asked.
“Everything,” she said, leaning her head on her hand. “But mostly today. And the way you put up with my badgering.”
He chuckled, staying silent as he looked at her with those warm brown eyes.
Penelope made a snap decision, setting her wineglass down before taking Luke’s out of his hand and setting it down as well.
“Wha…” he asked in confusion as Penelope crawled over to where he was sitting. She leaned in, just placing the briefest brush of a kiss to his lips.
Luke looked momentarily stunned, but quickly came around, bringing his hands up to her face to delicately cup it in his hands as he leaned in for a deeper, more passionate kiss.
After a few minutes of a mind-meltingly hot make-out, Penelope stood up, holding her hand out to Luke, who took it silently and followed her into her bedroom.
As they stood before the foot of her bed, Luke kissed down her neck, swiping her gently curled hair out of the way as he turned her around and started to lower her zipper.
He followed the path of skin he revealed with his mouth, and by the time Penelope stepped out of her dress she was already starting to pant. Luke laid her down at the edge of the bed without bothering to remove her bra; Penelope just barely caught a glimpse of mischief in his eye as he slowly pulled her panties off her legs.
Luke started at one ankle, kissing his way up to her center. He skipped the spot where she wanted his lips the most, taking his time in lavishing her other leg with the same attention. As he set her left leg back down and put a hand on each thigh, parting her even further, he made momentary eye contact with Penelope as her chest heaved with anticipation.
Luke dipped his head, finally, to her center. Licking slowly up her pussy, he stopped to lightly suckle on her clit before repeating the process. Penelope let her head fall back on a moan, relishing in the hot-wet perfection of Luke’s plush lips.
Before long he had her moaning, panting, and writhing. Her orgasm came seemingly out of nowhere, rippling down her spine in a delicious bolt of lightning that left her wanting more, more, more.
But just as she lifted her head to take in what would surely be a gorgeous picture of Luke between her thighs, lips swollen and slick—Penelope woke up.
She was panting, disoriented, and feeling bereft in a way that was irreconcilable with the joy and contentment she remembered from the dream.
Last night’s conversation with Luke at the hospital had been exactly the same as in her dream—but they hadn’t carpooled, and Penelope hadn’t had a reason to invite him over afterwards.
The last time she’d dreamed of him, she had woken hot and wanting, eager to finish herself off and forget the whole thing. This, however, was a little different. While the memory of coming in her dream was still fresh and clear, her body was clearly still wanting—but the romantic undertones had left her confused and disoriented in a way that she wasn’t entirely prepared to deal with.
Sighing heavily and running a hand down her face, Penelope prayed that she’d be able to get through the day without further incident. Eventually she knew she’d have to deal with the reason her brain kept conjuring up these dreams, but it wasn’t something she was quite ready to deal with just yet.
15x05 Ghost
The whole case seemed like a nightmare come true. It was bad enough that it had started as a copycat of a particularly gruesome LDSK case from a full fifteen years ago—the real nightmare came when Luke and Matt were kidnapped.
Alone in the BAU while the rest of the team was in Illinois, Penelope was stewing in her own fears and anxiety for hours while the team rushed to try and find the boys.
This couldn’t be the last of them. Matt had just had his fifth child, for god sakes. What would Kristy do if he never returned? And Penelope had thought she’d have ages to come around to Luke—to get over whatever weird hang ups made her flustered and combative in his presence. Instead, for hours she had to face the fact that she might never get a chance to make things better.
By the time the team located the boys and managed to break them out of the warehouse they’d been held in, Penelope had been in a stage of frantic anticipation for far longer than was healthy.
Unwilling to leave the BAU until the team was back and she could set eyes on Luke and Matt herself, Penelope attempted to nap on a couch until they returned. She tossed and turned the whole time, her mind filled with images of the torture that they must have been subjected to.
When the team finally emerged from the elevator, Penelope was still beside herself. Matt had headed directly home from the tarmac, his family as anxious to ensure his safety as Penelope was. But Luke was there, and Penelope wasted no time in enveloping him in a hug that she was reluctant to let go of.
In fact, Penelope refused to leave Luke’s side at all.
Luke was bruised, cut up, and limping slightly—and his eyes betrayed a kind of exhaustion that Penelope didn’t think she’d ever seen on the man. It tore her heart into pieces to see him this way, and she just wasn’t able to leave him alone in this state.
Steadfastly ignoring the incredulous looks from the rest of the team, Penelope grabbed anything and everything Luke needed, bundling him into the elevator before JJ could pick her jaw up off of the floor where it had fallen.
It was a mark of just how tired Luke seemed to be that he wasn’t able to muster a protest until Penelope guided him to the passenger seat of her own car as opposed to his. “Luke Alvez, there is no way in hell I’m letting you drive tonight. I’m taking you straight home, and I already arranged to pay your sitter extra to drop Roxy by before we get back. I have everything taken care of, so you are just going to sit back and let me make sure you don’t die before you can get some sleep, ok?”
Luke didn’t seem to be able to muster any words in reply—he simply stared at her before nodding tiredly, and letting his eyes drift closed as Penelope pulled out of the parking garage.
He didn’t wake up until Penelope pulled up outside of his apartment. Blinking rapidly as he came to, Luke didn’t seem to realize what was happening until Penelope had made her way over to the passenger side door with both her and Luke’s go-bags in tow.
Luke allowed Penelope to once again usher him into his apartment, breaking only to greet an anxious Roxy, who of course had picked up on not only the oddity of Penelope’s presence but seemingly on Luke’s injuries as well.
As he stared tiredly around his apartment, Penelope decided she finally needed to speak and let him know a little of what was on her mind.
“I’m not comfortable leaving you like this, Luke,” Penelope started slowly. “I can stay on the couch, but I don’t think you should be alone right now.”
Luke slowly brought his gaze over to her, and Penelope winced as she once again took in the deep bruises that were blooming from his right temple straight down into the scruff below his cheek bone.
“The bed’s plenty big, there’s no reason to be uncomfortable,” he said.
It was probably a sign of his exhaustion that he wasn’t protesting, and Penelope decided to take it in stride.
“You need to go to bed,” she stated. “Do you want to shower first?”
Luke nodded fervently, and Penelope swallowed hard, steeling her nerves.
“Then you’re going to have to put up with me helping you, cause I don’t trust you to not keel over right now,” she said, putting her hands on her hips.
Luke simply cocked his head to the side, considering her. He nodded slowly, and turned to shuffle over to the bathroom.
Penelope let out a slow breath, having expected a chorus of protests or mind-changing after her proclamation. She followed Luke’s slow progress, and found him sitting heavily on the toilet, still fully clothed, when she entered.
Pursing her lips, Penelope fiddled with the shower until the temperature felt right before turning back to Luke with a blush. His eyes were wide and tired as he looked up at her, and Penelope’s hesitation and indecision were gone instantaneously as she read the depth of exhaustion written so clearly on his face.
“Up,” she said, grabbing his hands and pulling.
Penelope reached for the hem of his shirt, hissing along with him as she saw the bruising down his torso. As the shirt dragged off of his arms, she glimpsed the welts from handcuffs looping his wrists, and caught one to press a kiss to the angry red skin, hoping some TLC might distract from the obvious pain and discomfort he was in.
She sighed, attempting to temper her own anger with Chaycon so that Luke would read nothing but compassion in her face. Fortunately for her, he was still glassy-eyed and tired enough that he hadn’t noticed the rage she was sure had bubbled across her features.
Peering up at his face, Penelope brought a gentle hand up to the unblemished left side to try and get his eyes in contact with hers. “Do you want company?”
She watched as Luke swallowed, then nodded. “Yeah,” he said in a rough, low voice.
Penelope smiled as he fumbled sleepily with his belt and jeans, taking the opportunity to start on her own dress and jewelry.
The whump of heavy fabric altered her to the fact that Luke had succeeded—and she couldn’t help but turn to take him in.
She sucked in a breath as she saw the extent of the developing bruises on his naked, swaying body. There was one in particular, on his… ahem… groin area that had her wincing in sympathy.
“Fuck, Luke,” she said helplessly, still staring. Luke looked down and winced himself, sitting gingerly on the toilet to wait for her. “Chaycon got in a particularly well-aimed kick while I was tied up,” he said. “Though poor Matt got a cigarette burn to the chest, so I might have gotten the better end of that deal.”
Penelope was still staring uselessly, lost in the horror and casual brutality as she stared at its evidence written all over Luke’s body. When Luke brought his gaze back up to hers, she shook herself out of it, removing the rest of her clothes, underwear, and accessories as fast as possible.
Taking a deep breath as she turned around to face him, Penelope saw that Luke was staring at her reverently—the first smile of the night gracing his lips. She felt an answering smile forming on her own lips, and grabbed his hands to help him up.
Ushering him in first, Penelope positioned him under the spray, keeping a hand on him at all times since he’d been swaying dangerously. The shower was a tight fit for both of them, but Penelope was appreciative of the closeness as she stepped in behind him.
Luke was facing her, tipping his head back and allowing the spray to run through his hair and down his shoulders. Penelope smiled as she watched him relax minutely under the heat, and grabbed the washcloth to lather it up. Luke ran his hands over his head, pushing the water back to keep it from his eyes as he looked down at her.
Penelope smiled and reached out for one of his hands. Luke complied, and watched her closely as she started scrubbing him down. She took care around every bruise, taking time to press a kiss to the purpling skin after the water washed all the soap away.
After she kissed the last bruise on his back, Penelope proclaimed that she was done, and Luke turned around slowly. He placed his hands on her waist, thumbs running back and forth, eyes half lidded.
Penelope’s breath caught at the warmth in Luke’s eyes, and she just managed to brace herself against him as he bent down to press his lips to hers.
It was warm, wet, and absolutely overwhelming. Luke pulled back before too long, and Penelope was reminded that he was exhausted, possibly concussed from the accident, and desperately needed to sleep.
Still, she was smiling as she looked back up to him, taking in his sleepily pleased face.
Penelope reached around him to turn off the shower, and then opened the door to grab a fluffy towel and dry them both off. As Luke brushed his teeth, Penelope decided that after the shower they’d just had, going to bed naked was perfectly fine.
When he finished, she grabbed his hand and dragged him directly to bed, tucking him in and pressing a kiss to the top of his head. Luke didn’t let go of her hand as she tried to move away—Penelope met his questioning gaze with a smile and assured him that she’d be back as soon as she found her own toothbrush and said goodnight to Roxy.
Penelope returned to a Luke already halfway to dreamland, and took it upon herself to snuggle up behind him, arm around his waist. Before long, she was drifting off to sleep herself, finally content that Luke was home and safe.
When she woke up, Penelope was cold. Turning over in confusion, Penelope slowly realized that she was alone—and not just that, she was in her own bed.
It had all been a dream.
When the team had returned, she had indeed hugged Luke—but she’d only asked if he was ok to get home, and had let him leave.
Her brain, apparently, had not been content with reality. She knew that she’d been worried, but to concoct an entire care-taking fantasy? Somehow, Penelope felt like this went far beyond the sex dreams that had been plaguing her. This was straight up relationship material—and she wasn’t sure what to make of it.