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Garrus had been—edgy. The mission had been fairly easy but he'd gone out of his way to make his part of it tortuous, had taken unnecessary risks. He'd made some unbelievable kill shots, too, but that was not the point. As his CO, Shepard was obliged to point it out to him.
Later.
She sat on her bed and eased off her boots, wriggled her toes in her socks and sighed. The door sounded and she considered a moment. "Come in," she said at last, and Garrus did. He entered with confidence, familiar with the space by now; he tapped the temperature controls and then dimmed the lights, just a little. Shepard suppressed a smile.
"Shepard," he greeted her at last. "I had a feeling you'd want to talk."
"Yes," she agreed. "But I need a shower first."
"Shower later," Garrus suggested. He crossed the room and stood over her.
Shepard reached out to touch his legs with her toes. "Are you hoping to join me, then?" She stood, and tilted her head back to see his face.
"In the shower? Definitely." As he spoke he moved to stand behind her, and his words vibrated pleasantly against her neck.
Soft warmth settled around her eyes as Garrus tied a blindfold around her head, and Shepard tensed. She blinked behind the smooth fabric but could see nothing. Garrus held her shoulders and nibbled her ear. "Sh," he soothed her. "Trust me."
"It'd be easier if I knew what you were doing," she said.
"It would be so much less fun if you did." Garrus moved swiftly, his hands knowing and gentle, as he stripped away Shepard's uniform, left her standing naked in the cool room; she shivered a little. "Ah," Garrus said. "I turned up the heat when I came in," he said, and drew a finger along her jawline. "Not enough?" The back of his hand brushed over one erect nipple and she shivered again.
"I'm fine, thanks," Shepard said wryly. "Now do I wait for everyone to jump out and yell surprise?"
"What? No. Why would they?" He sounded genuinely alarmed.
Shepard shook her head. "Another time," she said. "Are you going to let me stand here naked all night?"
"Of course not." She heard a rattle of metal; Garrus took her hand and smoothly snapped a cuff over her wrist, did the same to the other hand before she could react.
"Garrus," she said uneasily, "I'm not really into bondage."
"No, no," he assured her. "It's just a precaution." He scooped her into his arms and Shepard gasped involuntarily, brought her cuffed hands up before remembering she couldn't do much with them. Garrus deposited her on the bed, took her hands and raised them above her head, and Shepard heard a metallic clinking sound. The cuffs had been hooked to the bed.
"This better be good," she warned him, and twisted her head in an attempt to hear what he was doing. "I told you I don't like bondage."
"Have faith, Shepard," Garrus chuckled, and she heard the rustle of his uniform as he dropped it to the floor. The bed sank slowly beneath his weight as he climbed up on it, and the heat of his body—always a few degrees higher than hers—swept over her, though he did not touch her. Shepard shivered again. His warmth approached her face and he nuzzled and nibbled her mouth, made her tingle; she tilted her head toward him but he left her wanting. Shepard licked her lips, arched up but could not quite reach him.
He tapped her mouth with a finger, then, placed something on her lips that held them lightly together. "Don't open your mouth," he said with a barely suppressed laugh, "for at least thirty seconds."
This, Shepard decided, was definitely the weirdest game Garrus had ever brought to the room.
He resumed kissing and licking and nuzzling her and now and again he stuck something on her skin that felt like tape. His mouth travelled up her arms with stops at her elbows and wrists; back down to her throat, her chest, each breast, her belly. There he lingered longer, fascinated as always by the dip of her navel. Like a sweet little oasis in the middle of a smooth desert, he called it. Turians had no analogous feature and that Shepard's was ticklish and erogenous seemed to please Garrus more than it should. He tickled her now with the tip of his tongue and Shepard arched up toward him and breathed rapidly through her nose, careful to keep her mouth closed. Garrus held her hips and pushed her down to the bed, thrust his tongue down into her navel and laughed softly as she made a strangled noise. Desperate, she opened her mouth to inhale deeply and the tape he'd placed over her lips came away easily.
He stuck a piece of tape on her belly, just above her navel, and then he put three more around it. Shepard squirmed. "What are you doing?"
"You'll see," he promised. "Hold still."
"No," she began.
"You don't trust me," he said gently, and closed his teeth lightly over her hip. He had never broken her skin with his teeth but they were sharp and Garrus knew just how much pressure to use, and Shepard could not quite stifle a soft moan.
"I trust you," she said, breathless. "I do."
He released his bite and licked the spot, stuck a piece of tape on it. "If you did," he told her, "you would lie quiescent and let me do my work."
Shepard laughed at that. "When—ah!" She paused as he bit her other hip, held her breath until he released her and stuck tape on that side as well. "When have I ever been quiescent?" she wondered.
"Never in your life, I suspect," he said, and continued his inexorable path down her body.
Shepard parted her legs obligingly for him and Garrus kissed the inside of her thigh, stuck a piece of tape there, moved on to her knee. "Wait," she said, and tried to sit up. The cuffs restrained her and she dropped back down. "You missed a spot."
"Do you really think so?" Garrus wondered. "You are an impatient woman, Shepard." Another piece of tape went just above her knee and Garrus made his way down to her foot.
"I think I'm entitled to a little impatience," she grumbled. Her toes curled as he held her foot with both hands and kissed the arch of it. He licked where he had kissed and stuck a piece of tape there.
"You don't know what you're missing out on," he told her, and kissed his way back up the other leg. "Taking your time to get a job done right makes it that much more rewarding when you complete it." When he reached her thigh he bit it gently and Shepard sighed.
"I'm not a job," she told him.
"You do make me work hard," Garrus countered.
"I'm easy," Shepard complained, and pushed herself up to him. "Try and see." Garrus slid his hands beneath her buttocks and, gratified, Shepard was about to suggest he release the handcuffs when instead he flipped her unceremoniously to lie on her belly. She blinked behind the blindfold, startled. His talons grazed the skin on the backs of her legs.
"You are demanding," Garrus agreed, "and you are willing, Shepard, but you are far from easy." He proceeded to treat the back of her as he had done the front, leaving a trail of hot kisses and pieces of sticky tape on her skin. When he had placed the last of them, on the back of her neck, Garrus reached beneath her and turned Shepard to her back once more. He drew the back of one finger down her cheek, over her throat, her collarbone. "You are very flushed, Shepard," he murmured. "Are you hot?"
"You know the answer to that," she growled.
"Well," he admitted, "I do like to see you a little out of sorts. Having you always in charge is fun, but this—" He leaned down to kiss her, slid his knees beneath hers, and Shepard rose eagerly to him. "This is very nice," Garrus finished.
"You like having me helpless, do you?"
"You're not helpless, Shepard," he murmured against her mouth. "If you really wanted out of this, you could do it in a heartbeat."
"If I did," she said, and touched her tongue briefly to his. "If I did, you'd stop, wouldn't you?"
"You would have spoiled my fun," he agreed with amusement. He rocked slowly, pressed against her but not inside her. Shepard's toes could hardly reach the bed; she hooked one leg around his waist and pulled their hips tightly together.
His free hand rested next to the pillow. "Relax," he said against her jaw. "Trust me."
"You keep saying that," said Shepard, and turned her face toward his. He kissed her mouth lightly.
"Does it feel bad?" he said. "Do you want me to stop?"
"God, no," she sighed. "Just do it faster."
"Light-speed is for travel, not for sex."
Shepard twisted her body to try and coax him into action and Garrus backed away, dropped her hips to the bed. Startled, Shepard tried to sit up again, and was jolted back by the cuffs. "Garrus?" She could feel him still near her, could still hear him breathing close to her. "What are you doing?"
"I'm just looking at you," he said softly.
"You've seen me before."
"Not like this." He leaned over her, and she felt one thick finger snake into her hair; with a sharp motion he snapped the band that was holding her hair in its tight bun, and her hair tumbled down and around her head and face.
"Garrus," she said, half-scolding.
He pressed his face into her hair, against her neck, and inhaled deeply before he sighed and once more slid away down her body. He kissed another hot path down to her belly, let his tongue spend some more time teasing her navel. At last he shifted his attention lower and Shepard could not help but sigh gratefully as Garrus' fingers stroked her tenderly. "You are wet, Shepard," he mused, and slid his fingers carefully inside.
"You've been teasing me here for hours," she complained. "What do you expect?"
"Hours," he scoffed, and curled his fingers forward inside her. The pressure sent a jolt through her, all the way to her extremities, and Shepard cried out involuntarily. With the pad of his thumb Garrus gently stroked around the glans of her clitoris, never quite touching it, and Shepard shook, helpless, as his fingers continued to tug at every nerve in her body.
Just as she was sure she would faint Garrus leaned down and kissed her clitoris lightly. At the same moment he pulled forward with his fingers, hard, and Shepard saw stars as she arched reflexively and thrashed and made incoherent sounds. When at last, trembling, she began to relax, Garrus slid his fingers out of her. "Where," Shepard gasped, "did you learn that?"
"I think about ways to please you all the time," he said. "In between killing people, it makes for a nice distraction." He climbed up the bed again, slid his knees beneath hers, and Shepard obligingly wrapped her legs around his waist. Garrus tucked one hand beneath her again to support her, and he rocked against her, still erect.
"I should give you more time in between killing people," she babbled, and Garrus leaned down to kiss her mouth, her jaw, her neck.
"Short time to work with means I have to be creative," he said. With a practised roll of his hips he was inside her, and Shepard desperately wished her hands were free—
If you really wanted out of this, you could do it in a heartbeat.
He was right, of course; she'd escaped worse situations than a simple blindfold and handcuffs.
Shepard sighed, savoured the feeling of Garrus full and hot within her, thrilled at the sensation of the bumps and ridges of his shaft massaging her with each deliberate stroke. If he wanted to do this all day, every day, she would be more than happy to let the galaxy collapse around them.
He planted his free hand on the pillow and Shepard pressed her heels against his hips to try and speed up his rhythm, but Garrus would not be rushed. "Have I ever told you," he murmured against her mouth, "how beautiful you are?"
"A couple of times," she admitted. "I always figured you were flattering me."
He nipped her chin lightly. "I could do better than that," he assured her. His breath was growing uneven and the hand supporting her hips was beginning to shake. "So—much—better."
Shepard turned her head and whispered against his cheek. "Garrus." He stopped talking, then, began the sweet purring sound he always made when he was beyond words. Shepard closed her eyes behind the blindfold and concentrated on Garrus, on the hand beneath her that was clenching just a little too tightly, on his other hand closing over a fistful of her hair and pulling her head back, on his hips as he lost control of himself and hammered fiercely into her. He gave no shout, no singular cry to identify his climax, only stopped moving, still fully sheathed in her body, and held her tight to him for several long trembling seconds. At last he exhaled and his grips on her relaxed.
Slowly they sank to the bed and Garrus kissed her neck and jaw, panting heavily. "You're terrible," he told her.
"I thought you said I'm beautiful."
"I have no control around you and you know it." He kissed her mouth. "Was that all right?"
"Other than not being able to look at you or touch you or do anything I wanted?"
He snickered softly, reached up and pushed the blindfold up over her head. Shepard blinked; the lights in the room were dim, but she had no problem making out the ridges of Garrus' face, the wicked gleam in his eyes. "You can't always get what you want, Shepard," he told her. He reached up to smooth her hair away from her face. "It's a good lesson for you to learn."
She rolled her eyes at him. "Uncuff me," she said. "My arms hurt."
"Do they really?" he wondered, though he rolled obediently away.
"Yes." She watched as he rifled through the pile of their clothes on the floor and came up with a key. He swiftly uncuffed her, pulled her to sit on his lap and Shepard rested her cheek on his shoulder. Garrus massaged her aching arms and kissed her neck and shoulder.
"Crap," he sighed. "Sorry about that." His fingers brushed over her back and Shepard twisted to look; he'd pierced her with his talons, and she was smeared with dark blood.
"That's all right," she assured him. "I hear vigilantes dig scars."
Garrus laughed and bumped his forehead gently against hers. "Of course," he said. "But I got these for a reason." He lifted his right hand, showed her the rubber caps he'd slid on over his talons. Shepard grabbed his hand and examined them, fascinated. They clung to his talons and did not slide off when she tugged at them. "You have to peel them," he told her. "I had them specially made, so I wouldn't—you know. Tear you inside." His mandibles flared in slight embarrassment.
Shepard looked up at him. "You did that for me?"
"I don't see myself sneaking around to sleep with anyone else in the crew."
"We're not sneaking," she informed him haughtily, and looped her arms around his neck. "We're being discreet."
"If you say so." He wrapped his arms around her middle, and lay down with her. They slept entangled and in the morning Garrus rose before she did, showered and dressed and slipped away from the room so that no one would know he'd spent the night.
Shepard stretched out on the bed to lie on Garrus' warm spot and as she moved she felt a tugging on various parts of her skin. She remembered the tape Garrus had stuck on her, and sat up to see what it was.
Her body was covered in tiny red hearts. Every single piece of 'tape' had been a square of transfer paper, and now she knew why he had licked each spot before sticking it. Shepard laughed and shook her head. "Hearts," she informed him in his absence, "are not labels."
She swung her feet to the floor and winced. Her inner thighs were bright pink, slightly abraded. She would need to spritz them with a little medi-gel. She noticed a light on her datapad blinking, indicating a message waiting. With a yawn, Shepard logged in and waited for the message to load.
Good morning,
You have no doubt by now seen the "labels" I had special-ordered for you.
I hope you like them. They're waterproof. I could think of no better way to show
you exactly how I feel. If I could have, I would have covered you quite literally
with them, but sometimes a fellow's just got to make do with what he can afford.
I realise that this will destroy any illusion you have about discretion, but the
rumours that I've heard about Commander Shepard's apparently very noisy
love life have made me think that it doesn't really matter anyway.
You are beautiful and I adore every part of you. If you want to kill me for
this, I'll be up in the main battery, doing some calibrations.
Love,
Garrus
Shepard set the datapad aside, stood and padded into her bathroom. She looked at herself in the mirror, at the little hearts Garrus had put on her, at the four of them circling her navel, and despite herself she smiled. She tested one on her wrist, scrubbed at it with soap and water, and it was entirely unaffected.
How very like Garrus; there were things to be hidden, and there were things that didn't need to be. And if the crew had overheard them—
How would the crew overhear them? she wondered. Her quarters were not with the rest of the crew.
Of course sometimes Garrus caught her in the middle of an empty hallway where they would engage in a little impromptu makeout session. And sometimes crew members probably saw them. And some crew members were horrific gossips.
She showered and dressed and headed to the mess. Joker was there, one leg stretched out on a second chair, the other as close to the table as he could bring it for comfort. He glanced up at her face, at her bare arms, looked back at the datapad he was reading. "Have a little too much last night, Commander?" he wondered.
"What?" Shepard busied herself filling her big mug with coffee, hoped her face wasn't too red.
"I've done that, drinking with my buddies," he said.
"Done what?" She sat down at the table to down her medication.
"Gotten dumb tattoos."
"They're not tattoos," Shepard informed him, and swallowed her antihistamines with a gulp of coffee.
"Temporary tattoos are even dumber," Joker said, uninterested. "But at least they come off eventually." He lifted his head and looked at her, his ears suddenly red. "Sorry, Commander, I didn't mean to imply you're dumb. Just that I've done dumb things. I—"
"It's fine, Joker," Shepard said, and took a dextro-specific inhibitor, nearly choked on the enormous capsule. "They are a little dumb. But as you say, they'll wear off eventually." She stood and carried her mug with her out of the mess.
Garrus was, as promised, in the main battery. Shepard shut the doors and sealed them behind her as she entered. Garrus glanced back and flashed a half-smile before returning to his work. "Good morning, Commander," he said. "I see you've only brought your sidearm."
"You were afraid I'd come with an arsenal?"
He chuckled. "Maybe."
"Maybe I should have," she said. "You were taking too many risks yesterday," she went on. "I meant to talk with you about that last night."
"Ah. Well, I was trying to distract myself."
"How long did you have it planned?"
"A while. Sorry about the chafing."
"Medi-gel," Shepard shrugged. "Don't do it again."
"Sorry."
"I meant, taking stupid risks to distract yourself."
He paused and turned to her, leaned down and kissed her mouth tenderly. "Yes, ma'am," he said, and returned to his calibrations.
Shepard leaned against his shoulder while Garrus worked, and she drank her coffee in comfortable quiet. When her coffee was done she headed to the mess for a second mug, and then to the bridge.