Work Text:
Body parts were strewn across the room that reeked of decay and formaldehyde. A mismatched corpse centered the crime scene, pieced together like a horrific puzzle. Thankfully, no one had been killed this time, just desecrated. It seemed like something that could only happen behind the damp, stone walls of a castle—someone trying to reanimate life from nothing. Yet here they were in a Seattle ranch on the outskirts of suburbia. The neighbors with manicured lawns blissfully unaware of the horror down the lane where science had been perverted.
“This isn’t how life is created,” Scully muttered. It was a comment meant only for him... or maybe only for her. Her eyes were dark, the pale blue deepened by Azul swirls.
Their minds were still chained even though their relationship had splintered; Mulder knew she was thinking about William. The life they created together. The life they gave up to keep safe. It was the unspoken heartbreak between them. Never talked about, but always there. The reason she packed her bags last autumn.
He suddenly couldn’t stand it. The crime demanded his attention, and he gave it his full energy. He studied the evidence, spoke with the local law enforcement, and pulled latex gloves on and off until his hands felt raw. When he circled back to Scully, he found her medical-hardened eyes sweeping across the carnage again. However, her mind was still elsewhere.
His hand located the small of her back, lingering a little too long, a little too low. She stepped back, making room for the wall she insisted on keeping between them these days.
“Are you okay?” he asked anyway.
She nodded. “I’m fine.”
Of course, she was. Scully was always fine on the job, in the field, with files and autopsy reports in her hand. She was fine again later when they made the late-night drive across town, drinking coffee that had long gone cold. She was fine at the motel, too, a tight smile forming on her lips as she closed the adjoining door, shutting him out in more ways than one.
Mulder laid in the scratchy motel sheets with skin still damp from the shower. The caffeine he indulged in earlier made it difficult to sleep. Thinking about Scully made it impossible.
The door creaked as he pushed it open. Scully didn’t react. She probably expected him—she usually did. He crept across the dark room. His weight caused the mattress to dip as he slid into bed beside her.
“I know you’re upset,” he whispered as his hand fell across her waist, tugging her backside against his front.
“I’m fine,” she insisted, but Mulder could hear the crack in her voice, the heaviness leftover from tears. She didn’t pull away.
“Why do you always do this?” he inquired. The desire to peer into Scully’s eyes had him urging her onto her back. “Why can’t you just talk to me?”
He’d asked the question—meant it—but he wasn’t really expecting an answer. His lips were already covering hers, his hand caressing her face. Scully’s reply came with her tongue, hot and forceful in his mouth.
As his fingers found the buttons on her silk pajama top, he wondered how they had become this. Two people who searched for the truth but who were always terrified of revealing it to each other. The thought dislodged from his head when Scully whimpered, her body arching into him as he cupped her breasts.
“Talk to me,” he insisted, fingers still toying with hardened nipples.
Her tired catchphrase began to take shape. This time, Mulder didn’t let it leave her mouth. “I’m fi—”
“I miss him too,” he said. “It’s okay to miss him.”
Scully’s body became a board. Stiff and hard. William was another way he’d hurt her. Danger followed him, and it followed her by proxy. Their life couldn’t include something so small, so delicate. He didn’t hate her for giving up their son, but she often hated herself.
Now, he expected her to throw him off, to disappear into the rental car and into her own repressed emotions. Part of him wanted her to yell, to cry, to say something. Anything.
To his surprise, she grabbed his jaw to align their gazes. “I know,” she whispered. “It’s not about him, Mulder. I miss you.” Her Chapstick-soft lips grazed the stubble along his chin. Kisses dotted his cheek. Teeth sunk into his earlobe. Her next words rolled off her tongue like a purr: “I need you.”
It had been just over eight months since she’d let him touch her like this, climbing into his bed in silence one lonely night after she left. She was wetter now than she’d been then. Her edges were softer. Her guard lowered. He’d felt it slipping when they had stepped back into the basement office. When their eyes locked across a crime scene. When she tried to hide behind professionalism, but their history was too profound to be contained.
He whipped the covers off. No senseless boundary would exist between them now. The wall Scully clung to wouldn’t be rebuilt. He kissed the inside of her thigh. He swept his tongue across her center. Two fingers edged inside her. When she exclaimed to God, he sucked on her clit until she came.
He was still planting gentle kisses across her belly when she said, “Come here.”
Mulder knew what she wanted. She liked it when he entered her while she was still soft and swollen. He was the opposite. Hard and eager as he pushed into her. Her legs wrapped around his waist; fingernails dug into his shoulder blades. He was overwhelmed by the sensation, by the reunion of their flesh, and his appreciation spilled out in urgent murmurs. He told her how beautiful she was. How tight. How perfect. When her fingers dove for her clit, he felt his arousal spike.
“Just like that,” he whispered. “You’ve always taken me so well.”
Her muscles gripped him something fierce. Her moans echoed off the quiet motel walls. For once, her cries were of pleasure instead of pain.
“You feel so fucking good,” he muttered before her lips smashed against his. His own release grabbed ahold of him like a rope, coiling from toe to head until the tightness gave way to spine-tingling pleasure.
They laid together in the darkness. Scully’s head was against his chest; his arm snug across her hip. He realized then that he wasn’t much different from that corpse earlier. A man assembled from parts. Pieces of love, heartache, pain, and stubborn determination brought to life. But Scully was the stitches that held him together. He wasn’t a whole person without her. He kissed her cheek and squeezed her tighter.
“Talk to me,” he urged.
And for the first time in a long while, she finally did.