A/N: Well, hi. It's been awhile. Remember me? :) This is me dipping my toes back into fanfic… Wanted to get my feet wet before getting back into You and I so I didn't ruin that story, and I'm glad I did, because this is a little different, for me, but it's what came out, so...

Mistakes are mine. Hope you enjoy…

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Olivia wakes with a start, taking in a sharp breath through her nose as she works to regulate her heartbeat. Blinking against the sleep that weighs down her eyelids, she turns her head, a quick glance at the flashing digits of her alarm clock telling her that the power had been knocked out by the storm at some point during the night.

Another loud clap of thunder shakes the windows, and she looks at her iPad, releasing a relieved sigh when Noah doesn't stir. He's a pretty heavy sleeper and though they didn't get storms like this often, it usually took an act of God to get him back to sleep when one waked him.

She lay there for a few moments, listening to the rain beat against her bedroom window, watching as every few minutes, the blue glow of lightning fills the room.

A sleepy sigh draws her attention away from the windows and toward the still form of her love, lying shirtless on his stomach beside her. She shifts gingerly, not wanting to jostle the bed too much and rouse him from his slumber, settling on her side so she could study him better.

His face is turned toward her, nestled into the pillow that is bunched between his outstretched arms. He looks so peaceful, so relaxed. The lines of his face, once hard, unforgiving, have softened - both literally and figuratively.

Her eyes traverse his back, the ridges and contours of his musculature, kept firm by a vigorous workout regime, the skin that is perpetually tinged with red, even without exposure to the sun.

Her Irishman.

She fights the urge to trace his spine with her hands, to dip her fingertips in the dimples that punctuate his lower back.

He is all contradiction.

Hard lines and edges wrapped up in softness that she never could've imagined a year ago, two years ago. So tender he is with her.

She's never enjoyed being treated as though she would break at any moment; but his tenderness has never been about her being fragile. Rather, it's a demonstration. Almost as if to say, I love you this much.

Even his eyes, though they can still be cold when necessary, have the power to melt her with the warmth they exude.

She has never known love like what she feels when he looks at her.

She moves closer to him, close enough that he feels her breath on the bare skin of his shoulder, and she smiles as his eyes twitch, taking one or two tries before he can get his lids to fully open.

"Time is it?" His voice is sexiest when he's half asleep, the usual rasp amplified, thick with underuse.

"I don't know," she whispers. She seizes the opportunity of his suddenly being awake, wrapping an arm around his back as she sidles closer to him. "Early."

"Why are you awake?" His eyes are still bleary; he's not allowing himself to fully come out of his slumber, blinking lazily at her as he enjoys the gentle touch of her skin on his, her proximity.

There's a comforting quality about her presence. Even when he doesn't particularly need it, he lets it wash over him.

She shrugs. "Thunder."

"Noah okay?"

It warms her heart that this is among his first thoughts. The three of them have had a couple of late-night cartoon parties while trying to lull the scared toddler back to sleep during a thunderstorm.

"Hasn't flinched," she smiles.

He grunts in response, taking in a deep breath through his nose and letting his eyes drift shut again. His body is drained, having worked the better part of the last two days. He needs to go home - hasn't set foot in his apartment in days; a nagging thought in the back of his mind reminds him that his mailbox is probably overflowing… but when they closed his most recent case, he came here without even a second thought.

His place doesn't feel like home anymore; it hasn't in a while. Home has become wherever she is, wherever they are.

He feels her lips on his shoulder and groans appreciatively, noting the way her lips curve into a smile against his skin at his response.

She knows exactly the power she wields over him.

"Feels good," he murmurs. She only hums in response before her lips slide inward toward his spine. He can feel the bed dip slightly as she adjusts her position, and then she's straddling him, her thighs hugging his hips as she continues to trail kisses along his back.

She runs her fingers lightly along his sides, barely grazing his skin, eliciting a shudder that she not only sees, but feels as well.

"Liv…" he sighs, trying to shift so he can see her. She lifts herself up and he turns over beneath her, his hands immediately running up her thighs to her hips as she settles back against him.

Her hands trace the muscles of his chest and stomach and he watches her look at him. He can feel the heat of his burgeoning arousal tint his skin as she touches him.

Their connection is magnetic; the pull is a constant, undeniable force between them, and she looks up at him, feeling the weight of his gaze.

"Is this okay?"

She knows he's tired. Exhausted, even.

Wordlessly, he nods, and she leans forward as his hands ascend from her hips until they are splayed across her upper back. Gently, he coaxes her down to him.

Loose strands of her hair frame his face as she hovers over him, hands on the mattress on either side of his head.

He studies her face like he's seeing it for the first time. His fingers trace her features as if he were a blind man, trying to paint her picture in his mind.

He knows the reality of her is a thousand times better than anything he could conjure up in his imagination.

With anyone else, she would feel exposed under this kind of scrutiny. She would feel the weight of her flaws; the ones that former lovers would emphatically deny existed.

Not Ed.

The struggles they've both had – separately and together – have made them who they are.

He doesn't love her in spite of her flaws. Rather, he loves her because of them. Because she's not perfect, and because she's never claimed to be.

She is only Olivia.

But to him, she is everything.

…

Their eyes are locked, his blue eyes piercing hers as she moves over him, her breath coming in labored pants. She gets lost him; how he feels so familiar, and yet the Ed Tucker that moves beneath her can't possibly be the same one she's known all these years. Can it?

His hands are rough, but the way he touches her is like velvet; painting her skin with gentle caresses that say more than his words ever could.

"Ed," she gasps. She throws her head back, losing her rhythm as an onslaught of pleasure threatens to overtake her. She claws at his chest, her nails leaving crescent-shaped marks on his skin, trailed by angry scratches that will redden before the morning.

He slides a hand from her neck, down the center of her chest, damp with sweat, to where their bodies are joined, and her hips jerk when his thumb makes contact with her center.

The strangled cry that escapes her throat is timed perfectly with another thunder clap and as the room is bathed in blue light from a particularly long lightning strike, she falls against him, burying her face in his neck as he continues thrusting into her through her release, hurtling toward his own.

She tries to slide off of him when they finish, but he wraps his arms tightly around her midsection, whispering, "stay" into the curtain of her hair that separates his mouth from her ear.

Their breathing slowly returns to normal, and they lay together, listening to heartbeats in between rain drops as they fall asleep wrapped in each other's arms.

The thunder grows distant, the rumbles not as jarring as they were earlier, the lightning not as vibrant.

The storm has passed.

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A/N: Thanks for reading! I'm a little rusty, trying to get my bearings back with these two… I have some of chapter 19 for You and I written and I'll be chipping away at that this week. Stay tuned…