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Carla feels a familiar prickle of guilt as she watches Lisa bustle about the flat, restoring some order to the carnage wreacked by her reprobate brother.
The brunette can barely believe it. Just when she had started to think they were nearing the calm after the storm, Rob had arrived to turn her life - and her flat - upside down.
It was a minor miracle Lisa didn’t already have one foot out of the door.
“Thanks for this,” Carla says shyly as Lisa meticulously orders her desk drawer (which - if Carla was being totally honest - had been a tip long before Rob had got his mucky hands on it.)
The blonde snorts. “Well, what else would I do?”
“I dunno,” Carla shrugs, draping a blanket over the back of the couch. “Run a mile because your new girlfriend has a mentalist bloomin’ brother?”
Lisa shoots Carla a coy grin over her shoulder. More than three months into their relationship and the detective still struggles to contain her delight every time the brunette drops the ‘G’ bomb.
“Nah,” Lisa chuckles. “That all sounds a bit too easy if you ask me.”
Still, Carla worries.
“Seriously, though,” she says, chewing anxiously on the inside of her cheek. “We were just getting back on an even keel and now this happens.”
That gets Lisa’s attention.
“Hey,” she says softly as Carla busies herself tidying the mess on the coffee table.
When her girlfriend continues to steadfastly ignore her searching gaze, Lisa starts making her way across the living room, pulling Carla in by the hips to still her movements.
“Hey,” she repeats. “It’s alright. You’re alive. You’re healing and that’s all that matters to me. This will all blow over and, well…”
Carla reaches out to fix the starched collar of Lisa’s work shirt, feels she needs to keep her hands busy or else run the risk of totally breaking down.
Lisa, as she so often does, senses her discomfort and tightens her grip on Carla’s hips.
“Until then,” the blonde soothes. “I’m gonna look after you. I’ll keep you safe.”
Carla’s heart swells at that, and she wonders - not for the first time - how she got so lucky; wonders what noble deed she did in a past life to deserve the unconditional love of this remarkable woman.
But there’s something else there too, an entirely different kind of emotion, as Carla feels the pads of Lisa’s fingers pressing into her soft flesh. She swallows.
“Are you?”
Lisa grins. “Yeah.”
Carla quirks an eyebrow. “You’re gonna look after me?” she sing-songs, like a tormenting child.
Lisa rolls her eyes but holds her tighter. “Course I will.”
The blonde pulls her in then, snakes her arms around Carla’s waist and squeezes, just slightly. Carla allows herself a moment to get lost in the embrace, nuzzling her nose into Lisa’s neck and breathing her in.
She smells the perfume at her pulse point; musky and expensive. It’s the same one she’d been wearing on that very first day, when Carla had told Lisa not to get dressed and the two women had finally surrendered to their desire.
It awakens something - some kind of primal, animal instinct - deep inside of her, and she feels heat bloom at the apex of her thighs.
Carla’s fingers, as has become custom, find their way into Lisa’s hair, carding through threads of ivory silk, and suddenly this feeling - the one she has been trying, for weeks now, to squash down - feels too big to ignore.
Carla gets more purchase on Lisa’s ponytail and tugs slightly - hard enough to make Lisa gasp - and holds her head steady, so that the blonde’s sharp jaw juts upwards and Carla can see the fleck of orange in her left iris.
“Well, that’s good,” Carla says, her voice seemingly having dropped an octave in the past 30 seconds. “Because, I’ve been thinking.”
“Ooh,” Lisa quips, still oblivious to Carla’s gear change. “Don’t hurt yourself.”
Carla tugs again on her ponytail as punishment. “I’ve been thinking,” she repeats, “that I could really do with some looking after.”
Lisa’s face changes then, her smooth-as-glass brow contorting in worry.
“Are you okay?” she asks, panicked. “Do you want me to call the consultant and see if she can fit you in tomorrow because-”
“No,” Carla cuts her off with an adoring smile. “I’m fine. I was actually thinking that maybe…you could take care of me? Because, god, I really, *really* need taking care of, Lisa.”
Carla punctates each word in that last sentence with a soft yank of Lisa’s ponytail, and Carla can see it then; can see the moment that the penny finally drops.
“Oh,” Lisa says, voice strangled as she blinks dumbly back at her. “Oh. Are you…sure that’s a good idea?”
Carla nods, winds her arms around Lisa’s neck. They hadn’t had sex in so long, since before Carla had fallen ill, and the brunette was suddenly finding the yearning impossible to bear.
“Uh huh,” she says. “In fact, I think it might be the best idea I’ve had in a very long time.”
Lisa tilts her head, looks up at Carla with concern. “It’s just…it really hasn’t been that long since your surgery and-”
Carla drops her arms petulantly and takes a step back, unable to suppress the sudden surge of frustration that bubbles up inside her.
“Right,” she snaps. “And you don’t want to.”
Lisa quickly steps to her again. “No,” she yelps. “No, of course I want to. I just don’t want to hurt you, that’s all.”
Carla shrugs her off.
“I’m not a flamin’ china doll, Lisa!” she exclaims, exasperated. “I’m not gonna shatter into a million pieces every time you touch me.”
Carla takes in Lisa’s wounded expression and feels dreadful, can’t believe she’s exploded at perhaps the only person - besides Roy and Ryan, of course - who has always had her best interests at heart.
The brunette rakes a hand through her hair, tries to swallow down her rising embarrassment.
“But it’s okay,” she sighs. “I know this isn’t what you signed up for. I know a 50-year-old woman with one dodgy kidney and a whole load of baggage isn’t exactly the sexiest proposition. I’m not offended that you don’t fancy me anymore.”
There’s a pause then, long and weighty, until Lisa narrows her eyes and asks: “You really think I don’t fancy you?”
Carla feels her chest ache at the thought.
“Well, I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t,” she says in a small voice.
Lisa nods, her beautiful face impossible to read.
“Do you want to know why I took so long getting ready this morning?” she asks after a beat. “Before I walked you to the factory?”
Carla thinks back to the sight of Lisa padding into the living room with sleepy eyes and mussed up hair, wearing nothing but Carla’s dressing gown and a black silk negligee. She shudders.
In that moment, Carla had wanted nothing more than to pull her down onto the sofa, to pin Lisa between her thighs, to have the blonde writhing beneath her - Underworld, be damned.
Carla gulps as she notes the way Lisa’s eyes have darkened.
“Go on,” she prompts.
The blonde lifts her chin, almost defiantly. “Because I was getting myself off in the shower.”
The thought of that, of Lisa pressing those long fingers inside herself, coming undone against the cool bathroom tiles while Carla was only mere feet away, makes the brunette throb.
“Oh,” she says.
It’s all she can manage.
Lisa smirks, takes a step closer. “I was thinking of you.”
Carla suddenly feels lightheaded. “Oh,” she croaks again. “Why didn’t…why didn’t you say something?”
Lisa sighs, fiddles absentmindedly with the gold wedding band on her right ring finger.
“Because I was embarrassed,” she admits. “I mean, there you are, having gone through this awful ordeal - I mean you nearly flamin’ died Carla - and yet all I can think about, watching you put your lippy on, is how fucking good you look and how much I want to…”
Lisa dips her head as she trails off, bashful.
Suddenly, it feels imperative Lisa finishes that sentence.
“Want to what?” Carla implores desperately.
Lisa hesitates for a moment as she meets Carla’s eye, biting her lip in the way she knows - of course she knows - drives her girlfriend wild.
Then, she steps closer, fists her hands in Carla’s hair and crashes their lips together, kissing her soundly.
It’s not a sweet kiss. It’s rough and lewd, Lisa’s hot tongue forcing its way into Carla’s mouth, licking at every dark corner. The blonde tightens her grip on Carla’s hair, so that it’s almost painful, and sinks her teeth into the brunette’s pillowy bottom lip.
Carla whines and chases Lisa’s mouth, hungry for more, when, all too quickly, the other woman is pulling away, releasing her swollen lip with a wet pop.
“Do that,” the detective smirks, and Carla is pretty sure her underwear is already ruined.
“So,” the brunette says quietly, still finding it hard to breathe. “You do still fancy me?”
Lisa smiles - a proper, genuine smile - and it’s like a light switching on.
“Yes, you great big idiot,” she laughs, pushing playfully at Carla’s shoulder. “I fancy the pants off you. Now more than ever actually.
“And it’s not that I haven’t wanted to…you know. It’s just you’ve been through a life-changing event, Carla. That’s not me viewing you as an invalid or as some kind of china doll. It’s a fact. You’ve had major surgery, and I love you too much to try and push you into something you’re not ready for just to fulfil my own selfish needs.”
Carla swallows, feels overcome with emotion. She leans in and lets Lisa press a chaste kiss to her temple.
“I do get that,” the brunette croaks. “And I love you too, so much.”
“But, if you say that you’re ready,” Lisa drawls as she sinks slowly to her knees, looks up at Carla with a wanton smirk. “Then I’m more than happy to take care of you. All night, if you want me to.”
Carla inhales, drunk on the sight of Lisa knelt before her. She tries to downplay the extent of her arousal, thinks it might be the only way she can survive this.
“Maybe not *all* night,” she jokes. “I mean, we are getting on a bit.”
Lisa laughs, brings her hand down lightly against Carla’s backside. “Oi! Speak for yourself, Mrs.”
Carla giggles, though her glee is quickly replaced by lust as Lisa carefully eases the fabric of her blouse upwards, blunt nails dragging against the newly-exposed skin of her stomach.
“You know,” the blonde husks, placing a wet kiss just below Carla’s navel. “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about this, about you. I’ve missed your body so much.”
Carla shivers.
“Even now I’ve got another whopping great scar?” she huffs self-deprecatingly.
Lisa clucks her tongue, lifts Carla’s blouse further, so it’s bunched just beneath the wire of her bra. She traces her finger, slow and reverent, across the latest addition to the tapestry of her girlfriend’s body.
Her newest scar is still red, slightly raised. Lisa takes her time mapping it out before shifting her finger over, ghosting over the pale pink remnants of her first kidney transplant.
“*Especially* now you’ve got another scar,” Lisa says earnestly. “Carla, we’re not kids anymore. Both of us have our war wounds. Yours might be easier to see than mine but, in my mind, that just makes you even more beautiful. Because every time I look at you, I’m reminded how incredibly brave you are, how much you’ve survived and how hard you’ve fought to be the woman you are today. I couldn’t be more in love with you if I tried, and I’m so very grateful that you chose me; that you let me see you, warts and all.”
“Ay, I don’t have warts, thank you very much!” Carla jokes, though she’s struggling to mask her emotion, eyes pricking with tears.
“I’ll always choose you, Lisa” she whispers quietly. “In every lifetime, if I could.”
Lisa squeezes at her waist and replaces her fingers with her mouth, peppering a gentle trail of kisses across Carla’s soft torso. Carla moans, her every nerve ending on fire.
“Should we take this into the bedroom?” the brunette croaks.
Lisa shakes her head. “I need to have you now. I can’t wait any longer.”
Carla presses her lips together. “But what about…”
Lisa cuts her off. “Ryan’s on the late shift and Betsy’s spending the night with her grandparents. We’ve got the place to ourselves.”
Before Carla can protest, Lisa is back on her feet and kissing her fervidly, sucking harshly on her tongue as she walks Carla backwards, until she’s pressed right up against the cold granite of the kitchen island.
“Lisa,” Carla pants, turning her head to one side so the blonde can begin a sensual assault on her neck, nipping and sucking until she reaches the prominent jut of her clavicle.
“Arms up,” Lisa demands, and Carla realises then that she had forgotten how good this feels, how much she loves succumbing to her girlfriend’s every command.
She slips off her kimono and lifts her arms obediently above her head, lets Lisa undress her from the waist up, her lacy bra quickly joining her blouse in a rumpled heap on the floor.
“God,” Lisa breathes, her eyes almost black now as they scan Carla’s body. “I’ve missed your tits.”
Carla groans as Lisa palms roughly at her breasts, pinching at her nipples as she once again slumps to her knees. The blonde’s hands wander downwards, her fingers hooking deftly beneath the waistband of Carla’s leggings.
She looks up at the brunette with wide eyes. “Are you sure?” she asks, and Carla’s heart soars at the love she sees shining back at her.
“Lise, if you don’t touch me right now then I’m going to-”
Carla doesn’t get the chance to finish her sentence, instead letting out a guttural roar as Lisa pulls down her leggings and sodden underwear in one smooth motion, wasting no time in pressing her talented mouth against Carla’s throbbing centre.
“Fuck,” Lisa gasps as she pulls back, chin already glistening with her girlfriend’s arousal. “You’re so wet.”
Carla feels delirious. “All for you,baby,” she pants. “This is what you do to me.”
Lisa doesn’t tease her then; knows that both of them are in desperate need of release. And so she buries her face between Carla’s thighs, buries her tongue in her endless wetness and devours every last drop of it.
The blonde feels hungry, starving, as she laps and swallows, her lips fixing around Carla’s clit as she sucks and sucks, with more fervency than ever before. It isn’t long before Carla is keening against her, scratching at her scalp as she ruts against her face, fucking her tongue, like a dog on heat.
“I’m so close, Lise,” Carla whines, and Lisa can feel it, can feel the way the brunette is tensing and tightening under her touch.
And so she sucks harder, bracing her arms underneath Carla’s toned thighs as the other woman trembles against her, her knees nearly buckling as she comes, almost violently, with Lisa’s name on her lips.
“You’re okay, baby,” Lisa soothes as Carla sways and moans above her. “I’ve got you. You’re okay.”
Lisa continues lapping at Carla’s wetness until she comes back down to earth, the brunette’s smile hazy as Lisa clambers back to her feet.
“That was….fuck, I don’t even know what that was,” Carla laughs.
“It was incredible,” Lisa smiles, dropping a kiss onto the tip of Carla’s nose. “You’re incredible.”
Carla is just about to return the compliment when suddenly Lisa is lifting her, hoisting her so that her legs are fastening around the blonde’s waist, her hands grappling at Lisa’s shoulders as she maneuvers them easily into the bedroom.
Carla lets out a little squeal. “Good to see your body combat training is being put to good use,” she quips.
Lisa chuckles as she drops Carla carefully onto the bed. “Shut up,” she grins.
The blonde steps back then and makes light work of discarding her clothes. Carla almost complains, almost wants to bemoan the fact she hasn’t been allowed to do the undressing, but suddenly Lisa is there - bare before her - and she feels the grievance die on her tongue.
“Beautiful,” Carla whispers, awestruck, as she props herself up on one elbow. “You’re so beautiful, Lisa.”
It hits Carla that she hasn’t seen her girlfriend naked in so long, not properly. Of course, there’d been little glimpses when Lisa had just got out of the shower, or when she’d been getting ready for bed.
But Carla’s ailing health had made those glimpses furtive and fleeting. Now, she was getting the chance to unabashedly admire her lover, and she was relishing every second of it.
Lisa’s cheeks turn pink under Carla’s gaze as she climbs onto the bed, both women moaning as their naked bodies press together for the first time in what feels like forever.
“God, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve thought about this, about having you like this,” Carla admits through a sigh. “I honestly don’t know how long it will take before I can walk again after that orgasm.”
Lisa arches one perfectly manicured eyebrow. “Oh well, if you’re tired, we can stop.”
Carla leans up, so that she can feel Lisa’s hot breath against her lips, and the blonde is just about to kiss her when Carla flips them, so that she’s straddling Lisa’s waist.
“No way,” Carla smirks. “You’ve taken care of me. Now I’d very much like to return the favour.”
Lisa gasps as Carla dips her head and starts mouthing along the creamy slope of her neck. The brunette smiles against soft skin as she nudges her nose upwards, starts grazing at the shell of Lisa’s ear.
“You’re insatiable, Lisa Swain,” she whispers, sucking the lobe into her mouth in a way that has Lisa arching up off the mattress.
“Ah, ah, ah,” Carla chides, grinding down so that her wetness smears against the taut plane of Lisa’s stomach. “All in good time, blondie.”
Carla continues rocking her hips in a steady rhythm as she kisses down to Lisa’s breasts, the cool metal of her girlfriend’s belly piercing providing delicious friction against her clit. Carla lathes her tongue over one alert nipple, sucking the hardened bud into her mouth and biting down just hard enough to make Lisa cry out.
“Carla, please,” Lisa whines, her own hips canting involuntarily upwards.
Carla rears back, a challenge in her eyes. “Please what, darling?” she asks, voice saccharine sweet. “Use your words. Tell me what you need.”
Lisa squeezes her eyes shut, bites her lip in frustration. Before Carla, she had never begged in the bedroom, had always thought it beneath her.
But Carla, god, Carla could make her do just about anything.
Lisa exhales and swallows. “Please,” she manages to squeeze out. “Please go down on me. I need your mouth on me, Carla. Please.”
Carla’s arousal springs anew at Lisa’s words and she knows then she can’t deny her girlfriend any longer. She slides down Lisa’s trembling body and worships the inside of her thighs, paying particular attention to the spider’s web of purple stretch marks just below her right hip.
“Gorgeous,” she murmurs against Lisa’s skin. “You get more gorgeous every time.”
Lisa can only whimper, her hands fisting again in Carla’s hair as the brunette, at long last, slides her flattened tongue between her folds, licking generously through her wet heat. Carla hums at the taste, can’t get enough of it, and pushes hungrily inside of the blonde.
Lisa jolts as she pulses around Carla’s tongue, throws her free hand over her mouth to muffle her strangled moan. Carla notices and pauses her ministrations.
“No,” she growls, pupils dilating. “I want to hear you. I want to hear what I do to you.”
Lisa groans and her arm flops back onto the duvet as she rocks against Carla’s face, her gaze drifting downwards to watch her girlfriend work. She almost comes at the sight, marvels at just how much Carla enjoys doing this.
“Get up here,” she rasps, eyes wild. “I need to taste you again.”
Carla hesitates for a moment and then pulls away. Lisa smirks, expecting the brunette to climb up her body, but she doesn’t.
Instead Carla shuffles onto her knees, turns around, and Lisa is just about to protest until she realises what’s happening. In a flash, Carla’s perfect arse is in the air, her thighs bracketed around Lisa’s head and her face hovering just above the blonde’s centre.
Carla, on all fours, looks back over her shoulder with a wicked glint in her eye. “That okay for you?” she asks.
Lisa just nods dumbly, thinks this woman might just be the death of her. But then Carla is dipping her head again, her magical tongue stroking at her centre once more, and Lisa can’t think of anything at all.
The blonde snakes her hand up to Carla’s backside, digs her fingernails into the creamy flesh, hard enough to leave a mark. Carla hisses and ups her tempo, driving her tongue relentlessly in and out; driving Lisa to near-distraction.
Lisa decides to get her own back. Without warning, she slides two fingers into Carla’s wetness, smirking as the brunette breaks her stride, a string of expletives tumbling from her lips as she presses backwards, forcing Lisa deeper.
Lisa adds a third finger and quickly builds up an addictive rhythm, the room filled with the squelching sound of arousal as Carla’s mouth latches onto her clit, head bobbing determinedly.
“I’m close, baby,” Lisa pants as she feels that familiar pressure start to coil in the pit of her stomach. “Will you come with me?”
Carla nods frantically, reaching to rub at her own clit as she continues rocking against Lisa’s fingers. That image is what does it for Lisa; what finally sends her tumbling over the edge.
And suddenly she feels weightless, her whole body trembling as Carla drops onto her face, near-suffocating her as her walls tighten around Lisa’s fingers.
Lisa doesn’t mind, thinks drowning in her girlfriend’s arousal would be the most beautiful way to die. After a beat, though, Lisa can breathe again as Carla slides gingerly from on top of her and curls, boneless, against her side.
They lie there in companionable silence for what could be either minutes or hours, Lisa’s fingers tangling in Carla’s sweat-slicked hair as the brunette lays her head on Lisa’s chest, listening to the steady whoosh of her heartbeat.
“So,” Lisa says, when she’s eventually recovered her powers of speech. “Was that what you had in mind when you said you wanted taking care of?”
Carla twists her neck to look up at the blonde, her expression suddenly serious. “Oh yes,” she says. “Honestly, if they added that to the list of NHS treatments, the waiting lists would go down in no time at all.”
Lisa just looks at her for a moment, Carla holding her gaze, before they both dissolve into laughter. And Carla thinks - she knows - that she has never felt better.