Flame
“Flame,” you read aloud, and immediately see Shusuke Amagai, former captain of the 3rd Division, get to his feet. Surprisingly, he seems to have recovered from the sip of alcohol he’d had earlier. It’s pretty well known that Amagai is nearly incapable of drinking and remaining conscious.
He eyes you from across the room, walking towards the closet. His gaze brings you back to the moment—
Captain Amagai realized his foolishness, his stupidity. He hated himself. His gut burned with it. He’d manipulated good people, destroyed the happiness of others, and now he was kneeling before Yamamoto, despising the very air he drew. He would kill himself.
As he raised the blade to summon the purifying fire, you ran. Your heart raced, and you crested the hill, and suddenly you crashed into him. “No!”
Gazing down at him, you cried, tears coursing down your face like rain. “Stop! Please…”
He steps into the open doorway and offers his hand. You take it.
The door shuts and Rangiku announces the time left. “Ten minutes, starting now!”
“_________, how are you?” Shusuke asks, his thumb brushing your cheekbone. He smiles at you, and you smile back.
“I’m fine,” you manage, rubbing a shoulder nervously. You loved this man; that was why you had stopped him on the hill that day. His brown eyes are soft and considering.
“You’re thinking about that day.”
You don’t like being so transparent, but you nod. “I… I couldn’t let you do it.” You swipe at your eyes. The memory by itself aches.
“I think about it a lot, myself,” Shusuke says, taking your hand and leading you to the wall to sit. “I had to stop—I couldn’t let you get hurt. Not you,” he murmured, seemingly to himself—“Never you.”
You slide your fingers between his. They fit perfectly, and Shusuke studies your hand in his. “That damn grudge almost lost me everything. If you hadn’t arrived just then, I would be a pile of ashes.”
You wince. “Shusuke, don’t.”
“It’s the truth.” He sighs again. “The point is, because you came barreling up that hill to save the day I’m alive. I have a chance to make up for my mistakes—and a chance to be with you.”
“I want to be with you too.” The fumblings of first love are vacant for both of you; at the hill you had acknowledged your deep feelings and Shusuke had accepted them. They had become his reason for living.
There was no uneasy stutter, no quiet blush. There was no need. On the hill, on the verge, there had been no time for fear, and now it was just a question of where and when these precious emotions were realized.
That time was now, and the place was here.
Shusuke guides you into his arms, waiting until you are completely enfolded in his captain’s haori before he dips his head. “I love you, ________.”
At the moment your lips meet, Shusuke pulls you close, his heart matching yours, beat for beat. His mouth is warm, like the haori he’d stripped from his shoulders and wrapped around you. Contentment spills into your blood as Shusuke lifts you into his arms and carries you from the room. Rangiku, about to protest, is silenced by a look from Captain Hitsugaya, and Shusuke, with a chuckle, shuts the door behind you as you make your way down to his desk.
Once there, he begins in earnest.
Quaking with want, you kiss him, steadying yourself as his strong arms brace on either side of you. Sweeping everything off the desk, Shusuke presses you down, lacing the fingers of both hands with your own and stretching them up above your head. The metal is cold against your back, but the warm haori protects you.
His kisses are sweet and light, morsels of paradise. Then he kisses you fiercely, his need overriding the desire to be tender. His tongue paints your lips with deliberate firmness as his hands pin yours to the desk top; then his tongue is inside, caressing, touching, bringing your mouth alive. Your senses hum with overload as Shusuke’s lips brush the side of your neck. His tongue touches, much like it did in your mouth, but this time it is accompanied by his teeth. The nip is gentle, but you still squeak.
He lifts you entirely up onto the desk, freeing your hands so his can trail down your back. Your fingers quickly begin kneading his scalp as his lips worship every inch of bare skin, and you lay your burning cheek on his shoulder as he begins working his shirt off, never once taking his lips from your neck.
“I love you, Shusuke,” you whisper in his ear, your fingers tangled up in his unkempt hair.
He pauses mid-caress and looks up at you. He smiles. “Good. I’m glad I’m not alone.”
Sometime the next morning Shusuke brings you awake with a few gentle kisses. “Hey.” He drops another kiss on your waiting lips. “It’ll be time to start work soon—we should get out of here before somebody finds us.”
“Shusuke, wait.” You catch his shoulder as he moves to sit up, his robes shrugging down over sculpted abs.
“Is something wrong?”
“No. I just… Er… Will you marry me?” You take his hand. You’d just popped the question—go you.
Shusuke’s eyes glitter and he spends the next few moments turning your brain into a quivering puddle of adoration, running his lips and hands over you. “How’s that for an answer?”
“Yes would have worked too,” you all but sigh.
“Yes isn’t as much fun. Now what do you say we go celebrate somewhere private…?”
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