Star Trek Voyager: Here I Stand

Here I Stand, Part 20

Part 20

                With a soft thud, the duffle bag hit the floor.

                It was the last of many items to end up there.

                The first was an empty wine glass, jostled by the force of two bodies, one small and lean, the other large and strong, lurching against the edge of the table. The glass didn’t break. Even nine months removed from space, Chakotay was still in the habit of choosing items that would not shatter into a thousand deadly projectiles in the event of artificial gravity loss. So the glass merely toppled over, rolled across the table and fell to the deck, where it bounced twice, end over end, and tumbled over the edge.

                Locked in a searing, soul-deep and long-awaited kiss, neither Chakotay nor Kathryn noticed it.

                The empty wine bottle followed it a moment later. Its trajectory was more haphazard and noisier, due both to its greater mass and the slight swaying of the table beneath it.

                Chakotay and Kathryn didn’t notice the bottle, either.

                When the first dinner plate, flipped into sudden motion by a large hand seeking a flat surface for leverage, skidded across the table and clattered to the deck, a skinny gray rabbit darted from the shade under the deck and dove for cover into the high backyard grass.

                Chakotay sensed the rabbit’s careening flight and opened one eye. He kept it open just long enough to notice the rest of the dinner dishes littering the table around Kathryn’s backside…her firm, beautiful backside, which filled his palms just so and made him want to…

                The dishes were in his way.

                He closed his eye again and drew Kathryn away from the table, which had the sensual side effect of pulling her closer to his eager body. Distracted by the feel of her pressed against him at thigh and belly and lips, he forgot about the dishes.

                When she reached under his shirt and smoothed her cool, slim hands up his back, he almost forgot his own name.

                He wrapped his hands around that beautiful backside, lifted her up and perched her on the edge of the table again. He started to cover her body with his own…but the dishes were still in the way. Before he could decide what to do about them – Ignore them? Move them to the side? Run them back to the kitchen? – Kathryn disengaged from his kiss, pulled one hand out from under his shirt and, in one swift and decisive motion, turned and swept the entire contents of the table to the deck.

                The resulting crash of plates and glasses and a half-full serving bowl caused three more panicked rabbits to flee the scene.

                Chakotay couldn’t help it. He tried to focus on her eyes, her lips, the pulse throbbing at the side of her pale, slender neck, but he just had to look. As surreptitiously as he could, he eyed the untidy pile of dishes. Kathryn launched herself back at his lips, but stopped when she saw the expression his face. “What?”

                He nodded toward the pile. “You made a mess.”

                She raised her chin and, displaying the same air of decision with which she’d cleared the table, stood up, yanked the linen dress over her head and dropped it on top of the dishes. “Now it’s cloaked,” she said. “Satisfied?”

                “Not yet,” he growled, feeling his body react to the sight of her, hands on hips, clad only in cobalt-colored bra and panties. His fingers itched to touch every centimeter of her skin, alabaster white in the evening light. “But I soon will be.” He guided her down onto the table until she was prone and he was looming over her, his mouth fused to hers, his hands caressing every part of her that he could reach. Neck, collarbone, breasts, belly, thighs… He skimmed his palms over them all, making note of her every shiver and moan, her every sigh of ecstasy.