Surrender - Jack Abbot
Pairing: Jack Abbot x Former Seattle Grace!Female Reader
Summary: You’re building a life here - that's what Meredith had said when she saw you in Pittsburgh. She was right, you just still hadn't found the words to tell Jack you wanted more than one date, or the courage to surrender to the inveitable. Warnings: None, I think. Unless something major changes, this will likely be the last part. I've loved writing this but I don't have any more big ideas for it.
——————————————————————————————————— As soon as you’d walked through the door that night, Samira had been there waiting. She wasn’t mad that you hadn’t told her about Seattle, not really, but she wanted to be someone you could tell things to. So you had. The two of you had sat up in your bed all night and you’d told her everything. Including that you’d agreed to go on a date with Jack. She was pleased for you, she thought you were making a good choice and you agreed, but you’d still sworn her to secrecy.
You might have realised that you didn’t have to make your friend’s mistakes, and that Jack was a much more emotionally mature man than most of those you’d known before, but this was new and you didn’t want the pressure that would come with having everyone in the Pitt analysing the two of you for signs of it going well. Or not going well.
If the lack of sidelong glances and blatantly obvious chatter in another language when you were anywhere near Princess and Perlah were anything to go by, Jack hadn’t said a word either. Or maybe that was the tiny hint of awkwardness they seemed to feel now the reason you’d left Seattle was common knowledge. Princess had cornered you first thing on your next shift back after PittFest and dropped the pool money onto the desk in an envelope.
“We wouldn’t have been so in your face about it if we knew,” she had said. It wasn’t really an apology but it felt too much like one for your taste.
“I know,” you’d told her, holding her eyes with your own so she could read the honesty in them. “If I was upset about it, you’d have known.” You picked up the envelope and waved it at her, grinning. “I’m keeping the money though.”
It didn’t surprise you, really, that Jack hadn’t made a thing about your date because you were starting to settle into the feeling of trusting him to follow your lead without hesitating, but it did make you feel a little soft and euphoric.
Actually getting to the business of having said date, though, was another matter entirely.
Between your shifts and his, you hadn’t overlapped a day off since PittFest. That didn’t mean you hadn’t noticed the slightest change in your dynamic. It was subtle, something nobody noticed except the two of you. You both still sometimes showed up with coffee for the other, but now his fingers grazed yours every time in a way that couldn’t be accidental. You still flirted, casually and borderline sarcastically, but whole silent conversations passed between his smirk and your eyes.
When Jack came in for his shift today — early, obviously — he was treated to the very entertaining sight of the other residents popping up at your side at random intervals to pepper you with hypothetical medical scenarios. It was something you’d been doing all day, it was a great way to fit your studying into the little time you could dedicate to it while on duty. It was also fun and brightened everyone’s day. The others had made a game of who could sneak up and surprise you the most. Santos was winning, she’d had you paged for a consult and leaped out at you from behind the door when you’d stood puzzled at the lack of a patient in the room. Absolute fucking menace. Jack thought it was pretty genius, actually, because it got the younger residents competing about who could ask the most obscure question, which got them researching and improving their own education.
Still, impressed as Jack was, he made very sure to check there were no wayward residents lurking around when he finally got a chance to speak to you. “Tomorrow night.”
“Tomorrow night what?”
“I’m off work tomorrow night, Shen’s gonna cover me,” he clarified. “Have dinner with me, let me cook you dinner.”
Well, if he was going to get anyone to cover for him, Shen was the way to go. He was a great doctor, but he was so laid back he was practically horizontal and didn’t have a single gossipy bone in his body. He would have asked exactly zero questions.
“You cook?” You looked at him in surprise and then shook your head. “Don’t answer that. Of course you cook. Okay then, tomorrow.”
If you spent the rest of the day feeling like you might float away, that was no one’s business but your own.
———————————————————————————————————
Jack’s building was nice, far nicer than yours. Obviously, that made sense but it was an odd thing to be so focused on when you knocked on his door.
Jack had texted you the address, because texting was apparently something the two of you did after that night in the park. Just random messages about nothing at all, good morning and goodnight and Code Gloria, Robby’s on the warpath, just talking for the sake of talking. You’d showered and paced and changed your outfit four times before settling on your favourite jeans — the ones that you knew made you look good — and a top that was nice but didn’t look like you’d tried too hard. It was ludicrous, really, you’d had men look at you before, in various states of undress, but the idea of sitting across a dinner table from Jack made you jittery.
When the door opened and he appeared, all that went away. Dressed in jeans and a loose, navy button down shirt with sleeves already rolled up to his elbows, he looked good. He looked relaxed. And suddenly being here and seeing him this way felt like the most natural thing in the world.
“Hi,” you breathed. Seriously, ‘hi’ all breathless and sappy is the best I can do?
“Hey,” he smiled – and yeah, breathless was all you had – stepping aside to wave you in. “You look great.” The way he looked at you, your jeans may as well have been a ballgown.
As Jack guided you through to the kitchen, hand just barely skimming your lower back, you could see that his apartment was blessed with huge windows, making it open and light, it felt modern without feeling soulless.
“I brought wine,” you said as he moved to the stove.
“Great. Glasses are in there,” he waved at one of the cupboards. “I hope pasta’s okay?”
“I’ve spent the last three years of my life surviving on coffee, cereal and old takeout food,” you told him as you poured two glasses of wine, “I’m pretty sure whatever you make will be like a Michelin star meal to me.”
He laughed more freely than you’d ever heard him do inside the hospital, and you couldn’t control the smile that lit your own face in answer.
It turned out, dinner with Jack was effortless. The two of you had talked idly while he cooked and then you set the table and poured more wine. As you ate, conversation came easy. He confided in you that he was quiet and unassuming as a child, bordering on shy and it made you laugh a little because you couldn’t imagine him being anything other than the man he was today. The man who was calm and confident and who could cut a difficult patient or arrogant resident down with a single look. The Army was what made him that man, he confessed. He’d joined up because he didn’t see another way of putting himself through medical training, but he’d never anticipated the things he would deal with to reach that goal. He didn’t linger too long on the tough parts, instead sharing good memories from his time enlisted, because despite everything he’d suffered, they did exist, times he had spent in the company of good men and women that had become family to him. You told him how you’d worked two jobs all through college and med school and still came out the other side with more debt than you dared to think about most days, but that you’d never once regretted taking that path. You loved your job; you loved the challenge, the way no two days were ever the same and seeing someone come back from the brink of something awful and knowing you were the one who did that was a high like you’d never known.
You’d finished eating long ago and had cleared the table together, talking all the while. Now you were settled on the couch, which was comfy in a well loved way, a blanket thrown across the arm and you could so easily picture him falling onto it after a long shift, too exhausted to even make it to bed. You’d kicked off your shoes and you sat facing him the same way you had on that bench in the park
Your wine glass waved in your hand as you gestured while you spoke, him watching you like you were the most interesting thing he’d ever known, as you told him some of the most outrageous stories from Seattle. The Dead Baby bike race and the biker who kissed Meredith, the time the Chief’s assistant had to give the entire surgical staff a safe sex demonstration because half of them had shared STDs, the time Izzie ‘operated’ on a deer in the back of some guy’s truck in the parking lot.
“That place doesn’t sound real,” Jack laughed, eyes warm, arm draped languidly across the back of the sofa, fingers almost-but-not-quite brushing your arm where it rested against the cushion. “It’s like a TV show.”
“Thank you! I’ve been saying that for years.”
When you softly declared it time for you to leave, Jack tried his level best to insist on walking you home. Never mind the fact that you’d walked here all by yourself, or that you walked back and forth from the hospital almost daily. He’d mumbled something about it being after dark and you having had a few drinks. You were having none of it, no matter how charming you thought it was, and you both knew why. As the evening had gone on, you hadn’t missed the way he’d moved a little slower on his feet. How by the time you’d settled on the couch, he shifted in his seat, adjusting the position of his leg every few minutes, almost subconsciously. You hadn’t said anything, because if he wanted you to know his leg was bothering him then he’d have told you, but you both knew you’d noticed because noticing each other was just a thing you did now. So no way you were letting him walk all the way to your apartment and back. As he went with you to the front door, you compromised on texting him as soon as you got home.
“This was really nice, thank you.” You hesitated for half a second before leaning up to press a gentle kiss on his cheek. “Good night, Jack.”
“G’night.” Jack’s voice was as soft as that kiss had been.
The walk home felt weightless, like you’d drifted the entire way without realising it. You were glad Samira had gone out with Mel and Santos tonight, because you wanted to spend as long as you could without breaking the bubble of the evening. You’d never really done the whole dating thing before. You’d done cheap beer in cheaper bars and tequila shots and dancing in clubs where you could barely hear yourself think, never mind hold a conversation, but you’d never done dinner and wine and dating. Did it always feel like this? No wonder people did crazy things when they were dating.
As promised, you texted Jack.
You: I’m home. You can stand down the SWAT team.
Jack: You can joke all you want, but I have connections and I’m not afraid to use them. Gotta keep you safe if I’m gonna sell you on the idea of date number two.
———————————————————————————————————
One week out from your boards, and you were going insane trying to fill your head with knowledge. Knowledge that you knew you already had, but suddenly felt the need to remind yourself of constantly. You had the week off, Robby told you it was tradition for any resident undergoing their final boards because otherwise they’d all be driven mad by the incessant studying and quizzing. You could see the wisdom in that.
Of course, you’d been using the Hub as a study station any chance you got since long before this week, so it didn’t stop you. You thought it was kind of perfect actually, because you got all the noise and anarchy you needed to hone your mind and you could badger Robby for his medical genius. In fact, you thought calling it that was the only reason he hadn’t kicked you out yet. Or killed you.
He had called in reinforcements, though, because Jack had showed up, asked what you’d done to break Robby all of a sudden and then taken up quizzing you like he had all those weeks ago on the night shift. You figured it was as much to save his friend’s sanity as it was to help you out, but you’d take what you could get. Dana laughed at all of you, and told you that you absolutely had to take a break. You promised her you planned to. You hadn’t told anyone here, except Jack and Samira, that you had friends in town. Mark, Derek and Arizona had been asked to fly out to separate a set of conjoined twins that were admitted up on the surgical ward. Alex, Meredith and Lexie were coming along as the residents to each of their respective attendings. They were currently upstairs, conducting pre-op labs. You were going out for drinks tonight, and they’d operate tomorrow before flying home.
Despite not officially being on duty, Javadi had pulled you away for a second opinion on a case she was handling, Jack and Robby had both offered to go but you told them to let you have it in the name of education. You had finished with the patient and were standing outside the room when you saw it out of the corner of your eye. Alex was propped up on the Hub desk with one arm, leaning in close to one of the nurses, Kim, in a way that could only mean he was hitting on her. Meredith was standing close by with her arms crossed and rolling her eyes. Oh, what fresh hell is this?
“One minute,” you muttered to Javadi. Then you raised your voice obnoxiously as you walked over to them. “How’s the syphilis, Dr. Karev?”
Kim pulled a face before scuttling away and Alex turned to you with a look of thunder on his face. “That was one time! And it was like a million years ago.”
“One time is enough,” you shot at him. “Happy as I am to see you, I will not have you coming in here and messing up things in the place that I work. I swear, Alex, keep it in your pants or I will cut it off.”
“Friends of yours, I take it?” Robby asked, looking torn between amusement and irritation. He couldn’t really reprimand you, since you weren’t technically working, but you imagined he wished this was happening anywhere that wasn’t his ER. Jack looked more entertained than you’d ever seen him look inside this place and you knew he was thinking of all the stories you’d told him on your date and since, placing faces to the names of the people in them.
“Robby, Jack,” Robby raised a single eyebrow at the familiarity with which you said Jack’s name, “this is Alex and Meredith,” you gestured between them all.
“Hi,” Meredith said. Then she whispered to you, although loud enough for everyone to hear, “McHottie, in the flesh. I see the appeal.”
Shaking your head with a long-suffering sigh – one filled with equal parts love and exasperation – and diligently ignoring Jack’s preening, you asked, “Why, exactly, are you here and not upstairs with your patient?”
“We missed you,” Meredith answered, the picture of innocence. Which was, in itself, suspicious. Meredith only cared about appearing innocent when she was most decidedly not.
“They kicked you out because you wouldn’t stop arguing, didn’t they?” You had been a little bewildered to see Alex and Meredith together, without sparks flying, because you knew what had been going on back in Seattle. Meredith and Derek were on the outs, again, because she’d tampered with his medical trial and he’d kicked her out. She’d done it for a reason you could understand, but it was still unethical and would prevent Derek from conducting any more trials in future. Alex had tattled on Meredith, but not for the right reasons, and then she’d kicked him out. If not for this surgery requiring both Pediatrics and Neurosurgery, they likely wouldn’t deign to be in the same room as each other. When neither of them answered, you knew you’d hit the nail on the head.
“Jesus, okay,” you started. “I’m guessing Cristina took Meredith’s side because it’s Meredith and Lexie took Meredith’s side because it’s Alex so let me offer a different approach.” You pointed at Meredith. “What you did was stupid and unethical and I know, I know you did it for a good reason but the only reason you kept your job and your licence is because of the Chief and he wouldn’t have done what he did if you were anyone else.” Next, you pointed to Alex. “You didn’t turn her in because it was the right thing to do, you did it because you wanted an edge in the race for Chief Resident. You went full on Evil Spawn. You’re both in the wrong. Now, go upstairs and be grown ups!”
There was a heavy silence between you for a minute, in which Jack and Robby got the impression that all of you were well versed in refereeing conflicts between the others, before Meredith gave that little eye roll she did when she was about to give in and said, “Fine.”
“We’re still getting drinks later?” She asked on their way to the elevator.
“Yes, and I don’t care if you hate each other, you will be there and if I hear the words ‘medical trial’ or ‘Chief Resident’, I will hurt you.”
“Bitch,” Alex called over his shoulder.
“Ass,” you called back, as was tradition.
———————————————————————————————————
After Meredith and Alex’s visit to the Pitt, word had gotten around that the people they’d heard you talk about were here and you’d decided to just extend the offer of drinks to anyone who wanted to come.
You’d left soon after, ducking out with Jack just because you didn’t have to be there. The two of you had stayed together without really discussing it. First you went to his apartment, where you teased him from the living room about all his medical journals while he changed. Then you went to your – much smaller, much less nice – apartment, where Jack let you probe his brain for information like he himself was a medical journal. Which he may as well have been, you supposed.
The afternoon passed in a haze of laughter and teasing, an easy back and forth you were starting to think you never wanted to lose.
Showing up to the bar together felt natural, like you’d done it a hundred times before and would do it a hundred times more. By the time you got there, most everyone else was there, the day shift having come right from the hospital and the Seattle residents’ hotel being close by already.
You weren’t surprised or offended that the attendings from Seattle hadn’t come. Derek was avoiding Meredith, Mark was Derek’s best friend and Arizona had a child at home, you assumed she was relishing in the peace and quiet of a hotel room all to herself. The fact that Alex and Meredith were both there, making an effort not to look like they wanted to kill each other, with Lexie sandwiched between them, was enough.
For a while, you all sat with beers across three or four tables you’d pushed together, and the two halves of your world got to know one another.
Then the beer turned to spirits and everyone spread out across the bar. You and Alex played darts with Donnie and Mateo, the two nurses holding their own against Alex’s caustic wit. You sang karaoke with Mel, Santos and Lexie, stumbling your way through lyrics until there was more laughter than singing.
You and Samira dragged Robby and Jack into a game of pool in the back corner of the bar. You knew Robby had probably only come because Jack had but you were glad to see him out having fun anyway. That man took on entirely too much stress and tried to bear it all alone. You worried for him some days. You worried for him most days.
Emboldened by the shady corners, the gentle buzz of alcohol in your veins and your suspicion that Robby was the one person besides Samira who already knew about your date with Jack, you let yourself be drawn into him that little bit more than usual. You let him guide your hands on the pool cue, let him whisper instructions directly into your ear even when you didn’t need it just to feel the way his voice dripped, thick and sweet like honey, down the length of your spine. In return, you pressed back into him just enough to tempt him when he leaned over you, you dragged fingertips softly over the line of his shoulders and across the back of his neck teasingly between turns. Robby and Samira won the game, but neither you or Jack cared.
Eventually, you found yourself sitting alone at a table with Meredith. She was watching Whitaker argue animatedly with Santos about something, eyes narrowed slightly.
“You see it, right?” She asked. “He’s…”
“He’s Bambi,” you said quietly.
“Doesn’t it hurt you? It hurts me a little.”
“Sometimes,” you admitted. “But mostly it feels like George’s way of telling me I’m right where I need to be.”
She hummed, then her eyes drifted to where Jack was still hiding out by the pool table with Robby. “He’s not just McHottie. You showed up here with him, I saw you earlier when you were playing pool. You really like this guy.” She paused and then she said, in that way she did when she boiled some big realisation down to a few simple words, “You’re happy here.”
“I am.”
“You’re not coming back to Seattle.”
“No. Actually, I found out this morning that there’s a junior attending job waiting for me as long as I pass my boards.” You hadn’t told anyone that yet, not even Jack. You’d quietly interviewed with Gloria earlier this week, and she’d called you this morning to say they’d be thrilled to have you. You were capable and efficient, knew the inner workings of the place, had a good relationship with the staff and had great patient satisfaction scores. Plus, both Robby and Jack had written you glowing letters of recommendation. You were the obvious choice, apparently.
“We all thought this was your version of bartending at Joe’s, but you’re building a life here,” Meredith said, her eyes meeting yours.
“They’re my people,” you said, eyes roving over the room. Santos and Whitaker bickering like siblings. Samira and Mel laughing with Lexie as they picked out another karaoke song. Princess acting as both cheerleader and heckler as Donnie and Mateo competed at darts. Jack, in the corner with Robby, eyes already on you. “You’re my family but… they’re my people.”
“Well, okay then.”
Across the room, Robby stepped away to the bar, and Alex seized the opportunity to take his place next to Jack.
“Don’t hurt her,” he said without making eye contact, watching you chat with Meredith.
“Excuse me?”
“She likes you. She doesn’t do dating or relationships, never has, but I’ve never seen her like someone the way she likes you.” Alex paused. “She saved my life, so don’t hurt her.”
Jack considered Alex for a moment. You’d told him everything from your time in Seattle, so he knew your relationship with Alex had been forever changed by tragedy on the bloody floor of a hospital supply room. He also knew Alex would be the hardest of your friends to read and to win over if they got off on the wrong foot. While he didn’t personally care whether this man liked him or not, and he knew it would never stop you from making whatever choice you wanted, he did want to be part of your life in every way and Alex was only asking him not to do something he’d never had any intention of doing anyway.
“Easiest promise I’ve ever made,” he said, holding his hand out for Alex to shake.
———————————————————————————————————
The day of your boards, the anticipation dragged you from your bed far too soon. You spent the early hours of the morning curled up on the couch drinking tea — not coffee, you were too amped up already — watching the day splutter to life, the light battling to filter through clouds so grey it was as if someone had sucked all the colour from the world.
By the time you were dressing to leave, in the very same clothes you’d worn to your interview with Gloria the previous week, those heavy grey clouds had burst open, rain cascading against the windows in thick sheets. Some people might have considered it a sign, a bad omen, but you felt most alive during a storm, real or metaphorical, so it was actually kind of calming.
Either by cosmic design or by sheer luck, the boards were taking place right here in Pittsburgh so while you had to contend with the weather, at least you got to sleep in your own bed and didn’t have to travel across the country.
The morning passed in a fog, a strange mix of unyielding confidence and unshakeable anxiety. You were now in the hands of the examiners with their clean cut trousers and pencil skirts, their pressed blazers and dull, professional ties, their probing eyes and pointed questions designed to make you wonder whether the answer you just gave was the single most foolish thing anyone had ever said even when you knew it wasn’t. Before you knew it, the building was spitting you back out onto the street, pavement damp under your feet and air still heavy with the scent of rain.
Robby had offered you the full day off, but you’d told him you would only end up climbing the walls of your apartment. So you went home, changed into your scrubs and headed right to the hospital. You probably could have gone to Jack’s apartment, but despite the casual intimacy the two of you shared without question, neither of you had broached the subject of a second date. You knew Jack was waiting on you, you weren’t so oblivious as to be unaware that he was afraid you would bolt if he moved too fast, but something had stayed your tongue whenever you thought about bringing it up. It seemed realising you wanted to stop keeping him at a safe distance and actually doing the thing were very, very different.
As the afternoon dragged on, the other staff seemed to watch you and whisper more frequently than usual, because you hadn’t once mentioned how your boards went.
“Someone should just ask,” Javadi whispered to Princess and Perlah, watching you move around the Pitt.
“You will do no such thing,” Dana told her firmly. They had a rule on exam days, ever since a couple of years ago when Robby had asked one of the senior residents how they thought they’d done and the guy had promptly burst into tears. Nobody needed that.
A couple of hours later when the night shift started trickling in, the first thing each of them did was stop by the Hub to find out if you’d said anything yet. You’d never quite given up your semi-regular appearances in the Pitt during night shifts when you couldn’t sleep, and Ellis and Shen had both come to enjoy your visits and the entertainment they got watching their normally closed off colleague crack wide open in your presence. The results came by email the same day, given how early in the day yours had been done, you surely must have heard by now.
“Any news?” Jack asked Robby when he arrived, whispering so you wouldn’t hear from the desk you were using, only for Robby to shake his head.
They were so distracted, neither of them made a run for it when Gloria came striding down the hallway. The two of them and Dana had been avoiding her all week as if that would get them out of the annual PTMC fundraiser happening the following night.
You listened from where you sat, putting all your effort into not letting your emotions show on your face.
After she’d finished lecturing Jack, Robby and Dana about the importance of them not just showing up, but putting in an effort to increase donations if they wanted her to do some of the things Robby was always hounding her about, she crossed to stand in front of the desk where you could see her. “Congratulations on your certification, Doctor. And welcome aboard. Don’t think you’re getting out of making an appearance at the fundraiser because you haven’t yet done your first shift here as an attending.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” you promised her. You both knew you were already aware that you’d have to be there, she’d made that abundantly clear when she called to offer you the job, but she couldn’t resist driving the point home.
When she left, you counted to five in your head before you spun around in your chair finally sporting the huge grin you’d been holding back ever since you’d checked your phone an hour ago to find your board results waiting in your email inbox.
“You didn’t feel like, I don’t know, saying something?!” Santos asked, sounding incredulous.
“And put you all out of your misery? Surely not.” You patted her shoulder as you passed her on the way to your locker. “A girl has to be allowed to have some fun.”
———————————————————————————————————
Jack really hated this event. He hated the way he was trotted out like a show pony; the veteran amputee meant to garner sympathy or evoke guilt in the wealthy and entitled so they’d hand over money like that would absolve them of their sins. He hated the extravagance, the politics, the inane small talk and the fact that any part of his ability to save lives depended on people who had no idea how it felt to shoulder that responsibility.
He was also a man who knew the realities. He knew that, despite how difficult things were in the Pitt because of lack of funding, it could be far worse. If no one from the Emergency Department showed up to this thing, they’d get none of the funding that might be handed out here tonight. So every year, he shackled himself into a suit, made the rounds and tried not to look as blank behind the eyes as he felt.
This year, he’d at least have the pleasure of your company. The date you’d had had been one of the most pleasant nights he’d had in a long time and if he wasn’t so worried it would scare you off, he’d have told you right there at the door that he was half in love with you already.
You hadn’t said a word about a second date, but you hadn’t pulled away from him either. He was taking that as a positive sign, especially now the issue of your residency was resolved.
When you walked into the room, Jack’s entire world narrowed on you. Samira had styled your hair for you, your makeup was flawless and the dress you wore fit like it had been made with only you in mind. It curved and dipped and clung along the lines of your body in a way that sent heat curling along his every nerve. Eyes from all over the room were drawn in by the gravity of you and Jack found himself something he wasn’t often; jealous. Not in the sense that he wanted to hide you away and keep you for himself, but that he wanted to stand at your side, bathed in the glow you were emitting, and have everyone know he was yours.
“Close your mouth,” Robby muttered to him as you caught sight of them and headed their way, snagging a glass off the tray of a passing waiter. “You look like a simpleton.”
Jack hadn’t even registered that it was open, but he managed to snap it just as you reached them and was thankful that Dana was far too classy to tell you it was him she’d been laughing at.
“This thing is obscene,” you said. “They could staff us with the extra nurses we need for months with the money they spent on all this.”
“Amen,” Dana clinked her complimentary champagne against yours.
“Welcome to the other side,” Robby said sarcastically. “Knowledge can be a curse.”
“What, no sage words or glib remarks from you?” You asked Jack when he remained uncharacteristically unopinionated.
He didn’t get the chance to speak before Gloria swept over with an air very reminiscent of his Army Commanders and insisted she make your introductions as this was your first event.
For a while, you allowed her to parade you around the room, introducing you to various potential donors whose faces all melded together in your mind. You knew she was trying to capitalise on the fact that you were new and shiny and better practiced at the niceties that Jack and Robby, and even Dana to a lesser extent, had long since stopped pretending to engage in. You talked medicine and your move from Seattle, danced with one or two people and politely removed one particularly wandering hand.
When you managed to slip free, you hadn’t even made it off the dance floor before Jack was there, extending his hand. “Wanna hide out for a few minutes?”
Your hand slid into his without hesitation. “More than I want air to breathe.”
His laugh was as warm as his hand in yours as he guided you out onto a terrace overlooking sprawling, professionally manicured gardens. The night air was fresh and cool, stars scattered across the night sky like spilled diamonds.
“Have I told you yet that you look beautiful tonight?” Jack asked.
“No, you haven’t.”
“A nearly unforgivable oversight,” he said, dragging his hand up and down your arm in a way that was most distracting. “You look beautiful tonight.”
“You look pretty incredible yourself,” you said. He really did. You’d seen many versions of Jack. You had seen him in the hospital in scrubs, in his home relaxed in jeans, you’d even caught a glimpse of him in his SWAT uniform once, just for a second, and every version of him was beautiful. Jack in a suit, though, was something else entirely. It was like he’d been plucked from your wildest dream and presented dressed in sin.
“So, you’re staying at the Pitt now, probably be running rings around Robby and me in no time.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” you said quietly. “I wish I could say it was just that I didn’t want to jinx it, but the truth is I’m not good at the sharing part.” “You don’t have to apologise to me, and you don’t have to tell me things.”
Ever since you’d seen Meredith, you’d been playing her words over in your head. You’re building a life here. She was right in a sense. You wanted to build a life here, and you had started to. You’d formed a fantastic bond with everyone at the Pitt, a wonderful mirror to the bond you had with everyone back in Seattle – the same, but different – and you had finally achieved the next step in your career, a hard won victory that you’d been almost singularly focused on for the last four years. You had always thought your career was it for you, you’d never felt the pull to someone enough to rival that which you felt to medicine, but now you found yourself wanting more. Wanting not just your people but your person, the one person who understood you better than anyone else, the person who felt like home and safety and all the things you thought you’d never have again.
“I want to tell you things,” you said, stepping in close until your hands were braced on his strong chest and he was all that existed in your world. “I don’t know if I’ll ever be good at this part, but I’m trying. I want…”
“Tell me,” Jack implored, holding you gently by the chin so you wouldn’t shy away from his eyes piercing into your own. “Tell me what it is you want.”
“You,” you breathed. “Not just for one date, or two. I want you for all of it. For anything, for everything. I want you.” “There it is,” Jack whispered, dragging his thumb over your bottom lip. “I’ve been yours for months, sweetheart, just been waiting for you to catch up.” You leaned up and when your lips finally met his, it was complete and total surrender. The kiss wasn’t soft or tender or any of those gentle things, it was months of build up cresting on a wave of fiery hunger and the velvet slide of his tongue against yours. His arm banded around your waist, drawing you in so you were flush against him, pressed deliciously against the full length of every toned inch of muscle. Your arms wound around his neck, fingers finally sinking into the hair at the nape of his neck the way you’d imagined a thousand times since the first time you saw him. They tightened of their own accord when his tongue twisted exquisitely around your own. You felt the low rumble he gave vibrate in his chest and your answering sound of approval was delicate and desperate and entirely involuntary. Jack pulled himself away from you as though it was physically painful to do so.
“You can’t make noises like that, baby,” he told you. You were so beautifully dizzy that you almost didn’t hear him, but his next words hit like a bolt of lightning. “Not here when I can’t do anything about it.”
“You better take me somewhere else then, because if you kiss me like that again, I’m not sure I’ll care where we are.”
Jack’s eyes grew dark, and his smirk sharpened until it was a silent, wicked promise written across his face.
The two of you were in a cab in less than five minutes, not having said goodbye to anyone at all.
———————————————————————————————————
Jack knew you knew the second he saw you sitting at one of the computers at the Hub, fingers angrily smashing the keyboard and very obviously ignoring him.
In the two months since the fundraiser, the pair of you had barely spent a moment apart outside this hospital. You spent so many nights at his apartment that you practically lived there. You kept clothes in his drawers, you had a side of his bed that was yours, your toothbrush lived next to his. You hogged the covers, took up half his bathroom with various cosmetics and somehow his apartment now always smelled like your perfume, but you also made him breakfast — the only meal you could cook reliably — and suffered through history documentaries with him and massaged his leg after long shifts without him asking you to. He loved every single second of it. But you’d both agreed that for now, you wanted to have this wonderful thing that was just yours and so you hadn’t told anyone inside the hospital about your relationship. He found he actually quite liked it, as much as he’d be happy to have everyone know you were his and he was yours, the secrecy made it fun to flirt with you and tease you whenever you worked together.
Samira knew, of course, because she knew you weren’t spending your nights at your shared apartment any more. Which was why he’d gone to her when he realised he wouldn’t be able to reach where the bullet had grazed the back of his shoulder, because she was the only person who might understand why he didn’t want you to know. They both knew how bad the memories it would bring up were, and there was no use in stirring that kind of panic over little more than a bruise.
He hadn’t counted on the fact that this was the Pitt and someone clearly saw them and told you about it.
“You know, and you’re upset,” he said.
“How could I possibly know you were injured on a fucking SWAT raid? Because you certainly never said a word about it to me. And why would I possibly be upset about that?” You sniped, now in danger of actually breaking the keyboard from how hard you were typing on it.
“I’m sorry,” Jack said, pulling up a chair and spinning yours to face him. “I didn’t want to worry you, but I promise I’m fine. You’re not angry, you’re scared and we both know you’ll forgive me once that passes.”
“Oh, because you know so much about me?”
“Didn’t we do this exact thing, right here, all those months ago?” Jack asked, taking both your hands in his. “And I know so much more now. I know which side of the bed you sleep on. I know how unfairly beautiful you look first thing in the morning. I know what songs you sing in the shower when you’re happy, and the ones you listen to on repeat when you’re sad.” He smirked. “I know that little noise you make when you—”
“Okay!” You cut him off before he could finish that last one, looking around to make sure no one heard and missing Princess lingering in a doorway just behind you. You were still trying to live up to your promise to be better at the sharing part of being with someone, it was something that didn't come naturally to you, so you told him the truth. “Okay fine, it scares me when you go out with them but I need you to tell me if you’re hurt because not knowing scares me more.”
“I can do that,” Jack promised, just as Princess came back around the corner with a whiteboard in her hand and clapped it down on the countertop, pointing it at you so you could see the sticky notes littering it.
“When?” She demanded loudly, drawing in the others within earshot. When you and Jack both looked at her blankly, she elaborated. “When did you get together?”
Looking more closely at the whiteboard, you saw it was covered in bets on when they thought you and Jack would finally get together. They’d obviously been more careful about setting up this pool, clearly having stolen one of the smaller patient whiteboards from upstairs to collect the bets on so they could tuck it away in a corner somewhere neither of you would find it.
“Well shit,” Santos piped up defeatedly. “There goes my bet that they’d both be too chicken to follow through in the end.”
Jack shrugged at you when you glanced at him, as if to say tell them what you want, I don’t mind.
You leaned in, plucking a post-it from the board. “The kid takes it,” you said, handing Princess Javadi’s note that said Fundraiser - dancing, free booze and Abbot in a suit, she’ll cave. “I guess she really is a genius.” ——————————————————————————————————— Taglist: @li22ie2017 @starlitflora @kittykaylat1987 @leeemabean
