tBS – Just a Kiss

Title: Just A Kiss (Goodnight)
Author: Saydria Wolfe
Fandom: NCIS, Criminal Minds
Characters: Emily Prentiss/Tony DiNozzo, background Penelope Garcia/Derek Morgan
Prompt: Kiss
Tags: Sentinels and Guides are known
Word Count: 862
Warning: No beta
Summary: When Penelope is right, she’s right, and Emily isn’t even mad.

 

 

Emily Prentiss isn’t much of a Guide.

That’s what they said anyway. Years ago, when she came online just a few weeks before the expected end of her mission to get Valkyrie, because her empathy is barely there. Something more like intuition than any sort of reliable ability. Unless she’s trying to use it on someone she knows well.

Though that could change when she bonds. If she bonds.

She’s not going to bond.

Sentinels are too rare and her levels are too low. None of them have ever wanted her.

Still, it’s interesting. A thoguht.

Emily and JJ approach their table at Penelope’s side. The three men that are already seated all stand when they draw near. Derek, of course, kisses his bride to-be on the cheek because the two of them are ridiculously cute and then turns to introduce his groomsmen. Emily doesn’t even catch the first one’s name because of the second.

He’s tall, just a touch taller than she is even in her heels. Golden brown hair, playful green eyes, and Emily can feel his stomach flip when their eyes meet.

“Tony DiNozzo,” he says, reaching out to shake her hand.

“Emily Prentiss,” and it’s the clearest read she’s ever gotten from a stranger.

His smile is bold and charming but not crossing over the line into sleazy. It’s endearing, really, to feel his nerves, his hope.

“Derek says you’re a guide? Does that help you profile?” She’s not quite sure how they end up sitting together but they do and it’s so nice talking with someone honestly interested in her. In her interests and her job, in her ambitions. Someone not just in her breasts and mouth.

“Hotch, Reid, and Rossi should be here in a few. They had to pick up something.” Garcia says, radiating ‘I told you so’ smugness in her fiancé’s general direction.

“Alright,” Derek concedes to his lady love on levels. He’s feeling pretty pleased with himself too but Emily can’t honestly find it in herself to care because Tony DiNozzo is basically perfect.

The only thing that could make him more perfect is if he were online rather than latent.

Then again, all things considered, if he were online already he wouldn’t be here, available to her.

Their missing three show up and they make it through dinner, idly chit chatting about the wedding. Emily’s honestly not sure how they are all going to be in town for the big church wedding Penelope wants but Hotch is completely certain that he can make it happen.

“I’m taking leave,” Tony tells her when the subject comes up. “Two weeks, with the wedding in the middle of the second so nothing can come up. It’s already been approved.”

“Oh, that’s so sweet!”

Emily is surprised to find herself a bit jealous when Penelope takes Tony’s focus from her. They are all here to discuss Penelope’s day, of course the bridal party is going to pay attention to her some of the time.

Tony’s little eyebrow quirk when he turns back to her tells her he didn’t miss her reaction. She flushes but she’s not really ashamed. Tony seems to read that in her too and just grins.

Hours later, with dawn just beginning to color the sky, they walk home. Tony walks her home. She’s wearing his jacket and a cheap pair of corner store flip flops, he’s carrying her heels, and they are still talking. They had only stopped talking to dance really and other than a few emotionally charged moments they kept a whispered conversation going as they danced anyway.

“Well,” Tony says, looking up at her building. “We made it.”

“Yeah,” she draws it out, making her disappointment clear.

Tony grins sympathetically in response and steps close, like they are about to start dancing again.

“I want to kiss you.” He says, looking down into her eyes. “But. Kissing you would change my whole life.”

Emily’s breath catches. She’s not getting anything bad from him per se. Nerves. Hope. A bone-deep certainty and commitment that resonates deep within her and comforts her, rather than sending her running like it usually would.

“Is that a bad thing?” She asks. She means it to come out teasing but she’s way too invested for that.

“Only if you don’t want it as much as I do.”

She moves a hand up to cradle the back of his head. “I do.”

She can feel his soul studder. After a heartbeat, a blink, he leans down and seals their mouths together.

She shudders and he clutches her tighter. His tongue gently begs for entrance to her mouth and she welcomes it. She wants in a way she never has never wanted anything before, in a way she can’t readily articulate. It’s so foreign but it’s magical and she wants to want him too.

She can feel his mind opening in a new way, again in a way she’s never felt, and she instinctively allows hers to reach out and meet him.

Emily pulls back with a gasp and Tony buries his face in her neck.

“Sentinel,” she whispers, overwhelmed and so, so grateful for it.

“Guide.”

 

 

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