He'd been peacefully reading the newspaper in bed for an hour, enjoying the quiet of a Sunday morning, when Sara entered the bedroom and slammed the door behind her. She looked flushed and downright pissed off. So much, in fact, that he knew what her aggravation was about before she even opened her mouth.

"We need to talk about your brother."

"Sara, I already told you, it's a temporary thing…"

"It's been three months, Michael!"

"I know, but…"

"Three months," she continued, ignoring his protests, "of having an overgrown teenager living on my couch, making my life a really messy kind of hell!"

"Sara…"

"His son is more responsible than he is! And he has his own place. Why isn't he sleeping on his couch?"

"LJ and Diane just moved in together. He doesn't want his father around to scrutinize their new domesticity, surely you can understand…"

"What about our domesticity? Look, I know how close you two are, and I like Lincoln, really, I do. But he never cleans up after himself; he keeps coming home in the middle of the night making a hell of a racket; we have to tiptoe around the living room since he won't bother to get up before noon… This isn't a frat house! This is my apartment and I liked it better without the weeks old pizza boxes hidden under the couch or the empty beer bottles abandoned in the sink!"

"Please don't shout, he's going to hear you."

"Oh, Heaven forbid we disturb Lincoln's breakfast, it's only one in the afternoon!"

"I know it's been hard on you, Sara. I'll talk to him, okay? I'll ask him to make an effort. It's difficult for him, readjusting to normal life. Give him time. For me. Please? "

He gave her his best conciliatory stare for a full minute before she finally gave in and sat next to him on the bed, shaking her head. He moved to accommodate her and, when he was confident she wouldn't push him away, started massaging her tensed shoulder, soothing her raw nerves.

Sara leaned against him, enjoying his ministrations. With Lincoln around, they had come to cherish every minute of intimacy they managed to steal. Sara hadn't been exaggerating the situation in the slightest. He was well aware that his brother had been acting like a spoiled brat, taking advantage of his patience and Sara's good manners.

When Michael started kissing his way down her neck and his hands ventured lower, to the waistband of her pants, she brushed him off.

"Uh, uh. Your brother is right next door."

She was pushing him away again. With Lincoln's habit to interrupt at the very worst moment, it had been a while since they'd had an occasion to be together, and it was starting to get on his nerves. And Sara was a lot less accommodating than he was.

Defeated, he announced, "Fine, I'll talk to him right now."

When he closed the door behind him, she mumbled to herself, "Yeah, I knew that would get my point across."

---------------------

She liked Lincoln, really, she did. But ever since the incident, it was just that she couldn't look at him without blushing and he'd been enjoying her discomfort a little too much for her liking. The unfortunate event had taken place the previous day, a date she would probably curse for the rest of her life. Michael was reading in bed as usual, and she had assumed Lincoln was still sleeping, like he usually did in the late morning. Sara was getting ready to enjoy a sweet, long, warm bath with bubbles and lavender-scented salts, planning to lay in the tub until she turned into a particularly wrinkled prune. It was her weekend ritual, a way to prove to herself, week after week, that Paul Kellerman hadn't spoiled the simple pleasures of life for her.

But when she stepped in the bathroom that morning, she was immediately confronted with the vision of her wet and naked soon-to-be brother in law, who apparently didn't bother shutting the curtain, nor minded inundating the bathroom's floor.

Petrified and blushing like a schoolgirl, she could only stand there, staring at the very masculine, not entirely unattractive body of Lincoln Burrows enjoying his morning shower and conscientiously rubbing her bar of soap over his chest.

He was a really attractive man, especially in the nude. She never had giver much thought about how Lincoln looked like naked, his buttoned down shirt were revealing enough, as she never missed an occasion to tell him. She had never thought she would one day be facing that much of Lincoln, but now she was, she couldn't look away. He was breathtaking. The very image of masculinity, strength and virility. A man-shaped well of testosterone.

She was watching, transfixed, a single drop running from his muscular shoulder all the way down to his buttock, when he slowly turned to face her completely, a large grin on his face.

"Enjoying the view?"

She huffed and cursed, before rushing out of the room, thoroughly embarrassed. She grabbed her bag, told Michael she needed to grab some fresh hair, and went to wander the streets, trying to make some sense out of the turmoil that was raging in her head.

---------------------

A couple of days later and despite her best effort, she found herself alone in the flat with Lincoln. She was off duty from the hospital for the day, Michael was out to meet his parole officer and Linc was uncharacteristically up and, to her relief, fully dressed.

"Sara, we need to talk about the bathroom," he announced, cornering her in the living room.

"No we don't," she replied sharply, praying that he would let her off the hook that easily.

"Oh yeah, we do. You spied on me in the shower and now you're all weird."

"I'm not weird!" she shouted, indignant.

"What, then?"

"I'm… mortified! And I didn't spy on you, for God's sake. The bathroom door has a lock, learn to use it! Also, one word for you: curtains!"

"And another for you: knock. Why are you yelling at me? I'm the one who should be pissed!"

"I don't have time for this," she spat, wanting nothing but to get away from him. She tried to leave the room but he was blocking the door and when she tried to push him out of her way, he grabbed her arm.

"You're not leaving until we've settled this."

"There's nothing to settle. Let go of me."

She tried to wrestle his arm off her but he was way too strong and instead of letting her go, he only pulled her closer and closer still. Seconds later, before she knew how it happened, she was pressed flush against him and time stopped.

Her first thought was that he felt way too good. She was overpowered by his warmth, his strong, solid form against her. She sensed something shift in her, a burning heat that started down her throat and kept growing, moving down, settling in her stomach and radiating lower. She was turned on. She was pressed against Michael's brother, his toned chest moving rapidly against her breasts with each breath, and she was undeniably aroused. It was completely, infinitely wrong. Yet, she couldn't muster the strength to move away,

And what was worse, she could feel that his body was starting to react, too.

"Lincoln…"

Before she could say another word, he was kissing her. Hard. His tongue was frantically searching hers, playing, rolling, tantalizing her until the heat became so much her knees were melting.

She grabbed his strong shoulder to regain her balance, feeling the subtle play of muscles under her fingers, dying to touch his warm flesh and let him absorb her completely as his arms closed around her. A second later, his hand moved under her shirt and found her breast while the other one went to unhook her bra, never breaking the kiss, and she wasn't sure anymore how she had lived that long without knowing a man could feel oh so good, dangerous, forbidden and powerful at the same time.

He was pulling her top up to taste her skin when they heard a key turn in the lock and she jumped away instantly, panicked and breathless. She made a run for the kitchen to rearrange her bra and regain some composure before she could face Michael. She wasn't sure she would ever be able to.

---------------------

That evening, Lincoln went out without saying when he'd be back, and Michael and Sara finally had some time to reconnect. Unfortunately, that night of all nights, Sara would have given anything to not be left alone with her fiancé. She felt ashamed, guilty and awkward, stupefied still of what she had done.

When Michael kissed her sweetly and whispered in her ear that they were finally alone, that he had been dying for days to lock himself with her in a bedroom, she looked at him sadly and said she had a terrible headache and needed to call it a night. She felt his disappointment run through her like a train hitting her at full speed, but she couldn't make love with him after what happened just hours earlier, not when she could still feel Lincoln's rough hands on her stomach, drawing a pattern of sin and lust on her skin.

She went to bed and turned out the light, ignoring Michael's incredulous face, and turned to her side. That night, they fell asleep back to back for the first time since she had finally come to terms with the way he had manipulated her while in Fox River.

In the early morning, when she awoke to the sounds of Lincoln drunkenly making his way to the couch, hitting every piece of furniture on his way, she caught herself wishing she could go and lie next to him, to see if he could wake up that unfamiliar ache in her again.

She had never felt that bad in her life, and that was saying something.