Author's Note: This is a prompt for the mass meme. Original prompt:

Garrus, in ME2, makes a point of reminding Shepard that he's never thought of her species or her personally in any romantic sense.
But he was lying. Basically, I'd love fic where his casual surprise and reminders that he doesn't have any particular interest in humans are covers for the fact that he's been carrying a flame for Femshep for a long time. Maybe he panics when she actually comes on to him and lies to cover it, maybe he's just pessimistic and tries to downplay things with the expectation of disaster, or maybe he's just trying to play it cool because he thinks crushes are ridiculous. Approach it however you like best. I'd love it if she eventually discovers the truth, but I'll love you even if you don't choose to write about that part.

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I clenched my teeth tightly to keep in the growl as she slipped that warm and dexterous hand into my armor, running her too many and too small digits along the seam of my protective plate. She bit into her lip, her eyes gleaming with victory as she found the right place and pressed just so to make the plate relax enough to slip her fingers in. "Come on, Gar, you know you want to." She whispered tauntingly. Her strange and alien chest pressed against mine. She ran that wonderfully little pink tongue along my unscarred mandible before flicking it against the point just where my jaw hinged.

Spirits, did I want to. I just didn't want to let her get the upper hand in this. I didn't want to be just another follower obeying the great Shepard. I was going to be her equal. I slipped my hand to her pants and trailed a talon down the seam until I came to her warm center. I rubbed against the warmth there slightly. She pressed against me, biting my neck as I did. I trailed my other hand up and captured her breast in it, kneading the mound just as the turian had on one of the vids I'd downloaded.

She moaned beautifully as I did. I slipped my hand back up and slid it into her pants, searching for access to her. She shifted, making room for me, welcoming me in. I'd just reached the outer lips when she spoke again.

"Come on, Gar! Give it to me!"

"Oh, I'll give it to you." I laughed throatily.

"Then hand it over." I blinked and glanced at Shepard who was holding her hand out to me. She watched me with a puzzled look. "Gar?"

"What? Uh, I…" I cleared my throat trying to remember what was going on. Spirits help me, I was fantasying with her present now. I had to get it together. Maybe it was time to take a break from all the human/turian porn that I'd discovered. Well, some Mordin had given me, but…

"Are you going to let me try your rifle or not?" She asked. I blinked again. Rifle?

I glanced around. We were in the sim room. We'd been trying out some of the new rifle specs that she'd acquired. I'd teased her that the best was my personal one and she'd never be able to handle it. I cringed at my bad attempt at flirting without seeming like I was flirting. This crush on her was getting ridiculous. I wasn't some flustered untried adolescent. I was a grown man for Spirits sakes.

I'd slipped into the fantasy while she'd been lovingly taking apart her new favorite rifle. The way she'd been handling the barrel as cliché as it was had fueled my lust of her handling me the same way. I quickly handed over my rifle. In my haste I shoved it into her stomach.

She made a uff noise and looked at me puzzled as she clasped the rifle to her. "You alright?"

"Yes. Sorry. I, uh, had some calibrations that I needed to get to. Maybe I should go." I said and took a step back. She arched her brow at me.

"You are going to leave? Without your rifle? Without seeing if I can actually use it? You aren't going to rub it in that you're better at sniping than me?" She asked setting the rifle down and turning to look at me. "Gar, I know you're still pissed at me about Sidonis, but I really think we need to talk about it. I've tried to give you space, but you are acting increasingly distant. You're my best friend. I did what I thought was best. I didn't want you to live with something you couldn't undo. Tell me I'm wrong, and I'll hunt him down. Emily Wong did a report on him. She'll know where to find him."

"You think I'm mad at you?" I asked shocked that was what she thought. I'd been sure that I'd finally given away my hopeless crush.

"Aren't you?" She asked. For a second my brave and fearless leader looked anything but brave and fearless. She looked fragile and vulnerable.

"I was never mad at you. I was mad at him, at me, at the whole situation, but never you."

"Why were you mad at you?" She asked leaning back against the table where all the rifles were laid out.

"I'm tired of you having to fish me out of situations, pull me back from crossing a line. It seems like I can't get anything right."

She bumped my arm with her shoulder as I leaned against the table with her. "We're friends, Garrus. I'll always be here to help you with whatever."

"Great, just what I want. You to have to keep rescuing me." I grumbled.

"Hey, I seem to recall you having to pull me back from the line a few times."

"Name one." I said sulking slightly.

"When we went to recruit Thane and I shoved that merc out the window. You reminded me that that wasn't me. That I tried to talk people out of fights, not shove them through windows when they annoyed me." She said not even pausing a moment to think. That had been really out of character for the 'save them all' Shepard from before her death. "And you reminded me how much paperwork would be involved if I killed Alenko on Horizon." She cut her eyes to me, smiling at me slightly as she bumped me again. "Only reason that smug bastard's still alive. Call me a traitor and I'll show you one." She muttered.

"Shepard." I warned as she began to glow.

"Sorry." She said sheepishly. She then grinned at me. "See, Gar? You keep me in line. I keep you in line."

"Then I'm even more grateful to Cerberus."

She sighed and laid her head against my shoulder. "How wrong would it be for me to agree with you?"

"I'll never tell." I promised.

She smiled at me. "You know what? I think we need a break. You are always complaining I never take you anywhere nice. We have nothing pressing until TIM gets us our next lead. Illium or Omega? Your choice. We'll give the crew some shore leave and have a drink. Relax before the shit hits the fan again."

This was almost like she was asking me out on a date. I'd been watching a lot of human movies as well as the porn trying to learn about human mating rituals. I worked on playing it cool and smirked at her. "Is Omega really a nice place?"

She laughed. "Nope, but what can I say? My choices are limited while I'm a Spectre in title only. Illium it is then. Liara said she had a great apartment we could use." My heart fluttered at that. Share an apartment with her? This was sounding more and more like a date. Get your head on straight, Garrus, I thought angrily. She is doing this out of friendship and to relieve the stress of the crew. Don't read too much into it.

I nodded to her. "Sounds good, Shepard. I'll remind you that it was your idea when I'm peeling you off the bathroom floor again."

She laughed and punched my shoulder. "I don't plan on getting that drunk again. I was…testing this new bodies limits."

"Right." I smirked at her. "And it had nothing to do with the turian bartender flirting with you?" This had angered me as I'd watched it. I wanted to rip the bastard apart. She was mine. No way in hell I was going to lose her to some guy who couldn't even keep up with her, let alone best her.

"Jealous?" She teased elbowing me in the waist.

"You wish." I wasn't about to admit the truth. It was stupid to be jealous as much as it was stupid to keep this crush on her. I motioned to my gun to distract her from this line of conversation before I said something I couldn't undo. "So you gonna play with my gun or not?"

She gave me a teasing look that shot heat straight through my body to loosen the plates that had finally resealed from my earlier fantasying. "I'll show you the proper way to handle this beauty." She said and leaned around me to grab my rifle.

I shifted back and wiggled a bit as she focused on the gun. I was glad that I wore my armor around the ship. It would keep her from realizing her effect on me. But it was going to keep me in pain as I watched her reverently stroking my rifle and then lean against the table with it, steadying herself for the shot.

I refused to give into the thoughts of what I wanted to do to her splayed so nicely. The way the recoil of the gun would shove her farther onto me. The way she'd be trapped between my hard body and the table. I'd trace my hands over the swell of her ass, scratching lightly and then holding her hips still so she couldn't move against me. I'd be the one in control of the powerful woman beneath me. She'd be moaning my name and begging for more. I'd…

"Ha! I can too work your rifle!" She said triumphantly effectively pulling me from my thoughts. I nodded at her, hoping to placate whatever she was saying. It was going to be a long day before I could slip to my bunk and relieve the ache she caused me.