Same disclaimer as before. Finally updated.

Now M for lady-sexin'.

For a time, it's just their lips against each other, Kaylee shifting to make it more comfortable, Inara's arms wrapping around her. They're testing each other's reactions: Kaylee making sure that it's not just a mistake, not just Inara being nice, Inara making sure that she's not scaring Kaylee away somehow, not reading too much into it. She doesn't often make a move when someone hasn't explicitly told her to; she's forgotten, a bit, what the nerves truly feel like.

After a while, Inara reaches to lift Kaylee up so they're both sitting on the edge of the bed, still kissing, still both smiling into it. There's no point, Inara figures, in not being honest; Kaylee can't help but be. Inara's hands tease around the zipper of Kaylee's coveralls, and when Kaylee notices it, she flushes and nods. The zipper comes down, Kaylee searches in Inara's eyes for a cue to pull off her own shirt. Once she sees that, she's fast about it, not bothering to try and play coy.

She reaches her hands around to Inara's own zipper, but she blushes. "I shouldn't," she murmurs, pulling away.

"Shouldn't?" Inara repeats.

"I'd – I'd make a mess of it," Kaylee says.

"Kaylee," Inara says, quiet but forceful. "I don't care."

So Kaylee tugs on the zipper, careful, and she can't help but marvel at the beauty of Inara's body. She doesn't even have the same underthings like most women; it's somewhere between a bra and a corset, the fabric almost more grand than that of the dress, the golden threads picking up light against her skin. Kaylee hadn't figured on this: as much as she wants this, and she does, there's so much comparison going on in her head. She's asking herself how she can possibly hold up to someone this splendid.

That's part of what attracts Inara, though. That Kaylee is so unpretentious, that there's no ceremony to it. She's impressed, really and truly, by the fact that Kaylee manages to be so lovely with nothing but scarred-up, grease-stained skin and scraps of cotton. Not because she'd thought anything less, but because she finds it so wonderful.

She can see that Kaylee's still nervous, and she moves to pull her dress over her head herself before she gently nudges Kaylee back. As soon as she's at the right angle, Inara tugs the boots, the coveralls, off of her body; Kaylee's biting her lip, wondering how in all the worlds she got to this place.

"It's all right, băobèi," Inara whispers. "It's real." It comes as much from seeing Kaylee's sense of wonder – this is actually happening – as from a need to assure her that this isn't just her doing her job – it's genuine, too. This is her doing exactly what she'd like to right now.

Kaylee glances down a moment, then back up. Her look is so trusting, so sincere, that it almost makes Inara anxious too. It's different, she has to remind herself, with someone completely there of – of what she can assume is mutual attraction. Not just someone who's seeking a service from her.

Inara positions herself atop the younger woman, her hair brushing Kaylee's skin as she'd imagined it would. She reaches around to tug Kaylee's panties off, undo her bra, then reaches for her own garment; flushing, Kaylee whispers, "But it's so pretty."

It's such a Kaylee thing to say, and it makes Inara smile. After a second, though, the smile turns slower, more sultry, and she says, just as quiet, "Would you like me to keep it on for you, then?"

She's redder still when she replies, "Only if you wanna. It's just that you're so beautiful, in or out of anything."

Inara smiles, somewhere between flirtatious and reassuring. "You know that you're beautiful, too."

"Cute, maybe," Kaylee immediately corrects. "Not beautiful, not really."

Now Inara frowns, kissing Kaylee with more intensity. "No, tiánxīn," she murmurs. "Beautiful. Your eyes, your smile. Your everything."

Kaylee's flushed red, now. She knows the difference between false flattery and real, and this's real, she sees now. Inara uses this distraction to her advantage and angles to plant kisses on Kaylee's throat.

Of course, this gets Kaylee redder, her lips hesitantly fixing into a smile. She doesn't know how many she's been with before, how many lips have touched her skin like this, but it's different now. Because Inara's… because she's Inara.

She moves to sit up, to participate somehow, but Inara gives another of those smiles, patient and a bit bossy all at once, her eyes twinkling.

"There's time for everything," she declares.

"Takin' turns," Kaylee says in echo. "Lettin' you steer."

"Yes," Inara agrees softly. "For now, just – just let me steer. I'd like to."

The colloquialism is odd on Inara's tongue, but it makes them both relax some. She calms Kaylee a bit more, hands on her forearms, as she descends further. Kaylee's biting her lip, feeling a warmth beginning to spread through her.

"You've not – done anything like this before, have you," Inara half-asks, half-confirms.

"Sorta?" Kaylee hesitates. "I mean, I've kissed a few girls, been interested enough, but it never… y'know."

"All the more reason, then," Inara smiles, and she raises herself up again to kiss Kaylee's mouth, drop kisses along her throat and between her breasts and over her stomach. She leaves a lipstick trail on Kaylee's body, a faint one, but still proof, proof that calls a blush up along her whole body as it's left.

Reaching her target, Inara presses her lips against Kaylee's thigh, almost hesitantly at first. She's doesn't know how many she's had before, how many bodies she's touched like this, but it's different now. Because Kaylee's… because she's Kaylee.

One hand still around Kaylee's, Inara lets her mouth trace over the other woman's slit, gentle, and she moves her other hand to follow. She's barely touching her, but Kaylee's body shakes, her eyes wide.

"Wŏ qīn'ài de Kaylee," she whispers. "You're trembling."

"Good trembling," she assures, and she reaches her free hand to tuck Inara's hair behind her ear tenderly.

The gesture makes Inara smile, and she refocuses her attentions, soon shifting from that softest touch to something a bit needier. She's desperate for Kaylee's fingers against her skin, for the mewling moans she's letting out already.

When Kaylee hasn't got her hand resting on Inara's body, she's gripping the bedsheets, curling into a fist and releasing again. "Gorramit, 'Nara," she breathes, over and over. Of course she's good at this, of course she's got ways Kaylee's not felt before in dreams nor reality either.

Inara untangles her fingers from Kaylee's and reaches to hold both of her hips instead, not stilling but steadying them as they buck against her mouth. Kaylee's so sincere, so blissful, that it's hard not to enjoy herself, too. She tastes as sweet as, maybe sweeter than, would be expected; she's practically glowing with her body laid bare and open like this.

Her fingertips press against Kaylee's skin; Kaylee's feeling a need building in her belly, intense, almost painful, as she surrenders to the delirium. Inara's tongue traces over her sensitive spots, slow and fast and slow and fast, and she can tell by the louder and louder whining that Kaylee's close.

She's stopped holding herself back, she can't anymore, she's shaking and shrieking and digging her bitten-down fingernails into Inara's shoulders. Inara looks up, smiling at the sight of her there writhing and ecstatic, and as she meets her eyes, Kaylee climaxes.

Inara waits it out, massaging the other woman's legs and hips gently as she orgasms and pressing a kiss, light and sweet, to her clit. The unexpected touch gets another high, short cry out of her.

Then, spent, she's falling back against the pillows, and Inara's curling beside her. She throws an arm over her middle, presses the cool silk of her underthings against Kaylee's warm, flushed skin.

"Does that answer your question, băobèi?" she asks.

"Oh, yeah," Kaylee pants, smiling lazily.

"Good," Inara declares. "I never mind helping someone so kind and lovely."

Kaylee wrinkles her nose, then. "You keep sayin' these sweet things, and with you, I dunno what I oughta say back," she admits. "You must've heard it all."

"Kaylee," Inara says. "Whatever anyone else says is irrelevant in this moment, and besides, what you might say would mean that much more to me, being from you."

"I just – I think I should try not to think, is what," Kaylee giggles. "You make me kinda nervous, y'know, but it's – I'm not sure, a nice kinda nervous."

"Would you be surprised," Inara begins, "If I said that you make me nervous, too?"

A loud laugh. "Why'd I do a thing like that?"

"You're a rarity, tiánxīn," Inara declares. "You inspire such joy just by being. It's an enviable quality, and it just adds to the beauty you radiate."

Kaylee's turning to bury her face against Inara's shoulder now. "There you go again, sayin' such pretty words," she exclaims, trying not to laugh. "Maybe this's why I worry."

"What I'm telling you, sweetheart, is that you don't have to," Inara says softly. "That in this moment, I want this, and I want you, and nothing else quite matters."

Kaylee searches her face for the truth of it, and she doesn't have to search long. It's written plain as can be. "'Nara…"

"Yes?"

And all she does is shift, wrap arms around Inara and pull her closer. She presses a kiss to the join of Inara's shoulder and throat as she sets about unfastening the garments.

"What are you doing, Kaylee?" Inara asks (not without a certain hope in her voice).

"I'm in this moment," Kaylee replies, almost huskily. "And nothing else but this matters a whit."

tiánxīn; "sweetheart"
băobèi; "darling"