"Mmmm," Lana murmurs, her tongue swirling around Kalinda's nipple. Kalinda sighs, arches up towards her, and doesn't feel a thing.

Years ago—it seems like another lifetime—Donna Seabrook's attack had confused her. (She's thinking of Donna a lot lately, actually. Donna, who couldn't do this again, because it hurt too much.) Kalinda was sorry to have hurt her, of course, but she had failed to understand why self-preservation shouldn't be her number one concern. What was there without it?

It had been too long since Nick, that was all, and she'd just forgotten.

"What do you want?" Lana whispers against Kalinda's ear. Her sweet, pert breasts rub up against Kalinda's, and Kalinda tries to call up years of remembered electricity, memories of the first, and some of the best, sex she ever had as Kalinda Sharma, to offer Lana in this moment.

"Good," Kalinda says, trying to smile, trying to encourage. "This is good. You're good."

"Kalinda." Lana rolls her eyes.

"No." Kalinda takes Lana's hand firmly, kisses it, guides it down her body. "Go on."

The first two weeks after Nick's return are still a blur in Kalinda's mind. She hadn't felt like this since Leela was fifteen, a heady, toxic hormonal jumble. You remember him, Kalinda would hiss to herself on her way to the office. You remember everything he did to you. You remember what he did to— (Even then, she wouldn't finish the thought.)You set a fucking fire to get away from him. But coming home, to a bed now messy and rank and full, she would remember that she set the fire to get away from herself, that he was gone already. She could have just gone, another city, another province, and let's face it, without help he couldn't have found her. His gifts were his networks, which it must have taken some serious work to rebuild after he got out.

She had set the fire to cleanse, so nothing would be left behind. So she wouldn't have to be the person who stood by and watched, who did nothing to stop him, nothing to change him. She was burning all of that away. How could she have known she was an idiot?

Lana stares at her, then brushes her fingers lower and lower across Kalinda's belly. She kisses Kalinda's navel, scratches lightly along her hips, in a way that once made Kalinda shiver in anticipation. She pretends to do that now. Lana works her way down, kiss by kiss, ducking underneath the sheets.

Distance had changed nothing with Nick, that much was clear. Distance had made her Kalinda, and Kalinda was the best person she had ever been, but six years of Kalinda could all come crashing down under his fingers. She fought it, of course, fought it with everything she had, but she didn't have enough, on her own, to get him out of her house.

And there had been Diane's voice in her head, from another time, another universe: "Make it better. I don't know what's going on, but make it better."

"I love how you taste," Lana murmurs as she licks her. "I've always loved how you taste."

"Mmm," Kalinda responds, bringing one of Lana's hands to her lips and nibbling gently along her fingers.

Kalinda aches. It isn't just the bruises on her wrists or the soreness and strain crackling through her torso, her muscles, her pelvis; it's the simple exhaustion, how much it takes to convince everyone around her that she's still Kalinda. (And there's Alicia's friendship cracking up through the cement again, a responsibility Kalinda isn't equal to, should never have asked for.) Not to mention convincing herself.

When Kalinda had called, Lana had sounded surprised but pleased, even grateful. Kalinda supposed they hadn't parted on the best of terms.

But Lana was who Kalinda needed. The ferocious electricity of her touch. The delicate angles of her body. Her loyalty to Kalinda Sharma. She was the first person who knew Kalinda—the complete Kalinda, not the odd hybrid Peter Florrick had met. She wanted Lana.

She wanted Lana to take her back into Kalinda, completely. She wanted to be engulfed by that heat, the same heat that had taken her so many times when she didn't want it, didn't need it. Lana could take her away from Nick, away from Leela.

And Lana's risen to the occasion. She makes herself beautiful for Kalinda, comes at Kalinda with the same sweet, clumsy, predatory look that always flustered Kalinda, always surprised her with its potency. She's let Kalinda into her new apartment (there was a little house at some point, Kalinda thinks, but she never saw it), not questioning Kalinda's refusal to allow Lana into her space. (It's for her own safety, of course, but Lana takes it as a quirk, as some example of Kalinda being protective, being typical Kalinda.) She's laid Kalinda down in her luxurious quilts, run tapered, slender fingers along all the curves of her body.

But it hasn't worked.

Kalinda shifts her legs, sighs a little. For a second she almost felt something. But it's gone now, and the gentle strokes of Lana's tongue seem so far away they might as well be happening to someone else.

/

"There never was any 'us.'"

Lana watches Kalinda's back retreat. Her hips say she doesn't give a crap whether or not Lana is watching.

"Kalinda, wait."

Kalinda doesn't, but Lana collects herself enough to rush after her, grab her shoulder near the door to the stairwell.

Kalinda whirls. "Don't touch me," she hisses.

"Will you tell me what's going on?" It's not a question Lana has ever asked Kalinda before, she realizes. She doesn't really ask Kalinda questions.

"Stop it, Lana." The words are painful and familiar. Lana blinks. "How long have you been investigating me?"

"How long have I been—"

For a second the only reaction is overwhelming shame. Old habits, such as the habit of trying to hide the intensity of her feelings from Kalinda, die hard. Now Kalinda sees her for the stalker she is, has always been, and she doesn't know what to do.

And then reason hits. "You trashed my apartment?"

"Ssssh." It takes Lana a moment to hear the echo of her own voice in the vaulted hallway, and still another to absorb the peculiar look on Kalinda's face. "I didn't, Lana."

Bullshit, Lana thinks. "Then what are you talking about?"

"You know what I'm talking about."

They stare at each other, Lana unable to process the multitude of tiny expressions that are flickering across Kalinda's face. She herself doesn't know what to do or feel; she should have understood, remembered, that if she used Kalinda, Kalinda would use her back. She wouldn't have imagined Kalinda would stoop so low, but then again, what would have stopped her?

"There was nothing on Bishop in my apartment."

"No, just pictures of me," Kalinda says icily. "Just surveillance."

"You know the cases I'm involved in. You always have."

"Am I a target, Lana? Is that why all this started?"

"You started this."

And then Lana's furious and confused and she grips Kalinda's wrists and steers her into the stairwell. "And we are going to finish it," she continues, pushing Kalinda up against the wall and kissing her.

The confusion of the last few weeks—for that matter, the last few years—sparks between their lips. Lana feels fiercer than she ever has: she wants to bruise, to bite. The depth of it scares her a little, but her tongue has traced the outline of Kalinda's throat before she even pauses for breath.

Kalinda stares at her, panting, and then twists in Lana's grip.

"No way," Lana growls.

"No, over here," Kalinda says, pulling her towards a dirtier, more shadowy corner, a little pocket behind the heavy steel door. "The cameras don't catch it."

Lana doesn't question how Kalinda knows this, but follows immediately. Kalinda whips around, somehow corkscrewing her hands out of Lana's grasp and pushing her where the two walls meet. She shoves a thigh between Lana's—it's only the boots that make her tall enough for this—and kisses all the spots she seems to have dredged out of memory: behind Lana's ear, where her neck meets her right shoulder, at the open V of her collared shirt. Lana barely has time to wonder where this sexual energy has been, as for the last several weeks Kalinda's been passive in bed, murmuring phoned-in platitudes; all she knows is Kalinda's not going to be in charge, not this time. She closes her thighs so hard around Kalinda's that Kalinda is thrown off-balance, and Lana uses the moment to throw her weight. Kalinda gasps as her back hits the wall; Lana would check to see if she's all right, but she's not feeling particularly tender, and Kalinda is already reaching to kiss her throat. Lana feels a surprising amount of her strength training coming into play as she leans into Kalinda, pinning her shoulders, and wriggles under Kalinda's skirt with her other hand.

Kalinda cries out, her body suddenly straining for more, her eyes reflecting furious confusion.

"Sssshhh," Lana says, surprised, pleased the tables have turned. She covers Kalinda's mouth with her left hand, pressing Kalinda's head back. Kalinda licks her palm. Lana ignores it. Her other hand pumps furiously, and in between she grinds the heel of her hand against Kalinda's clit.

It's a horribly awkward angle, but Lana's fingers are furiously wet, and when Kalinda comes, she actually screams. Lana's palm barely muffles it.

"Shut up," Lana murmurs, though she's pleased. Disappointed in the past month, in her idiotic pining for Kalinda, but she's pleased to see Kalinda melt against the wall, her eyes wider than wide.

"Lana …" Kalinda says quietly.

Lana flushes, even the sound of Kalinda's voice enough to make her hot at this point. "Yeah?"

"Thank you."

Lana laughs a little. "No problem." This is odd, from Kalinda, and new, but she notes a sincerity in her eyes that she hasn't seen before. It confuses Lana, but if anything, it makes Kalinda more attractive.

"It wasn't—I didn't. Your apartment. I didn't. Please believe me."

"I don't care," Lana says softly, and saying it makes it true. Lana remembers a few blissful moments months ago, when she thought she was free of Kalinda, but she understands now that's impossible: Kalinda will always appear, and always Lana will be confused. And always this will happen between them, a charge too powerful to ignore, too tremendous to dismiss.

"I do care," Kalinda says, her voice still soft, but taking on a certain familiar silkiness. She seems to have recovered some of her energy, and she's standing upright. She takes a couple of steps towards Lana, undoes two of her buttons and puts one strong hand around her breast, walking Lana backwards towards the wall as she does so. "Let me show you." She twists Lana's nipple vigorously, puts her lips against Lana's throat.

Lana sighs. Probably, she considers, there are worse fates.