Title: Redux

Rating: What TV show were you watching?

Summary: "Hi. I'm Lee. And you are?" "Questioning your sanity."

Disclaimer: You really think I'd have the guts to put our beloved couple through so much heart-rending angst?

Author's Note: Personally, I think the Colonial Day episode (which is when this story takes place) was when it all went wrong for our beloved couple. I decided to set out to fix that.

Ever had one of those moments where you can feel your jaw drop and your eyes bulge and you know you're staring but you can't find it in you to move?

Ever had one of those moments where everything becomes crystal clear and you can't believe you were such an idiot for not seeing it before when everything is so simple?

Ever had a moment where both of those things happen at once?

Captain Lee Adama was having one of those moments.

Kara was wearing… well; he didn't have the words to describe that dress. How and where she'd gotten it he didn't know (Sharon, maybe?) but it was frakking hot. She looked gorgeous.

Not that she didn't look good every day, but now she had her hair done and some smoky eye shadow and her lips were shining from the sip of the drink she'd just taken and frak him…

He was so screwed if he didn't do something right the frak now. His pants felt tight.

The smile she was giving him, all cocky and knowing, definitely wasn't helping matters.

Fortunately he had that little epiphany to go with the jaw dropping, and he was going to run with it.

"Would you like to dance?"

She accepted, letting him lead her out onto the floor, letting him pull her into his arms. He resisted the sudden urge to crush her to him, hold her tightly so that everyone knew whom she belonged to. The music started off lively, with a saxophone, and they rocked to the beat, their bodies moving back and forth. Kara had her hand on his shoulder, her arm draped over his, while he clasped her other hand firmly in is left hand.

Kara. Not Starbuck, not tonight. No call signs or uniforms to hide behind. It was time to correct their course after veering off-target so many times.

And if he was thinking in pilot metaphors than he really had been on the job too long.

Only about a minute into their dance the music changed to a gentler tune, one that lent itself to soft swaying and cheeks brushing. Lee pulled back so that he could see her face.

"Hi." He said, hoping he didn't stumble – verbally or otherwise.

"Hi." Kara replied. She smiled, but her eyes were wary.

It was time to start over, to begin things as they should have.

"I'm Lee. And you are?"

Kara blinked. "Questioning your sanity. How much have you had?"

"Nothing at all." He assured her.

Kara considered this. "You just asked me what my name was." She said, slowly. "You sure you didn't knock back a few?"

Lee sighed. "We, uh… we got off on the wrong foot." He explained.

"That's an understatement." Kara snorted. "Do you mean the drunken almost-sex or the cold shoulder?"

"Both." Lee said quickly. "And the arguments and pretty much the entire Zak situation. And my dad, for good measure."

Kara gave him one of her disbelieving grins, the kind that he always wanted to kiss off her face. "And you're suggesting we start over?"

"If possible." Lee searched her eyes for any sign that she was against this. "I know that the past can't be erased or forgotten, but it can be forgiven. It can be accepted and set aside."

Kara nodded to herself, her eyes sliding down to the ground as she contemplated his words.

"Well," She said, and he could detect the cockiness lurking just beneath the calm surface of her tone, "If we were just meeting for the first time, I think I'd say something like…"

She slid both her hands up so that she was cupping the back of his neck, her body completely flush against his, her mouth not even an inch from his ear and her (sweet-smelling, tantalizing, mouth-watering) neck right in front of his lips.

"I have a new mattress back in my quarters; would you mind helping me test the durability of the springs?"

Leave it to Kara to cut right to the chase, and in pretty indelicate terms. Gods love her for it.

He chuckled, letting his hold on her tighten. "Are you sure about this?" He whispered. His lips lowered to her neck of their own accord, brushing against the sensitive skin. Kara gave a tiny little moan that sent heat raging through his entire body.

"I've been sure about it for months, Lee, now get your ass in gear and find me a solid surface so I can frak you against it."

He started planting openmouthed kisses on her neck, small sucking ones that drove both of them crazy but didn't quench their thirst or attract unwanted attention from the other partygoers.

"You're quite eager to get with the program." He commented, raising his head to brush their noses together.

"I've been waiting for this… or something like it, for a long time." Kara shrugged, a bittersweet smile gliding across her features like a ghost. "Made me pretty guilty, feeling like I was dishonoring Zak, but… couldn't fight it." She shrugged. "And we just kept making wrong turns so I was almost certain it would never happen."

Lee spied his father out of the corner of his eye, talking to President Roslin. The Old Man was watching them dance.

Well, might as well give him something to look at.

Feeling a kind of recklessness, a sense of abandon that hadn't gripped him in years, Lee turned his head and pressed his lips to the corner of her mouth. Kara's fingers dug into his skin, and his next kiss landed right in the middle of those full lips. He swiped his tongue across the seam, praying she'd let him in.

And oh gods, she did.

Her tongue was frakking strong, wet, slick heat spiraling through him from their joined mouths down to his groin, singing in his blood like a river. It took every ounce of self-control within him (thanks, military training) not to utterly devour her right there on the dance floor. He kept it slow, not giving in to the hard press of her mouth or the tight grip of her hands. He wound his arm around her waist, holding her in place so that he had his other arm free to cross diagonally across her back, tangling lightly in her hair.

When they broke apart, his body had almost forgotten what breathing was, and his lungs gulped and stuttered back to life.

"We're getting out of here." Kara announced, her voice ragged and her breath puffing hot against his lips.

Without a word, Lee turned, keeping his arm around her waist as he led her out of the dance floor and through the room. He didn't fail to notice the gleam in the Colonel's eyes or President Roslin's smile (a mixture of surprise and pleasure) as he led Kara away. As the CAG, he wasn't supposed to be having relations with a pilot, but he was pretty sure the Old Man would let it slide.

And anyway, that all could be dealt with in the morning.

Lee hadn't felt this sense of freedom since… well, since before he could remember. Maybe not since he was a teenager. But something about finally taking this step, the one he'd wanted to for so long and been unable to (for reasons that kind of seemed stupid now), was releasing him. Even breathing felt easier.

Technically, he didn't have a room for tonight and had fully intended to go back and sleep in his bunker, but at the moment his sense of morality seemed to have flown the coop completely, so when Kara produced a key card (swiped from Baltar, apparently, poor sap) he wasn't going to object.

"When did you learn to pickpocket?" Lee asked, keeping his hand on the small of her back as they walked. Her skin was magnetic, pulling him in, drawing him to her with a pull stronger than gravity. He couldn't have stopped touching her if he wanted to.

And he really, really didn't want to.

"Years ago." Kara replied.

"And I'll bet there's a story behind it." He teased, his smile slipping on easily.

She grinned back at him, all teeth and mischief. "Remind me to tell it to you later." She paused, her smile growing. "Much later."

He unashamedly crowded her against the door from behind as she tried to get it open, mouthing at the flushed skin of her neck and wrapping his arms around her so he could palm her breasts. Normally he wouldn't dare to be so bold out where someone could stumble across them, but tonight all bets were off. He'd denied this, and everything else between them, for so long. He was like a rubber band stretched tight, ready to snap.

Kara got the door open (thank the gods) and pushed it open, turning and yanking him in by his tie. The door somehow ended up closed, probably when she slammed him against it.

He should've known she liked it a little rough.

The second his back made contact with the door she was on him, her mouth sealing against his, her tongue hot and damn insistent, practically frakking into his mouth as it stroked in and out frantically. Her fingers – those lithe, dexterous pilot fingers – attacked his tie and buttons, flinging the clothing aside like it had insulted her flying skills. He let her (oh gods, did he ever let her) ravage him, soaked up her possessiveness, her hunger, letting her do this to him because the idea that she wanted him as badly, as desperately as he wanted her, was going things to him that might have been illegal.

It wasn't until he was bare-chested and her hands were roaming over his heated skin, nails dragging slightly, forcing him to hold back groans, that he remembered that she was still fully dressed. She was stunning beyond belief in the dress, true, but he was going to rip the thing if he didn't get it off right the frak now.

Lee spun her around, holding her against the door by pressing their bodies flush together. This was not conducive to his ultimate plan of getting her naked, but it helped keep her in place so that he could kiss her until her knees buckled.

Turned out, Kara's knees didn't buckle. Her entire body went slack, her arms around his neck the only thing keeping her upright as all the tension went out of her. He was practically holding her up as he kissed her, deep as he could get. He forced himself to slow down, to savor the moment – how she felt, how she tasted, how she let him deliberately consume her. She was completely pliant in his arms now, her tongue moving with lazy assurance against his.

When he broke away from her to breathe, he took the opportunity to nibble on the smooth column of her neck as his finally (finally!) got her dress undone, the silky fabric pooling to the floor, immediately forgotten. When he tore himself away from her skin to look at her, he jaw nearly hit the floor again.

She wasn't wearing any underwear.

Oh gods, he was so done for.

He must have been staring for a long time because Kara started pushing him back towards the bed, giving him a shove that had him bouncing on the (wow, super soft) mattress. She straddled him, his hands flying up to grab her hips. He'd wanted to get his hands on those for longer than he could remember.

Kara bent down, pressing against him. It was like being plugged into a live wire, is senses electrocuted with the feel of her soft skin. He filled them so that the light from the window could illuminate her face. She smiled up at him, so full of trust and joy and… and love, frak it, and he could hardly stand it. It was overwhelming.

"Lee?" Kara asked, her face falling slightly. "Is every–"

He swooped in and kissed her, hard, his hands wandering over every bit of skin they could reach. She moaned into his mouth, the vibrations passing through his body down to his groin. He didn't want her to think that he was having doubts, when that couldn't be farther from the truth. He'd been given a chance to start over and he was taking it, seizing it with both hands before it could slip away from him.

It occurred to him that he should probably be telling her some of this.

"Kara…" He whispered, nipping at her earlobe. She full on keened, her hips lifting to meet his. Oh gods, he had to get inside of her before this ended too quickly. "Wanted to do this forever…" He told her, his hand slipping down to probe between her thighs, make sure she was ready.

She was so slick he had a hard time finding his way, but he knew the minute he'd located her clit because she gave a sharp gasp and clawed at his shoulders, trying to get a hold on him to hang on. He worked her for a minute or two, his fingers coated in her juices as he slid them in and out, his thumb rubbing and pinching in a kind of halting rhythm.

Her face was a study in perfection, at least to his eyes. Her full lips were open as she panted; her eyes shut tight and drawing in the skin, making her full cheekbones stand out. Her chopped hair was splayed around her in a kind of haphazard halo, pale and shining in the fabricated moonlight pouring in the window. He picked up his pace, feeling her undulate beneath him as her hips moved of their own accord, frakking herself on his fingers.

When he added a third she was lost, pulsing around him as she cried out his name, gushing and making a bit of a puddle on the sheets. Her shriek was the best thing he had ever heard, and her face was nothing short of euphoric.

He couldn't wait to make her come again.

Barely resisting the urge to slip in and pound into her until they broke the bed, Lee bent his head and scraped his teeth gently along her collarbone, laving a path to her breasts, stimulating her while giving her the chance to recover. He knew she was ready again when she threaded her fingers through the hair on the back of his head and pushed him down further between her breasts, arching up to meet his hungry mouth. Gods she tasted amazing, responding to his every action.

"Lee…" She begged. "C'mon… oh frak…"

He couldn't have waited if he'd tried.

"Hold still." He whispered, placing his hands on her hips and nudging her legs further apart with his knees. He kissed her as he entered her, her arms twining around him. He'd never felt so alive.

"Beautiful." He whispered in awe against her lips. Everything about her was beautiful.

"Look… who's talking." She shot back, planting frantic kisses along his skin. "Being so… frakking sexy all the time, distracting me while I'm trying to work…"

He chuckled, feeling her walls clench around him, making his entire body shudder. He wasn't going to last long at this.

Thankfully (judging by the sounds she was making, anyway), Kara wasn't going to, either.

He could feel the heat rushing in, the unstoppable wave of electric energy, crackling through his blood and setting him alight. He wanted to hold off, to see her come, to witness that expression of bliss, but he couldn't. The wave was coming, and he couldn't hold it off. He could only be swept away.

He shouted her name to the gods and the stars, his body shaking as he emptied himself, the wave passing through him and into her. It was just like he'd always wanted it to be – better, because it was real and not another daydream or fantasy.

Gods, he loved her.

Kara gave a weak chuckle. "That's great. Does that mean you'll stop crushing me now?"

Lee made a face, panic rushing through him. "Did I say that out loud?"

Kara gave him a light push and he obligingly rolled off of her – but made sure to take her with him, cocooning her in his arms.

"Don't worry." She assured him, her lips brushing at his jaw. "I'm just glad I wasn't the first one who cracked. Now I can be smug when I say I love you too."

Lee laughed. "Insufferable smartass."

"Stuck-up dickface."

Lee had no idea what the next day or weeks or months would bring them, but he couldn't find it in himself to care. He'd gotten himself a second chance, wiped the slate clean and gotten the girl, all in one night. That sounded like a win to him.

Lee and Kara belong together. Anyone who has a problem with that is obviously a Cylon.

Reviews are as valued as a Battlestar and make me as giddy as Starbuck with four on a run! (Unless you have full colors, in which case, frak you. But not really.)