thelionessroyal

“Mal, if you're being a gentleman, I may die of shock.”

That simple statement played back and forth in his mind, the soft expression on Inara’s face. It was too much, hit a little too close to home, and so he joked as he always did. Buried that soft smile and pleasure at his words with pursed brows and annoyance.

But he couldn’t stop thinking about it, about her. It felt like she was always there in the back of his mind, just waiting if he could ever settle the churning in his stomach, the flutter in his chest any time she drew near to him.

Mal couldn’t sleep that night, like he couldn’t often the past few months. He blearily heaved himself up the ladder, heading to the galley for a warm drink to calm his nerves and hopefully drift off into a semblance of sleep.

He entered the common area yawning and rubbing at his eyes, which was the only reason he could think of that he didn’t notice Inara standing there until he stumbled into her back and had to fling out his hands to catch her before she was knocked over.

Well, he had meant to catch her arms, but instead found himself with his arms wrapped tightly around her, one hand grasping her shoulder, the other at her hip. Inara smelled like vanilla and spices he couldn’t even begin to name, with his face buried in her flowing dark hair. His hands tightened ever so slightly on her before he realized what he was doing and released the object of his tormented thoughts.

“Graceful as ever, I see, Captain,” she teased as she turned to face him, but he noticed that it didn’t have the usual steady calm and bite behind it Inara normally maintained. She looked…tired, he realized. To be fair, it was essentially the middle of the night, what could be called night out in the black, anyway. The lacy black shawl Inara had draped over her ruby silk nightdress clung to her body, making him trace the details of the pattern with his eyes.

It must have been the lack of sleep, the way the dim lighting of the galley played over the soft skin of her cheeks, her lips, the gentle crinkle of her eyes… Mal didn’t think, he just leaned in, grasping her shoulders with both hands, and pressed his lips to hers, which parted in a small gasp.

Inara was warm and light, the air that he breathed. Mal didn’t know that he was a poet, but in this moment, he could write sonnets.

Then the moment caught up with him with a jolt and he realized what he was doing, and with whom. He pulled away in alarm, eyes wide and seeming almost to mirror the shocked expression on Inara’s own face.

“I need to— that was— Right, okay,” Mal stuttered before quickly backing away and tripping over his own feet to go back to bed and hope that this was all a dream.

Inara was left standing in the middle of the galley, her fingertips pressed to her lips as she stared after the retreating form of Malcolm Reynolds, bemused and not quite sure of what just happened.