Candy Cane Martinis by Abigail

One

Sess/Kag. PWP.

Summary: A broken wristwatch, peppermints, and a hug that goes too far.

Candy Cane Martinis

Kagome frowned slightly and tapped the face of her watch with a slightly gnawed on fingernail. Her grandfather had given her the watch when he’d mailed in about a thousand box tops to his favorite fiber laced cereal, and while it was less than stellar workmanship it had gotten her where she needed to go this last month.

It seems it only had a month lifespan.

She picked up her pace, she could only guess when the stupid thing had died, and if she were late to this test there would be no repeats. She had only been in her time period for six months now, she had bent over backwards to pick up the pieces of her life in this world, meeting with private tutors, taking summer classes, mailing in applications to schools hundreds of miles away that didn’t know about her past.

She’d be damned if a box top watch screwed it all up for her now.

***

What seemed like twelve hours later – but was really only three – Kagome flopped onto the nearest park bench to re-evaluate her life choices for a moment. She had fallen so far behind in school that graduating on time was nearly impossible. Nearly, but not quite. She managed to squeak by with bare minimum grades, and had been able to graduate with her class two months ago.

Now a wonderful twenty years old, and having back a semi-normal lifestyle she never would’ve guessed how hard it would be to re-adjust to life in the present. For one, she never would’ve guessed how many demons were shuffled in among humans. They were diluted versions of their previous selves, but they were there none the less. It made her miko powers hum beneath her skin, and she was catching herself rubbing at skin that felt too tight, too often.

She was sure she would burst free of her skin sometimes, and it scared her.

When she first came back from the Other Side, she had spent a month looking for Inuyasha. Then another for Shippo. Lastly, Sesshomaru. She hadn’t been able to track them down in any records, story books, or in the surrounding area. It felt like her heart was broken all over again to realize she was all alone.

The choice to come back to this era was hers alone, they had all begged her to stay, to start a life with them there. But what Kagome had realized the last few months in that time period, there was no room for her there. Everyone had moved on without her realizing it, and she had spent too long looking back at Inuyasha rather than forward where everyone else was headed. There had been plenty of tears, and well wishes and promises from her demons to meet her again.

She wondered if they had been killed, or if they had just moved continents. She really hoped for the latter.

Sighing, she rubbed her knees absently and pulled her jacket tighter around her throat. Snow had started to drift from the sky, and she smiled absently at the flakes she caught in her palm. It seemed that she didn’t fit in anywhere, she wasn’t sure she would pass the test, and even if she did, did she really want to move ten hours away to go to a school for a career she would hate anyway?

“Still living inside that head of yours, miko.”

With a start she caught herself transfixed by an all too familiar golden gaze, in a face that she didn’t have to look as hard as she thought she would into to recognize. The tattoos were gone; his traditional garb was replaced by a crisp, pressed, business suit with his trademark silver locks still hanging down his back. For all attempts and purposes, he really didn’t look different as she would’ve guessed to hide in the human world.

He stood before her as though five hundred years hadn’t passed since she’d last seen him, like he hadn’t tried to eat her when they first met, and like he wasn’t surrounded by beings he used to so desperately despise.

She was going to kill him.

“Sess –!”

“Meet me for dinner tonight. We have much to discuss. Takenori Hyaku-Monogatari, five o’clock.”

As quietly as he came, he melted back into the crowd of people leaving like he hadn’t just taken her world and shaken it like a snow globe. Her head was starting to hurt, much like all the other times she had to deal with Sesshomaru, and she pinched the bridge of her nose.

What time was it anyway? She tilted her wrist, and bit back a scream of frustration. Of course, dammit all.

***

She wasn’t one for fancy restaurants or fine dining, mainly because she was so broke it wasn’t funny and she hated the feeling of sticking out like a sore thumb. She could wear the nicest clothes on the market to date, and still be picked out from a line of people who just didn’t belong.

Sesshomaru had given her a window of an hour and a half, which by the time she got home was more like forty-five minutes and after explaining to her mother she was going to dinner translated to more like half an hour.

She was going to kill him.

He had made reservations for them, and had already been seated by the time she arrived. She felt her face flush and swore this was what the walk of shame must feel like when the heads began to turn to see who was sitting with the silver haired deity.

He must have made a name for himself already.

She smiled gratefully at the waiter who pulled out the chair for her, and nervously patted down the front of her dress. It wasn’t like she had left the Sengoku period on the best of terms with Sesshomaru, at least not good enough to be having dinner with him at this current moment.

It took a moment for her to compose herself; she stared hard at the center piece while she could Sesshomaru stared just as hard at the top of her head. Good, he can wait. She knew good and well Sesshomaru had been hiding this entire time, plotting and planning the right moment to show himself to her, while she ran around fretting and worrying.

Well. Not exactly fretting and worrying about him per say. But still.

“You must have a lot of questions.”

“I – what?”

She was loud. Or getting loud, she knew she was and she still couldn’t stop herself even though people were shooting disapproving looks over their shoulder at her. She felt a surge of purifying energy, and balled her fists back in her lap.

“I want you to understand that I wasn’t hiding from you. I had no right to interfere in the life you were making for yourself. If I had come to you after you came out of that well, you would’ve never moved forward with your life with ties binding you to the past.”

In between his speech he had ordered for both of them, and it wasn’t lost on Kagome that he had ordered her some form of alcohol to go along with his. He was calm, or at least he was as calm as he always appeared to be. His voice never raised, his eyes never flashed or dropped from her gaze even when she felt her own shoot daggers back at him.

“You couldn’t even send me a letter, Sesshomaru? To at least let me know that you were somewhere? I couldn’t even find any trace you or Inuyasha existed! It’s like you were wiped from history, and you had to of known what that would do to me!”

The corner of his lip curled in distaste, “Yes, you always did have a flair for the…dramatics.”

If she hadn’t been in a restaurant full of unassuming humans, she would’ve purified him on the spot and gone on pretending that she had never had this little exchange. She was almost positive that was why Sesshomaru chose such a packed restaurant.

Bastard.

It seemed like in no time at all the food was rushed out to their table, the air was heavy with Kagome’s anger and Sesshomaru’s nonchalance and the waiter almost tripped over his feet to get away from the two of them.

If it was one thing that had to be understood about one Kagome Higurashi she was not a drinker. She never had the time to drink and party like her classmates, and she could not hold her alcohol. But sitting across from the former Lord of the West and her former flame’s brother she decided to throw caution to the wind, and get herself as sloshed as possible so not to kill him.

The first sip had her nose crinkle, and she saw what could’ve been amusement in Sesshomaru’s golden gaze. She had to resist the urge to stick her tongue out, because the drink just did not taste as pretty as it looked. Crushed peppermints rimmed the martini glass, with a nice little rounded peppermint floating around in the bottom.

“It’s a candy cane martini, I take it you are enjoying it?”

 The second sip was to make sure she didn’t come across the table, and it went down so much easier than the first. In fact, her head even tingled a little.

Was that a smirk? Was he smirking at her?

***

Before Kagome realized it, five martini glasses sat in front of her and her vision swam like she was in the ocean. She closed her eyes tightly before she realized how much she had just screwed up, and pinched the bridge of her nose to stop her head from matching her eyes.

“Shall we go?”

Sesshomaru stood before her in two steps, hand outstretched to steady her the way all people do when they know their partner has had just a little too much. She didn’t think she could harbor anymore bitterness towards him as she did in the moment she had to use his clawed hand to steady herself.

Her drunken-self took a moment to marvel at the roughness of his hand, because really when she looked at it, it looked delicate and soft. She could almost forget for a moment that centuries of sword work went into those callouses.

The little piece of her that remained sober could’ve kicked her in the side of the head.

“I – I can’t…go…home like thish.”

She blinked quickly to try and correct her vision, as Sesshomaru tucked her arm under his, “I’m well aware. While I’m sure I could handle your mother’s disapproving glances, it wouldn’t be quite right to drop you off on her doorstep after I got you drunk. You’ll come with me for the night, I have a room that you can use, and we can continue our talk in the morning when you are a little less…sloshed.”

***

Sesshomaru had a limo; and a driver; and a really, really large house.

She noted this dully as he held her tighter so that she didn’t slip up the icy steps, or wander off to look at the fountain she just couldn’t stop staring at. The snow had picked up, and large fat snowflakes fell in a torrent from the sky.

Abruptly she stopped, so unexpectedly that Sesshomaru accidentally yanked her forward with his momentum leaving him to yank her upwards so that she didn’t break her nose.

“What are you doing?!”

His snarl was so much like that of his former self she couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled past her lips. Sighing lightly Sesshomaru waved the limo attendant on, and stood quietly beside her.

It wasn’t long before her laughter gave way to tears, and she found herself on the balls of her feet in the snow. She didn’t need Sesshomaru to tell her that she wouldn’t be meeting Shippo and Inuyasha, and in the rationale of her drunken-self she found that crying in the middle of Sesshomaru’s court yard would suit this situation just perfectly.

He was uncomfortable, probably for the first time in his life, and that suited her just fine too. This was his fault anyway, if she were sober she would’ve waited until she got home to hide herself under the covers and cry like a normal person.

But since when was he allowed normal anyway?

Wiping angrily at her tears, and streaking make up, she stood up far too quickly and stumbled backwards. Catching her was not a problem, but he also caught the fist she threw into his stomach, and from the less than impressed look on his face she knew she hadn’t done any real damage.

But, damn, did it make her feel better.

“Done?”

Sniffling, she nodded slowly, and while her vision stopped swimming and her mind cleared a little her world had yet to catch up with her eyes. In fact, Sesshomaru had turned her world upside down and she wasn’t sure that this feeling would ever go away.

Sighing impatiently, Sesshomaru tugged on the arm he still had a hold of and wrapped his arms loosely around her shoulders. She stiffened immediately, and in return he went just as stiff and drew back.

“W-What do you think you’re doing?”

“I am hugging you. Isn’t this what you humans do in situations like this?”

Kagome wasn’t quite sure what answer she expected of him, but it was such a Sesshomaru answer that she surprised them both by laughing. A deep belly laugh, and for a second she wondered if she had lost her mind before wrapping her arms around him too.

In an action she would later blame on the candy cane martinis she buried her face in the folds of his business suit, and drew closer to the warmth Sesshomaru offered when she felt his arms draw tight around her shoulders.

He could smell the salt of her tears, and the sadness on her aura, he had known showing himself to her would elicit such a reaction from the human girl but he still wasn’t prepared. He didn’t do emotions, he didn’t do tears or laughter or joy, and he had no idea how to make it better. While he had practice up to this point, there was nothing like a real life situation and he had frozen.

And he hugged her. Or tried to, she had made it sort of awkward.

So when she buried her face in his suit, and she wrapped her tiny arms around his middle, he felt his muscles tense and his jaw clench. He could still feel her body wracked with silent sobs, and without knowing what else to do for her, he rested his chin on the crown of her head and tried to share in her grief.

***

There had been a moment of awkwardness between them when they had gotten inside, Sesshomaru had helped her to the guest bedroom where a fire had already been stoked and the covers pulled back.

She wasn’t quite ready to be left alone with her thoughts, and when she had asked him to keep her company for just a little while longer she wasn’t quite prepared for the intimacy that the damn fire set up.

If I didn’t know better, I would think I just walked onto the scene of a porno.

She sat in the middle of the bed with the covers pulled up around her shoulders, in a pair of Sesshomaru’s old boxers and a white tank, Okay. So it’s more than just the fire.

To his credit, Sesshomaru sat on the edge of the bed, not quite understanding the uncomfortable feeling in the room or why Kagome had drug the sheet around her shoulders.

The shadows danced on the wall with each crackle of the fire, and Kagome wondered what he would say to her if she asked him to make shadow puppets with her.

He’d probably tuck my drunken ass into bed like he should have done an hour ago.

She could still feel his warmth against her chest, the ghost of a memory of his body pressed against hers rising a feeling she had tucked away long ago after a mishap in a hot springs with the demon lord.

He could smell the change in her aura almost immediately, he watched her grasp the sheets and pull them tighter around her chest. His gaze lingered on her hands for a moment longer, and he guessed her mind was on the same memory that his had wandered to.

 She could feel his gaze searching his face, lingering a little too long on her lips and in that moment her drunken-self decided she was just tired.

After all, he had hugged her right? That had to be like second base to him!

“Sesshomaru.”

He didn’t even have time to take his eyes away from her mouth before he felt the same small hands wrap themselves in his hair for a second time, and the softness of her mouth cover his. She tasted like peppermint and alcohol, and he felt the beast surge within him at the way she molded her body to his.

Kagome all but climbed into his lap, and she felt those same arms – two she mused, why hadn’t she noticed that before? – themselves around her waist and drag her against the demon lord. With the help of the alcohol, her confidence was through the roof and her self-respect was somewhere under the floor. Sober Kagome would’ve never allowed herself to climb into the lap of the brother of her first love, and she certainly would not allow Sesshomaru to run his tongue along the seam of her lips, and she definitely would not have opened her mouth to that probing tongue.

He groaned into her mouth and she felt those clawed hands flex against her side, snagging on the borrowed tank top, sliding their way underneath to skim along her toned stomach she had worked so hard for. Goosebumps rose along her body, and she arched into the hand that cupped her hip.

She could feel the demonic aura press against her miko aura, pushing it back slowly, and she relished in the absolute strength Sesshomaru exuded. He was all hard muscle and jagged edges, and the way he seemed to fit perfectly against her softer body made her hold all the tighter.

A growl rumbled in his chest, and he pressed his lips harder against hers, devouring her completely in the long overdue kiss. A fang nicked her lip, and she felt blood trickle down her chin followed closely by Sesshomaru’s tongue, there was no question Sesshomaru was demanding complete submission from her and just this once she was happy to comply.

Sesshomaru’s tongue laved at the hollow in her throat, and she gasped at the sensation as she once more arched into the hand that had made its way to cup her breast. It was easy to see Sesshomaru must have never dealt with a bra before, as he chose to slice the fabric off rather than simply unclasp the back.

“H-Hey…!”

“Shhh…”

Muffling her protest, Sesshomaru slipped his tongue through her lips and pinched her nipple between his fingers. The moan that slipped past her lips made his length throb in anticipation, and he rolled his hips against hers. She needed no further prodding and wrapped her legs around his waist, arms draped across his shoulders she tugged at the back of his shirt.

Sesshomaru’s shirt was still the button up one from his suit, and with a flick of his wrist buttons went flying and the torn fabric landed on the floor. She blinked rapidly, and felt the heat of arousal course through her veins, who would think that would be a turn on?

His body had changed little since the last time she saw him, and underneath his business suit the tattoos were not hidden like the ones on his face and arms. She swallowed thickly, and ran a shaky hand across his toned stomach, feeling the ripple of muscle beneath her palm with each breath. He had filled out more, there was more definition to his arms, his stomach, than the last time, five hundred years have passed after all…

 With a soft push Sesshomaru had her sprawled on her back on the plush bed, and his body seemed to swallow her smaller one completely. The tank had ridden up in part to Sesshomaru trying in vain to tear it off of her, and the feeling of his naked skin on hers felt like lightning had coursed through her veins.

She had never really touched him before, not without some sort of barrier between them. In hindsight, it probably had been a good thing.

She could feel his arousal pressed against her thigh, and she couldn’t help but tighten her legs around his waist. She could see the red bleed into his eyes, and the responding snarl made her whole body shiver. Of all the times she had imagined herself in this situation it had never involved a demon with a beast that lurked just beneath the surface.  

His clawed hand cupped her chin forcing her to raise her eyes to meet his, to see the change, and while he knew exactly what he wanted, what he intended, he wasn’t quite sure Kagome was fully aware of the situation she had put herself in.

“Sesshomaru…please…”

And that was all he needed.

***

When they woke, she would blame it all on the alcohol and that she was sorry that she had put him in that situation, thanks for the pity sex, and they could go on with their lives pretending the other one didn’t exist like they had been doing for the last six months.

But, for now, she was content to listen to him snarl at her for draping an arm across her waist and for taking up too much of his side of the bed.

A/N: Taking advantage of the free time that this short college break provides to write as many one shots as possible, and finish the story I have going.