Southern Comfort (19/?)

Author- Midnight Faith

Spoilers- none

Distribution- FF.net, AOH anyone else just ask :)

Pairing- Lilah/Lindsey

Rating- R

Summary- Dawn leaves…

Disclaimer- not mine… yadda, yadda

They sat in the lobby of the hotel in cheerless silence, whilst Wesley loaded her bags into the back of Angel's car.

It barely seemed possible that Dawn could be going home after spending six weeks at the Hyperion.

The week had reached an impossibly tense crescendo. Connor had begun teething on the Monday and despite being awake and wailing all day he seemed to scream even louder at night. His constant crying seemed loudest in Lindsey's room, being directly above Angel's and that, and a host of other guilty thoughts and concerns had churned around and cultivated in Lilah's head.

She had systematically tried to move around the hotel from room to room, trying to find a place to escape Connor's incessant shrieking, but mainly to escape her own thoughts. But they, becoming so infixed in her, inescapable, even tormenting her in her sleep in the form of terrifying nightmares.

The lack of sleep and slow, pounding headaches from the continual noise seemed to make everyone twice as irritable. With the court case looming ahead on the Wednesday through to the Friday everyone was becoming nervous and agitated. Lindsey and Lilah, because they were so out of courtroom practice. (Lilah had explained to Cordy the higher you climbed at Wolfram and Hart the less time you spent in the courtroom.) And the others because they were major witnesses and had been grilled horribly for hours by Lindsey and Lilah in an attempt to show them what it would be like in court up against the Wolfram and Hart lawyers.

It had been particularly hard for Lindsey. Out of acting like a Wolfram and Hart lawyer instead of just a lawyer he's felt that exhilarating rush of power simmer in his veins- an evil he could maybe suppress but never really be free of.

He knew Lilah was better at concealing her emotions than he was. She appeared completely calm at the surface but underneath he knew she was letting familiar emotions return. Her feelings simmered to the surface in other ways. Every time he's gone to kiss or even touch her in affection in the past week she'd pushed him away. He knew her too well and could deduce that there was something wrong and it frustrated him that she didn't trust him enough to tell him what was on her mind.

To make things even worse than they already were, Fred and Gunn had broken up for good mid-week. Gunn had made it clear to Lilah, he hadn't actually told Fred about them but Fred was heartbroken nevertheless. She'd taken some personal time out and booked a return flight home to Texas promising to return home early Wednesday morning as the Angel Investigations character witness.

Gunn had phoned Cordy the next day to tell her he would take at least a week off to visit cousins in New York. In a way Lilah was relieved. But then everyone she cared about was leaving…

"Dawn…" Wesley's voice broke the tension; "We should really get going. I told Buffy we'd be there in an hour and if the traffic's bad…"

The four people in the lobby didn't move for a split second. Divided evenly over the two sofas, Lindsey was first to rise, then Dawn, Cordelia and finally Lilah.

Dawn said goodbye to Lindsey first, hugging him awkwardly.

"Take care," he told her simply.

"You've got my address…" she said, "write soon."

Their embrace broke as Cordy stepped over to Dawn.

"Come and stay again," Cordy said, touching Dawn's shoulder.

"I will do," she promised, as she and Cordy embraced quickly.

Dawn walked over to Lilah, who stood perfectly still.

Tears clawed their way against Lilah's eyes and throat as they hugged each other tightly.

"I'll call you when I get home…" Dawn told Lilah.

"Bye." Lilah said, her voice raw.

"Dawn…" Wesley's voice cautioned, echoing across the foyer.

Wordlessly, Dawn walked across the lobby, glancing back only once, before disappearing out of the door, Wesley following her.

There was a moment of complete stillness in the room as if with Dawn's departure she had taken every joule of energy with her.

Lilah pressed her fingers to her eyes, blotting away the first signs of unshed tears.

Lindsey was by her side instantly, pulling her to him, her eyes leaving mascara smudges on his grey shirt.

His hand gently ran up and down her spine, dissolving the knots of tension there.

She'd come to recognise this as a sign of reconciliation this past week. They'd fought a lot, over simple things; minor details in the case or whether to leave the bedroom window open at night. Their bodies rocking softly together, Lilah's head resting gently against his shoulder, so close she could smell his Ralph Lauren aftershave and she could've kept time by the soft beating of his pulse.

Because they were almost the same height his face rested against her neck. The faint scent of her banana shampoo intoxicated him.

Of course, it's so ingrained in them and there's been so much making up to do this week, they've used sex as a way of comfort and reparation. Lindsey knows it shouldn't be this way and he wishes he could tell what she was thinking… because this week she's been so lost…

This week she hasn't let the sentence 'what's wrong?' pass his lips. The moment the first syllable is out she's kissing him fiercely and allow him to forget as he drowns in her, worlds dissolving in a frenzy fuelled by their need for solace in each other and all the unbridled passion that comes from that.

He takes his chance. Here in the lobby.

"What's wrong?" he asked her gently.

She moved him away from her, forcefully.

"It's nothing," she told him, before walking away from him, arms wrapped around her in comfort.

Lindsey and Cordelia exchanged a glance but said nothing…