Pairing: Mal/Kaylee -

Rating: NC/17 Warning: Uh, this is kinda...well.. smutty. (Like you expect anything else from me?)

Disclaimer: Joss & Mutant own everything, with the exception of the song quotation, which belongs to Ms. Suzanne Vega.I make no profit. Indeed, I lose hours of productivity from flying the 'verse. Feedback: Love it! Good, bad and ugly, bring it on!

Another in my Collection, in which I'm collecting every pairing Serenity has to offer. This is a kind of "What If", taking place after "Objects in Space". May still be kind of rough.

"Hold me like a baby that will not fall asleep. Curl me up inside you, and let me hear you through the heat." "Gypsy" Suzanne Vega

"Hold Me."

Kaylee curled tighter into his arms, her head against his chest, the coolness of her cheek against his warm skin, his heartbeat againt her ear.

"Cap'n?" She murmured, a little sleepy sound flush to his skin.

Mal squeezed his arms just a bit tighter. "Ain't we a bit past the captain thing now, bao bei?" His voice was soft, amused in her ear and though she didn't raise her head, he felt her smile against his chest

How had it come to this between them, he wondered. When Inara had left he'd forgotten to breathe for weeks on end. It wasn't until he came in and Kaylee was cryin in the kitchen that Mal had looked around and discovered his crew was comin' unhinged.

Jayne was snarling at Wash, and Wash, for once, was snarling back. Only Zoe was keeping them at bay. River was screaming at them to stop stop stop, that it hurt her ears, and Simon was trying to calm her down, but his saintly patience was too thin and he was only upsetting her more, snapping at Kaylee when she tried to help.

Mal had snarled in fury, told the crew to get it together. Just because they'd lost one paying boarder didn't mean there weren't work to do. They'd all just looked at him as he stormed out and slammed the hatch of his bunk behind him to the echo of Jayne's bitter insults in Mandarin.

He figured he'd give 'em all a little time to calm down, then see what could be done about fixin' it one on one.

Then his hatch had opened and there'd been Kaylee, still cryin. He crossed his arms and waited for her to say her piece.

"Cap'n." Her eyes were near black, and tears streaked down her face and clogged her voice and his heart damn near broke looking at her.

"Kaylee? You got somethin' needs sayin?" He kept his cool voice, the reasonable sergeant granting permission to speak.

He could see her hands trembling and she clasped them together over her heart. Whatever it was she was going to say, it was making her squinch her eyes shut and gulp for air

"Just spit it out, Kaylee." He couldn't keep the fear and pain from his voice this time, but it prove to be the right thing.

At the hint of tenderness in his words, giving her tacit permission to speak her mind and heart, a sob wrenched from her throat followed by a torrent of words.

"I'm leavin'. I'm sorry. I can't stay here. Everybody's so mad!" Her voice trembled and her eyes looked everywhere but at him. "Si..Simon don't care. And Jayne and Zoe are gonna kill each other, lessen' you do first...and I can't...can't..."

Her head hung and words fell away in a fresh torrent of sobbing.

Mal stared. He was afraid to blink, afraid to look away. Kaylee. Leaving. Serenity's sunshine, the sunshine that brightened the black and made his freedom soar with the love she gave so freely. He blinked at last, his hands falling to his sides. So many things to tell her. Ask her to stay. Tell her she needs to do what's best for her. Let her go. Hold her tight. "Might be best you do, mei mei."

But he'd lost too much already. Inara was gone and now his girl was going too? Damn it. At the words he spoke she'd nodded and turned from him. Blinded by tears she reached for the ladder, but her foot slipped off the rung, banging her shin.

As she tried to take the step again, he found his voice.

"Kaylee, wait."

She looked back at him across the ladder rungs, a grief-laden mutter falling dejectedly from her lips, "Yeah?"

He made one long stride to her side, grabbing her shoulders, pulling her around the ladder to face him.

She tried to draw back for the briefest moment, then collapsed forward into his arms.

Mal thought he was used to her tears. Tears when the engine was broke, or when Simon was mean (not that the boy ever meant to be). Tears when she was scared. Tears when she was happy. But these tears tore his heart out. He didn't know how he could ever bear to be without them.

"Oh, bao bei, don't cry. Don't cry. Shhh. It'll work out." He murmured against her hair, her tears soaking his shirt as she wept. "Don't talk about goin' right now. Not now. We'll work it all out."

Kaylee wrapped her arms around him and held tight. He was surprised at the strength with which she clung to him, even though he'd seen how hard she worked, knew how lean and muscular she really was.

Backing up to the bed, he sat down and tugged her down against him, realizing how good she felt in his arms, how few hugs they'd shared lately. Oh how he would lose if she really left! He couldn't let her go, not now. It was selfish and it was wrong. She was young, talented, beautiful; she didn't deserve his stubborn old ship and angry old captain. But he couldn't let her go. Not yet.

Pulling her down with him against his chest, he kissed the top of her head and her tear damp cheek. As he bent to drop a kiss on the tip of her button nose, she'd suddenly raised her head and his lips met hers by mistake.

The shock that drove through his body, like an electric flash from his lips straight down to his groin, made him gasp.

"Capn?" She was looking at him now, in confusion and pain.

Let it go. Pretend it was nothing. Don't let her in. Don't let her see. He closed his eyes and fought it down, reasoned it out, but when he opened them again there was Kaylee's stunned face inches from his own, eyes wide, her expression guileless and open.

His gaze flickered down the length of her body lying against him and then back up, past the pale curve of her neck to her pouted lips, and her dark eyes. His gaze met hers and he stopped, mesmerized.

Silence. Perfection. Fear. Longing. And in the end, surrender.

He leaned his head down again and then they were kissing, Kaylee's lips soft against his, her clever little tongue flicking out to caress his mouth. He opened his lips, let her in, tasted the salt of her tears on her lips.

Mal remembered everything in that first kiss.

Kaylee, half-hidden behind the bulk of that moron Bender, her dress half off. Kaylee grinning as she said she had to ask her folks if she could fly with him. Her gasping cry of pain and the blood on his hands as she lay bleeding and Simon had made that choice between her life and River's. Her grin of tired pride after fixin' something broke, and her laughter that shined up the entire 'verse. He remembered every tear, every pout, every grin, that gorram fluffy pink dress, that relieved sighing smile when he came back safe from the duel...

He needed to stop this, get this under control. He was the mean old man. He could break her heart, do it for her own good, get her out of here and free where she could... but her mouth was so soft, her arms so strong, her taste so warm and sweet.

He didn't stop.

Kaylee shifted, willing, in his arms. One hand slid under the back of his shirt, pressing to the center of his back, the other coming up to cup his cheek as he kissed her deeper and more fully. And he found his hands sliding down the zip of her coveralls, pushing them back from her shoulders so he could touch her ribs beneath her thin baby-blue t-shirt.

She curved into his hands, her lips leaving his mouth to trail down his jaw, bury themselves in the crook of his neck and slip down to the collar of his shirt.

Bereft of her mouth, his own lips fell on her ear, her hair, anywhere they could reach.

She was unbuttoning his shirt now, and again, he paused, meaning to draw back and put an end to it. Then he could feel the dampness her tears had left on his shirt, soaking it through, and he knew the only truth that remained to be known. He couldn't let her go.

Bare skin touched bare skin as they pressed together and she was sliding down his body, her small breasts brushing his bare chest. Her lips kissed the scar at his chest before moving lower and encompassing one of his nipples.

The groan that fell from his lips was gutteral, primal, and the answering whimper from her own melted the last of his doubts.

Fingers were working at his pants and he reached for them, covered them, stilling them. Kaylee looked up, her brow furrowed in confusion, a thousand questions in her eyes as he raised her fingers to his lips and kissed them gently before pressing them to his heart. His words had to erase all her doubts and he felt them before he spoke them aloud. "Slow down, Kaylee. Ain't no need to rush."

The furrows on her brow dissolved and her smile was radiant for second before she lowered it to his flesh once more, kissing light teasing kisses as her hands returned to warm, massaging strokes that ran sensually over his arms, down his back, across his ribs, around his neck, over his hair. Everywhere she could reach, she touched, stroking him as her lips tasted as much as they could. She was savoring him, he realized, just as she would savor a fresh strawberry or a bite of chocolate.

Mal's heart swelled and he felt tears sting his own eyes. What would he do if she was gone? Desperately, like a dying man making his last gamble, he grasped for her arms, tilting her back beneath him as he kissed her exposed skin, caressing down and around her small breasts. He loved the way she arched into his fingers before he captured her parted lips with his own and massaged the tender breast beneath his hand.

She moaned soft and high into his kiss and he rubbed his thumb over her tender peaked nipple. When she raised to his hand, he did it again, until she writhed against him, her legs clasped around his, her kiss desperately suckling at his tongue, her hands grasping the small of his back.

He drew back to watch her reactions as he touched her. Kaylee's eyes were wide open, the lids fluttering softly whenever he touched just so. There was no regret, no fear, and Mal felt his own heart open. Coming to Kaylee any other way; as captain, as conqueror, as controlled comfort, that was unacceptable. Kaylee would only have his honesty, his love.

As her hand came to his face to pull him back into her kiss, he turned his head and kissed her palm. "Truth, bao bei." He whispered to her. "That's all this is."

"That's everything." She whispered back, her eyes closing as he flickered his fingers over her breast once more.

She understood, he realized suddenly. When had she become all grown up? When had she become so wise?

His fingers reached for her coveralls, stripping them down. She helped, raising her hips, turning to strip off her shoes and socks before turning back into his arms and kissing his chest and stomach. Her fingers unbuckled his belt and once again worked at his trousers.

This time he helped her, although he doubted his own self control were her fingers to wrap around that which was aching buried beneath layers of cloth. Then it was buried no longer; Kaylee kneeling up on the bed to strip him naked with an expertise that surprised him, although he knew it shouldn't. He knew she was no stranger to sex.

She knelt over him on the bed, her hair loose and tousled around her face. Her eyes didn't meet his, but traced his frame in the semi-darkness. He sighed, tension leaving his shoulders and back and flushing straight to his groin as her fingers moved from his thighs to his hips, then danced across his stomach, light enough to tickle. When he squirmed, she did it again.

A gasp of air slipped through his lips as she slowly awakened every inch of his skin. He hadn't been touched like this in.. not since ever. Tender, sweet, exploring fingers traced his stomach muscles, his hip bones. Kaylee's eyes met his, then trailed down his body, so there would be no mistaking her intentions as she focused her gaze on his erection and then flickered back up to gaze into his eyes.

"Kaylee..." He meant to say 'yes, touch me, dear sweet Kaylee put your hands on me right there, please you sweet angel.' But she was already doing it before he could sort out the words. Clever strong fingers that could retune the electrics or switch out a capacitor danced over his straining flesh. They cupped the head of his erection, sending a frission of pleasure up his spine, before trailing back down to the base and then back ever so slowly up.

The sound that escaped his mouth was torrential, a tropical storm of desire, and Kaylee quit her teasing and wrapped her strong fingers around him, squeezing and sliding as she lowered her body back down beside him, pressing herself to him.

She curled her head against his chest as she stroked him, her lips slipping tenderly across his skin.

Mal wrapped his arms around her, returning her kisses, moving his hips aginst her. "Ah... ah... oh.. Kaylee...you gotta stop that."

She stilled her hand but didn't remove it, nuzzling her lips into the nape of his neck and licking his skin as she waited for him to get himself under control. He took her wrists and moved her hands away, ignoring her pout and following whimper.

"No." He said firmly, regaining some control over the situation. "We gonna do this right, dong ma?"

A shudder ran through her at his words and then he found her tender pink nipple with his mouth and proceded to demonstrate to her exactly what doing it right entailed. Mal was good at depriving himself; it was one of his easy disciplines. And he did it now, pulling his heated flesh back from her, until only his hands and his lips were in contact with her skin.

Frustration welled in her and expressed itself in a fierce groan. He chuckled at it, deep and low, before kissing her exposed throat with small nipping bites.

Slender as a reed, she danced beneath his touch, bringing all of the sunshine and light that was Kaylee and tossing it up as a winter-blown storm. She trembled, quivered, and her moans were the sighs of wind across desperate plains.

Mal couldn't wait any longer and pressed a hand down her stomach, feeling her legs spread for him, opening herself, raising her soft auburn curls to his hand. Cupping a hand over that sweet warmth, he found her wet and slick, and gasped against her breast as he felt her unfold beneath his fingers.

"Yes....oh...yes..." Kaylee whimpered, rocking her arms around his body, forcing him back into contact with her as he gently fondled her, seeking entrance and finding her willing and waiting for him.

Murmurs reached his ears, and her sweet scent assailed his senses. As she danced beneath him, giving him all that she had to give, he knew. Malcom Reynolds knew without a doubt that KayWinnet Lee Frye was the one thing on his gorram boat that he could do right.

Confident, he slid his fingers into her softness, closing his mouth over hers to stifle the yelp of pleasure that she issued. Shifting, he found her clit, warm and swollen under his thumb, and pressed as she squeeled into his kiss, her entire body rolling with the pleasure of it. Her hands were locked around him, touching where they could.

Never had any woman felt so sweet, looked so right in his arms. He felt her through every inch of his body, and he wanted so much of her, so much more and more of her. Mal felt her whimpers change in tempo, becoming gasps of desperation, and he slowly raised his head from her breast and brushed the dampened hair back from her forehead.

Her eyes were glazed with pleasure and she murmured something he couldn't hear as he slowly slid his fingers in and out of her soft depths. "You ready for me, bao bei?"

His voice came out deeper than he'd expected, a sound he didn't recognize ladening his tone. Kaylee blinked her eyes and nodded, rolling her hips, grinding down on his fingers. Sucking in a slow breath, she tightened her body around them, groaning with the pleasure of it, his hand bathed with her wetness.

"Oh, shr ah, ye soo..." He hadn't realized he was saying it out loud. His cock pulsed in time with her movements and he wanted her, everything else swept away in that flood of heat from her body.

Her voice was a soft chuckle against his skin. "Are you ready for me?"

He was already shifting over her, gathering her to him, finding his way between her legs. He tried to say something clever, something funny, but all that he found in his extensive vocubulary was "Hell, yes."

She raised her thighs and wrapped them around his hips as he slid his fingers from her and replaced them with the head of his cock. She reached up to pull him to her, to kiss him as he entered, but he held back, wanting to watch her face as he slid into her. Slick, sweet, so hot she burned against his flesh and she arched suddenly, impatiently swallowing him into her. Gasping for control, he inched deeper, but she would have none of it, grabbing his backside to pull him fully into her.

"Ahhhhhhh." Her sigh was satisfaction, simple and perfect, as he filled her.

He smiled, letting all of the tender instincts he had squashed away for so long come to the surface, trusting her to understand. And she did, smiling back, freeing one hand to caress his face as his body strained over her own.

Slowly, she took another deep breath into her body and closed her eyes, and he felt her clenching down on him with steady contractions that rocked to the very core of his being. "Oh... girl..."

"What are ya waitin' for?" She murmured to him, her voice amused against his ear.

He shook his head. How could he tell her that he didn't want it to end, just wanted to feel this moment forever, to keep her there, safe and deep and warm? He couldn't. Slowly, he raised his hips and thrust back down, finding her raising to meet him.

Their breath became one, their heartbeats synchronized. How long? Longer than he would have thought possible, and he lost himself in her generosity, her beauty, her moans and gasps, her thrusts that met his stroke for stroke.

Then she was throwing her head back, mewling rythmically, and he felt her contractions start again, only this time harder and faster and far beyond her control.

"Oh, Kaylee, that's my girl." He managed to encourage, before feeling the fire flash through him, breaking his control, and he drove into her hard and fast as her keening filled his ears. With a groan that shook his entire body and swallowed down his entire being, he surrendered to the pulsing release that stripped him of every defense.

Then he was heaving against her body, his lips against her throat as her arms wrapped around him, holding him close as he trembled against her. Finally, slowly, he raised himself from her, rollng to his side and pulling her to him.

She rolled into his arms, head against his chest, not meeting his eyes. Now her words were timid, worried. "We okay?"

He held still for a moment. "I don't know. You gonna leave me?"

She didn't answer for so long that he started to be afraid, but then she shook her head. "Not lessn' you want me to. Do you?"

His arms crushed her to him, her slender body tight against his. "Never. I mean never, bao bei, ask me that again."

He felt her tears come again, but this time they didn't hurt, knowing they were the kind that comes when uncertainty washes away and all that remains is truth. There was a certaintity, he knew, that someday she would go, would leave him. One day they would be separate lives, carrying only a moment in their hearts, but for now the truth was that he wanted her, couldn't let her go. Not now. Not yet.

"Hold me." She whispered, and he realized he'd loosened his arms from around her and promptly pulled her close again.

"Always, bao bei."

When they'd awakened she'd been tucked against his chest.

"Ain't we a bit past the captain thing now, bao bei?"

She'd shaken her head sleepily. "Always my captain."

Now he chuckled again and shifted to cradle her to him, holding her like a baby and she curled up inside him, where he wouldn't ever lose her.

the end ---------------------------------