Part One: In Which Our Heroes Discern that There is a Definite Problem

- - -

The second the liquid hits Inara's lips, she knows something is wrong. Every fiber of her being screams out, begging her mouth to close against the hot drink, straining against the effects already taking place in her body. Inara's eyes, wide and pleading, catch Mal's equally-as-alarmed gaze for one fleeting moment. Then the deed is done, and heavy earthenware mugs fall from both their hands as a filmy blackness settles over Inara's lids and she gives herself over to whatever unseen force is guiding her limbs.

~*~

There's skin, and lots of it. The play of fire flickering across tawny browns and light caramels. The warmth of candles spreading a glow across the room, heating flesh as it's revealed, as clothing and defenses drop to the floor in the hungry rush for mouth against mouth. His hands cradle her head, tilting her chin so that he can slant his lips over hers, his tongue a wet, langorous slide against her own. He kisses without any real style, any consistent pattern. It's very obviously whatever feels good to him, and the lovely part is--

It feels good to her, too.

All of it, from the hot, dry drag of his lips, to the restless stroke of his knuckles against her breasts. He kisses her and she likes what he tastes of: moonlight and tang and the dull grit of protein. The way he brings her body up and against his erection, she wagers he likes the taste of her, also. His hands are rough and hot and steady and strong, hands that were made for shooting, for supporting, for punching, for caressing. She falls back into those hands and lets him go to work, kneading the muscles in her back, rubbing circles in her skin until his thumbs are running right against her nipples.

Then when his hands touch her center, right where she's aching, the slow, tantalizing entry of fingers against her folds. No one is ever as gentle, no one ever works her quite so masterfully, and she thinks it's because Malcolm Reynolds make