Title: Delightfully Senseless
Author: Kat Lee
Fandom: Charmed
Characters/Pairing: Cole/Piper
Rating: Soft R/M
Challenge: #60: Washing
Word Count: 1,361
Summary:
Disclaimer: All characters belong to their rightful owners, not the author.




"Bye!" Piper watched in tired shock as her younger sisters ran out of the door in eager search of finding whatever they might yet be able to squeeze out of the few hours remaining in their Friday night.

"Do you want to go with them?" Cole asked from behind her. She was so exhausted that even his gentle hand on her shoulder seemed to weigh a ton.

She yawned. She wanted a bath -- she was covered in Demon blood --, but she'd never stay awake long enough to get one. She was just going to fall headfirst into her bed and worry about cleaning herself and her covers tomorrow. "No."

"In that case, Miss Piper Halliwell," Cole replied, "come with me." Without hesitation or request, he swooped her legs out from underneath her, picked her up in his strong arms, and shimmered them out of the living room.

"Cole!" Piper exclaimed through a series of giggles. "Where are we going?"

"Not far," he assured her, his lips now next to her ear. "Just right here."

"Oh." She looked, in amazement, around them at their bathroom. This was where he must have gone while she and her sisters had been finishing telling their White Lighter about their mission. It would have taken any one else at least an hour to light all of the white candles lining the bathroom floor, counters, and cabinets, but not Cole. She doubted he had even been gone five minutes, but yet now, the bathroom was completely bathed in the warm, comforting ambience of candlelight and steam was weaving in an alluring stream up from the water filling the tub.

He placed her in a chair she hadn't noticed, mumbled quickly, "I'll be right back," and stepped to the tub. He turned off the water, then turned back to her, stripped her in a minute, and lowered her into the tub.

She had no time to protest his actions and barely to realize what he was doing . . . and that he wasn't, at least yet, joining her. "Cole?" she asked.

"Sh. I know you're tired, Piper, but I know you wanted a bath, too." She could tell from the direction of his voice that he was kneeling somewhere just behind her. He opened a tube of her favorite lotion and began spreading it in gentle, massaging circles onto her back. She moaned softly at the delightful feel.

He moved from the lotion to dipping a loofah sponge into the warm water and washing her back. Piper leaned into his touch, her brown eyes drifting closed. Bathing had never felt this good!

He poured water onto her long, ebony hair and took it, a few strands at a time, into his large hands. There, he not only scrubbed her clean but continued to massage her, as well. Her moans played like soft music in the candlelight, making him want her with an increasingly desperate need, but also helping to keep his determination to do this for her even stronger than his own base desires. Besides, he always did have a stronger desire than just receiving the pleasure she could give him, and that was pleasing her.

He did not stop massaging her hair and back until he heard her begin to snore softly. Then he gently led her against the back of the porcelain tub, made sure she was still asleep, and shimmered out. He returned to the Manor after two quick trips elsewhere, one to Paris and one to Wisconsin, and then popped into the living room long enough to grab a stool and the kitchen to take two of Piper's silver serving trays.

She was still sleeping soundly when he returned to the bathroom. He set the stool next to the tub, put the trays on top of it, and spread out what he had retrieved on that trip. Then he vanished one more time. He was just returning this time when Piper, having felt herself begin to slip further into the water, awoke. She peered out at him from sleepy eyes, saw his boyish grin, realized what he had done, and smiled widely. Only Cole would use the few minutes she had been asleep to retrieve chocolates, cheese, wine, and roses.

He knelt again beside the tub and held an unwrapped chocolate out to her. She took it from his fingers and was surprised to find, as her tongue touched his skin, that she was no longer as tired as she had been. A few minutes of sleep in the warm tub which he had prepared for her seemed to have done have wonders for her constitution, or maybe it was just the charming, handsome, and thoroughly magical man before her.

He still hadn't asked to join her, and she knew him well enough to know he wasn't going to. It wasn't that he didn't want to. He would love to be in that tub making sweet love to her, but he was more concerned for her at this time. He was making sure she rested and got her bath and ate a little something before she actually went to bed. He was the only man she'd ever known like that and, she was rather sure, the only one like him in the entire world.

Piper's grin grew, as she leaned back in the tub, watching him, and for a moment, she looked rather like her younger sisters. She wasn't concerned with Friday nights, however, or a Hunk of the Week. She didn't want any other hunk and was proud to wear this man's ring on her finger. She wanted only him. She had for years and would forever.

He lifted a piece of cheese for her next. When she went to take it, she let her lips linger on his finger and her hot, moist tongue curl around his tip. She was aware, too, that her dripping breasts were just inches away from that same hand. She took the cheese slowly from his finger, sucking him as she went, and then smiled and scooted back into the tub. "There's room in here for two, you know."

"I know," he replied, and she noted, with pride, that he was more than a bit breathless. "But you're tired, Piper."

"I'm never too tired to be with you, love."

"Not to be with me, but to -- I wouldn't ask that of you now, Piper."

Her eyes met his; their orbs seemed almost too glow a little in the candles' flickering reflections. "You didn't ask. I'm offering."

"In that case, sweetheart," he answered, kicking off his shoes, "you know I'm coming in." Their grins matched one another in size, eagerness, and volumes of joy. He stripped swiftly and then shimmied in behind and underneath her. She gave a little squeal of surprise and then laughed happily as she was pushed upwards. He wrapped his arms around her, pulled her back against him, and kissed her just underneath her right ear lobe. "Are you sure?" he asked, giving her one last chance. "I'll understand if you're too tired."

"I told you, Cole, darling," she replied, leaning into his embrace, gazing up at him, and wrapping a hand around the side of his strong, tanned neck. "I'm never too tired for you." She kissed him then, long and deep, her tongue thrusting up into his mouth and twisting around his.

It had been an amazing, if exhausting, night not because of the battle they had fought but because of the minutes that had followed, the minutes he had given her. This was going to be the most wonderful bathing experience she had ever had, and he was surely the most incredible man with whom she would ever share a tub or come to know and the only one she'd ever love as much as she loved him, with all her heart and soul. "I love you, Cole Turner," she lifted her mouth to whisper and gave him just time to answer, "I love you, too," while stroking her hair before kissing him again and swiftly rendering him delightfully senseless with the power of her mouth and body.

The End