Title: But Yet So Irresistible
By: Julian Lee
Pairing: Speed/Delko
Summary: "I can tell, you've never been this far before." Title from Bjork's "Human Behavior".

"I can tell, you've never been this far before." And Delko's smile is so wide, so smug, like a cat in the sun.

(And Speed's trying to decide if he'd rather punch that smile off Delko's face or lick it off.)

Speed turns the map. Turns it again. Again. And one more time, so it's facing the direction it started in. "I don't even - Eric, where are we on this map?"

The grin gets wider - if that's possible - and Delko crosses his arms casually. "We're not on the map. We're beyond the map."

A week like hell. A week that went on forever ("How many 12-hour shifts you put in this week?" "Five. You?" "Four."). A week where they could accomplish nothing ("How many cases we close this week?" "In our dreams or in real life?" "Nice to know our jobs are worth getting out of bed for."). And at the end of it, they'd been ordered to take a break ("You guys look like Hell," Horatio says, though he looks twice as bad and must know it. "Get out of here, and don't let me see either of your faces around tomorrow.").

So there's a whispered consultation, and a suggestion - "Let's get out of here. Let's get on the road and just drive."

"How far?"

Shrug. "Far enough to leave all this shit behind us."

So they're driving North, because the country doesn't stretch far enough South for that.

This had been Delko's plan - grab some bottled water, maybe some beer, climb into the drivers' seat and go, but Speed grabbed a map, instead.

Only, the map's no good anymore.

"Off the map?" he demands, feeling foolish. "Then where the hell are we?"

Delko looks into the humid afternoon sun. "Does it matter?"

"Hell yes, it matters, Eric! How are we going to get back if we don't know where we are?"

"Who says we're going back?"

"That's not funny." Too sharply said, but it's not funny. It's just not, because the temptation has been there too many times. Has been too real too many times.

"Tim, calm down." Just calm down. Breathe. Be. Just be here with me. "I've lived in Miami all my life. I'll get us back."

And Speed wants to keep protesting, but he trusts Delko (when did he start trusting Delko so much?), and straying off the map is what Delko had in mind anyway, and maybe it's not such a bad thing just this once. He leans against the back of the car, fingers lightly tapping the sun-heated metal, staring at Delko in unspoken challenge.

(Please, Eric, pick up the challenge.)

"You're the expert, then. Where are we going?"

Faintest hint of a smile and Delko's hand waving up ahead of them. "Wherever the road goes."

Speed waves the map. "But I have this map."

The grin comes back full force. A single flick of strong, sure fingers, and the map goes flying, somewhere in a damp Miami ditch. "Not anymore, you don't."

And the fingers come back, to twist in the front of Speed's shirt, to haul him close.

Just before lips meet lips and Speed's off flying, he thinks, I am definitely off the map now.

Good thing Eric knows where they're going.