Title: Stranded
Author: Fallon Ash
Rating: Strong PG-13 or R Disclaimer: not mine.
Pairing: Calleigh/CJ (The West Wing)
MS WORD count: around 2000
Summary: "You need a place to stay the night?" "Yes. Yes I do."
Author's Note: Thanks to sarapallas for the beta. And don't ask me about CJ, I don't know anything.

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CJ strolls up and down the crowded streets in central Miami, not quite knowing what to do with the night she suddenly wouldn't spend on an airplane, and then, later, being torn apart in her press room by the latest batch of gossip to hit D.C.. A snowstorm. In D.C.. In March. She'd reached Leo and he'd told her not to bother; it ought to be gone by noon tomorrow. So here she is. The air is hot and humid. She wouldn't mind some of that snow down here, as she rubs a hand over the tense muscles at the back of her neck and feels the damp ends of her hair. She hadn't even brought a change of clothes, just a briefcase full of documents and a shoulder bag. Teach her to be prepared for the unexpected; she should know that by now. She should get a hotel. She should shop for clothes. Instead she strolls the streets of Miami, briefcase heavy and the handle slick in one hand, shoulder bag making the fabric of her suit sticky against her shoulder. It's growing darker and she thinks about getting something to eat. Her feet ache from the hard pavement beneath shoes that really weren't made for walking. But what could she do? She hates this feeling of inactivity, wishes there was something she could work on, but she's already read and re-read and argued and analyzed the goddamned documents in her briefcase so many times she knows them by heart.

Darkness is all around her, and neon lights are blinking when she finally stops in front of a small wooden doorway. A crooked sign by an open door promises ‘home cooked Irish food and the best Irish malt served in an intimate romantic setting on our back porch with an ocean view' and for some reason she thinks that's exactly what she needs. There's laughter and folk music coming from the inside, and she meets a young couple in the doorway as she heads inside. She's met by a very big black man with a very white shirt, and very white teeth, she notices, as he greets her with a big smile and a thick accent.

"Just me," she answers his question, and he leads her past the full inside tables, through the back doors, and places her at a table off to the side, where she can actually see the ocean if she cranes her head and stretches her neck. In front of her is wild tangle of vegetation, most of which she couldn't name if her life depended on it. There must be some sort of air conditioning, because the air isn't half as humid as it was on the street. Or maybe it's just that she's sitting down, and is served a tall glass of ice water with her menu as her greeter returns and introduces himself as Jimmy, her waiter for the evening. She looks around; he seems to be the only employee circulating among the customers.

She's looking around for her waiter when a flash of long blonde hair catches her eyes. Ainsley? Ainsley in Miami? She watches with raising incredulity as Ainsley laughs and reaches up to hug Jimmy; he practically lifts her off her feet. Eventually Jimmy escorts her through the room, along with a woman wearing a no-nonsense look and, she realizes as they get closer, an MDPD badge and a gun fastened to her belt. CJ's gaze is fastened on Ainsley's face as they pass her, but she doesn't spare her a glance. And that's when CJ notices the similar badge and a gun on the woman's belt.

Jimmy seats the pair at the table next to her; pulling out the chairs for them, and giving them a flourishing bow as he hands them menus.

"Miss Calleigh, Detective Sevilla, always a pleasure."

Their tables are close enough for CJ to hear the two women's conversation through dinner. She wonders if they know how damaging such talk could be if there was someone listening who was out to hurt the MDPD, or their case, and then kicks herself for her own paranoia. She also watches Calleigh, the woman who should be Ainsley's identical twin, only she knows from the parts of Ainsley's FBI-file that Leo let her see that she doesn't have one. Nor does she have any sisters. And the more she watches the pair at the next table she realizes that this woman is really nothing like Ainsley. Where Ainsley comes off at first glance as open and friendly, there's something standoffish about this one. Her eyes are guarded, and while she smiles and wraps her lips around words with a sweet southern accent, that's at least a state or three from Ainsley's North Carolina, there's a bitter tang to her smile. Her eyes flicker around the room, though so far they haven't met hers.

About 45 minutes later Detective Adell Sevilla rises and throws a few bills at the table.

"I really need to get back to work now. Calleigh, I'll see you around." There's no regret in her voice, only a curt edge that CJ immediately and instinctively associates with honesty. CJ watches her leave, receiving a wave from Jimmy as she passes. As she turns back to her food, she starts as she realizes that the woman called Calleigh is watching her intently, her eyes inscrutable. She fidgets with her fork as Calleigh suddenly rises from her table, but instead of leaving, she just walks around it and pulls out the Detective's chair, straddling it opposite CJ.

"Ya'll's been watching me all night," she states.

CJ can't do much more than nod. "You are the exact replica of someone I know," she says, and winces as she watches the other woman's eyebrow rise.

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah," CJ answers, hears the defensive tone in her voice, and winces again.

Calleigh finally backs off a little, rises to turn the chair around and sit down properly, then stretching a hand across the table. "Calleigh Duquesne."

"CJ Cregg," and Calleigh smirks.

"I knew that."

CJ sighs. She should be used to that, but it's still annoying. She never sees it coming.

"I just don't know what you're doing in Miami. A long way from the White House."

CJ nods. "Snowstorms. Cancelled flights."

Understanding spreads over Calleigh's features. "Heard about them," and she nods a little before staring off into space for a moment.

CJ takes the opportunity to study her. Ainsley's hair, Ainsley's eyes, Ainsley's nose, Ainsley's lips. Just not Ainsley. Her body is different, though, tighter, stronger, thinner. And then she's caught in Calleigh's eyes again, a knowing smile playing around the other woman's lips. Before she knows it, a hand sneaks out to capture her neck, and she's pulled forward, lips crashing into her own. CJ remembers thinking about kissing Ainsley; that this is so much more and so different from what she imagined, as sharp teeth gives her lower lip an ungentle bite. And then she remembers what's happening, and who she's with, and wrenches away so fast the other woman almost tumbles forward at the loss of support.

"Don't tell me you hadn't thought about it." Calleigh's voice is challenging, edgy, defensive.

CJ takes a breath to deny it, licks her lips and can taste the remnants of the other woman's lipstick. Suddenly she doesn't care anymore, because she's stranded in a strange town. She should worry about what it would look like if this got out, she should worry about this woman's intentions, hell, there's so much she should worry about she just doesn't care anymore. "Of course I'd thought about it."

"You need a place to stay the night?" and the tone of her voice tells CJ she knows exactly what she's asking, her blunt expression leaving no room for interpretation, her eyes stripped bare of any romantic notions leaving only a stark honesty.

CJ thinks about Ainsley, and then she doesn't think about Ainsley but she does, as she meets Calleigh's eyes and understanding passes between them. "Yes. Yes I do." She answers.



Calleigh's apartment is on the 13th floor in the middle of the city. Neon dances on the walls opposite the windows, and the city never quiets here. Awkwardly they look at each other inside the door for a moment before Calleigh takes CJ's bags, leaves them on a couch and turns toward the liquor cabinet.

"You want a drink?"

"Please."

Calleigh doesn't ask more, and CJ doesn't care. The liquid is amber and burns its way down her throat and that's really all she cares about. Calleigh's swirling hers in the glass, watching it, before she downs it in a long swallow.

"There. I fulfilled the hostess's part."

And then she's pushing CJ back against the door, and CJ lets her, because it feels good not to have to be in control all the time. She lets Calleigh leave bruises on her neck because she wants to, and she lets Calleigh undress her because it would take too much energy to stop her. Calleigh's still fully dressed but CJ's naked against the wall with Calleigh's teeth around her nipple and Calleigh's fingers inside her the first time she comes. She gets Calleigh's clothes off after that, and CJ thinks about the difference between Calleigh and Ainsley again as she traces a muscular shoulder. Calleigh leads her through a darkened hallway to a dark bedroom, not bothering with lights, and CJ follows. CJ tries to make out her surroundings but the warmth and closeness of the body next to hers is distracting, and she find herself on the bed instead, fighting for the upper hand, finally pinning the other woman beneath her. There is anxiousness to their movements, a rush as they change positions and their hands and mouths wander. They're quiet, Calleigh keeping her eyes fixed on the wall, a lamp, handing over her body, but not her soul, and CJ bites down on her lip to keep from accidentally saying Ainsley's name when Calleigh reciprocates.



CJ doesn't get a chance to study her surrounding until the next morning, when she's woken up abruptly by a fire truck on the street below the window only minutes past 6am. Calleigh doesn't twitch.

Calleigh's bedroom is white. Walls, ceiling, bedspread, furniture. The sheets are a dark red beneath the bedspread. Guns and rifles are mounted on display behind locked glass doors, and CJ remembers the many heated arguments she's had with Ainsley on the subject. Which draws her gaze back to Calleigh, and she sighs as she studies the face, so much more like Ainsley's now in sleep than it ever was awake.

Carefully climbing out of bed, CJ finds her way back to the living room and her bags, digging around for her cell phone. She's sore, and there's a spot on her neck that actually hurts, but she finds her phone, and pulls her blouse over her head while she's at it. Leo tells her that the airports should be fine in a few hours, so if she gets herself to the airport and on a plane, they need her now.

CJ contemplates waking the woman in the bedroom but re-thinks the idea as she watches her from the doorway. She's sprawled on her belly; the tangled sheet not making the vision anywhere near modest and her hair is a mess. One arm is dangling off the bed, and her face is buried in a pillow. CJ blinks a few times before walking into the room, carefully pulling at the sheet so that it at least covers her lower body, before quietly exiting again without looking back. In the living room, she gathers her bag and her briefcase along with her suit jacket. Fumbling with the door, she finally makes it lock behind her, and a few minutes later when she hails a cab on the street her mind is focused on all the work she'll have to do in order to catch up on her missed hours. Only for a moment, when she meets the ghost of her reflection in the window, does she wonder what she'll think the next time she runs into Ainsley.

***