"As for what *you* want....it has been noted and logged," Kirk said and after viciously punching the comm button, turned from the wall.  Baris, to put it mildly, was a pain in the....  Caught.  Dark eyes, like deep space, met his and the amusement was unmistakable.

Even as a familiar pain began between his eyes --- familiar since the captain's acquaintance with Federation Undersecretary for Agricultural Affairs, Nils Baris, Kirk gave his first officer a sheepish grin.  Golden lashes lowered flirtatiously, intentionally seeking to giving the Vulcan something else to think about other than the display of temper he had just witnessed.  Hardly worth it to protest that Baris was insufferable.  In the quirk of Spock's eyebrow, the way those kissable lips were drawn in a thin line, the message was very clear.  Junior officer, still wet behind the ears stuff:  Kirk knew he should know better than to let Baris irritate him so.  Likewise, the half amused disapproval radiating from the one he loved shouldn't make Kirk want to grab him and kiss him, good and hard, and to hell with the crew.

 Mr. Spock could most definitely flirt with the best of them, as Jim Kirk was all too aware.  No emotions like hell:  no one in the galaxy would ever convince Kirk of  this.  Zeroed in on Kirk with all the passion Kirk himself had felt, though he had thought it well hidden.  Yet thinking about it now, he still felt the shocked delight of how they finally got together.  Extraordinary that it had been Spock who first spoke of their mutual desire.

"Where will you be, Captain?"

Very few would catch the subtle change, how amusement was giving way to a touch of concern.  Understanding flowed down their link, more intimate than any touch or caress.   Time stopped for just a little while --- no Federation bureaucrats, no quadrotriticale, no Klingons; just the two of them in the near empty corridor.

"Sickbay.  With a headache," Kirk replied, shattering the brief spell.

Rewarded with one of Spock's smiles that was never a smile, Kirk turned in the direction of the turbo lift.  Quite aware of that gaze that missed little marking his departure, he wondered once again just what he'd done to deserve Spock.  Probably just that old Kirk luck, he chuckled; the same thing that had charmed nearly every aspect of his life.  Onto the lift, the captain strode and as the lift doors closed before him, giving Kirk the briefest glimpse of the Vulcan, tall, spare, the grace of a creature only partially tamed, he knew he really wasn't that interested in the answer to his musings.
****

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