Title: Coming Back to You
Fandom: The West Wing
Characters: Andrea Wyatt/Toby Ziegler
Prompt: fanfic100: 38 – Touch; un_love_you: 2 – I was wrong about you
Word Count: 815
Rating: pg13
Summary: All my senses rise against this coming back to you.
Author's Notes: Thanks to intopolitics and amy_vic for the extra eyes.



He was staring at her hair, the familiar shade of red that was so different pulled into a tight chignon than it was when he’d last seen it, loose and wild around her shoulders. She turned and caught his glance, and he was surprised to see that it actually was her and not just another nameless redhead who’d caught his eye.

Andy weaved through the crowd toward him, barely breaking eye contact, and when she sidled to the bar next to him, she smiled serenely. She was almost unrecognizable as the same coltish girl he’d known two years earlier, this sleek, professional woman who was tilting her head at him appraisingly. At least the arch of her eyebrow was the same.

He ordered her another drink, remembering that gin was her weakness, and caught her up on what he’d done in the interim (two losses, zero wins, and a consulting job in between), and with every word, she was aware of his fingers sliding along her wrist, curling over her pulse, so when he asked where she was working, she had to regroup before she could answer.

Toby told her that Annapolis politics were too easy for her, that she should be running state campaigns at least, and she laughed when she told him that she was the candidate, watching as his eyebrows raised and his fingers tightened. He’d never asked what she wanted to do, she reminded him, and not everyone was content outside the spotlight.

When networking inevitably forced her away from him and back into the crowd, he followed her for a few steps and returned one hand to her wrist to stop her, whispering in her ear that she should find him before she left. Andy had to stop herself from inhaling sharply at the touch and the low warmth of his voice, and all she could do was nod, meeting his gaze, and disappear among the people crowding the room.

The party was impossibly boring, and by the time she slipped away, he was working on one scotch too many. She found him at the bar and lifted his glass from in front of him, gulping the drink, letting it burn her throat. Toby asked to take her home quietly, decisively, more statement than question, and his hand was strong on the small of her back as he led her to his car.

Neither of them had forgotten the way he’d pushed her away two years ago, and neither had spent the time pining, wishing for what might have been, but the electricity between them hadn’t changed. Their exchanges were heated and flirty, and he knew that she was smarter than he ever gave her credit for. She was an ideal candidate, he realized.

Toby kissed her outside his apartment, gently pulling her against him, and was surprised by her reserve until he pulled back and looked up, meeting her eyes, and saw the flicker of heat behind her gaze. When his hand stroked over her jaw and he leaned in to kiss her again, deepening the embrace, she responded with an unexpected ferocity. And he stepped her backward into the alcove outside the building, pinning her against the wall.

Andrea felt wanton and uninhibited when he pushed her against the stone, and struggled for a moment, stuck between the need to be in control that she always felt and the sudden desire to submit to his touch. She broke away then, breathless, but her resolve didn’t last, and he was pressing against her easily, feeling for the first time the way that her body molded to his. He memorized, in that moment, the way his hand cupped the dip of her waist and the swell of her breast through her clothes, and the way her moan reverberated in him as they kissed made him feel powerful.

He was, in the end, the one who was able to pull away first, though his head ducked to graze along her neck when hers tipped back against the wall and they both took a moment to catch their breath.

“Come inside,” he whispered, nuzzling behind her ear, his hand still on her ass. “You’re running for office; I don’t want to see this in the paper tomorrow.”

Andy nodded, her head dipped down against his shoulder for a brief moment, and he drew her chin up with a gentle hand as he stepped back. Her eyes searched his until his lips quirked into a small smile.

She returned his smile, and twisted her hand around his tie, pulling him to her again. “Two years, Toby. If I had my way, we’d have been doing this two years ago.”

“Yeah, but that would’ve required letting you win, and that’s never, ever gonna happen.” It was the most blatant lie he’d ever told; he knew already that he’d give her the world if he could.