Disclaimer: Pet Fly and Paramount own the copyright to The Sentinel and its characters. This piece of fan fiction was written solely for the love of the characters and to share freely with other fans. No profit is being made from the posting of this story.

Acknowledgments: Many thanks to the Great City team, particularly Alex and Marion, who helped with the beta of this story.

Sketch courtesy of L. A. Adolf, based on the manip "Sleeping Blair" by Kaelana. Both pictures used with permission of the artists.

Rating: NC-17

Summary: Jim finds inspiration for a little-known talent.

Originally published in The Sensual World 6 zine by MKASHEF Enterprises, July 2009.

Comments welcome and appreciated!

"Sandburg!" Jim shouted from the kitchen. "Hey, Sandburg, hurry up and get down here, we're going to be late!" He finished buttering the toast and pouring the coffee before his impatience got the better of him. Tightening the belt on his robe as he ran, he took the stairs to the loft two at a time. Opening his mouth to call out again, Blair's name died on Jim's lips as he reached the landing and froze.

Blair lay on his back in their bed, naked except for the sheet pulled up between his legs and covering his groin. Sun from the skylight above shone down on the sleeping man, while dust motes danced in the beams.

Slowly, Jim crossed to the bed and reached out, his hand hovering just above Blair's head, poised to caress the jumble of auburn curls, which glowed like a halo around the angelic face. He pulled back, loath to disturb the idyllic scene. He quietly opened the night stand drawer and pulled out a pad of paper and a pencil, then drew up a chair next to the bed and began to sketch.

All thoughts of work or the stake-out they were supposed to be attending to were forgotten as time slipped away unnoticed.

Blair stirred, his eyes blinking open in the bright light and slowly focusing in on the man in the chair. "Jim?" He pushed up on one elbow, the sheet falling away and exposing his semi-erect cock. "Jim?" he repeated softly. "What are you doing?"

"Huh?" Jim looked up from his sketch, startled to find Blair looking back at him.

"Were you... zoning on me?" Blair studied the beloved face, looking for the tell-tale signs.

Jim shook his head, clearing away the cobwebs of his daydreams. "No. No, not at all. Just thinking."

"What have you got there?" Blair reached out and plucked the pad of paper from Jim's unresisting fingers. "I didn't know you could draw," he commented in awe of the sketch of himself on the paper.

Jim snatched the pad back, his reply gruff with embarrassment at having been caught. "I took some life drawing classes in college. So what?"

"So nothing," Blair replied, the corners of his mouth curling up in a grin. "I didn't know you had it in you. It's not half bad."

"It's terrible!" Jim jerked open the night stand drawer, shoved the pad and pencil in, and slammed it shut again.

Blair looked puzzled, confused by Jim's strong reaction. He decided to try a different tack. "Do you like what you see?" he teased, one hand stroking his cock to fullness as his eyes caught and held Jim's. "Do I inspire your muse?"

"God, Sandburg, just shut up, why don't you?" Jim growled. His gaze was drawn inextricably toward Blair's groin; his Sentinel sight distinguishing a pulse in the throb of the arteries as the erect organ trembled ever-so-slightly in Blair's fist.

Blair's voice was barely a whisper of breath that only Sentinel ears could hear, "You know you want it."

Jim pounced like his animal spirit, pinning his lover's arms to the bed's head rail. Grateful that he'd showered and wore only his robe, he lowered his body onto Blair's, lips and cocks touching simultaneously. Like a hungry panther, he ravaged Blair's mouth, tasting his mate and claiming him. Jim's hips rocked rhythmically, the friction building between the two hard cocks. Blair squirmed beneath him, fighting not for his freedom, but for dominance.

Bound together by a bond deeper than mere love, deeper than mere sex, their orgasms surged within them, together, as though one body. Blair shifted beneath the weight of his captor, pulling his body upward so that Jim's heavy cock fell between Blair's legs, caressing his body's center. With a thrust, Blair impaled himself just as the rush of their climaxes flooded them both. Blair's cry was drowned by the roar of the panther... and then all was quiet, both men barely conscious; their energy drained by the forcefulness of their mating.

~oO0Oo~

In the early morning hours of the following day, the two men stumbled back into the loft. Barely taking the time to strip, Blair was asleep almost before his head hit the pillow. Simon had reamed them both a new one for not relieving Rafe and Brown on the stake-out and not calling in with a reasonable explanation. After pulling a double shift, both men were exhausted.

But for Jim, sleep wouldn't come so easily. He turned on the dim lamp on the night stand and withdrew his morning's sketch from the drawer. Picking up a pencil, he began to work on the shading, trying to capture the perfect combination of light and shadow. As his fingers filled in the image, his mind was filled with visions of dust motes, sunbeams, and Sandburg.