say it again.

Calden is already most of the way asleep when she moves. And when she moves, his eyes flicker open -- he gasps softly through parting lips when she slides away

but not very far.

The mattress shifts. She turns, puts her back to his side. It might be easy to read this as a form of rejection, a distancing. It doesn't cross Calden's mind. He knows she hasn't left him. Not even when the madness in her wanted to. Needed to. She stayed with him. He was glad for it then. He's glad for it now.

And he turns as she slides into sleep. He turns until his chest warms her back; his lower leg between her ankles. The blankets are ... somewhere. He pulls them up the best he can, covering her, but not so much that she'll overheat. He isn't certain, can't be certain, but he suspects she doesn't share her bed very often either. Neither of them are very used to sleeping with another body.

He nuzzles the back of her neck. Her hair, thick and golden. He sweeps it up over the pillow where it won't tickle his nose, and then

his arm settles heavy and warm across her side. He sleeps, too.

Dawn isn't far. Most days Calden would be up with the sun. Up before the sun, in the winters. Not today, though. Today he sleeps solidly through sunrise, sleeps through the breakfast hour, through rush hour, through midmorning.

He's still asleep when Avery wakes. And by then he's settled, he'd rolled a bit, he's slumped quite heavy against her back. If she pushes him, he rolls, grumbling, not waking, a great continental shift of a roll until he's sprawled on his back -- one arm outflung, sheets tangled, bare feet sticking out the bottom. He looks as dark and rough amidst that fine cotton, those rich creamy tones, as he did on her chaise. Wholly undressed and undone now though instead of merely half; and carelessly unconscious, lazy, as though he were so sure that no harm could befall him here that it isn't even on his mind.

There are glasses of water on the nightstand. Later on, Avery or her maid will find empty wineglasses and knives in the dishwasher, plus an empty pan. Plus some green beans in a pot in the fridge. Clothes strewn wherever they fell. And at least one towel flung up over some convenient hanger to dry. Haphazard. A bit messy.

That's later, though. Calden doesn't wake even if Avery pushes him off, doesn't wake if she picks up both glasses of water and drains them, but

he does wake, stirring blearily toward consciousness, if and when he feels her starting to get out of bed. And that's when he rolls toward her, murmuring something entirely incoherent, his arm flopping lazily around her waist -- too groggy to even wrap around and pull her back. He makes a vague inquiring noise:

"...y'going?"

Avery Chase

Without any talking or mussing about, the two of them -- quite bluntly -- pass out. Used to it or not, Avery sleeps heavily, deeply, and almost motionlessly. It's a much more thorough sleep than the only other time he's lain with her. She breathes like an animal, in silent inhales and exhales. He can, for the brief period where he is awake and she is not, almost hear her body regenerating itself. They could both be in their eighties, doddering and limping, and she would be healthier than he is. Sometimes it is easy to forget, and sometimes she truly is fragile in this form, but there is a limit.

At that limit, she becomes something so far from fragile that it becomes monstrous. At that limit,

she surges back to life,

climbs buildings,

tears her assailants apart. She wears the proof of it in her skin, twin marks before and after her heart, though she does not share the tale. And if she could do that to a man, if her body does that to time itself, a hangover is nothing.

--

Hours later she wakes and looks at the dim sunrise through the windows. Her curtains are effective. She dimly hears the sound of her steward and a maid, a sound she recognizes from years on end. Calden might think it the wind, if he woke. Calden has never had servants. He has no idea how softly they can open a door, or how silently they can close it again.

The breakfast hour comes and goes, and Avery feels sick when she wakes. She stays right where she is, sore and drained and dehydrated. Breathing in with a yawn she leaves him, and he flops around and rolls on her bed and Avery moves to get up. Calden flops his arm at her, mutters something incoherent, and she huffs a laugh at him. "I live here," she murmurs at him. Her hand on his arm then. A squeeze, gentle yet firm. She goes to the bathroom. The robe she dropped on the floor is hung again, but Calden's clothes are wherever he left them. He will likely think she hung it herself. He will not think that some servant of hers saw him naked, wrapped around their mistress.

It isn't fair, but she snaps when she gets into the bathroom. She shifts into a monstrous, feral version of herself. Some beauty remains, though not much. Her eyes are sharpened, still blue but briefly glowing almost gold. Her teeth grow in her mouth, come to points. She looks bestial, halfway between a fair face and a creature of myth. If she were seen like this on the hillsides through fog, people would come up with names to describe her. In one culture: monster. In another: angel. In another: fair folk. Baby-snatchers, blessing-givers, cursed of God, beloved of Diana.

The pain and the illness leave her almost instantly, and Avery sighs back into her birth form. She cures herself, and looks at herself in the mirror, and decides to stay mussed and messy and unclean for now. She uses the toilet and washes up and splashes water on her face, runs fingers through her hair, even brushes her teeth. She takes her robe from where it's hung as she comes back out, slipping her arms into it but not tying it. It drapes around her like the robe of a priestess or a witch, not quite trailing the floor.

Climbing back onto bed, her eyes brighter than they have a right to be, she positions herself in a tabletop over him, if he is in fact still lying in her bed. Her hands rest on either side of his torso. Her hair hangs down and her knees bracket one of his thighs.

"Come," she tells him. "There will be food. I suspect bananas."

Calden White

She lives here.

He settles as though reassured -- or perhaps he's just giving in to sleep again. And asleep is how she finds him when she comes back, that robe draped from her shoulders, a sliver of nudity glimpsed golden and tantalizing between the halves.

Or -- he'd be tantalized, if he saw. He doesn't, though. He's on his stomach, a great sprawl of a man occupying the center of her bed. He stirs as she climbs onto the mattress, and

as she climbs over him he turns over under her, slowly, languidly, the corners of his mouth curving as his lashes part. Maybe the animal in her, briefly but recently roused to the surface, recognizes the trust and the surrender implicit in such a motion. His throat exposed. His underbelly bared. The warmth in his eyes, too, shadowed beneath eyelids still half-closed.

His hand comes large and warm to her cheek. He looks at her like he finds her beautiful. Like he can't think of a better sight to wake to.

"Bananas," he repeats, laughing, uncomprehending. "Why bananas?"

Avery Chase

The animal in her does, in fact, recognize Calden's thoughtless vulnerability to her in that gesture. When he rolls under her, a sharp pang goes through her at his exposure. She is glad that she is already covering him, her back to the room, her robe and her hair and arms and legs guarding him. And maybe he sees that. Or maybe he doesn't, and all he feels is Avery's head dipping close to him, rubbing and nuzzling her forehead under his jaw, licking his neck the way a dam might clean her pup,

and then, not so unexpectedly, licking him a little softer, the way a woman might kiss her lover. Calden's fingers barely touch her hair where he cupped her cheek a moment ago. Heat coils up and rises from her center, spreading through her limbs. She lays herself out over him, covering him more fully, wrapping her arms around and under him. And also using him as a peson-shaped bed.

"Potassium," she tells him, snuggling to his chest as though she's going to sleep again.

Calden White

His eyes are closed through her licks, her kisses. He allows her his throat thoughtlessly, fearlessly; murmurs his pleasure at the touch of her tongue. Potassium, she says, as though this said it all. Calden laughs, an inexact murmur of mirth vibrating through his chest and through the solid lines of his neck, so near her lips that she can feel the sound before she hears it.

"Now you've done it," he rumbles. "You've revealed yourself as a lightweight. And I was so impressed by your ability to hold your scotch, too."

She curls up atop him, and he wiggles a bit under her to give her hands room enough to slip around his chest, under his back. His own hands fall heavily over her back. He grasps double handfuls of her robe and, quite without preamble or explanation, and without much in the way of hurry or furtiveness,

he starts to pull her robe up. Rumples, rucks, bunches it up over the small of her back, tugs until the sides split over her legs, pulls until the hem rises up over her thighs, and then over her ass.

He's rather unequivocal about putting his hands on her, then. Runs his palms over her, a heavy and shameless sort of caress; grasping her cheeks one in each palm, squeezing, rubbing. Presently one hand follows her spine up her back - and there, begins to tug her robe down from her shoulders. When the last of the silk between them gives way, and when her breasts come bare against his chest,

Calden sighs, a low, rough sound. Sheer enjoyment. "I love your body," he whispers. And, echoing her: "You should keep me here forever. Weren't you going to shackle me to your bedpost? You're a tease, Miss Chase, that's what you are."

Avery Chase

She can't believe he isn't hungover. Or: she can't believe he isn't so hungover that waking up is painful, that snuggling and laughing doesn't make him ill. Yet he makes that sound when she licks him, and starts teasing her, and starts pulling her robe up so he can rub her ass in his palms and feel her tits on his chest. Avery shifts slightly atop him; she wants to feel it when his cock hardens and lifts against her.

"We drank two bottles of red wine," she reminds him politely. There is science to why the 'red' there makes a difference, or the sheer amount, but she doesn't argue with him further. She lies there while he squeezes her ever-so-shapely derriere, quite content to let him touch her like this. Her arms don't come out from under him, so he leaves a swath of fabric across the middle of her back where it hangs on her elbows, and Avery is content with that, too. She breathes in, and sighs heavily, sleepily, while he's tugging and pulling that fabric. "I shifted," she admits. "I am quite sober and clear-minded at the moment."

He loves her body. And she should keep him. Shackle him. She's a tease.

Avery snorts, scoffing from her nostrils. "I still can if you like. I thought I might at least feed you."

Calden White

"The French," Calden says, "drink two thirds of a bottle a day, every day, on average. Don't tell me you, with that proud Anglican name, don't want to at least measure up.

"Besides. It's just a matter of tolerance. We'll make a proper drunkard of you yet." He leans up to kiss her mouth -- she admits she shifted. He laughs, low and long, and then he kisses her anyway, smiling into it, slipping his hands under her thoroughly disarrayed robe to touch her...

...wherever he can reach her, really. Long, slow, sweeping strokes. "That's not fair," he whispers. "That's cheating." And he kisses her again, and this one is longer. Slower. Sweeping and deep and --

not so playful. A little more poignant, a little more profound. It goes on a long time. His hands cover her back when it ends, and she gets what she wants after all: feels him hardening against her, slowly and by degrees, as though even his arousal is a slow, lazy thing this morning.

"You can do whatever you want with me," he murmurs. "But I loved how it was last night, the last time."

Avery Chase

"I am not French," Avery interrupts diffidently, before he explains where he's going with that. She most certainly is not. She is not House Gleaming Eye. Wyrmfoe, she wants to tell him -- or remind him. As though there's any difference to the common tribes what house their Silver Fang fuckbuddy is from. But he is talking low and slow and lazy, and she realizes he has more to say in that sentence, and her eyes gleam (despite her true house) as he goes on.

She kisses him in between 'matter of' and 'tolerance', right on his mouth. And he leans up to give her a proper kiss after that, after he's spoken, but he laughs instead. And touches her. And slips his hands between her legs, stroking at her lips, making her arch her spine slightly, lifting her hips to move into that touch. There is only the faintest, softest tracery of silk wetness there, just as he is only just starting to harden and firm against her.

They keep kissing, and Avery makes no argument about cheating or what is fair. She only kisses him, moving a little on him, with that touch of his, as he brings his hands to cover her and hold her close to him. Quietly he tells her what she can do with him. But.

Her breath curls over his jaw, which is now thoroughly scratchy. Avery opens her eyes and looks at him while those words leave this mouth and sink into her, as though she is smoothing them over her skin and welcoming them into her blood. She exhales after a few moments of simply looking at him, exploring his eyes, then lowers her mouth to his and kisses him again, long and slow and sweet. She doesn't say me, too, but perhaps the intention makes its way through her to him.

Calden White

The French, he says.

I am not French, she says. And he pauses, he laughs, he leans up ahead of schedule and kisses her soft and light on the lips.

"I know that," he says, very very patient and all, and

then she lets him finish, and he makes her eyes gleam, and -- she kisses him again. This one is firmer, it interrupts him, he lets himself be interrupted. The words simply pause. Then they continue. Then, for the third time in perhaps half a minute,

they kiss again.

It's like they can't quite bring themselves to stop. Nothing about this is urgent or frantic, but it is continuous, it is slow and enjoyable and enjoying, it makes her eyes glitter and it makes his smoky. He gives her a small confession. He gives her that moment after, too, when she's simply looking at him, seeing him relaxed and quiet and warm and open beneath her. Whatever you want, he said. It's all yours, he may as well have said.

Those eyes of his, greyish with that hint of green, close again when she comes back to him. His chin lifts, and he welcomes that kiss, takes it, absorbs it, breathes it back to her.

When they part his hand comes to her face. He touches her gently, intimately, rubbing his thumb over her cheekbone.

"I love the way you taste," he whispers. He loves, he loves, he loves.

Avery Chase

No you didn't she could argue. He didn't know she's not French. Maybe her mother was. He doesn't know. But Avery doesn't argue with him. She doesn't prod at him or tease him. She and he kiss instead of arguing. She feels strangely comfortable this morning, lazy and replete, particularly now that the pain of a hangover is gone from her system. So: she sighs instead, when that kiss parts. She still has her eyes closed. She looks like she's just received Communion.

And then her eyes open, her cheek moving into his cupped palm, his rubbing thumb.

"I know, darling," she murmurs, and

how could she not, with the way he kisses her, the way he goes at her sometimes as though he's starved for her cunt. How could she not know that he adores her?

Avery seals him to her with another kiss, and pushes herself up on her palms, sliding them out from under him. "I'm going to feed you," she informs him. "There will be breakfast, and we shall have coffee. Or juices."

Calden White

God, she must know. Look at how he kisses her at every opportunity. The moment they meet, every time. In a blues club or in her foyer; on the street, one imagines, or possibly,

just maybe,

even in front of others of the Garou Nation. Those who might have things to say about a wolf of the royal tribe and a kin -- however thinly bred -- of Stag.

She must know he loves her taste. Wants her, adores her, adores adoring her. But there's this to be said too: he doesn't try to hold her back when she pushes herself up. Much, anyway. His hands drift down her back, cup her rather shapely ass. His mouth tilts, a crooked smile.

"And bananas," he supplies. And then he too sits up, and that distance closes again; his chest presses to hers as he wraps his arms around her just for a second. Kisses her thoroughly and soundly on the mouth. "And, I hope, some form of bacon or sausage or ham. I need my strength if I'm expected to continue to please the lady."

He lets her go: his knuckles pressing to the mattress, propping himself up as she sits up or stands or gets out of bed. His eyes follow her. Apart from that brief, gracious goodbye last weekend, they've rarely seen each other by day, but the truth is they're both glorious in the sunlight. She's golden. He's auburn and tan, and the green in his eyes is all the clearer, sparking as he watches her. After a while he throws the covers back, climbs out of her bed, lifts his arms, links his hands overhead, stretches with a yawn so enormously loud that he may as well be roaring to establish his territory.

Drops his hands, after. Shakes his head, blows out a breath, and then

brushing past her, his shoulder rubbing past hers, his eyes following her curves down with a smirk,

heads for the bathroom.

Avery Chase

Once again, Calden White is pawing at her, playing grab-ass and grinning lopsidedly with self-amusement and, more than that, simple enjoyment. Avery tosses her hair off her shoulder as she rises back up, essentially sitting that ass of hers into his palms like he's only creating a seat for her. Their chests touch when he sits up, and she shivers, her robe still hanging from her elbows instead of her shoulders.

When he kisses her -- again -- she thinks he's going to roll them back into her covers, lay her out against that soft mattress, and have sex with her. Again. She starts to slide her arms around his neck, and that is where they are when he stops kissing her, talking of meat and pleasing his lady. She has a dark look in her eyes, a smirk playing at the corner of her lips.

"I think you're quite burly enough, thank you," she informs him, and

they do, in fact, get out of bed instead of wrecking it all over again. Avery slips off of him and off the bed, feet falling softly to the rug that protects morning-tender feet from the hardwood. A few steps and she'll be back on that firm, polished surface; in the meantime she turns from him, drawing that silk-soft cotton robe up and around her, tying it off loosely. "There will be a guest robe," she tells him mildly as he starts to flip the covers back and gets up.

He stretches, yawning, and she looks over her shoulder at him, smirking with fond amusement. Avery shakes her head. "I believe there should be a toothbrush for you as well, if you didn't bring one."

Calden White

Oh, the idea of another go-around isn't so very far from Calden's mind, to be honest. It's there -- a notion conceived, toyed with, and ultimately let go because... well. Because they drank so much, last night. Because they haven't eaten for quite some time now. And because

even if he's easy and smirking and flirting with her again, the bruises of last night still have him taking a little more care with her. And the tenderness, the intimacy of that last round still echoes in him in the quietest, subtlest ways.

Still. She sits back into his hands. Tosses back her hair like that. Makes something flare in his eyes. When she gets up, when she ties her robe,

he thinks to himself that maybe he should have tumbled her back into her luxurious sheets after all. Just once more before they leave the room.

That thought falls by the wayside, though. She seems so sure that there will now magically be a toothbrush and a robe for him. Calden, finishing up that leonine stretch of his, quirks an eyebrow at her. "Will there now?" he reflects. Then the penny drops. "Your staff's pretty good with unexpected developments, are they?"

Avery Chase

There is a moment when they very nearly do it all over again. When he is hardening against her and she is rolling her hips down to rub against him. When he is smoothing his hands over her ass, stroking between her legs, feeling her starting to grow wet

wet for you

once more. They drift apart, though, because of hunger and dehydration and simple tenderness. He wants to be careful with her, and the truth is that there's some necessity in that. She looks at him, seeing some of his lingering desire in his eyes that meets her own, matches it. He realizes why there will be breakfast, and a robe, and a toothbrush. Avery smiles.

"What good is a staff that is not?" she asks him, and then, on a whim, crosses to him.

Calden is naked. Avery is covered. She brushes her hand over his side, down his abdomen, with the backs of her knuckles tracing his skin. At first she is looking at her hand against his body, her golden skin to his slightly rougher, ruddier coloring. Then she lifts her eyes.

"If you like, we could wash first." Nevermind that she showered at least once last night. They've fucked again since then. Nevermind that he needs food and water and nevermind that the intimacy they shared last night in the dark still feels like something sacred and untouchable, unrecoverable. She touches him, and she looks at him, and there is not a question in her eyes, nor an invitation. It is an offering. All he has to do is accept it.

Calden White

The truth is, some small and ruthlessly tamped-down part of Calden wonders if it really is just exceptional staffing -- or if her staff is used to this sort of unexpected guest. If they prepare for the eventuality of their mistress,

their gorgeous, sexually confident mistress with her healthy appetite for sensuality,

bringing a guest home. A fucktoy. A friend with benefits.

None of which should matter to him, of course. It's not as though they have some sort of exclusivity contract. So he pushes that thought aside, and meanwhile she's come to him, put her hands on him, felt his body warm and firm, carved under her palms. He leans into her touch. He has the sort of complexion that might have once been emerald-isle fair: all alabaster skin, Irish roses in the cheeks. Some trace of that ruddiness, that easy flush, remains still -- but generations of american crossbreeding and a lifetime of high-plateau sunshine has bronzed the undertone of his skin. Against his body, her hands seem fair and golden, nearly aglow. His hands come up to cover hers, holding them gently against his abdomen.

"Come with me," he says softly.

Avery Chase

As hard as he tries not to, the thought keeps coming up in Calden's mind: is he the only one? Is the latest in a long string? Does she do this a lot? Does he matter to her at all? Why is he worrying about it? Stop worrying about it, Calden.

He mercilessly pushes that thought aside, yet again, but like a spring being pressed downward, it may very well erupt under the pressure eventually. While Avery, herself, is unaware. She actually has not thought much at all about whether Calden has multiple lovers, if his every-other-weekends in the city have been his opportunity to seek out some supple young thing and fuck her senseless every so often for a few months -- or just once -- until they get bored with one another, if he has some fuckbuddy of his own closer to the ranch who helps him relieve the stress of running such a business, dealing with his father, living out there with mostly men and not a spectacular tit in sight for miles.

Avery might just not care. It's not as though they have some sort of exclusivity contract. It's not as though he's her mate, or her official consort, or anything like that. He doesn't belong to her. She doesn't belong to him. He has promised her nothing. She has promised him only that if he has a heart attack from sheer desire, she will find someone to heal him.

Calden covers her hand while she looks at him, telling her to come with him. She gave him an offering; he answered with a request. An invitation. Avery exhales, her free hand coming up from her side then and moving into his hair, fingers sliding through the auburn as she pulls his head down, tilts her own face up, and kisses him as though she hasn't seen him for weeks.

Her breasts touch his chest again, that thin robe separating flesh from flesh. He can feel her nipples hardening through it.

--

That kiss goes on far longer than intended. Calden begins to bend to her, gathering her in his arms and groaning softly. All that arousal, stirred when she climbed over him as he woke, starts rising to the surface again. Like a banked fire, it comes to life in mere moments, his cock hardening where he presses to her lower half, her pussy growing warmer, growing wet. Her fingers are in his hair, all of them now, fingertips massaging his scalp while she moans softly into his mouth.

Her robe comes off. The tie is undone fiercely, quickly, but when it slips off her shoulders and down her body to the floor, it's slow. Calden almost grabs it to make it go slower, to part it gradually over her breasts, to slide his hands down and around to cup them in his palms. Avery exhales, biting her lower lip, but letting it go when he takes his eyes off of her body and kisses her again. Her thighs part and her spine arches. He feels her stroke her inner thigh across his cock; she feels him clutch at her ass in response, feels his cock jerk, feels herself grow all the more heated, all the more slick.

They don't make it to the bathroom right away, much less the shower. They make it to the bed, because after all, it's right there. Instead of climbing atop it, however, they end up against the footboard, Calden whispering what he wants in between groans, Avery panting just at the sound of it. Who would listen to such things, such filth, and not want to turn around, bending over the edge of the mattress? Why would she tell him no, she doesn't want him to sink to his knees and spread her open with his hands and lick that wet pussy clean? Well: she might, since his jaw is bristled now and rough, scratchy. Her hands clutch at the bedspread as she lets out a yelp, a little whimper.

His hands smooth down her ass, over the backs of her thighs. His mouth rests kisses there, and there, and he shushes comfort to her. I'll be gentle, he promises again, his tone dark and amused and warning all at once just like last time. And just like the last time, it is just about the most goddamn erotic thing she's ever heard. Avery moans, arching her back, stretching out as Calden begins to lick at her again.

She comes pantingly, her whimpers plaintive and needful, her hands grabbing the sheets so forcefully that she's dragging them all toward her body. She's squirming near the end so eagerly that he can barely finish her off. Calden grabs her ass in his hands and lifts her slightly, which puts her on her toes, makes her unable to writhe quite so wildly, makes her start to scream when he flutters his tongue over her clit, rapid now, til she's bucking against the mattress, gasping into the covers, slicking his jaw with her taste.

Those hands keep rubbing her ass, slow and warm, as she comes back down. As he stands over her and behind her, watching her til her trembling subsides. After the first time she rolls her hips upward and brushes over him, he begins rocking slowly against her, his cock sliding smoothly back and forth between the cheeks of her ass, sending shivers through her, making her cunt clench for want of him.

Maybe because of last night -- no, certainly, definitely because of last night -- he waits a little longer. There's no question of going to the shower now. Avery is breathing heavily beneath him, lifting her hips, all but crying for him with her body language, and her skin is so soft and she feels so fucking incredible and he withholds and she shudders and soon enough she says his name,

with that note in his voice, pleading with him, and he doesn't need to be told what she's begging for.

--

There is the intimation of roughness: her body bent over before him, his back straight, his cock sliding firm and slow and deep into her. There is the picture of distance, of detachment, except for the way he watches her. Except for the way she fucks him back, whimpering his name, the way he says her name, the way his hands slide down her back, smoothing his palm along her spine to her hips, holding her against him while he grinds into her.

The way they fuck this morning is lazy and filthy and gentle until it can't be anymore, until neither of them can stand it, until she's rising up on her palms and bouncing back against him and he's trying for the love of all that is holy not to slam into her but she keeps working herself on him like that,

god!

Until his hands are gripping her hips to try and -- fuck her harder? not fuck her harder? survive this? -- and then gripping the bedcovers beneath them both as he bends over her, kissing her back, panting against her neck, kissing her neck, trying to kiss her mouth but she doesn't bend that way and

feeling her come again, long and slow and forever, it feels like, til his own orgasm rises up inevitable and inescapable to twine with hers, to ride through hers, as every clench of her cunt takes him more thoroughly inside of her.

And they keep going through it, after it, though the way they rock and grind together in the aftermath is as lazy and filthy and gentle as the way they began. His cock pulses in her; she clutches at him. They both groan, almost in harmony, his chest to her back, his forearms barely holding him up over her.

--

And the banter afterward: whether she should, in fact, shackle him to her bed. say it again, she's murmuring, turning over under him, his cock sliding out of her, her legs spreading around him once again to drape loosely to either side of his body. say I can do whatever I like with you. Her hands are running over him; she is wanting him again. She wonders if he really would let her tie him to the bed, feed him and let him rest occasionally, but otherwise be there for her to fuck at every whim. If nothing else, he knows she likes it when he says that. She likes it more when he nuzzles her under her jaw, kisses her neck and her breasts, suckles at them because, to be fair, he didn't get to at all during that round.

She likes it when he scoops her up, because if they don't get cleaned up they'll never eat and, as he reminds her, he needs his strength to keep this up.

There are dual showerheads in her bathroom. They both stay warm while they wash together. Perhaps he is resolved to get clean and move on, but standing under the water she smiles at him, smirks at him while water runs down her body, and a moment later he's crowding her to the tiled wall, just to feel her like that,

naked and warm and slippery-wet,

wrapping her legs around his waist when he lifts her up, onto his body.

Avery looks into his eyes when he enters her this time. She wants to see the way his eyes flash at the feel of her. She wants to watch his mouth part when he finds himself at home in her body.

--

So: it is nearly lunchtime. Even when they're quick in the shower, even when she's laughing because her legs are trembling and coltish, even when he's set her down and made sure she's steady and they're washing sweat and cum off of themselves, kissing under the falling water, it takes time to get clean, and to brush their teeth -- there is, in fact, a fresh toothbrush in its package resting on top of a neatly folded washcloth on the counter, as well as a shaving kit with a single-blade safety razor and a straight razor and a four-blade disposable razor in it's package, just in case he actually shaves every day and just in case he prefers straight to safety or maybe the newfangled nonsense.

Maybe he asks her why he didn't see her razor anywhere. Maybe she tells him she got quite a bit of laser treatment when she was in college, before a trip to the Caribbean. Maybe they just chat, aimlessly, while he pulls on the light terry robe that was hung up on a hook for him, clean and fresh and new-smelling, made for someone much larger than Avery Chase. Maybe,

when she slips her hand into his as they leave the bathroom,

he folds his hand around hers and holds it, close, as they walk to the kitchen.

Where there is quite a spread. A bowl of fruits, apples and -- of course -- bananas, oranges and pears and grapefruit. A breadboard and what looks like a freshly-baked loaf beside a long bread knife. A small porcelain urn of creamy butter, a set of porcelain-handled spreading knives for that and for the set of miniature jars of jams and preserves from apple butter to strawberry and just about everything in between. Avery has a toaster now, which she didn't last night. Avery also has a very large skillet with a copper base now, which she didn't before, and even things like plates and cutlery. There is milk and cream and juice in the refrigerator; there is a coffee press and a grinder and a bag of locally roasted beans and a shiny yellow kettle on the stove and a pretty sugar bowl on the island with a tiny spoon. There is an assortment of loose-leaf and bagged teas in a lovely cherry-wood box on the counter, the interior lined with dark blue velvet.

There is a rasher of butcher-fresh, thick-cut bacon in the fridge. There are eggs, too.

Avery looks pleased. But not surprised.

Calden White

say it again.

That's after the first round. Or the nth, depending on when you started counting. That's what she murmurs, turning over beneath him, hearing him groan softly when he slides out of her. For so brawny, so burly a creature, he certainly seems taken to pieces every time she's through with him. Sprawled over her, the bed carrying more of his weight than his own two feet, he barely manages to lever up from her enough to give her room to turn.

Those smooth legs of hers wrap loosely around his body. She's a tall woman. Those legs are long and sleek. He really should lavish more attention on them, but then -- he always gets distracted elsewhere. Her mouth. Her cunt. Those magnificent tits. Still, right now, in the aftermath, he follows her movement with his hand. Touches her, caresses her, runs his palm up her thigh and then up her side. It's contact for the sake of contact; its own reward. And there's a secret smile in his eyes, curling onto his mouth, when he raises himself up enough to see her

while his hand cups her breast.

"You can do whatever you want," he whispers. It doesn't sound like lip service. It doesn't sound like repetition on cue. It sounds like --

"I'm yours to do with as you wish."

-- which is such a dangerous thing to say that she sees it flicker in his eyes a second later: should he have? Was that too much? His eyes drop away, fix on her mouth. His mouth nips at hers, a gentle grazing kiss that repeats itself on the arch of her jaw,

on the line of her neck,

on the rise of her breast. He parts his lips; his breath is warm. His tongue is delicate, careful, slow, playful: caressing her nipple in tiny, sweet little circles until it hardens, until her hips rise against him, until

he scoops her up in his arms. Because if they don't leave her bed right now, they'll never leave at all.

Not that that helps, in the long run. They have each other in the shower again. It's like they can't get enough of each other. Actually, it's not like that: it is that. They can't get enough. She smirks at him and he's ardent, he's inflamed, he picks her right up and her back is against the tile and he's panting as he kisses her, he's almost rough with her again but

no. This time he remembers. Reins himself in. He strokes between her legs, rubs against her until that first furious urge is past, and then

while she watches his eyes, watches his mouth, his face,

he lowers her onto him. Slowly, his hands gripping her water-slick body, his mouth coming to hers as his eyes close.

There is a toothbrush. There is a shaving kit, which Calden thinks is overkill, even when it comes to hospitality. He passes over the disposable razor, admires the straight-edge for a moment, but ultimately sets it aside. Too complicated. It's the safety razor he uses, a handsome thing of gleaming accents and satin-finish grip, reassuringly heavy in the hand. Calden has enough adeptness with it to suggest this might be his usual shaving implement ... if and when he bothers to shave, that is. He suggests that maybe she can keep this one around for him, lightly, not wanting to assume the sort of permanence that keeping a set of toiletries at her place might imply. Since she likes him shaved, he adds, smiling, and yet doesn't even have a women's razor for him to borrow.

That's how they get into the discussion of laser treatment. Which he looks briefly intrigued by: how come her hindlegs aren't embarrassingly bare in the other forms? She calls him ridiculous. He grins, head tilted, scraping off a last stroke of shaving cream and twenty-hour beard.

Conversation interrupts for a moment. He turns on the tap and splashes cool water on his face, cleaning away the residue of his shaving cream. And towels off. And slips that cool, summery robe on, large enough to fit his shoulders, large enough not to truncate somewhere north of his knees. As they leave her bathroom her hand slips into his. His fingers close, and he raises her hand to his mouth, kissing her knuckles lightly, playfully, smiling into her eyes.

They find bananas in the kitchen. And meat. And a cornucopia of other things. Calden takes eggs out, and bacon. He puts a pan on the stove. "Sunny side up or easy-over?" he asks her, dropping a hefty amount of meat on one side while saving space for eggs on the other. Utensils that have magically appeared in the drawers overnight clatter noisily as he hunts for a spatula. One suspects one of his older brothers taught him to cook. Or maybe his father. He bangs around in the kitchen, cracks eggs in his fists, shakes the whole pan to keep food from sticking. Half a dozen eggs go onto the pan, unless Avery manages to speak up in time and tell him she wants fewer than three. He takes his eggs easy-over, with plenty of bacon on the side, and two slices of toast,

a banana. Also, a quartered orange. And some orange juice.

They eat at the kitchen island again. He's big and hunkered over atop that barstool, all shoulders, one forearm folded along the edge of the counter. They actually have forks this morning. He eats voraciously, as though he'd worked up an appetite earlier: chows down on eggs and bacon, mops up spilled yolk with his toast, gulps juice. He eats fast too, and without thinking about it, as though breakfast is traditionally something wolfed down as quickly as humanly possible for him. When he's done, it's likely she's only halfway through. He pours himself another glass of juice, which he nurses, looking out her window at the mountains and the city; looking back at her. Sunlight goes well with her hair, he thinks.

"Can I ask you something?" he says, sounding curious. "What you said earlier made me wonder -- did you first-change pretty recently?"

Avery Chase

His eyes flicker when he says it: she can do what she wants with him. He's hers. Avery sees that flicker, and she holds his gaze even as he drops away to look at her mouth, to kiss her. She doesn't say anything about it. Her mouth melts into his, even into that bite, her lip soft in his teeth. She is so soft. She smooths her legs and her hands up his sides; he lets his mouth move to her breasts, always drawn there, bird to nectar. Calden hears her breath start to quick, start to hitch. Perhaps he thinks of stopping there, but he goes on, licking her, as time melts around them, as Avery starts to move toward him, longing and welcoming.

She can do whatever she wants. And at no point does she seem to want to harm him. Even when she commands him, she is only playing. He saw a glimpse of her madness last night, in her silence, in her withdrawal, in the way she looked at him like a stranger. Her insanity does not make her want to harm anyone. If anything: it makes her want to ensure that she can't.

Avery wraps her legs around him and lifts herself onto his body, carried to her own shower, smiling against his mouth.

--

As he's shaving, Avery brushes her teeth. He mentions, carefully to the side, that he likes this one. Maybe she should keep it around. She's no fool, though. She glances at him, and she hears the lightness of his tone, and he adds that she likes him shaved. That careful look she gives him spreads into a smile at that, and his joking complaint that she has no razor for him to borrow. Hence her explanation of laser treatments.

His question actually gives her pause. Her toothbrush is held to one side, a safety razor is in his hand, and she considers why her other forms do not have hairless underarms and legs. She does not actually call him ridiculous, not this time, but only because she is suddenly terribly curious, herself. Avery spits the toothpaste from her mouth, neatly and about as prettily as a person can do such a thing.

"I have no" idea," she answers then, amused. Maybe she'll ask a Theurge. One who won't laugh at her. Or maybe when they're both drunk. That's what she should do: get a Theurge drunk and ask about lasering and shifting and science.

They leave the bathroom, hand in hand. Her hair is wet and combed; her robe is fresh and matches his, though it's smaller. He kisses her knuckles with rough grace, and she smiles back to his gaze, amused. He does amuse her so. It certainly helps the time pass.

--

It seems to go without saying -- and does -- that Calden will cook breakfast for them. Avery does her part, at least a little: she makes some tea for herself and tells him over easy with a smile. He goes quickly about all of this: frying up bacon and eggs while she slices a grapefruit in half and finds a tidy, sharp-toothed grapefruit spoon in the drawer. Avery seems quite happy about plating everything: on large rectangular white plates, she gives them each half a grapefruit. She slices them each a banana in tidy little slices. She peels an orange with her fingers and gives them each a row of slices. Three types of fruit is quite enough, she decides.

Calden is slicing bread while the bacon fries. They toast it, and Avery hums. He's cooking eggs and, when he looks over, sees that she has cut the crusts off the bread and sliced them into triangles and put a smidge of butter on each. When he has bacon and eggs ready, Avery wants to transfer everything to the plates. She makes it all so pretty and smiles at her handiwork, like she's done something a servant usually does and has not utterly failed at it. This is a triumph.

With tea and juice and breakfast, they sit at the island on the barstools, side by side. Avery eats as primly as she set their plates: her back is straight, each triangle of toast is given jam separately, she adds no salt to anything but a bit of pepper to her eggs and a tiny dash of sugar to her grapefruit. She eats slowly, smiling at the way he hunkers over his meal and wolfs it down.

Considering how they met, the tables have turned a bit. She sips her tea with sugar and a dab of cream, looking at him over the rim of the white, silver-rimmed china teacup when he asks if he can...ask. "Mm," she hums, in the affirmative. He asks her about her first change. She doesn't know what recent comment he's referring to, but no matter.

"Oh," Avery says, slowly setting her teacup down on its saucer. She looks faintly embarrassed. "Yes," but not dishonest. "I received my name just two years ago. I changed the summer after my first year of grad school."

Her fork tines fiddle with some of the egg on her plate. "Sometimes," she says, though she doesn't sound morose about it, merely thoughtful, "it's like playing catch-up. Most garou I meet changed when they were teenagers. Many my age are fosterns already. There are even adrens who are in their mid-twenties. Not many change as late as I do."

She pauses, then shrugs lightly, looking at him with a smile. "I did meet a Black Fury once who didn't change until she was in her late forties. She had quite a lot to say about the expression of female anger and the power of its oppression. It was a very interesting conversation," Avery adds, and lifts her teacup to her mouth again to sip.

Calden White

Busy with the hot portion of breakfast, Calden doesn't see what she's done with the toast and the fruit until he turns around. And when he does, the expression on his face

is very much like the one she wore when he came back to their table at Ziggie's with a sunshine cocktail.

He says nothing of it, though. He doesn't have to. The smirk sort of says it all, even as he's sliding into the seat beside her, thumping her plate down in front of her and starting in on his own like maybe there were a few hundred head of cattle waiting to be looked after. And there are -- but they're up north, hours away, and not his problem today.

He asks about her change. She looks embarrassed, which makes him feel a little sorry to have asked. Her hand lowers her teacup. Of course she drinks tea from a cup, even as he's gulping juice out of a glass. His hand covers hers when her fingers release the delicate little handle; his fingers, far from delicate, fold around hers.

And meanwhile, she tells him she changed in grad school. He looks surprised, then pleased and not at all surprised. Of course she went to grad school. That intelligence wouldn't have settled for finishing school and trophywifing. She muses about playing catch-up, and about changing at nearly fifty, and his thumb rubs the back of her hand idly. He stabs a few pieces of bacon with his fork, then eats.

"Maybe there is some catching up to do for you," he says, "but on the flip side I doubt any of the kids that Firsted before they could drive understand humanity as well as you do. Or ... anything as well as you do. There must be benefits to growing up a little before you get pushed into the front lines of a war.

"Besides," he adds, and now with thirty-three percent more smirk, "if you were two years out of a conventional Firsting, you could be hitched to that spotty seventeen-year-old by now. And I'd be stuck herding cows on a Sunday instead of having breakfast at noon."

He picks up his glass, takes another swallow. Genuinely curious: "What were you studying in grad school?"

Avery Chase

It surprises Avery a bit when Calden reaches for her hand. But she smiles at him, fond and tolerant. Any excuse to hold my hand, Mr. White she thinks, and permits it. Their fingers stroke together a bit. Or rather, Avery stroke her fingers against the side of his, in between his digits while they talk. She eats her eggs while he talks.

The truth is: she was meant to be a wife and mate. A well-bred, financially stable, household-running, leader-in-the-community wife and mate. No one in her family would stand for her being snatched up by some hot-blooded moron, doomed to die a matter of weeks after his naming. Avery would be educated, raised fully to adulthood, and then suitors of acceptable rank and standing would be permitted to court her. They would have to have their own wealth, of course, in some form or another; they would have to please Avery herself. Charm would matter. A good match for both families would have to be confirmed by augury -- drops of blood sacrificed to a particular talen, something like that -- to make sure that any pups of the union would be, at very least, healthy and strong.

If not sane.

Perhaps the fact that a mateship to an older wolf was always part of the expectation for her life's trajectory is involved in how naturally, how fondly, Avery takes to her attraction to Calden. Perhaps she enjoys the amusement of doing the math, of figuring out where they both were in parts of their mismatched histories. Perhaps nothing about the ten-year gap between them strikes her as odd, much less displeasing.

Then again, Avery herself acts far older than twenty-five.

"I tend to think of it that way," she says, with a small nod. "It doesn't break my heart; it's just a strange place to be sometimes." Avery smiles. "What spotty seven--oh," as she remembers, laughing brightly. "No, I don't think so," she adds on to that, still laughing, shaking her head. Calden has no idea how ridiculous that idea is. She laughs again, lifting her tea.

He asks her what she studied. "I should clarify: law school. I majored in political science and minored in public policy, however."

Calden White

Avery does, in fact, act older than her years. Calden always assumed it was because of what she was. A Garou. A leader and a lawman (lawwoman? lawwolf?) of the Nation. He'd always assumed, he realizes now, that she was something above a Cliath. Maybe not an Adren -- not by the way she mentioned, ever so briefly, the Adren in her home city that would have happily torn her apart if not for the sake of that mystery man between them. But a Fostern, certainly.

But she's not. He's beginning to realize that. She's not a Fostern, and she hasn't been a Garou very long at all. Two years. Which to some -- to Ahrouns, to cannon-fodder from the lesser Tribes -- may be a long time, may be most or all or more than a post-Change lifetime. Avery wears privilege like a crown, though. She would have never been destined for servitude and ignominy, even if she'd never changed. Two years out of her life: very little, really. Not enough to have shaped her wholly. Not enough to have given her her maturity and her bearing.

That must simply be her, then. A product of who she is, and not what she is.

And she laughs at him: quel ridicule!, mated to some fumbling teenaged boy. His lips quirk -- his stubble shaven, she can see every flicker of humor on that warm mouth of his, and there are quite a few flickers indeed. He still has her hand in his. He kisses her hand again -- no wait, he bites her hand this time, his teeth scraping ever so gently over the fragile skin of her knuckles. They talk about what she studied. She clarifies: law school.

He laughs aloud, his lips brushing her skin. His breath over her fingers. He lets her hand slip loose, picking up his glass again. "Of course you did. It's almost like you're a Philodox."

The last of his juice goes down the hatch. When he sets his glass down he leans back in his seat, smiling at her crookedly. "So, an aspiring lawyer-lawmaker," he muses. "No wonder matching wits with you is never boring. Or easy. I think the Garou Nation was the right career move for you though, Miss Chase. Not sure that pesky honest streak would've gotten you very far in Washington."

Avery Chase

The rough barbarian who does not properly appreciate a well-plated breakfast nor eat it with any panache will not return her hand to her. Avery has not scolded him, and merely uses her free hand for all the business of dining, even daubing her napkin at her lips after sipping her tea. Then he kisses it. No: bites it, and her eyebrows lift and she removes her hand from his, giving him the slightest, softest tap on his nose that one could imagine. How dare he, her look of mild affront seems to say, as much as my darling, that is not how one behaves at breakfast.

Calden reaches for his juice. He attributes her studies to her auspice and she corrects: "Silver Fang," neatly but seriously. Though it fits, and though it has come in handy at times, in the end it is her blood that drove her to such heights: to position herself in power. To rule humans not behind closed doors or with pocketbooks but visibly, with some version of celebrity. It is what the Silver Fangs have always done.

It is what Silver Fang kin have always done. The garou of the tribe are usually too busy ruling creatures who are closer to their equal: other garou.

She gives him a narrow smile as he goes on, spearing some egg with her fork. "You flatter me," she says, and he can see how well she says it, how she laughs, how despite the softness of her touch and the grace with which the message is delivered, he gets that message as firmly as if she'd snapped at him: that area of conversation is being closed for renovations. Follow me to the east wing. And another message beneath it, a challenge to his declaration that she's too honest to have made it in Washington: really, Mr. White?

Calden White

Calden gets the message, all right. And an un-rough, civilized gentleman might have left it at that, but rough barbarians who won't return her hand, who'll nip at her knuckles --

well. Who's to say what they'd do, as a class. For Calden's part, his head tilts slightly. He watches her for a moment, serious now. Then:

"Did I say something insulting or upsetting?"

Avery Chase

"No, darling, of course you didn't," Avery says, and she turns to him, looking at him. Her sculpted brows tug together; she means it, and she makes her face look a certain way to try and prove that. She covers his hand with her own, the one that he was just biting and the one that she was just swatting tenderly on the tip of his nose. It's a casual gesture, but then she rubs her thumb over the side of his hand, and

it isn't so casual. It's closer.

"You are asking me about a life I spent two decades living, a future I spent all that time preparing for, looking forward to, expecting... only to watch it die. I don't regret it,"

which is perhaps half a lie, but even that half is so well-told,

"but we are discussing a version of my future that lies under a tombstone. And that is perhaps a bit serious for breakfast at noon."

She smiles. Of course she smiles.

Calden White

Avery speaks of that life almost like it was a child-to-be. Calden's eyebrows knit too: it's the looking forward to that does him in. His hand moves a little under hers, the knuckles brushing her palm before they turn over. It's his palm to hers, then.

She smiles. He leans forward, not minding that they're both eating breakfast, not minding that he might taste like bacon 'n eggs and she might taste like... well, bacon 'n eggs as well. Plus the rest of it: the fruit, the juice, the tea, all of it. He kisses her. She doesn't taste like any of that. She tastes like herself, sweet. It's not possible to discount her beauty, her elegance, any of that -- but it's the warmth and the joy and the golden light that seems to live under her skin

that makes his heart skip a beat sometimes when he looks at her. Or thinks of her. That makes his blood tingle with anticipation every time he thinks of the next time he goes to town.

"Sorry," he whispers, smiling a little, and a little apologetically, as they draw apart. "I wasn't thinking of it that way. I'm just interested in you. But that was insensitive of me."

He looks down at her hand on his. He shifts his palm until their fingers align, then weave. The bold white light of day catches in his eyes when he looks at her again; picks out the muted hints of green.

"Do you want to come to my place next time?" he asks. "Or should I keep visiting you here?"

Avery Chase

Calden doesn't say anything at first. At first, he just kisses her, and perhaps for a moment he forgets that they were talking at all. Avery kisses him back, unreservedly, slowly. She's not blind. She's not a fool. And she sees and senses with utter clarity how -- yes -- enchanted he is with her. Avery, ever gracious, does not indicate to him this morning that she sees the stars in his eyes when he looks at her as that kiss parts. He can't even help but smile, even as he's apologizing. Avery's hand lifts, and touches his cheek, even as her other hand covers his. Holds it, now, as he turns it over.

"I know, darling," she murmurs, sweeping her thumb lightly over his cheek. Smooth. Even though he thinks he wears the rugged look better. Avery leans to him and kisses him again: soft. Some part of her already wants him again. Refreshed, washed, rested, she finds herself thinking of that last time, last night. How slow it was. How close they were.

Her eyes open as they draw apart yet again. He asks her what he does, and she smiles, her face still near his. Her eyes glance down, not quite a blush or a shy look but a pretty imitation of one. "If you'd like," she says, lifting that gaze again after a moment, meeting his, smiling. "If you think it won't be an imposition on your household."

Calden White

If you'd like, she says, as though there were the faintest, slightest, remotest possibility that he might not. Well; a moment later he puts rest to that, so immediately he almost interrupts her:

"I'd love it."

And they are, in fact, still so close. And when she leaned in to kiss him again, he'd shifted until he was barely on the edge of his barstool, one foot on the floor. His hands were on her waist then. Now they're resting on the outsides of her legs, the thumbs tracing the tops of her thighs, his fingers wrapping loosely behind her knees. Their eyes meet. He smiles with her almost without realizing it; laughs as she mentions his household.

"That'd be me, my dad, and maybe one of my cousins. And frankly, if one of them feels imposed upon, I've got fifteen square miles of open land they're more than welcome to camp on for the night."

The humor simmers back down to a smile. "I'd love to have you over," he says again, quietly. "Come whenever you want. It doesn't have to be weekend-after-next. You have my number?"

Avery Chase

"You love, you love," Avery teases again, laughing softly at him. Though this time he says he would love, it echoes between them now, a tender mockery of their language despite the insistence to keep it light. She does not mind. Calden has told her she may do what she likes with him. Shackle him to her bed, if she wants. He is hers to do with as she pleases. She can come whenever she wants.

His hands on her waist, then her legs, her knees, which would be ticklish if she weren't covered by the robe. He looks so happy.

"I," she interrupts him, when he's in the middle of telling her that it doesn't have to be next weekend or the weekend after, she can come whenever, "need to finish my breakfast. And then," she adds, her hand on his cheek trailing off his jaw, "since you sound as though you're getting ready to tell me that you need to head back, I am going to chain you to my bed. One more time."

Unsaid, but felt: at least.

Avery lets her hand fall to his chest, wherever it is bared by the fall of his borrowed robe. "I am inclined to wrestle with you a bit in the sunlight before we go about our lives." She smiles.

Calden White

Calden does look happy. He looks very happy indeed at the thought of Avery Chase just ... showing up one day. Maybe calling a half-hour or a half-day in advance so he has time to shower and shave. Or maybe just appearing the way she did that very first night, a beautiful slice of primordial wilderness right in the middle of his life.

"I don't need to go," he says, "but I should. Soon." He glances down: her slim hand slipping under his robe, against his skin. He wonders if she can feel his heart

skipping its beat. "Later," he amends. And he smiles, too.

Avery Chase

It unnerves Avery, and charms her, how willingly Calden has come to her. How much he has offered, as though eager to see her take him up on the offers. Take his wine, share his bed, let him drive her, enjoy his razor-smoothed jaw, shackle him to her bed. Whatever you want, he says, and his heart skips a beat when she touches him, and his eyes light up like stars when he asks when he can see her again.

At least Avery knows how to handle someone with that big of a crush on her without humiliating him. She smiles, and her hand smooths over his chest, under his robe. She leans over and kisses him, which is a way of sealing that word on his lips: yes. later.

And then, quite primly, she drifts away and resumes eating her breakfast with her cup of tea and shiny grapefruit spoon and triangles of toast. Calden is, of course, free to help himself to more of the bacon he fried, to have more fruit, to guzzle more juice. Avery eats no more quickly than before, taking her time to wipe her mouth with her napkin, enjoying the creamy yet underlyingly dry sweetness of the tea and the tart sharpness of the grapefruit. If he holds her hand, she allows it, but only for short periods; occasionally she needs both hands, after all.

When she is finished, Avery lays her napkin down over her plate and moves to rise. Her robe falls around her legs, covers her knees again, as she slips from the barstool. They leave everything where it is; perhaps Calden rebels at that, inwardly or otherwise, because it's so rude to just leave dishes everywhere, but perhaps he remembers without being reminded that her staff slipped through the room without even waking them, leaving him the robe he's wearing, leaving him three different options for shaving in case he was the sort to shave daily. Her staff shopped for her, dishes and cutlery and all, before Calden and Avery were even conscious. The food he prepared and ate today is food they shopped for, delivered, put away in the kitchen, never once saying a word lest they wake their mistress and her...

guest.

--

Her hand reaches for his. She leads him from the kitchen much the way she led him from the entryway last night, when he had just licked her to orgasm and when he was so hard he thought he might die if she didn't fuck him soon. Avery takes him right back to her bedroom and closes the door. Without saying a word, she unties his robe and he unties hers and both drop to the ground. Her arms loop around his neck. Her feet lift from the ground, and her legs wrap around his waist. His hands spread across her ass, scooping her up against him.

Avery loves the feel of his chest against her breasts. She kisses him and mutters as much against his lips; he growls quietly and carries her to the bed. Perhaps that's just so obvious as to be almost boring, but it is a decadent surface, a flat surface, and they have time enough to fuck over couches and against walls and on floors if they like. His hand covers the outside of her thigh, holding her where she lifts it over his hip. She grabs his ass, snarling softly, raking her nails

lightly, lightly

up his flank. His bicep flexes, just right, close enough that when she turns her head she licks him there, opens her mouth and sets her teeth in him there, groans into his flesh when she comes. She loves his fucking body, his ridiculously strong arms, his taste. She doesn't say so this time, though; she's moaning, muffled by his skin, her cunt tight around him, surrounding him, holding him right where he is until she's done with him.

--

When she's done with him, there is surprisingly little awkwardness between them. He washes up, one last time, using that toothbrush again. He discovers clothing that has not been touched; her staff considered it, decided against it, lest laundering his attire while he slept would be too invasive. He does discover that his boots have been shined, does not know that there is at least one person on Avery's staff who just can't help it. It just isn't done. Boots and shoes left out are to be shined. It's the way it is.

Avery, for her part, washes up and just wears that same clean robe she wore to breakfast when she walks to see him out. To her door, at least. She kisses him again before he leaves; they'll talk again soon, or see each other again soon. Yes, she has his number. Yes, she knows he means it when he says she can come see him anytime she likes. She laughs at him, light and amused and fond, and kisses him harder then, pulling his hand to cup her tit through her robe. It isn't a tactic; she wants to feel it. She also wants him to remember it.

When the door closes behind him, and she exhales, standing in the exceedingly quiet condo without him, Avery feels the vibration of the silence and wonders, even to herself, if she is more lonesome or relieved.