Cian (thebettingsort) wrote in emillion, @ 2013-10-05 21:18:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !complete, !log, aisling wilde, cian wilde |
So I cross my heart and hope to die that I'll only stay with you one more night
Who: Cian & Ash
What: A Really Big Mistake (the bad idea bears would have a ball with this one)
Where: Ruby House
When: Late Saturday night/early Sunday morning
Rating: On the high end of PG-13
Status: Complete
Nothing was helping -- nothing, not drinking, not sex, not cards, not flying fast through the darkness, not any of the things that had dulled the edge before (fuck it, he was so keyed up that he’d nearly killed those idiot kids tonight) -- which was why he found himself here. He’d never entered a gem house as a customer in his life. He’d never entered this one at all. He’d spent the ride over thinking just what the fuck he was doing (what the fuck what the fuck whatthefuck; it was an endless litany in his head), but he hadn’t been able to change his own mind. He was at the end of his fucking rope. Everything inside was red satin and black leather. He was waved through the lobby by a hostess with a tumble of glossy brown curls and an inviting smile -- whatever he looked like, broke wasn’t it, apparently -- and into the main room. Small, round tables, a few upholstered booths for clients to get cozy with their companions of choice, a stage, a staircase in the back of the room leading up to the private rooms above. Not so different from Opal, really except the color scheme and the decor. His teeth were on edge. She was dancing. She wore some concoction of leather straps that managed to cover almost nothing. He didn’t even notice anyone else; seeing her was like a punch to the stomach. It was like this, sometimes, had been for years, but not exactly like; he could barely make himself breathe through the warring emotions of rage and desire. Fortunately, he didn’t have to be chatty here, all he had to do was point and say, “Her,” (and try not to think of the times he had been pointed at, which he pretended not to recall for his own sanity), and open his wallet. The hostess smiled again, his gil disappeared, and he was left in one of those booths to hunch over the table in the half-darkness and wait. Nothing was helping. That entire fucking conversation in the Necrohol replayed through her thoughts in an endless loop; just when it got to the end, it would restart. She could still see his face if she closed her eyes long enough - the anger real and barely kept below the surface. The first few times it replayed when she was sober enough to comprehend it, she had felt guilty. There were lines that weren’t meant to be crossed, and she had jumped the fucking line and set it on fire. She hadn’t been on deck for the floor show, but dancing required her concentration and so she’d talked Lily into giving it to her. The leather straps that comprised her outfit chafed as she moved about, but she was used to the way the leather rubbed her skin raw. Just another day at work. The showroom had a decent amount of people in it before she started, and it wasn’t until she finished, parading around the room to let them stick money into her clothes, cop a feel, or both, that she noticed him. Immediately, her eyes narrowed. She wanted to storm up to him, demand what he was doing here, throw something at him, but she couldn’t. She was here to work, not to fight with Cian Wilde. That was, until Vanessa approached her and told her that the gentleman in the back had purchased her company for the night. A very pointed warning was given to her - he’s an important person, Ash; don’t fuck it up - and she barely managed to contain her anger. How dare he? It didn’t occur to her until she was practically at his booth that it could be business related. But why go through the trouble of buying her? He could have sent her a fucking message; wasn’t that how they’d been communicating for years? Why go and switch shit up now? It didn’t make sense any more that Cian coming to Ruby to purchase her for his own entertainment made sense. She knew little about the circumstances surrounding his promotion to Tynan’s enforcer, but she knew that he had a strong dislike for brothels. From what she could piece together, he only went to them nowadays to conduct business. And it wasn’t like he had to buy company. He’d been flaunting his conquests in her face for years, a not-so-subtle reminder that he’d never cared and that she had been so easily replaceable. The anger from that memory, from him throwing her away once her usefulness had run out, still boiled just below the surface. “What the fuck do you want?” she hissed when she got close enough. As she’d approached, he’d tried to think of what to say. There was no way to do this that wasn’t going to be a fucking mess (but it had to be done, anyway; he was here, wasn’t he?). Then she was hissing at him, and that was easy -- the sarcasm was an old friend, worn and familiar. “Your customer service is shit,” he told her. “You treat all your paying clients like this? Bondage with a side of bitch?” Damn it, why couldn’t he just turn it off like a switch? Why did he keep right on wanting her? He’d done what he set out to do -- it was pretty clear she hated his guts. And he still couldn’t get that damn kiss out of his mind. It was seared on his memory, opening wounds long scabbed over. His words stopped her in her tracks. Paying customer. She had to have misheard. Because Cian wouldn’t buy her. He wanted nothing to do with her. He’d made that pretty clear in the past, and if she hadn’t gotten the hint? Well, then being pushed off her father’s coffin was a clear enough indicator that she was unwanted. She wanted to say something else, tell him to get the fuck out and leave her the hell alone, but Mama Jewel was staring at her from the front of the house, expression clearly saying if you fuck this up, Ash, you’re out. And as much as she didn’t need the money, this was the one thing she did that allowed her to keep dancing and had nothing to do with the Wildes. Hell, no one in the club except Mama Jewel knew who she really was. Work in the industry long enough and you learn not to ask questions. So, instead of turning around and walking away, she pasted on her best smile and asked, “What do you mean paying?” The only way he was going to get through this (and he wasn’t the type to back out of anything, ever), was to act as though none of this were grossly outside the norm (hilariously untrue as that was), so he gave her a wry look and said, “Need a vocabulary lesson, princess? You charge for the pleasure -- using the term loosely -- of your company. I paid the going rate.” The thought of railing at her, of saying, you started this, don’t blame me now, was nearly irresistible. He tried to swallow down his fury. A guy got violent with a girl down here, there was no way he was getting upstairs. And he didn’t do things halfway, either. So instead he said, “Pretty pricey. Apparently you’re good at what you do these days.” And the thought of that was infuriating, too. She was, by far, the best at angering him, even when she intended no such thing. The look of shock on her face was gratifying. She was confused? Good. So was he. But he was here and that -- supposedly, in theory -- was simple. “Guess we’ll find out.” The gauntlet thrown, no room for misunderstanding, he thought she might actually try to kick him out, but he was playing by the rules -- brothel rules, hard to forget: customer is always, always right unless he raises his hand or his voice first -- and she was supposedly a professional. She had to literally swallow back the rage. Whatever the fuck he thought he was doing, whatever fucking kick he thought he was going to get out of this, he was going to be severely disappointed. After all, she was a professional, and she really was good at what she did. Which meant he would get exactly what he paid for and not a gil more or less. So, instead of railing at him and trying to toss him out on his ass, she leaned forward and took his hand. “Well, then,” she purred, stroking the inside of his wrist with her index finger, “it wouldn’t do to keep you waiting, Mr. Wilde. After all, you’re a busy man. Let’s see if we can work off some of that tension.” She released him and turned around, shooting a follow me look over her shoulder as she headed towards the stairs. He wished he could say it made things better. He’d come here with -- what -- some half-assed thought toward getting her (and that Faram damned kiss) out of his system? It had seemed the easiest course of action at the time -- granted, he wasn’t exactly thinking straight, but this was a hell of a lot less intimate than trying to talk to her would have been, and any invitation he issued, especially any invitation that hinged on the idea that this was to be a one-time walk down memory lane, not to be repeated, was likely to be refused. Here, she was obligated to go along with him (and the thought of that made him feel a little ill, and so he wasn’t going to think of it at all). He made a living of outmaneuvering people. He’d just outmaneuvered her. That was all. But when she leaned in, smiling (fake, but hell, he didn’t come here for real, just relief), he almost turned on his heel and stormed out of the building. He rarely thought about it anymore, but the assumed name was a weapon of a sort, and the only one he’d left her. He shouldn’t have been surprised that she was going to use it against him -- what else did she have? So he followed, and pitching his voice low as he came up behind her, told her. “Don’t call me that.” He’d given her that victory, small as it was, but he didn’t care. “Don’t bother calling me anything. Just do your damn job -- it’s the one you picked.” And don’t blame me for your choices, even if I’ll probably blame you later for mine. It was a small victory, and a hollow one at that. She didn’t want to do this. Normally, she had no problem with it - hell, most nights she enjoyed her job - but that wasn’t what this was. This wasn’t some person that she would see on the street later and not recognize. It was personal, the exact opposite of why she liked working here. And ever since that fucking kiss, it had been harder and harder to tell herself that this wasn’t what she wanted. But even if she wanted Cian to press her into a mattress and fuck her brains out, she didn’t want it like this. She could feel the anger radiating off of him, and it took most of her self-control to not point out that he didn’t have to do this if the idea of fucking her was that distasteful. Instead, she opened the door and headed towards the large bed that took up most of the room. Toys and various accessories were lined up neatly against the wall. She sat down on the mattress, immediately falling into habit. “So, what’ll be, sugar?” she asked, affecting a bored tone. “Vanilla? Or are you looking for a little spice?” As long as her hesitation didn’t show, as long as she didn’t let him know that she was at war with herself over this, she could do it. He shut the door behind him, the quiet click of it sounding with a strange sort of finality. He didn’t look around, pretended that he wasn’t on edge just from being here. Just this once, he reminded himself. Get it out of his system and move on, once he could think straight. Whatever effect it might have on her was something he couldn’t be bothered to care about just now. She’d started it, he was finishing it. There was nothing else but to take the course he had charted. So he shrugged off his jacket as though he hadn’t a care in the world and told her, “Thinking we’ll figure that out as we go along.” |