This is slightly OOC and fluffy. Disgusting, I know.

He Always Wins

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i.

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He's in love with her—real, true, stupid, head-over-heels in love with Bonnie Bennett. The feeling first hits Kai when he's walking home from her dorm. He thinks he's having a panic attack, but doubling over with his hands on his knees, deeply breathing in and out, doesn't help. There still isn't enough air in his lungs.

When he gets home, he throws up in the bathroom sink—long fingers digging into white porcelain as he retches up what little lines his stomach: pork rinds and strawberry jam. After a few dry heaves he can finally take on air, and he thinks maybe that's all he needed. But when he goes to shower, the soap makes the scratch marks on his back sting and suddenly he's hyperventilating again.

He lowers himself to the bottom of the tub, thighs still aching in protest from the evening's activities (because damn the Bennett witch's got stamina and he thinks—no, he knows—that someday she'll kill him). He rubs his face with a sigh and tries to erase the memory of a gloriously nude Bonnie on top of him, in front of him and beneath him, watching him watch her as he slowly moves inside her. Because he can't have these feelings about her; he can't have feelings at all. He's a murderous sociopath for Christ's sake. He can't love someone, not someone like Bonnie. He can't.

Kai tries to remember how to breathe again.

ii.

.

It all begins with a stuttered apology. The deafening bass and dark womb-like atmosphere of the club do little to help convey the sincerity of his tone. At one point he can actually hear himself speak and he inwardly winces at what a fucking tool he sounds like.

Of course she doesn't believe a word coming out of his mouth, doesn't want to hear any of it. Worse still is the way she's looking at him, terrified that he's about to gut her at any moment, and it makes him feel like a walking sack of shit. He wants to stab himself, just to see the fear dim from her eyes, if only for a second.

But Bonnie's tougher than anyone else gives her credit for—and not that bullshit 'strength' her friends say she has when they're fattening her up for another sacrifice. No, this toughness has a razor-sharp edge to it, honed by pride and suffering, so he knows it's a solemn fucking oath when she tells him she'll melt his face off if she ever sees him again.

Still, Kai's a risk-taker, or maybe he just invites the face-melting. It's only fair that she gets her pound of flesh. So when he shows up at her dorm room later that evening, he's not surprised to see the tip of a fire iron buried in his chest just a few millimetres from his heart.

"Well," he pants, wrapping his fingers around the shaft, "at least you didn't melt my face off."

"The night's still young," she threatens, and he can't help but grin. He loves seeing her like this: a badass witch afraid of nothing and no one.

"Yeah, I deserved this," he says, pulling the poker out with a sickening shluck. The wound is deep enough that he really should heal it, or at least get stiches, but he decides to leave it open and bleeding like a peace offering. "But you have to know I've changed."

"Changed?" She scoffs at him, literally scoffs, before folding her arms over her chest. "You mean you merged with Luke and are all in your feelings now and want me to feel sorry for you?"

"That would be swell," he says, throwing down the fire iron with a loud clang. "But all I want is for you to just listen to my apology."

"Oh, is that all?" she asks, suspicion painting her beautiful features.

He tries not smile at her gumption, otherwise she'll shut him out completely, thinking she's fallen into some kind of trap. Normally she'd be right, but he really does want her to listen to him. He needs her to.

"Ideally, I'd like you to forgive me." When she glares at him, he throws up his hands. "But I don't expect you to; I don't. I just—I need to get this off my chest, not just for me but because you deserve an apology, Bonnie, a real apology."

If possible, she looks even more sceptical than before, yet there's a subtle shift in her stance, a slightly lowering of her guard. She's still tense and ready for a fight, but now there's genuine curiosity reflecting in those beautiful eyes of hers. It's as if she's encouraging him to continue, even if it's just to eventually slam the door in his face and shut him out of her life forever.

"First of all, you're right," he says, and she lifts an eyebrow at him. "I am new to the whole empathy thing—emotions in general, really—and merging with Luke was more… complicated than I thought.

"I mean, honestly, I thought I'd just develop an affinity for rimjobs, but—" He clears his throat when he feels her murderous gaze on him. "Listen, I don't expect you to know much about sociopaths—clinically diagnosed ones, that is, not the freakshows you call friends." He holds up a hand to stop her from interjecting. "But basically, being a sociopath means understanding that the only person who matters is you, your wants, your goals, and fuck anyone who gets in your way.

"And the thing is, you got in my way, Bonnie; you were my collateral damage in the prison world. I did whatever it took to get you to do what I wanted, what I needed to get out of there. It didn't matter what happened to you. It didn't matter… what I did to you."

Images flash in his head: siphoning her powers, shooting her with an arrow, grabbing her neck in the back of the Camaro, jabbing the knife into her gut. He winces painfully at the recollections.

"When I merged with Luke, everything, and I mean everything, came flooding to the surface and, well, the sociopath that I am, was, had no fucking clue how to process it all." He palms his mouth with a laugh, but it comes out forced and desperate. "Forty years of not understanding what empathy is and then to have every evil, spiteful, shitty thing you've ever done thrown in your face all at once—" he swallows thickly "—Bonnie, l can say with absolute certainty that I truly grasp what I have done to you and why you deserve to hate me."

"Oh wow, thank you for validating my feelings—"

"And I know I can't atone for everything I've done to you," he continues, talking over her because he knows he only has this one chance, "but I wanna try. Please, Bonnie, give me a chance."

She makes a strangled noise of disgust at the back of her throat, something between a scoff and a snort, and he knows that she has dismissed his words entirely. She never planned on actually hearing him out let alone taking him seriously, and suddenly he's enraged. It's the one emotion he's all too familiar with.

"You laugh like this is a fucking joke, even though I tried so hard for you."

This time she does snort, rather derisively. "Stalking me at a club and getting Damon to help you stutter a lame apology is trying hard? Kai, you are a fucking joke."

"No, not the apology, dammit!" He tears at his hair. Why won't his words come to him? "I came back to 1994 for you!"

"I don't care!" she rallies back, until his words finally register in that pretty little brain of hers and she blinks up at him, confused. "Wait, you did what?"

Oh, so now she fucking listens. "Your birthday celebration in the garage?" he offers, a cruel sneer settling on his lips. "A fucking suicide video left for Damon? I was there, Bonnie."

She takes a step back, head shaking. "No."

"Yeah—" he nods, taking a step forward "—I was. I risked it all to bring you back. My powers, my coven, my life." He thumps his chest and his fist comes away bloody. "I had a fucking fire iron sticking out of my chest, a hell of a lot deeper than the one you put in me tonight, but I kept at it and I brought you back."

She actually looks more horrified than shocked at the realisation and it makes him want to laugh and scream all at once.

"W-why?" she finally asks.

"I don't know. Guilt, maybe?" He shrugs angrily. "Fucking Luke?"

He does blame Luke when he thinks about it. Of all the qualities he could've inherited from his baby brother it had to be empathy. Admittedly, Kai was so confused and disgusted by the opening outlet to his emotions that he took scalding hot showers for days afterwards, hoping to rid himself of the filth, but nothing worked; so, he wallowed in guilt. And while he's almost certain the guilt he's still experiencing is a residue from Luke, he realises that when he was fighting off his own sister he was still far more concerned with Bonnie's safety than with Liv's or even his own. So, who can he blame that on?

"I didn't—I just couldn't see you like that, okay?" He shrivels inside of himself, remembering how defeated she looked, how utterly unlike herself. "You looked so… broken."

She comes alive again then, rounding on him, "You made me that way!"

"I know that!" he roars back. "Do you think I'm here because I don't know that? It's why I came back for you!" He runs bloody fingers through dishevelled hair. "It's why I can't sleep; I can't eat. I see everything I did to you. It runs on a reel in my fucking head and I can't make it stop."

"And so, what, you need me to make it stop?" He can hear the venom in her voice. "You need me to make you feel better about yourself?"

"No, I just—I just need you to listen to me."

"After everything you've done to me, why should I?"

"B-because I need a chance, Bonnie." His shoulders sag forward in defeat. "For once in my life I need someone to actually give a fuck. I need… I need you."

Once again, he can hear how pathetic he sounds—he might as well have said that he needed her to make him a better man—and he wishes he could take it all back. He wishes he could articulate these frustrating and alien feelings of his, but he can't because he still doesn't understand any of it.

So he waits for her to tell him that his guilt is his own fucking problem and that it's not her job to teach him how to be human, but for once she's got no rebuttal, no weapons aimed at him. Instead, she stares at him mutely, a look in her eyes he's never seen before and can't even begin to decode, and he is deafened by the silence of what's not being said.

iii.

.

She lets him leave that night, relatively unscathed but certainly not forgiven. He didn't expect her forgiveness anyway. Still, the next day he pokes around campus in hopes of seeing her, and the day after that. He's pushing his luck with her, but he can't help it. Every time he sees her, alive and unharmed, a piece of him is so fucking elated at the sight. She's alive because of him in a big way. Of course, she also almost died several times because of him, but he's going to focus on the positive.

The good news is that she's stopped telling him to fuck off—with those exact words. Now it's more of a 'I don't have time for your bullshit' eye roll and some magic bitch-slapping here and there, just to let him know who's boss. It's virtually the same treatment Damon gets, so it feels like progress. Yet despite all the strides he thinks he's making with her by letting her unwind by kicking his ass, it means dick all at the end of the day. Because barely tolerating his presence isn't cutting it anymore. He needs more. After all, he's a greedy fucker, and he always, always wins.

As if to prove it, fortune smiles on him one night when he finds Bonnie alone and drunk at some local college bar. He spots her right away, despite the fact that she's hidden herself in the farthest recesses of the pub. She always has this way of shining in the darkest of places.

Her head is bent, face in her drink, yet she notices him before he even approaches her. "Why do you keep following me around?"

"Egotistical much?" He flags the bartender, pointing to what Bonnie's having, and takes the seat next to her. "I came in for a drink."

"Sure ya did." She props her chin up with a closed fist and turns away. "Just stay over there and keep your thoughts to yourself, Mal-a-chai."

"Oooh, using formal names now, are we?" The barkeep sets down a bourbon, neat, and Kai takes a sip. "Should I call you Bonnie now?"

She rolls her jaw along her knuckles to glare up at him. "What did I just say?"

"Keep my thoughts to myself," he parrots with a slight smirk and tilt of his head. "Bonnie."

She turns back to her drink with a grumble, effectively ignoring Kai while he steals furtive glances, trying to work up the courage to start a conversation that won't end with her walking out. Then a group of rowdy frat boys come stumbling into the bar, reeking of booze and inflated egos, decibel levels high, and Bonnie is suddenly rearing back, curling into herself like she's preparing for a full-on onslaught.

Kai instinctively moves in front of her, blocking her view of the Neanderthals, who astutely note the murderous look in the warlock's eyes and move to the other end of the bar, closer to the television screens. Kai can hear the exhale of relief in Bonnie's voice and he slowly turns to find her hunched over the table, cupping her glass of bourbon to keep her hands from shaking.

"You know, I can teach you a little trick to help out with that PSTD thing."

He expects her to say, 'What PSTD thing?', but she just frowns, sizing him up with a calculating look before asking, "How did you adjust so well?"

He lifts an eyebrow in surprise. He didn't expect this. "Let's just say I had some practice."

"What kind or practice?"

"Well—" he leans back "—for starters, my parents separated me from my siblings when I was around five; that's when I started showing signs of being a siphoner. I spent a lot of time alone, locked in my room, but every once in a while my dad would have to entertain guests, hold gatherings and whatnot, and I'd be trotted out, forced to mingle with more people in three hours than I'd seen in an entire year."

She nods slowly at this, as if she understands or is at least encouraging him to continue.

"It was the noise, you know, and the suffocating feeling of having someone near you, breathing your air. I, uh, freaked out a few times in a very public way." He laughs at the now painful memories. "Needless to say, I wasn't let out to play after that, but it didn't stop me from sneaking out when I got older.

"The thing is, I really didn't wanna be freaking out at a concert when the bass got a little too heavy or some person had the audacity to walk within ten feet of me, so I started scouring the grimoires for a spell and found one that helped." He pauses for a moment, taking a sip of his drink, and tries to shrug indifferently. "I could show you, if you want."

"You think I'd let you touch me?"

He chuckles, of course she'd think that. "I'm not going to siphon you, Bonnie."

Her jaw locks stubbornly, either in disbelief or with offence. It's anyone's guess. Clearly, she doesn't believe him and he doesn't blame her. Still, it's annoying how bullheaded she can be, so he decides to flip the script and give her no choice but to trust him.

"All right, I'll tell you what—how about we make this an even playing field," he says, swivelling his legs out towards her so that their knees meet. "You don't have to worry about me taking your powers if I give you mine."

He reaches for her hands before she can figure out what's happening and closes his eyes, chanting a swift spell that literally takes the wind out of him, and her. It's both terrifying and euphoric to feel the power literally drain from him, seeping from his bones, his very soul. He can't help but think that if this is what it's like to be siphoned, he has no idea why anyone's ever bitched to him about it before.

When the spell ends, Bonnie's gasping for air, eyes wilder and greener than he's even see. "What did you do?" she accuses, snatching back her hands as if they've been scorched. He's fairly certain he didn't fry her.

"Sorry," he pants, forcefully pulling back to hide his trembling hands. "But I knew you wouldn't let me do this without forcing it on you." He tips his head back and takes a deep breath, like he's just come up for air or had the best orgasm of his life, and finally meets her gaze with an elated grin. "So how does it feel?"

"What—" she looks down at her hands in amazement and confusion "—what did you do to me?"

He thinks she means to be angry and confrontational but she looks blissed out, just starting to ride the high of the power he's bestowed upon her. She looks thoroughly fucked is what she looks like. It's a hot look on her. He really digs it, and wants to see more.

"Power transfer," he says, still basking in the beauty of her high. "You, Bonnie Bennett, now possess the entire power of the Gemini Coven; temporarily, of course." He curls his hands into fists, feeling the last of his magic tingle in his fingertips, before settling his gaze back on her. "Technically, you could kill me right now and not harm a single member of my coven," he says, before adding wistfully, "But try not to get yourself killed or else we all go down."

She blinks at him. "W-why?"

"Because you needed a reason to trust that I won't hurt you, so I gave you the means to kill me without any consequence." He then claps his hands together with a rub. "Now, do you want to learn that spell?"

iv.

.

He's teaching Bonnie magic. He never thought he'd be teaching the stubborn witch anything, let alone magic, but here she is at his apartment every other day; sitting her fine ass on his sofa, poring over his family's grimoires and asking him which artefact is best for what and testing out spells by getting into sparring matches with him.

Honest to God, if this is love, he's all in.

After one particularly brutal match, both of them lying flat on their backs and panting loudly as the smoke wafts from Kai's naked chest at an alarming rate, Bonnie turns to Kai. "Why do I keep coming back here?" She asks this as if he'll give her an answer she'll be satisfied with. "Why won't you leave me alone?"

"Cause you won't let me?" he offers with a shrug, propping himself up on one elbow. "I only follow your lead, Bonster. That's all I've ever done."

It's true. She stabs him and he stabs her right back. She tries to leave without him and he abandons her in the world he offered to escape with her. And now she's letting him get close to her and he's returning that favour by allowing her inside—inviting her to get closer to him than anyone's ever been.

"I still hate you," she says, inching closer to him.

"I know," he says, voice low in his throat, watching her move with half-lidded eyes, "but I think you're the bee's knees, baby."

"Don't call me that."

"What, the bee's knees?" he whispers, lips on the shell of her ear now. "Or is it baby? Cause I'm kinda partial to baby."

"I'll never forgive you," she whispers.

"I really wish you would."

She tilts her head to look up at him then, her lips dewy between her teeth, and he reaches out to touch those soft lips with the pad of his thumb. He watches her lips part, feels her hot breath on his skin, and sucks in a shuddering breath of air. And there it is, that hackling, barely perceptible fire that's always been between them, charring through them both until she's grabbing him by the back of the neck and pulling his face to hers.

"Fuck it," she hisses, mashing her lips against his. Her kiss is brutal and bruising, meant to punish him, but he melts into her anger all the same. "I just want you out of my head."

v.

.

She bounces shortly after that, leaving him blue-balled and aching. He has to give her credit for the brilliant tactic because it makes him step up his game. He's texting her on the regular, offering to cook her dinner; he's even sending out for more grimoires to get her to come around more. They play the cat and mouse game (he's the mouse) for a week and a half until he finally gets her back to his place and is tackling the lips he's been dreaming about since he first saw her back in 1994.

The kiss is practically mutual, although the last few inches of lean in are his—he'll own up to that. But it isn't long before she's taking control, climbing on top of him and straddling his lap. She kisses him slowly, thoroughly, with more tongue than he expects.

While Kai hangs back and lets her set the tone inside their mouths, he explores her exposed skin. He strokes her neck, her shoulders, the smooth length of her arms, and the small of her back where her shirt rides up. Usually this slow going, gropeless sort of making out is a plan of attack—a way to get his hands placed directly on her naughty bits. At least that's how it used to be for him back in the day when he was getting any type of action. But on this occasion, with Bonnie, he holds back.

He realises that the more he kisses her, the more he wants to. The more she bites at his neck, juxtaposing it with the maddeningly soft brushes of her lips over his, the slower he wants to go. And she's got to feel the hard-on he's been sporting since before she even climbed on top of him, but she's not grinding. This is all hands and mouths exploring each other. Kissing her, being kissed by her like this, is like free-falling into space. She makes him dizzy.

He's aware that he's showing more patience than he's ever shown with anyone in his life. Ideally, he'd like to throw Bonnie down on the floor and knock her back like a shot, but he knows as soon as he goes for it, she's likely to come to her senses, crawl off his lap and tell him what a gross, horrible abomination he is, before lighting his ass on fire. And he'd really, really rather keep kissing her as long as possible.

vi.

.

He's smiling more than he thought humanly possible. It's not the practiced smile of innocence he used to charm gullible women or placate his suspicious family into thinking he could be a normal boy. He isn't emulating human emotion; he's experiencing it, and it's all because of Bonnie.

They see each other almost regularly now, and he's quickly come to the realisation that she kisses him so much just to shut him up—and he's all right with that. Because, if he's honest, he can't really think straight when he's with her. Just being around her makes him nervous, so he babbles, often insulting. However, when her lips are on his, the annoying voice in his head that prompts him to spew utter nonsense, disappears; everything just melts away. All he can think about are her lips and her kisses and if she's half as attracted to him as he is to her…

Probably not, but a guy can dream.

Still, she seems to enjoy kissing him almost as much as he enjoys kissing her. And then one night when they're on her bed, making out like two teenagers in heat, Bonnie makes the mistake of leaning back and looking at him, really looking at him—it's the kind of look that could ruin a man.

Kai swallows thickly, running his palms up and down the tops of her thighs, careful not to siphon, and waits for her to freeze up and push him off, questioning why she'd ever get involved with a sociopath. But then she starts fondling his rings, stroking down the length of his fingers, and he has to bite back a moan. It reads more nervous hesitation than lewd pantomime, but it still sends him from hard to so hard he could break diamonds in a matter of seconds.

She slowly lifts the hem of his shirt and slides it up over his head, kissing his throat as they both discard his t-shirt to the floor. A shiver rises up inside of him as he watches her, fascinated. He's mesmerised by the way she drags her nails in slow circles over his heart (she really does have pretty hands). And even though his lips are wet and his tongue has been doing battle with hers for the longest time, his mouth suddenly feels so dry that it's hard to speak. Another first for him.

She chuckles throatily, almost nervously, as she slides back off his lap, kneeling on the floor between his legs. She kisses his stomach, his chest, and as her breasts squash against his thigh and brush over his erection, he shuts his eyes with a load moan. Her hands go to his belt, then his zipper, and he's helping her by lifting his hips and she's got his jeans down around his ankles. No underwear. She sits back and gives his body a look of cool appraisal.

For the first time in well, ever, Kai's apprehensive about his nakedness. Not about his body, which he knows is banging, but about whether or not it's to her liking. He means to crack a joke about his physique moving her speechless, but it comes out, "We, uh, don't have to do this, you know…"

Fuck… Did he really just say that?

She looks up at him, startled. "A-are you saying—you… you don't want to?"

He swallows back the fluttering in his heart at how insecure she sounds and almost shouts, 'Are you fucking insane, woman?' Instead, he takes her hand and wraps it around his length and says, "Of course I want to, but—"

She frowns and looks away, pulls her hand back and says, "No, I get it." Then she's on her feet, heading for the fireplace, and Kai is left holding his dick, bare-assed on her bed. He yanks up his pants, fucking skinny jeans, and follows the clearly mental woman to the hearth where she's pouring herself a glass of bourbon from the trolley bar.

"Look," she says without turning around. "You're right, this is a shitty idea, probably. You should go home."

"I don't recall saying this was a shitty anything, Bonster, but you're right, probably," he says, walking very quietly towards her. "I should, probably."

"I mean—" she takes a gulp, then a few more until she drains the glass and refills it. "I get it."

"What do you get?"

"I get why you're doing this."

He stops a foot behind her, tucks her hair behind her ear, then says into it, "Enlighten me."

She judders for a second, sending a warm feeling fluttering through his stomach again, and then turns around, facing him with hard eyes. "Kai, you've been in a prison world for, what, almost two decades? Of course you'd be horny. And, I mean, if I wanted pity sex, I would—you're the last—I don't…" She laughs bitterly and turns her back to him. "Just go home, Kai, seriously." She drains the glass and taps it loudly on the mantle.

"Pity sex? That's what you think this is?" He grabs her by her bony wrist and spins her around so that she's forced to look at him. "You think I'd risk—" he flounders, looking for the right words "—whatever we have here because I'm a horny teenager who can't get laid outside of Mystic Falls? What exactly do you take me for?"

"Come on, Kai. I know you, and we both know what this is. You want me to forgive you and you think this is how you can go about getting it."

He laughs heartily then, and that really gets her attention. She's all icy glares and twisted lips, trying to break free from his hold, but he tightens his grip just hard enough to hurt and laughs even louder.

"You don't have to laugh!"

"Why not? I mean, do you normally forgive people by fucking them? Cause if I'd known that's the case, I would have been begging for your forgiveness back in 1994—but this, what I'm feeling right now, is the furthest thing from pity or a quick roll in the hay to settle some score."

It was love, of course, but that was the furthest thing from what he was able to process at that moment. The truth was, or what he thought it was, was a combination of lust and the only chance he might get to sleep with someone as powerful and beautiful as Bonnie Fucking Bennett; not to mention how mind-bogglingly enraptured he is with her. But he knows without a doubt that it is not pity or the need for her to forgive him that has him wanting her.

"That's not what this is."

"Oh yeah, then what—"

He grabs her then and shoves her against the trolley bar, kissing her hard. His kiss goes from 'I'll show you what pretty little idiot you are' to something more desperate and all sorts of shit he hasn't even realised are in him come out in that kiss. She's drawing it out of him like some soul-stealing demon and he loves it. His legs feel post-marathon weak. He moans into her mouth as she paws at his chest, using her nails. He grinds against her and when he seizes her hips and sits her ass up on the bar, her flailing hands knock the bourbon over. It splashes his belly and her thighs as it tumbles to the floor.

It's loud and she freezes, then shoves him off her and hops to the floor. He steps back, hands in the air, breathing a little hard, wetness creeping down his pants, nose full of the scent of Hirsch Reserve. A puddle is forming around the bottle, soaking his socks. He looks down at the small lake of bourbon and pictures himself stripping her and throwing her down and fucking her in it. He looks up to find her staring at the puddle, then she looks up and it's instantly clear she's thinking the exact same thing. And then the most insane, perverse, disturbing thought crosses his mind:

Marry me.

Bonnie picks up the half-broken bottle and he takes it from her, throwing it into the fire. She's got a couple wet fingers in his waistband, tugging him close, and then they're kissing and scrambling at each other's pants, shoving them down and grinding at each other with just her underwear between them, and her hand is squeezing his ass.

She stumbles him back towards her bed, his pants around his ankles because they're unable to stop kissing long enough to properly de-pant. He tosses her onto the bed, kicks off his jeans, and rips off her skirt in one swift motion. She rolls to her belly and stretches for her nightstand.

He's not at all smooth as he pulls her shirt up and undoes her bra, but he finally works the contraption open, pushes it up and mostly off, then manages to catch it on her hair. As he works the bra hook free from the snare, he hears plastic tear, then she's rolling on the condom, then they're both butt naked (except for his wet socks and, technically, the bra that's still stuck in her hair). Then it's all grinding and groping and it's really frantic and rushed right up until the moment he slides inside of her.

They both go still, eyes wide. She gasps—in shock, he thinks, and partly in pain. She's tight, almost unnaturally so, and it takes more willpower than Kai usually possesses, which is next to nothing, to keep himself from releasing inside her.

"Bonnie—" It comes out as a plea, and her eyes soften momentarily, causing him to freeze up. He presses his stomach against hers in an attempt to dispel the sudden tightness in his chest.

"So," she finally drawls, hiking a knee up alongside his hip, "are you gonna get a move on or what?"

She gives him a rueful smirk and Kai returns it, starting to rock his hips against hers. Not thrusting so much as settling in, getting comfortable. "Get a move on? Do you get a move on when you're enjoying that bourbon you love to drink so much?"

She hums, rocking her hips in counterpoint to his. "And who's the bourbon in this little analogy of yours, Kai?"

"I don't know." He withdraws halfway before he can't take it anymore and sinks back into her. "Depends on which one of us swallows."

She tries to hold back a snort and fails, clenching herself around him as she tries to catch her breath. When she finally does, he wipes a tear of laughter from the corner of her eye and that makes her stop breathing for a few moments, which does a thing to Kai's ribcage.

She looks away and he chuckles, leaning in close. "You wanna be the bourbon, Bonster," he says, lowering his mouth to the side of her neck and kissing his way to her ear. "You can be the bourbon."

She judders beneath him, masking a moan with a huff of annoyance. "Seriously, if you don't get a move on soon, Kai—oh!"

He cuts her off with a good, solid shift-her-ass-half-a-foot-up-the-bed thrust. "You were saying?"

She wraps her legs around his hips and squeezes. "I was saying that if you don't—oh God, do that again I might—fuck!"

"You might what?" When she grabs his ass and tries to make him move, he catches her wrists and pins them above her head. She struggles, bucking up against him, putting up a good fight, but in the end she just rolls her eyes. He grins in triumph this time. "You might what, Bonnie? What are you going to do?"

She quirks an eyebrow at him and suddenly he's a little afraid. "You do realise I can hurt you, right?"

He scoffs in mock disgust. "Please, Bonnie, you're making me lose my erection."

She smirks and squeezes around him, making him groan. "No, I'm not."

"No," he breathes out, finally starting to fuck her properly. "You're really not."

A couple minutes later he's close to coming when she whispers into his ear, "The answer is yes, by the way."

"What?"

"If you wanna be the bourbon, the answer is yes: I do... swallow."

Kai screws his eyes shut and growls lowly in his throat, slowing his strokes, making them shallower. Bonnie moans with each thrust and Kai takes a deep breath, then another. He's still in control at this point, in control of himself, but then Bonnie drags a fingertip down his sweat-slicked spine and a current of magic crackles along his body and in his blood, raising the fine hairs on his skin.

"I'll roll you around on my tongue and—"

He doesn't remember what she says next because his world becomes white noise and Bonnie's magic is pulsing hotly inside him and he hears himself spit out series of stuttered syllables as he passes the point of no return. Then he says fuck it and goes for it, pounding her as he starts to come, rolling into her still as he releases inside her.

When the haze clears, he's collapsed on top of her. Her one hand is still grazing those beautiful fingers of her along his sensitive spine while the other hand is gently stroking the back of his head, unaware of who she's touching so intimately. She says something and he can only manage a grunt in response.

"That," she finally says breathlessly, "—that was kind of amazing."

Kai snorts into the pillow and Bonnie suddenly goes rigid beneath him. Frowning, he can almost feel the insecurity radiating off her, so he tiredly pushes up onto his forearms and studies her face; her expression has grown wary, guarded.

He withdraws carefully with a collective hiss, discarding the condom, and kisses her left breast then her right. His lips travel down to her navel and then he's got his tongue between her legs, tasting her, tasting a bit of himself. He licks and sucks and fingers her until she's rocking up against his mouth. Once she's got her eyes closed and her head back and her hands grabbing restlessly at his skull, he glances up at her from between her legs.

"You are amazing, Bonnie," he says softly, giving her clit a few more kisses. "That was just us getting warmed up."

Her eyes get a lot warmer after that, and the tickle in his ribcage only intensifies.

vii.

.

They seem to run into each other three or four times a week now—or, more precisely, Kai finds any excuse to situate himself in Bonnie's orbit as often as she will tolerate it. Their encounters don't always end in sex; sometimes it's just coffee or a bite to eat (he loves to watch her savour food). But when they do have sex, it's almost always initiated by Bonnie. Although sometimes he will make a request…

Back at his place, Kai is squeezing hard around the base of his cock as Bonnie considers his request (which is more than he expected, as he anticipated a slap across the face). Finally, she says, "Fine." And then she adds, "As long as you lick it up."

His jaw drops.

She smirks. "What?"

"Marry me." He means it as a joke, obviously, but she goes rigid anyway. He quickly says, "That's right, you and me, right now—I fly us out to Vegas and we're hitched before the sun comes up. What do you say?"

Her smile gets that glossy, protective twist that says 'Stop while you're ahead', and then she lays back and puts her hands behind her head, saying, "You've got thirty seconds before the offer is rescinded. Twenty-nine, twenty-eight..."

He makes it with three seconds to spare, and when he's finished, she looks down and says, "Not bad. I give you a seven for distance."

"Seven?" He covers Cobrakai Jr with both hands. "Don't listen to her."

"An eight and a half for volume and a nine for artistic expression."

"Okay, okay. I can live with that." He gives one of the more wayward splashes a lick, another, and it's gone, then he starts on the largest pool, between her breasts.

"You don't have to get it all," she says.

"Are you kidding?" He licks and kisses and licks some more. "I'm getting every inch of you clean."

viii.

.

Shortly before dawn, as the room slowly grows brighter, he's lying next to Bonnie, kissing her shoulder, brushing his thumb back and forth over a dusky-coloured nipple. About five minutes ago he came just a few seconds after she did, with her moaning in his ear. Now, she's staring up at the ceiling and he recognises the look on her face: she's searching for the right excuse to leave. What he's searching for is a reason to convince her to stay with him just a little while longer. He rationalises that this could very well be his last time with her—she's all but got him out of her system by now.

So when she removes his hand from her breast, he brings his mouth down to hers. Before she can give a reason for this to stop, he starts in on her one last time and discovers that—with Bonnie—he can go half a dozen times in one evening.

Dawn breaks, light spilling through the open curtains, over the bed while he moves slowly inside her. She puts her arms around him, moves with him, but she doesn't look him in the eye. Instead, she stares up at the ceiling with a 'How do I get out of here?' look. He doesn't call her out on it or make her look at him. He just keeps kissing her lips. A few minutes in, he feels her hands on his chest, her nails digging in. He pauses and looks down to find her gaze is still fixed on the ceiling.

Under her breath, she says, "What are we doing?"

"You're right." He slides a hand under her ass, holds her close and keeps them connected as he rolls them, then, Bonnie is on top of him. "Much better."

When she sits up, she keeps playing idly with her nails on his chest. The way the light hits her dark honey brown skin, her sex tousled hair, it's literally breath-taking. If it weren't for her troubled frown, she would look like a centrefold, but he keeps that to himself. He gives her hip a gentle smack and says in the lightest tone, "Get a move on. We don't have all night."

Her frown deepens as she looks over her shoulder at the sunrise and the gnawing feeling he gets in the pit of his stomach right then is another sign that he ignores. He slides his hands up her arms, over her shoulders and cups her face, turning her head back towards him.

He strokes her cheeks with his thumbs. "What's wrong?" When she turns her face towards one of his palms and kisses it, he keeps stroking her. "Talk to me, Bonnie."

She shakes her head, then kisses the inside of his wrist, which shouldn't feel so erotic, but the sensation gives Kai goosebumps. It also energises his flagging erection, which she must feel because it's that moment she chooses to start rocking her hips. She laces her fingers through his and presses his hands back into the pillows, then leans forward, perfect breasts sliding soft and smooth against his chest.

"What's wrong?"

But she won't answer him, and when he starts to ask again, she cuts him off with a kiss. Normally, he'd let her shut him up with this, but he can feel something wrong, feel the sadness in her soul. He pulls away and holds her face in his hands again, trying to make her look at him. She won't. So he rolls her on her back and slides down her body, planting a chaste kiss on her collarbone before moving downwards.

"Bonnie," he says softly, lifting his head and looking her in the eye before kissing her left nipple. His hand moves over her stomach and a brief look of panic passes over her eyes.

"Kai, don't," she starts, before shutting her mouth and swallowing hard.

He hesitates for a moment, sliding his hand back up to her neck and she visibly relaxes. Kai frowns in thought and moves his mouth's attention to the inner curve of Bonnie's breast, up to her collarbone, then her chin, then back down to the other breast. She makes a mewling noise and he looks up at her again, waiting for her to continue. When she doesn't say anything, his mouth moves downwards, between her breasts and down her sternum to the taut line of her stomach until it settles above the puckered scar he gave her. She goes rigid again, hands on his head, and is forcefully trying to push him away.

"Is this what you don't want me touching?" he asks gently, and she loosens her grip on his head.

"Kai, don't…"

He inches down and feathers his fingers lightly over the scar, examining it.

"Kai, seriously—"

He makes a very serious face then and drops his voice an octave. "Hush, Bonnie. This will go a lot easier if you relax."

His fingers begin to glow over the puckered flesh and Bonnie's eyes suddenly go wide and she's pushing his hands away. "Wait, what are you—"

"I'm not, I'm not," he hushes, drawing back his hand to touch her jaw. He can feel the warn wetness there, can see the look of desperation in her eyes. She thought he was going to heal her; she doesn't want him to and he's not, even though he really, really wants to. "I know you want to keep this as a reminder for you not to trust so easily—" his free hand ghosts over the badly healing wound "—and to let me know that you'll never forgive me."

She exhales at his words, eyes softening in a way that tugs on his heart. He's about to take his hand away and apologise, when she places her hand over his.

"Heal it," she says.

"Really?" His face lights up, and she nods sadly.

"Yeah."

His hand trembles as it hovers above the scar; he's whispering a spell he never thought he'd use. The glow of his magic is a white-blue on her skin, knitting the fibres of broken tissue like a delicate weave. She quietly inhales the magic while he exhales it, feeling his essence channel through him to her, filling every empty space of her body with a tiny piece of himself.

When it's done, he bends down and plants a chaste kiss on the soft skin of her sternum before looking up to meet her eyes. The sad tenderness in her face moves him with an emotion he cannot begin to fathom. He knows that her allowing him to heal her is her way of forgiving him, yet he isn't sure how to process her mercy, her bottomless compassion.

It is then that he feels her hand on his cheek, well before he feels the tears fall, and he doesn't stop himself from curling into her palm with a gentle sigh of relief.

Yeah, he thinks contently. I might just be in love with her.

ix.

.

Kai groans, exhausted, as he picks himself up from the bottom of the tub. What a night, he thinks, as he towels himself dry. He believes that the panic attack/getting kicked in the nuts by love type thing he experienced earlier that evening might just be over with now and so he crawls into bed.

Sleep comes fast but fitful and the next morning he awakens in a funk. He has no appetite, walks around in a daze, spaces out during a call with Jo and even forgets to insult his father to his face. He's off his game.

He thinks he should be angry about all this but he's not. Mostly he's confused and missing Bonnie's face like crazy. So he calls her up, hoping to have a conversation with her—about what, he's not sure, maybe the whole forgiveness thing—but he only gets her voicemail.

By the time he leaves his fifth message in two hours, he realises that something is wrong, and that despite his unflagging confidence in himself, he might not win this time. Maybe he's never meant to get the girl.

x.

.

He's got himself convinced that this spiralling funk he's in is because of something he ate, not the fact that Bonnie's been ignoring him for a solid week after (unofficially) forgiving him. So later that night when he walks into The Mystic Grill to find her sitting at the bar, he is secure in the belief that nothing's happened. Only, it turns out that Bonnie is way, way better at that game than he is. As for the hot, angry ache he gets in his throat when he gets just how good at it she is, how perfectly unaffected, he writes off the feeling to nerves over her possibly changing her mind about not hating him anymore.

So now it's just him and Bonnie, alone at the bar. She's poking through a bowl of mixed nuts, unperturbed, as if she hadn't been actively ignoring him for seven fucking days.

"Seriously?" he says.

"Hmm?"

"Seriously."

"Seriously what?" She pops a Brazil nut in her mouth and chews, gives him a mildly curious look.

His face flushes red, cheek twitching. For a hot second he wants to slap her, just to see her try and keep a blank face after that. He knows she can be one cold bitch when she puts her mind to it, and he thinks she might succeed, right before lighting his ass on fire.

Slowly, and with zero attempt to hide how pissed off he is, he says, "Did I do something wrong?"

She looks confused. "I don't know, Kai, did you?"

He grabs her drink and knocks it back, pulling his stool closer to the bar so that his knee knocks into hers. He feels around for her foot with his own and steps on her toes, hard enough so that she finally looks him in the eye.

"Ow," she says, unenthusiastically.

His breath hisses in through his nostrils loudly and he can't unclench his jaw enough to speak, so he steps down even harder. That earns him a reaction.

"Ow! What's your problem?"

He takes his foot off hers, sits back in the stool and crosses his arms. "I don't know what it is I did to offend you; that's my problem."

She scoots back and slides off the stool, edging away from him. "You're weirding me out. I'm going to leave now and you're not going to follow. And if I do see you again, you won't be a freak anymore. Got it?"

He nods in a weird sort of stupor and watches her until she disappears outside the door, then he lowers his head to the counter and bangs his forehead for a while.

"I." Bang. "Am." Bang. "An asshole."

Bonnie doesn't come back and he tries his mightiest not to follow her. There's an unpleasant patch in their relationship for a few weeks after that where she completely ignores him and Kai forgoes his usual self-restraint when it comes to the opposite sex and finger fucks pretty much any woman who will stand or sit still long enough to let him. No oral, no penetration, just straight finger-banging to see how many times they'll get off before begging him to fuck them. Which he won't.

The thing is that none of them compare to the rush he felt when Bonnie took hold of him and pulled him in for that first kiss. And the more he chases that sweet, sweet high, the more numbness he feels, but he keeps pushing forward, full speed ahead, until he doesn't.

A few more weeks go by and he's managed to pull himself together for the most part. And as long as he doesn't try to get cocky and finger any petite brunettes, life is awesome. So awesome. So very fucking awesome that when his phone buzzes at three in the morning and it's Bonnie, he only has a mild panic attack and manages to refrain from answering, letting it go to voicemail on the first ring (the struggle is real), but ends up picking up on the second.

After about ten seconds, she says, "Kai?"

"Yes?"

"Mal-a-chai." She sounds drunk.

"That's my name."

"…I'm sorry." She does sounds drunk, and like she's possibly been crying.

He throws back the covers and puts his feet on the floor, rubbing at his eyes. "For what?"

She doesn't answer, just breathes into the phone.

"Sorry about what, Bonnie?" he asks, more sharply than he means to.

"This wasn't supposed to happen."

"Yeah, well, maybe you should have thought about that before you let me go balls deep in you, huh? Before I opened up to you, before I—" He exhales shakily. "Look, why did you even bother with me? Was this your revenge all along: to get me hooked on you, then bounce?"

"No, I just..." she pauses, inhaling deeply. "I was just thinking..."

He waits. The dead air goes on so long he wonders if the signal dropped, then he hears her sighs. Softly, he asks, "What were you thinking, Bonnie?"

"I'm sorry, Kai." Her voice cracks. He's losing her.

"No, wait! Wait, Bonnie! What were you thinking? Tell me."

But she hangs up.

He stares at his phone, and he's still staring at it a minute later when he finally admits it out loud:

"I'm in love with Bonnie Bennett… Well, fuck."

xi.

.

He showers, changes his sheets and lies down on top of them. When dawn comes, spilling light across the bed, he's still wide awake and staring up at the ceiling.

I'm in love with Bonnie.

It explains the panic attacks. It explains a lot, really.

A few minutes go by and suddenly he's up and dressed, seated in a cab headed for Bonnie's. Ten minutes later, he's sitting outside the dorm building and ten minutes after that he hears the door open and out steps Bonnie. A second later, he's on his feet.

"Heads up, Bonster."

"Kai, what's—" She walks down the first few steps and stops two above the one he's standing on. "What's going on?"

He holds out a big bouquet of red, orange and yellow Gerber daisies that he gave the cab driver $100 to go pick up.

"Wait. Why—what?"

"All good questions," he says, "but the word you're looking for here is 'woo'."

"What?"

"No, 'woo'," he enunciates, squinting at her. "Is this an East Coast or southern Virginia accent thing?"

She shakes her head. "Kai, what do you think you're doing?"

He waves the bouquet. "Wooing you."

"Why are you doing this?"

"I thought you deserved fair warning."

"I don't have time for this," she sighs, exasperated. "I'm late for class." She pushes past him and starts down the sidewalk.

She's going to be his, he decides. He's known this since the first moment he laid eyes on her. The only difference now is that he's aware of his own emotions and that he wants her for her, for how she makes him feel, not what she can do for him.

He shouts after her at the top of his lungs, "I'm in love with you, Bonnie Bennett!"

She stops dead in her tracks.

"That's right." He trots over to her. The look of shock and utter fear on her face makes him more than a little giddy. "So brace yourself."

"I don't—"

He kisses her until she stops trying to speak, then he kisses her some more until she melts against him. After a moment, he takes a step back and winces. "Ooo, sorry about your lipstick. Nice colour, though."

She wipes at the blood red smear, spreading it even more, and gives another exasperated sigh. "You're not in love with me Kai."

"Not true."

"Well, I'm not in love with you."

"Of course you're not. Where's the fun in that? Where the challenge? This is why there's going to be wooing. Game on, Bennett."

"I'm not falling in love with you."

"Yeah you are."

"I know all your tricks," she says, finally taking his flowers and pointing them at him. "I'm immune to your moves."

"You know my seduction moves. Wooing is a totally different endeavour." Although, technically, he's never done it before.

"Don't do this to me, Kai." She pinches the bridge of her nose. "Please."

"Okay."

She drops her hand and glances up at him in surprise. "Really? You're giving up that easily?"

"I most certainly am." He winks at her.

"Kai…"

"I am absolutely positively not going to do everything in my power to make you fall in love with me." He winks at her again.

"This is a very bad idea."

"The best ones always are. Anyway, you need to go to class and I need to go think of ways to win you over," he says, rubbing his chin. "For starters, how about having dinner with me tonight? I'll teach you a super cool Gemini spell that only the Elders know and would likely try to flay me alive for teaching a non-Gemini."

She raises an eyebrow at him. "You're bribing me into going on a date with you?"

"What can I say? I fight dirty. Correction, I woo dirty."

"I—I'll think about it."

He grins. "Great. I'll pick you up at eight. Wear something that's about eighty percent classy, twenty percent slutty. Make that twenty-five percent!" He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a perfectly folded tissue. "Seriously, though, you kind of look like the Joker with the—" he gestures at his mouth for reference.

She half laughs, half groans, and says, "So do you."

"Yeah, but I pull it off."

She exhales slowly, shaking her head. "You're not in love with me, Kai. You're still processing your emotions and eventually you're going to get bored with me, and then—"

"What are you talking about? I'm bored now." Mid-yawn, he winks at her. "Anyway, I've got some scheming to do. Mademoiselle." He takes her hand and turns it over, kissing the inside of her wrist. "Eight o'clock. Sixty percent classy, thirty percent slutty, ten percent scary. I know you can pull it off!"

"I'm not going to fall in love with you, Kai!" she shouts after him, but he just grins.

"Whatever you say, baby."

But he knows that she will fall for him; after all, he always wins.