Paying Debts

Chapter Forty-Five: Fluidity

Because when something feels so right, you know it has to be wrong. They say it is often the ones you never expect, the ones with their noses so high up in the air with their morals and pride and prejudices. But they fall down just like the rest. They fall hard and fast and they can't help it. They don't know how to stop. From that first taste they're hooked.

And he knows it. And he counts on it.

Piper exhales above him and settles back down on the bed and onto his outstretched arm. She learns how to use her body in motions that seem so awkward and exaggerated from a third perspective; but now that she knows better her reservations slowly unwind one by one.

She feels his touch, the way he says so few words unless necessary, the way he looks at her with half-lidded eyes and doesn't remind her they need to be quiet. Discreet. For it takes a discreet woman to be a mistress, and the Storm Hawk acknowledges she's too far gone to go back.

She doesn't want to go back. And maybe that is why she pretends it won't hurt at all.

At first the element of danger frightens her more than it appeals, but now it is all about the thrill of being caught. Of getting as much skin as she can before her time is up. To learn as fast as possible so the student can finally outsmart the teacher.

It always starts with a kiss before she quickly ends up in his bed with her top off and her nipples erect in the air. He groans in her ear, holds her left hand as an anchor while his right reaches inside her pants and touches her.

She says to herself she will never get hurt. Tells it like a lie, like a soundproof barrier that surrounds the jail cell, protecting her friends from her betrayal. She tells herself there are no consequences ("I won't get caught. I won't get caught.") and the invisible sentence leaves the mind and guards the door. It is only when she dresses to leave does she pick it up at the gate and stuffs the letter into her pocket.

Piper starts to dislike her handwriting. She writes deception in the squadron log book.

It is not five minutes since she leaves his bed does Piper check in the mirror for bruises and marks. She leans closer to the wall, cranes her neck and searches. Nothing. He knows.

The girl takes a step back and stares.

This body.

Her face.

They are different now.