Scandalous things

Ian

It's slightly past midnight in Boston when Ian gets out of the hotel shower and goes to the balcony to look out over the city. Emma (who he's sharing a room with) is sitting cross-legged on one of the beds texting someone on her phone. Ian glances back at her and she stops, meeting his eyes with a distracted gaze.

"Benji wants to know if we're coming out tonight."

"Not tonight. I think I might just go to bed. You should go if you want, though."

Emma lifts a brow and eyes him shrewdly. Then she gives this soft huff of laughter. "You want me to leave."

"I didn't say that, Emma." Ian turns away from the balcony, letting the curtain drift closed in his wake. There's a long moment when the two friends just look at each other. Finally Ian relents. "Okay, I wouldn't mind being alone for an hour." He lets out a sigh that lingers into a self-conscious laugh.

"How about I give you two, and you can owe me when we get to Chicago."

"Deal."

She smirks as she gets up, but as is often her way, she doesn't needle him about whatever it is she thinks he might want to be alone for. After sliding on one of her better pairs of boots, she checks her hair and makeup in the bathroom and offers Ian a knowing little goodbye before heading out to meet Benji in the lobby.

Which leaves Ian sitting in a towel on his bed, staring at his phone with a contemplative expression. Eventually he picks it up and dials Kiara's number.

When it rings on her end, it's about 10:12pm in Denver.

Kiara

It rings out for a while on Kiara's end.

Long enough that Ian may think it's about to divert to the brunette's voicemail before there's a click and then a familiar (albeit slightly sleepy) voice greets him with: "Hello? Ian?" There's the rustle of sheets and he can, no doubt, envision Kiara struggling upright and pushing her hair from her face.

It's not as late in Denver as Boston but the Verbena's exhaustion hadn't been constrained by the hour, she had in fact, dropped her bags at the door of her apartment upon arrival home, surveyed the potential damage left in the wake of her absence and the prolonged stay of another Awakened in the throes of Quiet before crawling under her bed-covers and pulling a pillow close.

She hadn't stirred for hours, the afternoon passing into evening; the lights outside in the city spilling across her floor; the sounds of traffic faintly weaving into her dreams. He can hear her half drowsy little noise of confusion before she comes fully conscious of where she is - reaching to turn her clock toward her to read the glaring neon numbers. "God, what time is it there?"

She's pressing her hand against her cheek, though he can't see it, perhaps he can sense her awareness returning. "Are you still in New York?"

Ian

There's a quiet "hey" when Kiara's voice greets him on the other end of the line. He can hear the sleep in her voice and it makes him almost immediately regret the call. She must have just gotten back from Hawai'i.

"It's after midnight. We're in Boston now."

"I woke you up." There's a note of that regret in his voice. "I'm sorry. I was just..." there's a pause. "Thinking I missed your voice. Do you want me to let you sleep?"

Kiara

"No, it's okay." She hears the regret and something in her voice softens as she awakens.

She draws the covers back and rises to her feet, padding across to her window. The blinds were left open and the Verbena's dark eyes survey the streets below before she drops them down and moves into her living room, turning lamps on to bathe her apartment in a soft, warm glow. "I've been asleep for hours since we got in. I've missed your voice, too."

There's the sound of a facet running and the muffled chink of glassware. She must have moved into her kitchen. "Boston, hm? And you're not out in the city? Color me shocked." There's a gentle flirtation to her voice as she leans a hip against a counter top. He can envision the slight curve of her mouth upward, the way it always tended toward when she was teasing him. The gleam in her fine dark eyes.

"You know between our perilous adventures under the sea I think I got a tan in Moloka'i." She's examining her arm, the phone cradled between her chin and shoulder. "I should send you a scandalous picture."

Likely, it would not be the first she ever has.

Ian

"Mm, so long as you don't mind if I use it for scandalous things." There's a blossom of amused warmth in his voice, though the flirtation is colored with hints of exhaustion. "I've gotten kind of pale with all the night hours I've been keeping. We might almost match by the time I get back."

There's a pause as he lies back on the mattress. Kiara can detect a faint rustle of fabric as he shifts to get more comfortable on the bed. "I had enough nightlife in New York. More than enough." His voice goes a little ambivalent there, touched with something that's hard to place. His communication has been sparse the past couple of days. Whatever it is he's recalling, it isn't a story he's relayed.

"Kind of wished you were there, actually. You could have saved me from all the nineteen year old fashion models."

Kiara

"How tragically domestic of us," she tosses back with this hint of wry amusement, settling herself down onto a sofa and drawing her legs up. A hand tangles back through her hair but stills, briefly, as he mentions New York and its social scene.

He can hear her breathe out softly against the receiver.

He's heard Kiara mention the city more than once, felt the discontentment and constriction that had been part of her time there; the discovery of her mentor; of her sister Sadie; of an entire new world that had been given to her and, later, brutally torn away. "Are you trying to tell me the cosmopolitan glamour of New York and all it had to offer didn't seduce you?" Quiet, though threaded through with echoing ambivalence, somehow.

The nineteen year old fashion models though, gain a little noise and the Verbena's laughter. She stretches herself out along her sofa. "I sadly think you're doomed to a life of women fawning over you, Ian Lai. You'd better resign yourself to it, now." There's a curl of warm humor, then, a little mellower: "I don't miss a lot about New York but I do miss the way it looks this time of year. Central Park in the snow and ice skating at Rockefeller."

It's hard to miss the undertone of longing, there.

"You'd have liked Moloka'i. It's beautiful there. I think Kalen would happily have spent longer learning about the Kahuna if we'd been able to." A trace of something vaguely regretful, perhaps uncertain. "But we got what we went there for."

Ian

There's an answering bubble of laughter when Kiara asks if he remained unseduced by the cosmopolitan glamours of New York. The wording of that question may or may not have been intentional, but the answer he gives is the same regardless. "The cosmopolitan glamour of New York can and has seduced me on many occasions. Just not this one." His tone dips to something softer, more reflective. "It was beautiful though."

Kiara thinks he would have liked Moloka'i, to which Ian gives a little hum of agreement. "I've been out to the islands a couple of times, but I never actually stopped in Moloka'i. Your pictures made me wish I had." He pauses to take a breath. When he exhales, he lets his eyes slide shut for a moment. "I'm glad the trip went well."

There's relief in his voice too. Subtle, but not entirely masked. "I think we'll both have some stories to tell, next time we see each other."

They could just as easily tell those stories now. The fact they do not is indication enough as to the nature of them. There are things about their lives that are not safe to discuss this way, and for a moment there's a quiet edge of frustration in the set of Ian's jaw (not that Kiara can see it.) Thinking of the things he wants to ask her - to tell her - but can't.

Instead he changes the subject. "We're heading to Chicago tomorrow." There's a lot he could say about that as well. Going back to his hometown is always a heavy thing for him. But he doesn't linger on it.

"Do you want to spend Christmas in Wisconsin with me?"

Kiara

There's things she does want to share with him. Moments of the trip to Hawaii, her time spent around Kalen. The fact that the other man knew now how Kiara thought of Ian, the degree and intimacy of their connection to each other. The alien beauty of Ali'ikai's world beneath the trench. Her feelings on witnessing the reunion of a long estranged family. They aren't so easily (or safely) articulated across a phone line though and the silence presses down on the awareness of it.

A moment or two where neither of them can say anything but there's a silence that passes - a brief flickering recognition for it.

And then he changes the subject and reveals he's heading to Chicago. The brunette finds herself frowning toward her ceiling at the revelation, her fingers idly caressing the edge of the sofa's arm; tracing along a new tear in the seam. He invites her to spend Christmas with him and she registers, Kiara, that in another reality, in one where he hadn't lost his family, the invitation would have been layered through with that implication that meeting family, that traveling to a childhood home meant.

There's still something significant to it, perhaps more so for the textured loss there she can feel pressed beneath his words; dwelling within the invitation. There's a pause and he can nearly picture the frown marring her forehead; the way her brows drew together when she was uncertain, the flicker of fear that nearly always managed to surface with every new development that intimacy on this level presented her with.

Still: "Yeah. I'd like that." She sits up, taking in the sudden emptiness of her apartment, the spare room that had once been her sister's standing open, like a quiet reminder of Sadie's departure from her daily world. There's more to offer to that, she hovers over the notion of saying more, offering some condolence, some commiseration for the difficulty of the return there.

"I've missed you."

(Because it was somehow harder to say what she meant like this, in the face of what he'd just asked of her but he can feel the quiet sentiment beneath it, anyway).

Ian

Of all the places he could choose to spend the holiday, Wisconsin may seem, on the surface, an uncharacteristic choice. It doesn't have the lights and glamour of New York. It isn't somewhere that he has ever called home. Were it not for its immediate proximity to Illinois (and Chicago,) Kiara's first response to his question might very well be: why there?

Of all places.

She doesn't ask that, though. Instead she says yeah, I'd like that and Ian exhales this silent breath of relief away from the receiver. (He hadn't realized he'd been holding it until then.)

Then she says she missed him, and for a moment he gets this soft, sad smile.

"Yeah. I've missed you too." There's a contemplative pause before he admits, "I'm not really used to it. Missing people."

That isn't true, though. There are people he's missed for so long that missing them has become a part of his daily existence. But that isn't what he means right now when he says it.

"I used to drive up to Madison from Chicago, when I was in high school. It kind of... became this refuge for me, I think. And it's probably the safest place I know that isn't out in the middle of nowhere. We're doing our last performance there. Last year I stayed behind for a few days. I thought maybe this year I'd do the same. It's... I don't know. I don't want to be in Chicago on Christmas, it's too fucking depressing. But I don't really want to be in Denver either."

He slides one of his hands across his chest to trail over a collar-bone. "I want to be with you, though. I want to be with you... somewhere where I only have good memories."

Somewhere safe, he doesn't reiterate, but the intention hangs over the conversation like a cloud.

"If you feel like coming early and flying into Chicago, I could show you around there too." After a pause he adds, perhaps as a way to cut some of the heaviness from his voice, "I hope you realize the first thing I'm going to do when I see you is drag you back to my hotel room. If we even make it that far."

Kiara

Part of her wants to argue that there would be (are) worse places they could be stuck than in Denver for the holidays but the protest stays lodged firmly in her throat and never quite finds vocalization because the other part of Kiara, the part that lived in fear of the Union finally taking note of the young Verbena right beneath their noses in the city, the part of her that saw more violence than peace, that had stood in a clearing with Annie Pierce and seen what devastation lay in their past (and probably their future, too), the part of her that still dreamed of terrors and woke up, momentarily terrified - that part knew better.

Knew that her presence in the city was nothing more than a ticking time bomb. Eventually, something would set in motion events.

She's quiet while he talks about Madison, there's a sense that she's listening to the timbre of his voice as much as what he's actually saying. Feeling the undercurrent of old emotion, the way it stirred to life as he says he wants to be with her in a place that only holds good memories.

Somewhere they weren't in danger.

"There's a Yule party that the girls are holding out in Morrison on Monday, Annie sent me a text about it." A beat. "I should probably make an appearance, talk to them about Hawaii." There's the sound of movement, a rattling that resonates as the woman searching around for something. What sounds like keys being set aside and then the rustle of pages being turned.

Kiara consulting her diary, perhaps. She kept one, an elegant leather bound thing, for her consultations with clients. It was a tiny reminder that despite the shape their lives took, the supernatural dangers they lived with (in spite of) every day, there were other aspects that shaped them too, Ian's career, the performances that took him away from Colorado, Kiara's business, the dedication she had for helping strangers with their troubles.

"Why don't I fly into Chicago on Wednesday?" The first thing he's going to do is drag her back to his hotel room. The edge of her mouth curves into a smile and she sits back, humming. "And what makes you think you'll be the one doing the dragging around?" Ever that edge of competitiveness. "But as for the rest," softer. "I don't anticipate we'll even see any of Chicago for at least 24 hours if I have my way."

Ian

"Our last performance in Chicago is the 22nd. That's... I think Tuesday. Yeah." The exhaustion is evident there, with the little pause he has to take to remember what day it is. "If you fly in early Wednesday morning, I can pick you up. We won't have much time in the city cause our Madison show is that evening. Which..." he laughs, "...might preclude us spending 24 hours in a hotel room."

The tragedy.

His voice slides into a playful tone when he adds, sleepily, "I don't know, you haven't dragged me around much lately." There's a faint rustle-slide of fabric and a quiet sigh as he stretches out his spine, resting the phone in the crook of his shoulder so his arms can pull up over his head. "I guess we'll see what happens."

There's a telltale down-shift in his voice here. This sort of low, half-asleep, half turned-on sound.

"I miss the way you smell." A beat. "I miss fucking you. A lot."

You'd think that three weeks was an absolutely interminable amount of time.

Kiara

"I guess that depends on how good your stamina is, buddy."

There's no disguising the flirtation now, Kiara uncurling herself and navigating her way back into her bedroom. Ian's been to the Verbena's apartment often enough to remember how it looks, even in his mind's eye. Kiara's bed was a handsome, modern affair made of dark, polished wood and a black steel frame. Her window overlooking the city below and her bedroom floor polished wood that nearly always seemed half engulfed by the brunette's belongings.

A sofa and sturdy chest of drawers in one corner seemingly in perpetual danger of overflowing with the belongings piled on top of each and everywhere you looked - plants thriving. On her windowsill, housed on top of small corner tables; beside her front door.

There's a beat where she sets the phone down and his voice suddenly finds projection around the room as she pulls a sweater over her head, casts it aside and bends over to undo the laces on her boots. He can hear the solid thunk as each hit the floor and the rustling of the brunette sliding out of her jeans; she leans over the phone, Kiara, her voice a low murmur as she peels the last vestiges of her clothing off; shedding the traces of a long flight.

"I do too. You have no idea." She pulls an over-sized shirt on and crawls up her bed to settle back into a pile of overstuffed pillows. "I could use your capable hands right about now." There's a tiny hint of a smile that creeps across the Verbena's supple mouth. "Your mouth, too." A pause, she slides her fingertips over the slope of a bare shoulder where the neck of the shirt drapes down, the material gaping wide.

"If I was there right now," Kiara's eyes drift closed, she tips her chin up. "I'd make you give me a massage." Then, coyly: "Among other things."

Ian

There's an almost offended little huff when Kiara taunts him about his stamina, followed by "Excuse me, I have it on good authority that my stamina is fucking impressive."

Says the man who sounds as though he might be in danger of falling asleep on the phone. Though, after the rest of what Kiara says... probably not any more.

Kiara puts the phone on speaker while she pulls her clothes off. Her apartment is easy for him to visualize: the plants, the bed, the stray clutter of her things strewn across the floor. At some point his arms slide back to his sides and he takes the phone in his hand again so he can untwist his neck. When he hears the faint sound of her jeans being unzipped, he looks up at the hotel ceiling and smiles quietly. His free hand finds its way to his stomach and traces a lazy, circling pattern over it.

It stops when Kiara starts to speak again. Mentions that she could use his hands. His mouth.

Briefly, he shuts his eyes and rolls his lower lip between his teeth. Then he gives this low, pleased sound that tumbles into a quiet laugh. "Among other things," he repeats, casually mimicking her coy tone. "Well, if you were here, I would definitely give you a massage. Among other things."

He's never been especially shy about saying what he means. Kiara knows that. So she'll likely pick up that he's being playful here. "I could map out the lines of your body with my hands. Then my mouth. Maybe I'd go slow to draw it out. Because I kind of like when you get frustrated."

At some point while he's saying this, the knot on his towel gets pulled loose. He slides it out from under him to discard on the floor.

"But then I'd go down on you for as long as you wanted." He bites his lip again, makes another little sound. "I want to feel you come under my tongue."

A beat and he adds, "You could use your own hands, you know."

Kiara

I kind of like when you get frustrated.

There's a breath of answering laughter from the female at that, she shifts forward and rolls onto her stomach, tucking a pillow beneath her stomach and framing the phone between her fingers, smiling down at the screen in much the manner she might have if it had been him, rather than a small electronic device she was interpreting mood and inclination of.

"Whatever gives you the impression I don't?" She feigns with an impressive degree of nonchalance inherent in her tone, followed by a small sound of pleasure. "I just prefer somebody else doing the heavy lifting." There's the rustle of fabric as the brunette settles on her back again and twists her face so her voice carries to the phone where she's set to speaker, again.

"Or maybe you just like the idea of listening to me using my own hands. Have you? Since you've been on tour?" She reaches for the phone and brings it back to her ear; her fingers idly stroking over her skin, dipping down to slide over her stomach. If she closed her eyes, she could almost pretend it was his fingers; feel the ghosting heat of his mouth pressing kisses along her hipbone.

She makes a tiny, half frustrated little noise.

"Thought about me while you did?" A beat, her sharp little teeth sink neatly into her lower lip. It verges on the painful, which spurs her on. "I thought about you in Hawaii. Lying on the beach in the sun, there was nobody there but me. It made me think of that night at Cherry Creek. The way you fucked me against the cave."

There's a sharp little breath out from Kiara, a flush staining her cheeks, spilling down over her neck at the very visceral, primal imagery it invokes, her words, that particular memory. "We could have had the entire island nearly to ourselves."

Ian

Maybe he just likes the idea of listening to her.

"Of course I do." He almost laughs at that. There's warmth in his voice and a little gust of breath at the suggestion. When Kiara asks if he's done it recently (touched himself, thought about her,) he lets that not-quite-laugh evolve into a pleased hum. "Of course I have."

He goes a bit quiet after that, listening to her talk about the things she thought about in Hawaii. He runs his tongue between his lips as they part to allow a couple of quick, shallow breaths.

"Did you?" he asks softly, his voice barely registering over the receiver. It isn't a question that really needs an answer. More of a spontaneous utterance. "I thought about that too. When I was in the shower this morning. I remembered your teeth on my skin and then I came so hard I saw stars."

There's a point while they're talking when the hand on his stomach drifts lower and wraps around himself. Less a conscious decision than a natural response to their conversation (though surely he at least half-expected it to end up here.) When he does it, his breath goes slightly shaky for a moment.

"I loved fucking you like that. I love watching you come undone. Ah..." He doesn't quite manage to keep that little moan from escaping his lips. Doesn't really care, either. "I love that you always leave marks on me."

"I think about you a lot when I jerk off. It kind of makes me crazy, actually." His breath gives another little shudder. "That I want you that much." He lets his voice curl up into a wry tone. "I'm doing it right now."

"Fuck, I wish I could have been there with you." Whatever momentary control he had over his voice, it's already starting to slip away again.

Kiara

There's a tiny thrill to it.

To hearing the way his breathing changes, becomes shallower, harder pants against the receiver. Something very private and personal and a little obscene about it - the idea of listening to one another in the midst of something that physical and base. It could be said (and wouldn't be an exaggeration) that she's encouraging it. Encouraging him to do what he does with her words and the picture she paints of herself lounging on a sun-chaise; her skin gleaming and tan beneath the warmth of the day.

The memory of the two of them pressed against the rough rock face.

The tang of blood and the spark of pain where Kiara's fingernails raked his back and the jutting stone cut her skin.

"Mm, are you?" She murmurs lowly into the phone, her fingertips skimming down her midsection, dipping beneath it to the hem of her underwear. "I like that I drive you crazy. I like the way I can feel how hard it makes you when we're close, sometimes. Like all I'd have to do ... " The brunette's fingers slip down further, her knees falling apart ever so slightly and she makes a little sub-vocal noise.

Just - this little suggestion. This response to her own fingers motion. Her eyes drift closed.

" ... is put my hands on you or find that spot on your neck and bite down." There's a sultry edge that creeps into Kiara's voice, now. A slight breathlessness that builds as she shifts a little on her bed and he can hear it; the slide of her body against the sheets, the tiny sounds escaping her throat as she slides her fingers in deeper.

"If I was there right now, I'd do that. Leave marks all over your skin." There's a gust of breath exhaled hard into the receiver and he knows the Verbena well enough by now, has a degree of intimacy with her body, with the hitches and tiny noises of Kiara when they're together to know he's not alone in giving in to the momentum of their conversation.

Ian

They've both been encouraging it. Outside the window of Ian's hotel room, Boston is humid and misty and far too warm for late December. People are Christmas shopping and bar-hopping and meanwhile there's a war stirring right underneath their noses. It was like that in New York: this undercurrent of fear. Whispered stories told to him by old acquaintances. People are disappearing, they said. It's starting again.

What he and Kiara have together. What they're doing now: intimate and visceral, that's something worth holding on to. Even this frustratingly limited version of it. This is how they survive: by allowing themselves to live. By continuing, despite the odds, to let themselves fucking enjoy things.

And there is very little doubt that he is. Enjoying it. Getting off on it (literally.) There is a picture in Ian's mind of Kiara in her bed. In his version she isn't wearing any clothes, but the details of her expression are fairly close to reality. He knows her well enough, has been with her like this enough times to picture the way she looks; to feel an echo of sympathetic arousal at the memories of her body's response patterns.

She likes that she drives him crazy. That she can feel it, when they're close: how hard she makes him. He makes a sound at that, all at once frustrated and turned on. Kiara can't see him right now; can't feel for herself whether her words are having the intended effect, but whatever image she's picturing - it's likely pretty close to accurate.

If she was with him, she'd leave marks all over his skin.

He finally puts the phone on speaker, tapping the screen distractedly as he sets it on the pillow beside him. Once free, he drags the fingernails of his left hand over his shoulder and across the length of his chest, pressing hard enough that they leave raised red marks on his skin.

"If you were here right now," he adds, his voice edging into something a little harder, a little more base and demanding, "I'd put your legs on my shoulders when I fuck you, so that every time I sink in I can feel how fucking deep I'm going."

It makes him harder, thinking about that; makes his cock give this reflexive little jerk in his hand. The way he's touching it is more deliberate now, moving from lazy strokes and exploration to a harder grip. It's a poor substitute, really, for what he wants, but it still makes his breath catch.

"Fuck, I want to be inside you right now. I want to feel how hot and wet you are." His voice stops, and there's a brief beat of silence before he rolls his head back on the pillow and lets out a lingering moan.

"I wish I could see you. You are so fucking beautiful."

He breathes hard when he turns his head toward the phone. "Tell me when you're getting close."

Kiara

Maybe Kiara could feel that too. The stirring of something there, in the world. Like tiny whirls of dust kicked up by a returning breeze - at first it's barely worth the glance but given enough time and force - you begin to sense it. The electricity in the air. It's almost tangible, almost tasted. She's been away from Denver long enough almost to have forgotten but she'll feel it again in the days (and weeks) to come. In every dark street corner and blustery, snow-swept afternoon.

The sense of the oncoming storm.

The surety of the menace, forming in the constrains of nature herself.

Perhaps there is some impetus to this, then. Being together the way they are. Even separated by distance (though were they both a little more skilled at certain magicks maybe not even that could have held them back). There's something potent and powerful to it, connecting with somebody who mattered to you. Reveling in the physicality of it, their pleasure, your own. Ian knows the brunette well enough now to picture her in his head, to conjure up through fantasy and memory both the way she looks, flushed and aroused. The way her chest rises and falls in quick succession, the way sweat paints itself into her temples and the small of her back.

(He's tasted it, he ought to).

Knows the way she tangles her legs around his body when they're together, curls into him and keeps him close with her thighs locked around his hips; knows how triumphant and wild she looks when she's on top of him when they fuck; her dark hair tangling and loose over her shoulders, her mouth kiss swollen and parted and her eyes glittering and focused on him.

Intimate and visceral. They were both capable of giving in to it, some primal, predatory urge deep within them, thrumming in their veins.

Tell me when you're getting close.

"I'm - " there's this protracted, broken off little gasp from Kiara's side and then, her back arching a little off her bed, fingers curling into the covers of her sheets and dragging them, " - so close, God, Ian. Are you? I want to hear you." She demands in a rush, barely suppressing a moan as her clever fingers, fingers that could press and shape and deliver soothing restoration to the human body, find that point and she writhes there, on the bed.

"Let me hear you."

Ian

He's never been very good at keeping quiet. Not in these moments, anyway. On the rare occasions when he's forced to, he usually ends up either bleeding or breaking something. Kiara doesn't need to ask, but hearing her say it pretty much tips him over the edge from close to right there. Part of it's the sound of her voice when she's that far gone. Part of it's the demand. He's picturing her in her bed, wild hair splayed out in a chaotic tumble with moonlight slanting off of her skin, giving in to the moment with the same primal abandon she's always displayed when they're together. Combined with the sound of her voice (her breath) in his ear, he can almost imagine he's there. Almost.

His own breath hitches when she tells him she's close, and there's this bloom of heat that spreads out across his chest. He arches his neck, head rolling back into the pillow with a little flutter of his eyelids. Kiara can't see any of that, but she can hear the catch of his breath and the sudden beat of silence followed by a breathy high note in his voice.

"Yes... fuck, I'm..." There are two quick, wild gasps and then this loud, punctuating moan that starts somewhere deep in his chest and rolls up through his throat. The sound of it is visceral and unambiguous, cutting off into another gasp and a sharp curse.

All things considered, it's probably lucky the people in the adjacent room are still out for the evening.

The sounds don't stop right away. His moans hit a peak before gradually winding down. By the time he speaks again, he's panting and lying back with one arm splayed behind his head, looking up at the ceiling with this bright shine over his eyes.

"God, I miss you so much."

There's a little pause and then suddenly this low, almost self-conscious laugh. He's still laughing when he mutters "I'm glad you can't see this huge mess I just made."

Kiara

There's this beat - several of them, in actual fact - where neither one of them can speak.

Too busy focusing on the buzzing rush between their ears; the thrum of blood moving through their veins. The harsh, static noise of their breathing as they lay across their mutual beds and come down, slowly, from their physical high. Much like when they're together, Kiara revels in this - the loose limbed luxuriousness, the liquid sedation of her limbs as much as the act of sex itself.

There's something richly primitive and base to the sights and scents and sounds of the human body in the aftermath.

Kiara stretches out her legs and points her toes and sort of - sighs. Turns her face toward the phone and brushes strands of dark hair from her temple where they've become damp and pasted themselves to her skin. "Mm," she hums with infinite, throaty satisfaction and half rolls to draw the phone closer and curl herself inward, drawing her knees up and propping her head on her hand; elbow supporting her weight.

God, I miss you so much.

"I did get that impression." Wry, that little comment. Then, gentler, infinitely so. He can hear the tenderness yielding itself to the moment, weaving into her voice across the line: "I miss you too." Her fingertips brush the edge of the phone and light up the screen (probably sending a ripple of static, too).

"At least I know I'm going to sleep tonight."

She's quiet for a moment or two, the brunette, then adds, somewhat coyly: "If I was there I could probably help with the mess, too." It's a little mean, considering the imagery it paints but since when had Kiara Woolfe ever played fair in such things? The breath of laughter that follows it suggests she's well aware.

Ian

At least I know I'm going to sleep tonight.

He gives a long subvocal hum. There is both pleasure and agreement in it. Were it not for the mess on his skin, he would likely be quite content simply to stretch out on the bed and luxuriate in the afterglow. As it is, he's a bit lazy in getting up. Kiara makes that coy little comment and he laughs, the tone of his voice rising to indicate amused interest.

"Would you?"

There's a faintly audible sound - like he just sucked something off his thumb - then a more thoughtful noise. The bed creaks and rustles beneath him as he starts to sit up. "I somehow managed to hit the headboard. I'm blaming you for that." He sets the phone down on the side table as he gets up, moving into the bathroom to grab some tissue. When he returns, there's a measured pause before he says,

"You should tell me what to do more often."

Kiara

"Should I?"

There's the sound of the Verbena rising herself, the rustle of clothing; of sheets being shucked to one side as the brunette gets to her feet, there's a faint rattle as she draws the blinds in her bedroom to one side, opening the window a little to let the crisp winter air flood the room; the distant sounds of traffic sounding floors below.

She leans her weight against the sill, Kiara and Ian can sense that the female is contemplating whatever it is she's looking down on, can likely almost picture the scene - the Verbena's lean frame against the window lit by the moonlight slanting in from above; her dark hair a wild tangle around her shoulders; cheeks still faintly flushed by the physical exhilaration of moments ago.

"I do like being in charge." Her voice drifts back, slightly softer for the distance between her and the bed where it lays in a mess of sheets before there's the faint depression of springs and Kiara settles on the edge of it, recollecting the device and pressing it against her ear with a faint smile twinging the edge of her mouth. "Maybe when I fly out there I can find opportunities to put you in your place, Ian Lai."

There's a curl of flirtation.

She settles back against her pillows. Her voice softer, the easy sedation of her pleasure and the last few days seeping into her speech. "I can't wait to see you." A quiet noise of settling sleepiness. "So much to tell you."

Ian

Put him in his place, she says. Ian laughs at that. The sound is low and wry, tinged a bit with this subdued note of challenge. "Oh, I didn't say I would be accommodating."

He didn't say it, no. But he had been, moments ago. Maybe he just has too much pride to surrender so easily.

It's easier than talking about the heavier things: what being in Chicago means to him (does to him.) The person he used to be when he lived there. The memories that are likely to get dredged up. Easier to think about her: seeing her, fucking her, pretending they're in any hotel in any city. Listening to her tell him the story of how she and Kalen negotiated a trade with a sea witch.

He cleans up quietly while she talks. Later, after he hangs up, he'll make a more thorough job of it. Probably jump in the shower again. By the time Emma gets back, he'll be resting with a book open on his tablet with no evidence or indication whatsoever as to what occurred while she was gone.

She'll figure it out anyway.

Now, though. Kiara is settling back into a sleepy tone and their conversation (such as it is) is winding down. "Mm," Ian agrees. "You too." After a considering pause he adds, "I can show you around a little, before we leave Chicago. I do know some good places we could get lunch." He sits down on the side of the mattress and grabs the phone, switching off the speaker as he sets it to his ear. "You've had a long trip. I should probably let you go."

Kiara

She wants to ask him to stay on the line while she falls asleep. It's in her to do it, too, to ask that of him the same way she asked him to hold her while she fell asleep that night at his apartment when she'd been so shaken by what had happened with Michael. It's easy to forget, the stronger a front a person presents, how vulnerable they may truly be beneath it all.

Ian's glimpsed enough chinks in Kiara Woolfe's armor to know that much of her.

That for all her coy banter and veiled, sharp-edged looks there was a far more to the woman, once the surface layers were pried away. That beneath it all she was capable of bruising and unraveling as easily as anyone else. There's a beat of silence that builds there in the silences after he speaks and she lets her eyes close for a moment - just drinking in the familiar lilt of his voice where it seems clear she wants to stay on the line with him - doesn't want to surrender to sleep, to the exhaustion etched into her limbs, before:

"Mm.  Don't want to go. Want to stay here with you." She'd said something similar that night at his apartment, half roused and disorientated. Then: "I love you." Simple. An unadorned murmur.

Ian

The sleepy confession gets a little laugh out of him. It trails off into this note of quiet affection, then a beat of more sobered silence. And maybe he hasn't really managed to shake the specter of Chicago from his thoughts as much as he'd like, because the first thing he wants to say to that is: I don't know if I deserve it.

He doesn't say that though. Instead he lets the edges of his mouth curl up just a little.

"I love you too."

Another beat and he says, "I can stay on the line for a while, if you like."

It doesn't sound as though he minds.

Kiara

"Maybe I should command you to."

It's a sly thing, that murmur, if heavy with sleep. Kiara curled there on her side, her bare legs drawn up and that oversized shirt sliding off her shoulder. The corner of her mouth notching upward as she presses a hand against her mouth to stifle a yawn. Then: "You need your sleep, you have to go be spectacular on stage and make all those audiences fall madly in love with you."

There's an absent little hum, then: "I'll be okay."

Now that she's not being awoken by her dreams at night, perhaps that's true. Perhaps she means it.

"I'll see you soon." She's never been great at goodbyes, she'd told him that much once, it seems to be an extension of it in a way, the fact she rarely says it when they speak like this. Rather it's a promise she brings, a certainty.

She'll see him soon (even if in their world, it may not always be the truth).

Ian

Maybe I should command you to.

The little huff of laughter he gives there has a rueful quality to it. "I'm going to regret suggesting that, I can tell already."

But Kiara decides to let him go; tells him he has to go be spectacular on stage, and he doesn't argue with that - though there's a part of him that wants to (wants to stay up with her until night becomes dawn; wants to forget for a few hours how far away she is.)

They'll see each other soon.

"Alright." He accepts her reassurance with a reserved smile. "Goodnight."

10:30 PM