totallytrustworthy | I N B O X:

He rasps out a laugh, lightly catching her bare thigh in a facsimile of a slap - easy catch of skin on skin before he makes good on bracing against the counter and slides free of her with a low, catching noise.

"I think I'll manage it," he says whilst leaning over, catching the half empty mug and canister from the basin of the sink. Charlie passes her the latter, takes a pull from the former.

Taken with an only half-steady hand. She's more focused on settling back across that hard, reflected countertop than she is drinking-- more focused on the thought of it rather than the reality which is proven a few seconds later when she knocks the back of her head against the cabinets set up against the ceiling.

Winces sharply, goes in for the wine. "Glad to hear it - think I could get used to this: going into hiding is way more fun when you've got someone else to knock boots with."

Charlie makes a low sympathetic hissing as she hits her head, punctuated by a somewhat mild little snort of laughter - he reaches up, tucking his fingers between her head and the edge of the upper cabinet. Too little too late, but it's the thought that counts.

"I thought that's why spies worked in teams, yeah? Got to have to something to take the edge off at the end of a long day pretending not to be yourself. Just ask James; sure he'd agree."

Pain aside she's smiling under the press of his fingers (one eye open, nose crinkled up unattractively) leaning back into the broad flat of his palm.

It's not the bump on her head that keeps her from connecting the dots: the name James-- actually most of the names from Exsilium-- feel more distant memory than what few months it's been. Eventually, though, Chloe gets it.

"Feel like I should be pointing out that neither of us are really Bond material."

"You, maybe. I've done the double agent thing, thank you very much." Not with much finesse, mind, but he likes to think it still counts. That it might still count where it matters. With Nate in jump school and Chloe here, they've both got their heads so far underground that there's no one left to watch their bloody backs. Not that the dig in and stay very still plan isn't a bad one - in a place this big, going to ground would be his first bet as well -, but it'd be a piss poor idea to send a potential angle down the river without giving it a shot first. The Serbian doesn't know anything about him; if Charlie plays his cards right, it'll stay that way.

Not that he says as much to Chloe. Not right then.

Instead Charlie knocks back what's left of the wine in his mug, shrugs and sets it aside before he tries to make for his pants and trousers, shimmying a little awkwardly to wrestle them up from around his thighs with only one hand.

"So did I," Her toes paw at his bare thigh as he shuffles his way back to decency. Chloe doesn't bother to chase after the discarded pyjama pants when half-dressed works so well with her new look. "And it ended badly for both of us."

Just saying.

"Oh, I don't know. It wasn't going too badly right up until the big bad bitch turned pyromaniac."

He's grinning - all post-coital stupidity as he wrenches his trousers the rest of the way up. He doesn't bother with fastening them, rather catching her thigh. He drums his fingers there at her skin, quirks an eyebrow. "Anyway, practice makes perfect."

"Provided you live long enough to improve." She braces herself, heels flat against the counters beneath her, leaning across the space between to scuff her forehead-- the bridge of her nose-- across the underside of his chin. "Come on, Prince Charming, this counter's no doona. Help me get down before I go numb."

"Doona," he repeats the word back at her, tucking his chin to press the elongated 'oo' into the corner of her mouth. "Bloody commonwealth."

But she has a point and he's getting tired of standing about with his trousers undone when they could be anywhere else. So he's straight forward enough about doing his pants up properly before catching her by the hips and dragging her to the edge of the counter - gives her a neat little smack to her arse before he steps back enough to give her the space to dismount.

It prompts a short snort of laughter from her as she climbs down, long tank top making the business of standing upright surprisingly decent (so long as she's not doing star jumps or anything else equally as ridiculous). Drops the cup on the counter and makes her way to the living room where she crashes down in a heap on the makeshift space-futon.

"Don't judge. Good things come from where I was born." Her ankles cross at the edge of the coffee table. "Like me."

"You know what else comes from there? Giant spiders" -- he makes as to count the list off on his fingers, though it's a brief beat before he grabs the bottle-- "Everything poisonous."

Moving after her, the flat's small enough that it's just a few strides for him from the cramped kitchenette to the equally cramped futon. He's ginger about sitting down beside her, legs all sprawled in front of him, as the thing seems rickety as all hell. To whatever fabricator did the job on it, the futon's frame groans under the weight but doesn't protest beyond that.

"But I suppose there are exceptions to every rule. You're only mostly poisonous, eh?"

"Mostly. More than mostly. Enough to incapacitate you." Her palm skids across his thigh, creeping over, over...and settling on the bottle before tugging it loose with a smug little sound from the base of her throat. "Nothing to be worried about, yeah?"

Which prompts an snort from him, all faux indignant as she wrests the bottle. He stretches his arms across the back of the futon, settling like a stone in water: legs outstretched, weight sinking low. "Yes, well - never been too good with the creepy crawlies."

He makes a face at her, all wrinkled nose and pulled back lip - catches his fingers against her hair and wriggles them, spider-like, for a moment for emphasis before his hand simply settles there. Stills a moment before blunt fingernails absently scuff through her short hair, up the back of her head. There's no real purpose behind the contact, ninety percent subconscious.

It feels good-- not just the weight of his hands or how his fingers sift soothingly through the cropped ends of her hair-- but this, all of it. Him beside her slack and smitten with all the noise of the world outside their window boxed out of the picture entirely. Her eyes lid, one breath pulled in through her nose and let out when she turns to rub the side of her head across his palm.

"You could stay."

Topic change, and it comes natural as anything after the lengthy silence in between breaths.

The weight of her head fits neatly against the palm of his hand. He presses back accordingly, a lopsided attempt at combing his fingers through her hair, and watches at he does it: studies the shape of his fingers tangled there, the line of her profile and the length of her eyelashes - the kind of look that isn't meant to be seen, a thorough study.

He presses his thumb against her temple, draws a slow circle against the skin.

"Sure, alright."

Which is fantasy and stupid to boot and he knows she knows it too, but what the hell ever. He can say whatever he pleases here and they can both pretend it's the truth.

"And..." She starts, a slow smile crawling its way across her lips as her toes snap on a particularly awful awful future soap opera before snaking across the long lines of his legs. It's all deliberate, like she's swinging up onto a saddle, when her thigh crosses his hip, temple turned into his thumb. Nudged till he's at her cheek. "you'd have the added bonus of all the free sex you can physically stand."

It's one part honesty, two parts distraction: the longer they sit in silence soaking up idle contact, the less likely she is to let him actually walk out that door.

And he does need to, eventually.

Eventually.

"I'm not sure standing's got much to do with it, really." One hand at her cheek, his other settles at her hip - the top of her thigh. He's grinning a little, settled back into the cushion of the futon. He taps his forefinger against the point of her cheekbone - lets his hand skim down, thumb tracing the line of her neck.

He hooks his thumb into the neck of her shirt, drawing it down a few degrees. Charlie grins up at her, wider then.

"You know I like a man with confidence." It's a low, throaty sort of noise that she makes in response to the collar of her shirt going taut along the tugged seamline. That half-shift in position turns into a full one: Chloe presses herself up and over him to brace herself with hands pressed into cushion on either side of his head, scuffs the curves of her mouth over his. Considering how little she's wearing, it's completely indecent.

Which makes it perfect for her.

He breathes a laugh out against the shape of her mouth, the edge of his teeth gentle at her upper lip - happenstance more than planning. "And I like a bird with a nice arse. Match made in heaven, really."

Though he's not going for her bum right now, thank you. Instead Charlie turns the collar of her shirt free, passing the flat of his hand across her sternum, over the plane of her stomach through the thin fabric of her shirt. Sliding his fingers under the hem of it and skating straight back up to unabashedly grasp at her breast, pinching her nipple idly between the knuckle of his first and second finger, is all easy enough.

Chloe, on the other hand, is decidedly not gentle when she catches his lower lip in her teeth under the pinch and press of his rolling fingertips. Her weight drops, stomach muscles tense, the angles of her shoulders all rough and dramatic just before she rocks against him. Inhales the heady scent of wine and sex-- and the two week old linens beneath them.

Poor life choices doing up those jeans again, Charlie.

He starts to get that somewhere between her teeth narrowing on his lip and the grind of her over top of him. At the time it'd seemed like the sensible thing to do, but he's regretting that done up zipper now as he breathes into her mouth, fingers closing on her naked thigh as she rocks against him. Her shirt's all rucked up against his forearm, the swell of the underside of her breasts just visible there - and he presses against her chest with the heel of his palm, his nose to her cheek as she kisses and bites.

It's honestly not that hard to ignore the bullshit: the soap on the holo, the slightly stale taste of the air, the fact that they've got a few hours and then he should really think about sliding out the proverbial back door. Right now he finds himself preoccupied with wresting his mouth away from hers, kissing and licking at the underside of her jaw, the line of Chloe's neck. Eventually he shifts his hand under her shirt to catch the rumbled fabric, peeling it up, fingers fisted in the knit and knuckles against her collar bone as his mouth finds where his fingers had set before.

Slow fumbling on both their parts, really. Intentionally. Her skin raw against the coarse fabric of his trousers, teeth still hungry when they snap idly at his ear before he drops too low for it. Before she's tense and drawn up and quiet under the warm, damp roll of his tongue.

Soft enough to stand out more than the scrape of his zipper, and she forgets-- briefly-- to work her hips the way she had been before.

He'll take that as a compliment (though the less conceited parts of him are fairly certain Chloe's clear headed enough to work past any minor distractions his tongue might provide), mouth hot over her skin as his fingers slide up across the top of her thigh, anchoring sturdy right where her leg and hip meet: thumb stroking low, low, low across her belly. It's mostly idle touches: wandering hands as he grazes and pinches with his teeth, breathes out warm and presses with his tongue to follow up any minor sting. Easy, simple; despite what should probably be a narrowing window for how long he should really be spending in her flat, he finds he's not really in much of a hurry.

Okay, not fair. Not really unfair either, but that's neither here nor there when he's done most of the heavy lifting thus far (and seriously, it's been one bloody hell of a dry spell so she's not exactly against the idea of sitting pretty for round one). She arches up into his grip, into the path of his thumb, the heat of his mouth and that dull, urgent pressure.

And then draws back with her fingers dug in under his jaw, pressing back in a bid to try and force him-- mildly-- into the back of the futon behind him at a steep angle rather than letting him stay upright for what's next.

Sorry, Charlie.

He's biddable enough - usually is under the press of her fingers -, and lets himself be pushed back, the line of his shoulders heavy against the (mostly) upright futon at his back. Though it doesn't stop him from shifting his hand down, touching Chloe where she's hot between her legs. And while he can't keep her shirt rucked up at this angle, other hand slipping down to the flat line of her stomach, he tugs on the hem in an explicit display of how much he dislikes the bloody fabric there - a brief irritant that doesn't do much to knock the smug look off his face, all half grin with an edge of teeth as he settles in.

Sorry's got nothing to do with it, honestly.

"I should probably be off," he says, cheerful as he works her over with the callused pad of his thumb.

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