~*~ Contractual Obligations Pt. 2: Performance Review ~*~
Arsa laces her fingers around Marie's neck, pulling the brunette bodily into her lap. She rolls her hips against the slight woman's, exulting in the feeling of their collapse against each other and way their paired movement draws a creak out of the cheap futon beneath them. Their bodies mold into one another as if they were meant for it, with only the thin barrier of Marie's panties separating flesh from flesh. Arsa's fangs skim against Marie's shoulder, olive skin tasting of dry sweat against her lips. The peaking arousal smells to Arsa's preternatural nose like lemons, freshly cut. What do lemons taste like? Arsa thinks. Marie's cautious sigh of need rebounds off the white walls of the tight room, her heartbeat already thundering against Arsa's chest.
Arsa's foot curls around Marie's leg. She groans against the frustration building in her gut as her rutting shaft vainly seeks entrance. Her hand clambers for one of Marie's breasts, sinking nails into fulsome flesh hard enough to tear a gasp out of her.
Wickedness seizes the Skint's bones. Arsa's hips spike and stab at that cotton-clad bottom, her tapered tail thumps anxiously against the back of the futon, unable to maneuver in the tight space, but hungry to share in the licentious movement of their bodies. "I'm going to ruin you," she says, throaty with lust and power. Almost overflowing, Arsa sinks her fangs deep into Marie's arched shoulder; Marie screams.
The intercom's buzz shrieks through the small room, the fluorescent lights kick on to full brightness, and Grace voices her disapproval over the crackling ceiling speaker like a director after a bad cut. "No, no, no! Stop!"
Arsa's passion flits away, replaced by the all-consuming embarrassment of her third failure of the morning. Her body suddenly heavy, she can only stare down at the speckling blood. A potent sting fills her guts, the blush rises in her cheeks. Fuck. Again with the biting?
"Holy crap." Despite her wincing, Marie gives a congenial laugh. "You really got me that time."
Marie's good at putting on a strong show, but Arsa's potent instincts can still sense her human companion's elevated heartbeat, the adrenaline of her fear response, and every individual drop of sweat trembling atop her pores. "I'm real sorry, Marie." Arsa drags her short, violet hair behind her ears and fingers idly at the fetter around her upper arm, a silver bangle in the shape of an ouroboros, the snake's eye inset with an iolite gemstone that not only converts and stores the passion she's meant to collect into usable energy, but also restrains Arsa's more dangerous abilities-though, as Marie has painfully learned, it does nothing to stop her fangs. "Once I start getting really into it..."
"I know, kiddo." Marie extracts herself from Arsa's limp embrace, pressing fingers against the new marks on the curve of her shoulder, thoughtlessly swabbing the pinpricks of blood against her sweat-shined skin. "At least this time you got me somewhere I won't have to explain to my mom at dinner."
Grace's voice fills the room. "Don't fucking humor her, Marie. It's been a goddamn week, it's not cute anymore."
Arsa folds her hands in her lap, partially from the disappointment of her failure, partially from the embarrassment of her cock, which takes always forever to settle, even after the passion of the moment flits away.
Marie aims a pointed glare at the ceiling speaker. "Can you take the lights back down so we can give it another go, Grace?"
"Forget it. I've got a meeting in half an hour," Grace says. "Marie, go ahead and take lunch. Arsa, I want you in my office."
The brunette mouths the word 'bitch' towards Arsa as she removes the terrycloth bathrobe from its hook on the wall. "You gonna be okay?" She asks.
"Yeah. It's just a little... embarrassing."
"Hey, don't sweat it. These things take time." Marie pulls her modest body into the sumptuous robe one lingering arm at a time, and Arsa can't help but watch every subtle flux of Marie's breasts until the cinching of the belt removes them from her view. Ever the professional, Marie doesn't seem to mind Arsa's hungry gaze, she doesn't even make note of it. "You haven't come out with the group yet," she says. "It's Friday, wanna grab drinks?"
Arsa perks up for an instant, tail rapt in attention, but slowly her posture slouches back against the futon. She indicates her stubby horns with an overanxious sigh. "Can't. Grace says I don't get a glamour until I figure all this..." She indicates her fetter, its purple eye gem slowly dimming, unfulfilled, as the manufactured passion fades from the room. "...out."
"Well, offer's on the table." Marie gives Arsa's slumped shoulders a conciliatory squeeze as she uses the Skint's body for balance while she steps into her slippers. This genuine proximity significantly more intimate than their mock seduction sessions, Arsa finds herself swept up in her own heart rate, which only seems to be increasing even as Marie's cools. "The Duck's not exactly a three star place, but..."
The intercom buzzes on, ensuring the two of them hear the full measure of Grace's impatient grunt. "I'm not going to say it again, Arsa."
Arsa certainly doesn't rush her trek down the hall to Grace's office-thankfully empty, with everyone out to lunch. Rick, Grace's secretary, quickly sits up straight behind his desk and adjusts his tie when he hears Arsa padding down the hall, only to slump with relief when the Skint rounds the corner. "Oh, hey Arsa." Rick runs his fingers through his short, blond hair and tabs back to his game of solitaire. "Give her a sec, she's on the phone."
"She's mad," Arsa says.
Rick spares her a fraternal smile. "That's how I know you're still new here, 'mad' is her default state."
Arsa shrugs, wasting a few moments glancing at the non-specific art hung on the mauve walls outside of Grace's office. She doesn't think she gets most of them; then again, she's not really sure there's anything to get. Tilting her head, she takes in a canvas of splotchy blue and red colors, mimicking the scurrilous art thief in the movie she'd watched last night on the TV in her dorm: Sheridan Enchanté and the Treasure of the Humble Pirate. Even though she found Sheridan's insouciant mannerisms grating, Arsa finished the whole movie anyway, finding herself inexplicably drawn to the female lead: Sabine, a buxom, mature woman with a penchant for slinky dresses and grappling hooks.
The next painting is a lemon-colored sunburst. Arsa nose flares, recalling the aura of Marie's desire, fabricated, yet still potent. Marie would look good with a grappling hook, Arsa thinks, though she's probably quite a bit younger than the actress who played Sabine-Arsa is finding it difficult to tell with humans.
When Sheridan eventually got the girl, Arsa stayed up half the night practicing his absurd accent in the mirror, leading her to sleepily stumble out of the elevator thirty minutes late for the morning session, directly into the path of Grace's unceasing ire. Marie offered her coffee, but the bitter scent was too much for her sensitive nose. 'Suit yourself,' Marie had said. Unsure what "suits" had to do with anything, Arsa was too self-conscious to ask the origin of the idiom.
A groan from Rick snags her back to the real world. Shaking thoughts of Marie from her head, Arsa urges down the crinkling arousal of her nipples with a sharp pinch before she turns and asks, "Did you lose?"
Rick often loses.
"Yeah, game's rigged." He rests his chin on his hand and clicks aimlessly around his computer screen. "You got that W4 for me yet?"
The memory of fresh lemons, acidic and sour, still tingles through Arsa's nose. She applies a bite to the inside of her cheek. Get it together. "W-which one is the W4?"
"The one that gets you paid." Rick cocks an eyebrow. "You want to get paid, right? That's how you buy stuff, with money."
