"I don't care if she's old money, I am not taking this case!" Rumford Gold rolled his eyes as his firm partner, Cruella de Vil, went on and on about the benefits of taking such a high-profile case.
Cora Mills was a socialite who was better known for sleeping her way up the totem pole to get what, and where, she wanted. She was currently in the media due to her husband, the father of her second child, had finally summoned the gall to divorce her and she was trying to suck his resources dry in retaliation.
Gold had dealt with Mrs. Mills on several occasions, all of which had been at high-profile parties where she tried to seduce him, usually with her husband in hearing distance. For those who were willing to look past Cora Mill's scandalous reputation, they could clearly see a charming woman with poise and culture and understand how those foolish enough to fly into her web remained forever entangled.
However, Gold was not one to be ensnared by anyone, and resisted her attempts to woo him. Now she was divorcing her devoted husband who had raised her first daughter as his own, and was requesting Gold as her lawyer. Rumford knew that there was a double agenda behind her request and refused to even sit down and discuss it with her.
"If you want this case so bad, you defend her, or get Glass on it! I don't give a damn!" He slammed the phone down before anything more could be said, feeling his blood pressure bubble under his skin.
He turned to the two photos on his desk, the only objects that could calm him down when he got this agitated.
One was of his wedding of his beautiful and unbelievably amazing wife Belle. She had been de Vil's secretary when they first met, awkward and unsteady in her "office heels" as de Vil called them. She also was prone to get lost in a good book and not get her work done on time, something that amused him and irritated de Vil only slightly.
"Why did you hire her if she's no good at her job?" Rumford had asked de Vil one day at lunch.
His firm partner grinned, her expression glowing with mischief. "Well, I couldn't hook you two up if she was your secretary, now could I?"
This led to him asking Belle for coffee, then to several dates afterwards, and finally to a simple but beautiful wedding with a sobbing de Vil in attendance.
Gold smiled and picked up the second photo of his two sons. His oldest, Baelfire, was from his first marriage, which had failed before it really began. He had been ten when he and Belle had married and just in love with her as he was. He had been just as in love with his little brother when he was born.
Gideon was a beautiful combination of both his parents, having his father's eyes and Belle's glowing smile. He had recently turned four and started school, something Belle was still adjusting to. She had taken a job as the law firm's librarian to fill the hours, but even Belle could not find joy in reading ledgers and old cases.
He was glad she was so nearby, however. They had lunch sometimes, the very few occasions they had without the boys. They hadn't been able to recently with the cases and the meetings and he missed her like he hadn't seen her in years.
A knock at the door jolted Rumford from his bliss and he swore collateral damage on the soul who walked through his door.
"Come in!" he called out, not bother to mask the irritation in his voice.
A giggle filtered through the room as the door opened every ounce of irritation and banished.
"Hello Love." he greeted his wife as he stood, kissing her cheek and inhaling both her scent and the smell from the takeout bag in her hands.
"I could sense your lunch-time breakdown all the way from downstairs and thought I should assist." She said as she strode through his office.
Gold watched in appreciation as she bent over the desk to lay out the lunch. Her legs were firm and strong from years of office heels, her balance now steady and graceful. This trait came in handy often when she was balancing their hyperactive 4-year-old.
"And just how…" Gold eased out his rolling chair from under the desk and wheeled to Belle's side, guiding her into his lap, "do you plan to assist me?"
Belle bit her lower lip as their pelvises pressed together, sighing airily as heat warmed the lace of her knickers.
"I have an idea or two." She purred as she breathed along the shell of his ear, causing her husband to suck in a shaky breath and press her more firmly into his. Belle turned her head and captured his lips in a searing kiss, moaning as he bunched up her skirt around her waist.
"Although, we will have to keep it short." She pouted when they came up for air. "Ariel had an emergency, so I only have a thirty-minute lunch hour."
"Did you lock the door?"
Belle smirked. "How many times have we done this now?"
Gold trailed little pecks along the side of her neck. "Too many, and each and every time," he paused to suck in some of her flesh, releasing it when he was satisfied that he had left a mark, "you leave the door unlocked and we get interrupted. Remember a certain incident two weeks ago?"
Belle eased back just enough to get to the buttons of his shirt. "Cruella really didn't mind." She placed a kiss on his sparsely chest, taking a deep whiff of the cologne he had dabbed there. "She even let us finish."
Mr. Gold growled and hoisted Belle further up his lap, leaning down just enough to push his papers, pens and their lunch aside so that Belle wouldn't sit on anything when he dropped her carefully on the desk. She giggled and locked onto his lips again, running her fingers through his hair and scratching lightly at his scalp the way he liked.
He pulled back again and undid the buttons on her blouse, licking his lips at the sight of her creamy orbs barely contained in her lacy black bra. The reflection of one of the glass photo caught his eye. He pulled away from Belle long enough to grab the picture and put it in a drawer.
"Sorry boys."
Belle laughed at his quip, arching her neck back so that he could continue kissing down it to her breasts again.
She sighed in pleasure and open her eyes, falling on the hastily shoved stack of papers. The words 'Mills' and 'divorce contract' immediately stood out to her pleasure-buzzed brain. As her husband nibbled at the flesh of her breasts, she reached out for the sheet of paper, skimming over it and grasping the details while Gold grasped her thighs.
"Are you taking the Mills case?" she inquired.
Gold stopped his ministrations, glancing nervously into his wife's unimaginably blue eyes. They weren't full of disapproval or even hurt; even though Belle hated to be the last to find out anything.
"I'm not sure." He relayed as his thumbs grazed her hips, the mood dampened but not completely gone.
"Why not? It's a great opportunity for the firm. If anyone can handle Cora Mills, it's you."
Gold smiled lovingly at her. Her confidence in him and his ability as a ruthless yet fair lawyer never seized to amaze me. She always supported him in his cases, even the more grueling ones that kept him from home for hours or even days on end. Milah hadn't been as tolerant which led to their divorce. Belle was much more patient, finding simple pleasures like reading and playing with their sons to fill the hours. He was grateful for it, but sometimes had that twinge of fear that one day he'd return home and the perfect little life he loved so much would be shattered.
"It's not my ability I'm worried about, Love." He confided. "It's Cora Mills. She wants me to side with her."
Belle's eyes widened slightly, but she nodded her head in understandment. She knew of his "relationship" with the Mills matriarch, and new that it was nonexistent. She had met the woman only once and knew by the way that she glared at her husband that she hadn't gotten quite what she wanted.
"That's unfortunate." Belle said. "Henry Mills is a good man, too good for that cheating hussy."
Mr. Gold chortled at his wife's slur. She was not one to insult anyone regardless of their faults unless it was well-deserved. And for Cora Mills, it certainly was.
"Does he have a lawyer yet?"
"I believe Spencer, but nothing's set in stone until I say yay or nay."
Belle kissed his cheek, slightly scruffy from skipping a shave. "Why don't you want to do it? Is it because of Mr. Mills or me?"
Gold sighed. True, Henry was a good man and didn't deserve to have his livelihood stripped away him by his unfaithful spouse. But it wasn't his pity for him that kept him from taking the case.
"Cora and I have…history Belle."
"I know." Belle confirmed with a shrug. "And I don't care. I know your past was littered with filth and darkness, that you weren't Mr. Perfect. All I care about is how you are in the future."
She kissed him hard before he could respond and pressed herself into his lap.
"Go defend the bitch, take mace or a crucifix or whatever you need to keep her at bay, but go with a clean conscious."
"But-"
"It doesn't matter where you go or who with. I always know that you're coming home to us."
Gold nodded in agreement. "It's what I look forward to the most, coming home from all this and seeing you and the boys."
Belle slipped her hands under the silk of his shirt and rubbed his shoulders. "What else do you look forward to when you come home?"
Gold licked his lips, his mood resurfacing as his hands crept under her skirt. "Oh you know, your cooking, pillows that are actually soft…"
Belle giggled and gave him a rough nibble on the neck. "What else do you miss?"
Gold pressed herself against her crotch again, deciding to give her what his wife wanted once and for all.
"I miss screwing you in our bed until you go hoarse."
Belle moaned as he ground against her, the buckle of his belt and a delicious sort of friction. "Yeah?"
"I think about it during my meetings or when I'm with an insufferable client. I think about holding your hips down and licking you out until you're twitching and begging me to stop. I think about your breasts bouncing as you ride me. I think about all those times I've had to put my cock in your mouth when you got too loud—"
"N-ah!"
Gold smirked as his wife moaned and trembled in ecstasy from her mild orgasm.
"In…inside me. Now!" she demanded as soon as she calmed.
"Aren't you pressed for time?" He teased.
Belle's hands attacked his belt. "I have ten minutes left on my break. I want you in me for nine of those minutes or so help me I will invite Cruella and Ursula to dinner."
Gold had both their underthings off in under ten seconds.
"Yes!" Belle cried as he sunk into her warm depths. "Don't stop!"
"I'll never stop." He husked, thrusting in over and over again.
Belle buried her face in the crook of is neck, her coos and moans reverberating through her husband's skin and causing his head to go fuzzy with pleasure.
"Eight minutes left." Belle teased breathlessly.
Gold grabbed her hips and picked up speed. Cruella had made the off-hand comment once that if a woman could talk during sex, a man wasn't doing his job right. Belle argued that talking during the act made it much more intimate (and no, she argued, that excludes dirty talk, thank you Cruella).
Still, if he could render Belle mute and senseless, neither one of them complained.
His mouth trailed down her neck to her breasts and took in an erect nipple, nibbling it before soothing it with his lips, palming the other one. Belle clutched his graying locks, recently cut short for convenience. She wrapped legs around his waist and Gold nearly passed out from the pleasurable sensation of her heels digging into his lower back.
"Oh! There…almost there!" she gasped.
"Me too, hold on Love." He lifted her leg to readjust the angle and Belle threw her head back.
"Right there! I'm-I'm—"
Gold felt her release, his ears ringing with her cries. With a shaky gasp he followed, her spasming walls gently massaging his pleasure from him.
Belle groaned as he pulled out, cupping her to prevent his seed from leaking all over the desk.
"If I do recall," Gold sighed as his and his wife's breathing evened, "our son was conceived in this very fashion."
Belle giggled and grabbed a few tissues from the box on the floor. "Can you imagine, another baby?"
Gold noted the whimsical tone of her voice. Since Gideon had started school, Belle had been dealing with borderline-empty nest. Even with her new job, she hadn't quite adjusted to not being home with her sons, being there when they returned and doing all her motherly tasks.
As soon as the couple redressed, Gold wrapped his arms around her waist. "Maybe we'll get a girl this time?"
Belle smiled in appreciation for him musing her little fantasy. In reality, she knew now was not quite the time to have another baby. Her husband's firm had been taking on more cases in the last few months, with certainly more to follow. He would miss out on the important pregnancy moments and Belle didn't want to risk him missing the birth. Best to wait another year at least.
A knock on the door broke the couple from their post-coital bliss. Before Gold could give an okay, the door flew open and Cruella de Vil strode in all her black and white glory.
She gave the couple a brutal all-knowing smirk. "Hello Darlings, having lunch I see."
Belle hid her small smile as she picked up Gold's papers from the floor.
"Do you have any respect for privacy?" Gold snarled.
"Oh hush short-stuff." Cruella teased as she straightened Gold's crooked tie. "I was just coming to personally persuade you to take the Mills case but…" she survey the recovery process of Gold's office and Belle's mis-buttoned blouse. "Looks like Belle got to you first."
"She did." Gold agreed, prying de Vil's sharp, red nails from the delicate silk of his tie. "And she's persuaded me to take the case."
Cruella clapped her hands in ghoulish delight. "The power of sex never seizes to amaze me!"
Gold glowered at his co-worker while Belle only giggled.
"I'm two minutes over my break. I have to go now." Belle said regretfully, one of the take-out bags rolled up in her hand.
Gold instantly felt guilted that he hadn't allowed her to eat. "I'll call you to let you know if you should go home without me." He promised.
Belle nodded and kissed his lips, "At least now you have a new memory to take with you on your case. Get her arse, honey." She whispered, winking at Cruella as she sauntered out.
"You had something to do with this, didn't you?" Gold inquired as soon as the office door closed.
Cruella leaned casually against the edge of the desk, looking much too proud of herself. "Did I suggest earlier today that your wife join you for lunch? Yes. Did I suggest she sex you so hard you'd comply with everything I say?" she sent a look over her shoulder at the disarrayed desk. "I may have undertoned it."
Gold rolled his eyes, putting pens back in the cup on his desk. Though he'd forever be grateful to his unstable colleague for steering Belle into his life, it made him uncomfortable just how much she knew of their personal life.
"I'm taking this case Cruella, but on one condition."
Cruella's boney smile straightened. "State your demands then."
"After this, no matter how long it takes, I want to be able to pick and choose the cases I take. I can't keep spending all these nights away from home. I need to be with my family, Cruella."
Cruella nodded, not entirely unsympathetic. "Deal."
They shook hands and she excused herself after a few more minutes of casual banter.
Alone now, Gold finished straightening up, smiling as he pulled his family photos from the drawer. He sometimes missed his wife and children so much he ached, but hoped now that it would all change. He would face Mills, avoid whatever advances she had planned and do whatever he had to in order to fairly settle her divorce so that he would get back to his family ASAP.
With his new-found courage intact, he picked up the phone and dialed Cora Mills.