AN: A birthday gift to the wonderful Blythechild as well as incorporating prompts from the Bingo Bango Bongo: 'drunk kissing', 'cuddling', 'teaching', '(smutty) spa/hot-tub', & 'hooker/sex-work'
Premise: When Emily is twenty-nine, she decides to aggravate her mother by showing up at a diplomatic function with a man ten years younger on her arm. She's aware that he's an escort using her to pay his way through college, that he's given her a false name and that they really don't know each other at all—but what she really doesn't understand is just how this man she doesn't know has quickly become all-important to her, or just why he worries so much about the way she's living her life. Five years later, when she finds that same man now working a desk at her dream job, she's given the unanticipated second-chance to answer both questions.
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Night 01. Room 302. October 02, 1999. 17:01.
Emily Prentiss isn't the kind of person to throw a man to the wolves, especially not a man as fresh-faced as this one. When she answers the hotel door to him on this brisk October evening, he's every bit as pretty as the glossy picture in the book she'd been given had promised. The same worried eyes hidden under the unconsciously messy bangs, the same shy mouth, the same cheekbones she can imagine someone his age dreaming of breaking themselves open on.
Fuck, she's at least ten years older than him and she's thinking of the kinds of sinful things you could do with a face like that, even though that's not her intention at all. Besides, as she'd been informed both by the lady she'd done business with initially and the small print of the contract she'd signed: the boys are breakable—don't break them. Breaking them, Emily assumes, includes many things, one of which is fucking them. Another is probably loving them, since she doubts too many escorts keep on working once they've got a ring on their finger and prospects outside of looking pretty every other night for a stranger on their arm.
Luckily, she doubts that's going to be a problem here, no matter how nice 'Robert Manning' looks in black tie tailored sharply to his slender body.
"Miss Prentiss," he chokes out, eyes going a little bit wider when his attempted smooth greeting falters.
She rolls her eyes at him. "Don't call me miss."
"Yes, ma'am," he says with a flicker of humour in those hazel eyes, stepping inside without missing a beat.
"Ma'am is my mother," she snips, already wondering if this is a mistake. But even if it is, it's Elizabeth's money that'd went towards buying Emily her date for tonight—and there's a kind of beautiful wilfulness in that, isn't there? Maybe it will finally get Elizabeth off Emily's ass about creating offspring that isn't an embarrassment, even if Emily doesn't mention the fact that the man staring awkwardly at her is some out-of-luck college student playing discount hooker on the side. Emily rocking up to a diplomatic dinner with a—she pauses, looking at him again.
"How old are you?" she asks, because the book had said he was twenty, but she knows that's probably about as true as his name is. At least she's reasonably sure he's of age: the place is well known enough that she seriously doubts they'd risk their business with minors, but she's an FBI agent. She knows sometimes things that look legit, aren't. "And don't lie to me. I'll know."
He studies her for a second, Adam's apple bobbing on his throat as he swallows around the nerves she's assailing him with. "Nineteen," he says finally, mouth quirking. She frowns. "…in twenty-six days. I'm legal."
"You're a child," she mutters, shaking her head at him. Well, he'll certainly do. 'Hello, Mother, here's my boyfriend' indeed. See if she's forced into any more functions after this.
"This might be impertinent, but isn't that the point?" His voice is still wary as he says this, but he says it anyway and she appreciates that. For all his nervous twitching, he has spine. "You deliberately picked me out, even though there are other men much more handsome or suave in the selection you were given and despite the fact that Caroline would have warned you that I'm new. It must be because I'm the youngest at our service, by far—that wasn't an accident. And…"
Now he trails off, which does nothing but serve to pique her interest further. Even though she needs to finish getting ready for this dinner from hell, she leans against the dresser and waits for him to continue, gesturing at him to do so when he seems inclined to say nothing instead.
"And I don't think it's because you're looking for an expensive night in bed," he says finally, mouth shaping the words strangely as his cheeks flare red. He's embarrassed. It's sweet. She wonders if he has a girlfriend as young and sweet as he is. "You would have also been warned that we're not prostitutes, despite rumours."
"With an emphasis on how sweet and innocent you in particular are," she half reassures, half teases him, seeing an almost-scowl flicker across his features. "Don't worry, Robbie, I don't plan on seducing your pretty face. All you need to do is endure my mother and her contemporaries for seven hours and then you're free to go your merry way."
"Ambassador Prentiss," he says, her heartrate rocketing for a second as her brain takes the fact that he already knows her mother and spins that a thousand different ways at once, all terrifying. "I looked you up on the cab ride over. Your mother is an impressive woman. You yourself are much more discreet, I couldn't find anything. Having met you, I doubt that means you're any less impressive, though."
"How long was your cab ride?" she asks, wondering just how much he'd read.
"Ten minutes." He nods to the windows, the rain pattering gently against them, and shrugs. "It was long enough."
"Alright," she says finally, deciding to query him once they're acceptably late to dinner. After all, she has seven hours with this man to kill—surely enough time to learn even a little about him. And, really, if she can't profile an escort in seven hours, then what business does she have aiming for the BAU? "Well, I need to finish getting ready, Robbie. Make yourself comfortable. I'd recommend alcohol, if you were old enough, but as it is I guess you'll just have to face her as you are. If you upset her, I'll double your tip."
The look he gives her is startled enough to be amusing, his hand flicking up like he's adjusting absent glasses. "And how do you suggest I 'upset' her?" he asks.
She smirks. "Talking about our sex life would be a fantastic start."
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Night 01. Room 302. October 02, 1999. 23:17.
Robert outdoes himself at the dinner. He's spectacularly awkward in a way Emily envies, having managed to derail five separate conversations into discussions of particle physics and string theory and awkwardly segueing innuendoes into his stream-of-consciousness rambles every time Emily nudges his foot with hers. By the time the night comes to a close, Emily's drunk and Elizabeth's a glorious shade of fucked off and, honestly, isn't that just the best way it could have gone?
He has to pour her back into the hotel room she's booked for the night to avoid having to stumble home drunk or give away her apartment address to a random escort, staggering through the door with his hand on her arm before making her way unerringly to the mini-bar. When she turns, miniatures in hand, he's standing gawkily in the entranceway looking very out of place despite his nice suit.
"Night is young, Robbie, my boy," she informs him, cocking her hip against the counter to hide how wobbly she is right now and feeling all kinds of hot and bothered about his pretty, young mouth. "Stay a while. Come on, take advantage of the idiot you're billing—sit and have a drink with me."
"I'm eighteen," he comments despite walking forward and taking the miniatures from her. Instead of popping the top for himself, he puts them aside, and she scowls at him. "And you're very drunk. Perhaps bed would be a better idea?"
Now that is an idea.
"Tell me about yourself," she demands, catching his ridiculous hands with hers and dragging him closer. He comes, sighing and steadying them both against the counter as he gives her the same rueful look he'd given her at dinner when Elizabeth's comments on Emily 'ruining herself' had begun to dig deep enough that she'd reached for the wine bottle instead of her glass. "Come on, don't be a stranger. God, you've got fantastic hands."
He looks startled, staring down at his hands as she holds them up and studies them. They're wide and narrow and soft, definitely not blue-collar hands. No callouses, no scars, no hardened tissue showing where he's overcome trouble and come out tougher. He's a soft pretty-boy who doesn't realise how hard he'll crash up against the world, she decides, shaking her head a bit at him and all the other babies out there who don't know that life is hell and you've got to build callouses against that.
"I can't think what would possibly interest you about me," he says, which is wrong wrong wrong. Everything about him is fascinating, even when she's not spinning a bit and letting go of his hands to grab the closest miniature. Fuck him, she's earned this. A night with Elizabeth is enough to get anyone drinking… and god, the worst bit about drinking isn't the hangover or the wine-gut, but how stupid it makes her about things like interrogating her breakable escort, or considering breaking him, just a little, if he'll let her.
Fuck he's pretty.
"Your name?" she tries, earning a laugh. That's okay: she'd known he wasn't going to answer that. Robbie he remains. "Favourite book?"
"I've never read a book I haven't loved on some level."
"How many books have you read?"
He pauses before answering that with: "You wouldn't believe me if I told you. My mother was a professor of fifteenth century literature. I'm, ah, well-read."
See? Weird, but in such a spectacular way. She boosts herself back up so her ass is on the counter and she can look him eye to eye, earning a startled hiss from him as he lurches forward in a rush of ungainly, barely grown limbs to stop her from pitching off the edge.
"Fair warning," she tells him, narrowing her eyes and trying to gauge his reaction. "I get handsy when drunk around impressive men. Or women. Whatever. I'm a slut for a clever mouth."
He stares, pink in his cheeks and mouth a little open.
"I, uh…" But his hands are more confident than his voice, catching the bottle in her hand before she can drain it. "I'm not going to have, uh, sex with you, Miss Prentiss." Miss Prentiss again, is it? But she respects his boundaries and doesn't haul him forward by his belt buckle, even letting him take the bottle back from her. Despite this, she can tell that he knows she's thinking about his dick right now, despite his age, despite his breakable status, despite the fact that's he's no hooker. And he murmurs, "You think I'm impressive?" while still looking flushed and shy.
"Favourite colour?" she says, determined to learn something about him and without answering his question.
"That's contextual." At her stare, he clarifies. "Any colour is beautiful in the right framework."
"In this framework?"
He looks right at her, square in her stupid, drunk face, and says: "Tonight, I'm partial to sapphire blue."
She swallows and doesn't look down at the shade of her dress. "Fucken hell," she mutters, closing her eyes for a second and suddenly feeling tired and ancient and alone. "I'm too old for you. You're a pretty fantasy for me, but I'm nothing you'd want. You're probably gay, anyway."
"I'm not gay. And you're not old. But I'm also not going to sleep with a client, especially not a drunk one. What will it take to get you to agree to go to bed?"
"Water, probably." She doesn't say the sly thought that flickers through her brain—his sharp cheekbones cutting a line between her legs—because she's been a dirty old pervert enough for one night. "You should probably get your money and leave before I completely ruin the illusion you've built of me while trying to get out of this thing. I can barely get the zip down when sober."
That earns a laugh, his hands in hers as he guides her down from the counter and leads her to the double bed. "If you turn around, I'll tell you one thing about myself," he says.
She turns, feeling his hand on the zip and putting her own arms up to stop the dress from falling forward. Some decorum must remain, she figures, even if she's never going to see Robbie and his cheekbones again. "Do I get to pick? How about… are you a virgin?"
He makes a soft scoffing noise behind her, fingers sliding down her spine along the zip. Really, he doesn't need to be undoing it that slowly, lining a trail of fire down her back that keeps going even when he stops. It's just unnecessary. "Would it change anything if I am?"
Not really. Right now, she wants him because she's drunk and he's gorgeous. Tomorrow? Probably. She'd be pretty sour with herself being that person for a random boy whose name she doesn't even know.
"Maybe."
"Then I'm not answering. And you've wasted your one question on that."
She takes that as a confirmation and shakes her head: breakable indeed. "You're in the wrong job."
"And you don't like not knowing things." He's smiling when she looks at him, still a little pink and with his gaze switching from her bare back to his hands. Seven shades of shy and she can see his wide, hungry pupils—it's a small boost to her confidence that he clearly wants her too, he's just too moral to make a move. "Finish getting undressed. I'll get you your water and then leave. Oh, Emily?"
"Yeah?" She has to call it after him as he vanishes to the kitchenette, leaving her to strip to nothing and slide between the covers, not bothering with clothes. He can't see anything anyway except the obvious truth of the pile of clothes on the floor that he cautiously steps over when he returns, glass in hand.
"I won't bill you for the last hour," he says with another of his—she's sure they're his trademarked now—shy smiles. "Thank you for the dinner and company. It was lovely, even if I was a mess."
"Your name?" she calls after him, but all she gets back in return is a chuckle and the sound of the door closing behind him.
In the morning, when she wakes with a thudding head and dry mouth, she decides that not knowing this is unacceptable. After all, he's not wrong: she's always hated being left in the dark.
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Night 02. Room 302. December 31, 1999. 17:59.
"Same room? You're a woman of habit." He's looking at her with that same look he'd given her the first time: slightly wary, desperate to please.
"Robert Manning," she says, seeing his stare turn odd. "Also known as Robert de Brunne, an English chronicler and Gilbertine monk. Am I wrong?"
He keeps staring.
"It was that or Robert Manning the Irish engineer," she adds, stepping aside to let him sidle in, clearly thrown. Tonight, he's dressed just as pretty as before, except he's wearing cologne. It's a sharp scent, masculine and mature, and she doesn't like it. He'd been sweeter last time, scented simply with his soaps and shampoos: a clean, human smell. Now, he smells like a pantomime, like he's trying to present himself as someone else. "So, am I wrong? You picked your pseudonym for a reason. I think you do everything for a reason, including high-class escorting."
"You're not… wrong," he says finally. "How did you know? That's an obscurely large leap to make based on nothing but a suspicion that I'd choose my name for a reason."
"Your mother," she says, satisfied. "You seemed intent when you mentioned her last time. A question about books as a hobby, a private undertaking, and your mind went immediately to her. Obviously, you love reading and you clearly love her, so when I looked you up and a thirteenth century poet came up with that name… Well, that's just obvious, isn't it?"
He hums, leaning back against the wall and thinking for a moment, long fingers tapping at his side. "If I love my mother so much, why am I here with you on New Year's Eve ushering in the new millennium with a client instead of being with her or other companions?" he asks, narrowing his shoulders in a way that tells her he's making himself vulnerable again with that question. Tempting her dangerously close.
There's a pause before she responds to that… carefully.
"You don't really want me to answer that," she says, smoothing her hands down the dress she'd bought for this occasion. Sapphire blue again, for no reason except it'd been nice, that first time, feeling pretty in his eyes. A reminder that she's twenty-nine, not dead, and maybe not as past it as she feels sometimes. There's not much call for feeling pretty at the FBI, where everyday she's doing everything she can to make sure the men there don't see her as a woman at all. "You're just testing to see if I would."
He smiles tightly, but doesn't answer, shoulders loosening slightly.
"What exactly is it that you do?" he asks her as she moves to find her shoes. "I know you're an FBI agent from your mother's comments. I wasn't aware that field agents needed to be quite as obtrusively discerning as you've proven to be."
"They don't." She straightens, wincing as a waft of the cologne hits her again. It's not a bad scent—she just doesn't like it on him. It smells too much like… well, the kind of guys she usually dates. "Behavioural analysts do."
"Ah. High goals?"
"High are the only goals worth having." She leans closer to him, sniffing at his throat and seeing him jolt back, startled. "Hey, Robbie? Before we leave, let's wash that off, huh? And whoever told you it was a good idea was wrong."
Robert frowns, brushing his fingers against his skin as though searching for wayward traces of scent. "They told me it would make me seem more attainable, to assist with client retention."
That earns a laugh, the first one for the night since she's spent it all before this dreading her mother's company. Somehow, with him there, even that doesn't quite seem as dreadful anymore. "Attainable isn't what they meant, kiddo. The word they were looking for is 'fuckable' and, trust me. That'll only get you hurt."
Take it from her as someone who knows: easy is nothing but.
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Night 02. Room 302. January 01, 2000. 02:26.
She's drunk again and ready to admit that she's definitely not showcasing her best side to him. Tonight had been brutal, with Elizabeth airing the sharpest edge of her tongue on them both. She's sorry, for everything really, but especially for putting him in that situation.
"Didn't even say happy birthday to you," she mumbles from the bathroom, hearing his nice shoes tapping across the floorboards towards her. "Sorry for that too."
"It's not my birthday."
The tiles under her are a disgusting purple and grey, swirled together like the ghost of fashion past. She stares at it and groans as her gut lurches again, his shoes tap tap tapping right on in as he comes up behind her and rests his hand between her shoulder-blades, the other holding a glass of water. When he crouches beside her, his knees don't pop, and she hates him for his enviable youth and innocence and just—
"It was. You're nineteen now, right? Twenty-eighth of October. So, happy birthday for that. And Happy New Year, new millennium, for tonight… sorry you're spending it with me."
Robert makes a soft noise, tipping the glass closer in a silent command for her to drink. "Thank you for remembering," he says first, in the kind of voice she doesn't really know how to unpack. "Why do you do this? Validate her beliefs about you."
"How is it validating them if they're true to begin with? I'm just confirming them." She leans her chin on the toilet seat for a second before thinking twice about that and sitting back, looking around for something to wash her face. Everything is gross, everything feels awful, and she hates DC so much. A town as political as her mother, just as false. "Don't sit there and judge me, pretty boy, you've got your own shit going on."
"Do I?" Up goes his eyebrow, his mouth doing a strange, nervous twist. He's a conundrum, often shy, sometimes brave, always hyper-intelligent and seemingly ashamed of that, and she can't get a fucking read on him and that pisses her off. And she still doesn't know his name. "Well, I guess I'm here, aren't I? Does that bother you? That I'm here because you're paying me?"
Yes.
No?
"I don't know." That's the most honest answer she can give. "Probably not. You piss me off, you and your… face."
Blinking. She hates how he blinks when he's surprised, slightly out of sync with the rest of himself like he's an android glitching over an update. "It's not the nicest face, but I—" he begins, sounding affronted.
"Not your face, just you. You're so fucking vulnerable. I hate that—don't you hate that?"
And now he's looking at her, really looking at her, and she wants up off these horrible tiles but doesn't know how to ask him to lend her a hand. God, she still needs to get out of her dress, into bed; the night seems longer, suddenly, and lonely.
"I don't think I'm vulnerable," he replies, standing—knees still silent—and offering his hand. "I'm not the one vomiting expensive wine into a hotel toilet."
"You are," she promises him, because aren't they all? She sure as hell is. "You'll see. It's only a matter of time before someone shatters you."
She wonders if that someone will be her. She's broken people just as kind as him before.
In many ways, he reminds her painfully of Matthew.
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Night 02. Room 302. January 01, 2000. 09:32.
He's still there when she wakes up, sitting in an armchair with the book she's been reading on his knee. "Check-out is in an hour and a half," he says without looking at her, eyes flickering quickly across the page.
"Hope you're not going to bill me for this," she mutters, lowering her head back into the pillows and hating the sun and the birds screaming outside.
He chuckles, a low, deep sound that hurts. "Was worried about you. I don't charge for my own catastrophising."
"Wise. Hey, Robbie?"
"Mmm?" She hears the pages beginning to turn again, too fast for him to be reading. "If you're about to ask my name, I'm still not going to tell you. Why do you want it so bad?"
That's an easy one. There's a glass of water by her bed and she drinks it and wonders if there are painkillers here, somewhere. "I don't trust people who use false names."
"You don't trust anyone."
He's not wrong but she doesn't tell him that, just mutters, "Well look out Prentiss, here comes a little profiler to steal your dream job," and curls back under the blankets. It's cold. She's cold. Today is a problem for future Emily. "Don't reckon I can pay you extra to get in here and share heat? Clothed, if you want. Or not."
All he does in reply is laugh.
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Night 03. Room 408. April 04, 2000. 17:31.
She doesn't see him again until spring and, to be honest, she doesn't even really need a date for tonight—pretend or otherwise. But he's been on her mind since that morning, always lurking in the corner like he has an armchair and a book set up there with the early morning light streaming in around him. It's remarkable, really, how such a split-second image has been burned into her brain, seared right in there always ready to pop out at the most inopportune moment. She can't even begin to understand the hold he has on her thoughts.
It's a different hotel room tonight, probably as an apology for the last two times she's seen him, and she refuses to analyse why she cares so much about this man's opinion of her when she doesn't even know his name.
"Door's open," she calls when she hears the polite knock. She knows it's him. It's exactly one minute past the time she told him to get here, and he hasn't been late yet. Painfully punctual is his MO. And, shit, maybe she's kind of missed having someone to talk to outside of work who can't really hurt her because he's entirely disconnected from the rest of her shitty world.
"Emily, hello," he says from behind her, a heartfelt kind of pleasure in it. It's how a friend would greet a friend, not an escort his client, and she shakes herself a bit at how warm that makes her feel.
Fuck, she's lonely.
"Robbie-boy, hell—" She turns and stops, narrowing her eyes at him. The suit is familiar; it's the same one he wore the first time they'd met. His hair is a little longer but just as fussily combed, his bangs just as wayward over those changeable eyes. To the untrained eye, he looks much the same despite the months that have passed. But hers isn't untrained, and he's not the same. "You look like shit."
"Well, thanks." His is a wry look as he steps closer, leaning a little on the counter. There are swollen shadows under both his eyes, ringed in purple and red. His skin looks sallow, pulled tight around a downturned mouth determinedly tipped upwards. The smile he gives her is wan, all the colour leeched from it. "You, on the other hand, look lovely. Your mother again?"
She continues staring intently at him, seeing his gaze flicker nervously away, a nerve under his eye jumping. He's scared. Of what? Of her?
"Don't turn the subject back on me. Why do you look so tired? Have you been sick?" God, she's turning into her mother, fussing over him like a hen while he looks nothing but uncomfortable. It's a sticky day, too warm for spring, and she's not quite ready yet. "Take your suit jacket off, sit down. I still have my hair to do. You're sweating."
None of that is worded as a request or a question.
He slips his suit jacket off with the kind of stilted movements that mean he doesn't really want to, but that doesn't bother her; if he was that against it, he could have told her to go jump. He knows her well enough by now that he'd still get paid even if he said no to her. God knows, he's smart enough to say no every other time.
She spots them instantly. Maybe his cuffs would have hidden them, but his shirt is a size and a half too small and they sit too high up his arms.
"Don't," he says sourly, the soft look vanishing from his expression for the first time since she's known him. Folding back into himself and looking almost resigned to her scorn, he scrubs the fingers of one hand across his wrist, across the yellowed line of bruising left there in a blurry arc. "They're nothing."
"Movies always get it wrong," she says. Instead of continuing to get ready, she sits on the bed and gestures to the chair across from her. He looks like he needs the rest and, confirming that, when he sits it's more like collapsing, like an old tree folding inwards. "Fingerprints don't bruise in the shape of a hand. The bruise spreads outward from each contact point and often blurs together. Did you know that?"
"Yes." His fingers scrub harder, like he can rub away the yellowed crescent moon betraying him. "Would you believe me if I told you I asked to be held down?"
"No. Was it consensual?" If she's a little sharp in asking, it's because she's been shaken free of the pretty fantasy she's been hiding in, where maybe, just maybe, this fresh-faced babe straight out of college could be someone more like a friend to her—but now, violently, here's a reminder of what he is to her, and to others. Others who aren't her. Others who could be dangerous.
"It wasn't anything. Why are you so determined to read into this?"
She turns his own words back on him, maybe betraying herself a little in the doing so despite not wanting him to know that she's met with him three times now and she, what? Cares about him? She doesn't know him. "You said it yourself, you're not a hooker. You say you don't fuck the clients, and I know you don't. You're attracted to me and you wouldn't sleep with me either time I asked, and no virgin asks to be pinned down their first time."
His stare is incendiary, like he's annoyed that she pays so much attention to him—or like he's not used to it. "You've met me twice in the guise of a business relationship. If this is the best profiling you have, I have doubts about your career intentions."
That's bitchy. She's gotten to him.
"Here's a theory, let me posit it to you." She makes herself comfy on the bed before continuing, ignoring his, "We're going to be late." This is more important. "You look exhausted. Your clothes are nice but the same as you've worn previously. It's sloppy to wear the same outfit twice with the same client in such short succession and you're not sloppy, so I assume you had no choice. This job pays nicely, I know because I slip extra in every time to what is already a substantial amount, so you should be able to afford new clothes—but you haven't bought them. You only have a few good suits and you have to reuse them. Money is tight, why? Drugs? You look desperate and stressed enough that it could be drugs."
He snaps, "No," and hunkers deeper into the chair, eyes flickering like he's fighting sleep for a moment. She wonders when the last time he slept was, really slept.
"Whatever the reason is, you're broke and worried and someone offered you extra for a tumble, which you rationalised by thinking that you're not a whore, only for them to proceed to treat you like one, huh?"
Silence. For a heartbeat, she's sorry. He looks miserable, and he's nowhere near as good at hiding his feelings as she is.
"Robert…"
"They didn't ask. They just… assumed. I declined and left once extracting myself from them. They've been removed from our client list and won't be using our services again." Robert gives her a cool look, almost daring. "There. I'm unsullied. That's what you're into, isn't it? How young and untouched I am? Is that your kink?"
Her turn to be blasted, but she's dealt with that her whole life. She doesn't flinch. Instead, she stands and goes for her bag, pulling out pyjamas and smirking at his confused look.
"Change of plans," she informs him firmly, turning and studying him. "I'll pay you double to stay here and watch shitty horror movies with me, deal?"
"But your mother—"
"I don't want to spend the night being bitched at by her, I want to spend the night here being lazy and eating pizza and ice cream. I'm the customer, am I not? Don't I have a say?"
He gives her a wary look, all doe-eyed worry that she hates. See? Vulnerable. "I'm not—"
She cuts him off right there. "Don't even. We're watching movies, Robbie. That's it. Don't even imply that I'd proposition you while you've still got bruises from the last asshole who assumed. Look at me, right now." He does. "Every time I've propositioned you I've done it because you're damn good looking and incredibly clever and those are both things I like, especially when drunk—it had nothing to do with you being here as an escort. I wouldn't have ever paid you for sex, do you understand? I'm not holding that power over you, especially not if you're desperate."
"But you'll pay me double to watch movies?"
And sleep, she thinks, but doesn't say. She doubts he'll make it through one movie before he's out like a light, looking that tired.
"Exactly. So, are you in?"
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Night 03. Room 408. April 04, 2000. 11:29.
The movie ends and she hits the mute button fast before the rock music over the credits can startle him awake. As the night had wound on, he'd dropped his frightened rabbit act a little and relaxed around her, finally deigning to join her on the bed with the pizza and popcorn. Now, with the clutter of the night still tossed around him, he's curled on his side and breathing deeply, so fast asleep that she's pretty sure she could balance the pizza box on his head and he wouldn't even blink.
She inches out of the bed, intending to make a nest on the couch—but his breathing pauses and he sleepily mumbles, "If you get on that couch, I'll leave. I'm not taking the bed you paid for."
Bullshit he's not. His voice is the exhausted kind of slurred that she knows means he's barely awake, not enough to get up and leave. But she pauses anyway, moving the popcorn bowl away in case he jolts and knocks it.
"Sleepover it is," she says finally, sliding back into the bed and curling on her side, facing him. "Have you ever even shared a bed with a woman before? Or are you just bolder when sleep-deprived?"
But he's already asleep.
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Night 03. Room 408. April 05, 2000: 05:13.
It's barely five a.m. when he sneaks out of the bed, padding in his socks across the room to find his shoes. Honed from years in the field, she wakes to his quiet movements and watches his shape shift about in the gloom.
"Name?" she asks when she hears the handle of the door turn gently.
"Goodnight, Emily," he says, a smile hidden in the shadows of the early morning. Then he's gone, and she rolls into the warm space he's left in the bed and drifts lazily back to sleep.