A/N: One shot where Tom role plays as Coriolanus with his girlfriend, who has confessed to him previously that she would be into being "forced" to have sex with him, and does just that. He treats her as slave who exists for his pleasure.

Very dominant Tom, smut, erotica, spanking given with a belt, discipline, rough sex, forced orgasm ensue as Tom takes complete control of her. 18+.

He'd just finished patiently signing autographs and taking pictures with fans - having had to subdue the natural tendencies that sometimes remained quite close to the surfaced after the performance was over that made him want to be much less the warm, fluffy Tom his fans thought he was.

But he was a very good actor, and he knew that no one there suspected that what he wanted to do was either fight or fuck someone.

And he knew exactly where he was going to go with that latter need, too.

Without calling or texting, minutes later he arrived at her door to rap on it as if he was seconds from knocking it down - considerably less than his usual patient self as he waited - fidgeting, unable to remain still at all, shucking out of the quilted black jacket he had put on over what he was wearing so that no one would suspect - for her to open the door.

When she finally answered, he bore down on her like a thundercloud, being quite deliberately intimidating and forcing her back into her flat before she even had the chance to open that delectable mouth of hers to invite him in.

He dropped his coat to the floor in a heap, having less than no patience for the niceties tonight, but he hoped she'd understand. He had a strong feeling she would or he wouldn't have come to her.

His hands landed none too gently on her hips as he turned the both of them and slammed her - full body press - against the door that he then reached up to secure, trapping her there with him as each individual locking sound hammered it home to her that she wouldn't be getting away from him tonight unscathed on even the most insignificant of levels.

But she'd had no hope of that even when he wasn't in this kind of a dangerous mood; when he was at this weight she knew full well that she was entirely incapable of stopping him from doing whatever he wanted to do to her. She was dramatically smaller - and he was dramatically larger and stronger - than when he was in what she thought of as "bean pole" shape, which, frankly, in itself was more than enough for him to be able to truly subdue her, if that was his aim.

It hadn't been, until tonight.

They'd already had discussions already about how it'd always intrigued her - the idea of being overpowered, of being forced. She'd never been with a man that could do that to her - her exes were - almost to a man - the same size as she was or smaller, and definitely meeker than he was by a long shot.

He was a distinct exception to her rule, but one she enjoyed enormously.

He most certainly could overpower her, having confessed at the same time an interest in doing so that might overtake him. And when he was in a mood like this, he definitely wanted - and what's more intended - to do exactly that.

"Remember your safe word?" he growled against her shoulder where it met her neck, which he then proceeded to bite, drawing a gasp from her.

She nodded, fear crawling up her spine, followed very, very closely by the undeniable, unmistakable heated lick of desire through her veins. His words scraped erratically along the synapses of her mind, setting off alarms of apprehension - flooding her much too receptive body with adrenaline - as well as well marking paths for the arousal she was feeling to follow as it careened through her beneath her perpetually sensitized skin. "Good. You might well have need of it. I'm going to use you roughly tonight, Tanya. I'm going to ride you very, very hard and put you away still dripping wet." He jerked his head back and caught her eye. "But then you're always dripping wet for me, aren't you?"

She could only nod again at the fierce look in azure eyes, the pupils of which were so large they very nearly blotted out that usually stark color, creating a look from him she barely recognized

He thrust his blatant arousal aggressively against her, deliberately bending his legs to catch her at her notch, as if he was going to plunge himself up inside her through the barriers of his clothes and hers while his mouth ravaged the delicate skin of her neck, leaving a trail of very nearly too sharp love bites up from the first one, not bothering to soothe the twinges of pain with his tongue tonight as he usually did for her, but continuing to nip her ear lobe and along her jaw, claiming her mouth like the conquering hero he had just finished playing less than an hour ago. Tom gave no quarter, allowed her no ability to make accommodations for him - he out and out took her lips - there was no other way to describe it - slanting across hers and plunging his tongue past lips that had barely opened to him, biting them when he found teeth baring his way inside until they, too, yielded their secrets to him, plundering what was past them as if it was his due from her.

He was so strong, so . . . unusually severe a presence before her that she almost wasn't sure what to do with him. But tonight, she knew somehow instinctively, there would be absolutely no trace of the curly haired, ever smiling, tender, respectful, protective man who usually came to her.

And with her.

Tanya was almost frightened to admit to herself how much his rough treatment of her turned her on, and a name came to mind - an unconscious thought or idea or impression from him - and slipped from the lips he left to begin his descent down the other side of the slender, graceful column of her neck, treating the other side of it as fiercely as he had in his ascent.

"Martius," she barely sighed on a whim.

Yet his head snapped up, those burning blue flame eyes taking no prisoners when they locked with hers, and she knew she'd guessed correctly about what he was feeling.

But still, he corrected her sternly - verbally, first - then physically. "What makes you think that you have earned the right to call me by my given name, girl? Just because I've fucked you, like I've fucked a thousand other unwilling women who've warmed my bed?" he snarled. "I'll teach you better than to take such liberties with your Master." She found herself hauled abruptly away from the door, his fists twisted in the lapels of her silk pajamas - a modest, boring set he would never have seen if she'd known that he - or Coriolanus, rather - was going to make an appearance this evening.

She found herself standing in front of him, next to the back of her shabby chic overstuffed couch. "You are wearing entirely too many clothes, slave." He made that last word such an insult she wanted to take offense, and her eyes flashed angrily at him before she could temper them. Of course he hadn't missed that. Tom took a step forward, a hand snaking out to claim the small of her back, holding her still, trapped against him and the couch - both immovable objects to her. "There's that flash of fire - of anger at your fate. I have yet to break you, I see. I'll remedy that tonight, I'm thinking."

He contracted that one arm around her waist, lifting her against him, ruthlessly adding to her helplessness by gathering both of her wrists there in that one hand behind her back, his other coming up to wind that great fall of blonde waves around his hand, until he met the back of her head, using it to hold her still for his marauding mouth and tongue again, leaving her lips bruised and swollen in his wake.

Against the ear he was avidly razing with those sharp teeth of his, he ground out, "Go ahead, my girl - and you are my girl. Fight me. Please. I want you to pull out all the stops and give it everything you have, because I so look forward to taming you when you've exhausted your pitiable attempts at avoiding what I'm planning to do to you."

Tanya took him at his word; anxiety and out and out fear coursing through her veins and momentarily winning the war against the smoldering ache of her very real passion. With no other weapons at her disposal, she craned her head back as far as his hand would allow and cracked her forehead against his - not having calculated on just how fucking much that would hurt.

She'd managed to startle him, though, and he let her go to put his hand to his head, apparently finding it hard to believe that she had just done that.

Score one for her, although she doubted that - after that - she'd be scoring any more this evening.

Tanya wasn't about to wait around to be captured again, but her flat was so small there was really nowhere to go - especially once the bedroom was eliminated, which it most definitely was.

They ended up circling first the dining room table, then the couch, eying each other warily, him crouched down like a beautiful jungle cat, until she was at the tall back of it and he very simply stepped onto the cushions then put his big foot on the top of the back and pushed, tipping it over and riding it down as gracefully as if it was something he did every day, looking for all he was worth like a militaristic Gene Kelly in that scene from Singing in the Rain.

She was well and truly caught because she couldn't stop flat out gaping at him. Was there nothing the man couldn't do and do excruciatingly well?

Too late Tanya remembered to run, but was easily caught by the hair that streamed out behind her in her attempt. Tom hauled her back up against him by it as she whimpered and quickly began to voluntarily move back towards him so that he wouldn't yank her hair out by the roots.

When her pert little behind was against his prominent front, and that strong right arm had snaked around her waist again to keep her in her place - which was, of course, anywhere he wanted her to be - he whispered, "You're almost too easy, little girl. There's not much sport in the chasing, anyway. Now," he growled. "Get your clothes off. Quickly. I'll not see your punishment for your insolence delayed a second longer."

With an almost contemptuous look on his face, he let her go and leaned a hip against the back of the couch, which he had righted with depressing, impressive ease, and crossed his arms over his chest, making Tanya feel as if he was measuring her up and finding her severely lacking.

It was then that it hit her - why the delay, she didn't know, perhaps his mere unexpected presence here and his highly unusual demeanor had blinded her to it.

He was wearing the exact same costume he wore as Coriolanus - one or them, anyway - that magnificent, bronze quilted leather vest with the lion on the front, the tanned, long sleeved knit shirt with the sleeves pushed up to display his well muscled forearms, even to the gloves and bracers that turned her on no end, that thick black leather belt cinched around pants so tight she could practically discern his religion, considering how tightly packed what she knew was his considerable endowment seemed to be within them.

And it strained and throbbed and hungered before her eyes.

With great difficulty, she shook off her surprise; her hands going quickly to the buttons of the pajama top, but her fingers were shaking so badly - from a heady combination of fear and arousal such as she'd never felt before in her life - that they were clumsy and it was taking her forever - even in her own eyes - to get the tiny buttons through the even tinier holes.

It didn't take Tom long at all - not that she was surprised - to become impatient with her efforts. When he took a step towards her, Tanya had to brace herself mentally - and physically - not to take a step back away from him, but she very carefully didn't look him in the eyes, keeping hers on the relative neutrality of what she knew was - behind his shirt - that taut, washboard stomach of his the entire time as if they were glued there as her senses were filled with - and helplessly overwhelmed by - him. He was all she could have seen even if her eyes had wandered - he comprised her entire field of vision. She could smell the strong scents of leather mixed with the remnants of his aftershave and pure, unadulterated masculinity emanating from him, and everything feminine, soft and yielding in her responded automatically to him. Tanya could feel her body preparing itself for him, whether or not her mind had quite - or could quite - come to terms what she knew he was going to do to her.

Seconds later, she heard a shower of delicate buttons clicking on her hardwood floors and material ripping distressingly at the same time, and she was suddenly, starkly naked before him, unable to resist the urge to try to cover herself with her hands as he stared down at her, licking his lips, sexual hunger plain in his ravenous gaze.

Each of them was breathing hard, but his was the loudest as it assaulted her ears.

The look he gave her was close to contemptuous. "Put your hands at your sides, slave. Your virgin's blood was smeared all over my cock long nights ago, wasn't it? You have no more cause for modesty, nor will I allow you to take comfort in the false claim of it."

It was one of the hardest things Tanya had ever had to do in her life - to force herself to remove the arm and hand that covered her breasts from his heated look, and then to take her other hand away from where it protectively cupped her womanhood, but she did it, still not looking at him, not wanting to see the truth of what he thought of her - his slave - his insolent slave - in those eyes.

She immediately found herself bent over the back of her own couch on her tummy, positioned so far forward that her feet dangled uselessly, long inches from the floor.

Her wrists were bound together - she didn't know with what - at the small of her back as he took that wide legged stance just to one side of her and she heard a sound she never wanted to hear: the metal clink of his belt being unbuckled, then the deceptively soft thwick of it being removed from around his waist through the belt loops.

It was in her mind to use her safe word at that moment, to prevent the misery he was most assuredly going to impart to her, but she reconsidered. This wasn't her first dance - with him, maybe, but not overall. She detested pain, but had long since admitted to herself that it was a very potent aphrodisiac for her - especially when it was an integral part of such an intricate scenario as the one he had constructed for them.

For him, she thought, if she got down to it.

And then there was the fact that she had been telling him for some time that she was up for anything like this. She could hardly back out now without making him think he couldn't take her at her word.

Besides, he had not allowed her to choose her safe word but rather gave her the one he wanted her to use, knowing, because of the word he'd chosen, that she - stubborn, headstrong and willful creature that she was - would do anything in her power to keep from using it.

While she was debating with herself, he had folded the belt in half, holding both the buckle and the end in his strong right hand and landed it across her bottom from side to side with a resounding, heart-stopping crraacckk!

Every bit of Tanya's breath left her body. Not even on a scream - she was too stunned to summon any sound. It just whooshed out of her as if someone had taken her lungs and wrung them dry in their huge fists.

And long before she could begin to come to grips with what he was doing in any way, before she could fill her aching lungs with much needed air, he had lit into her several more times and she was forced to do the exact same thing again.

As he mercilessly slashed that two inch wide belt down across flesh he was leaving alarmingly singed in its wake, he lectured, "If you ever take it into your head to call me by my given name again, I will punish you like this every night for a month and then I'll give you over to my men afterwards. I am 'Sir' to the likes of you, or better yet, 'Milord'."

Tanya had found her voice and began keening and wailing with every stroke he delivered - unfortunately for her.

She didn't know how Coriolanus would feel about it, but Tom preferred that she take her punishments as quietly as possible - which she would have sworn was what she was actually doing.

She had no idea how many cruel slices he made across the flesh of her behind, but eventually she heard the belt drop next to him, and she was unceremoniously hauled up against him again by her hair.

"I see you have yet to learn your lesson about taking your punishments quietly. Let me see if I can give you something worth screaming about." As his snide words washed over her, Tom's usually gentle hand roamed the flesh he considered to be his, hefting then squeezing a breast here, cruelly tweaking a nipple there, then marching boldly down the center line of her tummy to force his fingers between her legs. "Drenched as usual, I see." He continued to root rudely around her delicate folds like the marauding Roman he portrayed nearly every night of the week, not trying to impart any pleasure, just stamping her most intimate flesh with his undeniable possession.

One form of it anyway. She was about to encounter it in another, even more primitive manner as he grabbed the hair at the back of her head again and pushed her back over the couch, this time leaving her toes touching the floor - barely - not enough for her to gain any purchase against him but enough to cruelly tease her with the infinite possibility, at least until a hand took a hold of her bound wrists, clamping down on them to still her as he began to work the knee of his leg against the bottom of her cleft, making sure that her nether lips had absolutely no choice but to split wide open around the big, intrusive invader and deliberately causing the rough material that covered it to scrape against her most tender - well, perhaps her second most tender after the belt - flesh, smiling ferally as she tried to quietly gulp back her undoubtedly involuntary vocalizations.

When his knee hit the couch and he knew that her clit was helplessly perched upon his leg, he began to move it back and forth, like a pendulum, shoving her legs well apart and giving her no choice but to put even more of her weight on her exposed privates.

"Keep those legs wide, slave," he leaned over her and warned before straightening again to begin to bounce that wicked knee up and down in a way that he knew would be pure torture for her. The center of her pleasure was being stimulated, all right, but not in a pleasant way. And yet he could feel how soaked the material covering his leg continued to become and realized that even this was arousing to her on some level.

He wondered in a flash whether she would become excited by anything he did to her, but this was not the time to contemplate that, with her spread out before him, helplessly riding his knee. Just the idea of what he had done to her - and what he was going to do to her in the next few seconds - had him practically cumming in his pants.

That rock hard thigh was withdrawn without any warning whatsoever, making Tanya cry out at its loss - and regret her outburst immediately when that vicious, still leather gauntlet covered hand of his gave her another ten or so stinging smacks, onto flesh that had already been well insulted, so that each spank felt as five of the same.

Tom waited, calculatedly, until she was merely snuffling softly at her spanking, so that she couldn't miss, in the quiet of the small flat, as he lowered his zipper, having long since undone the top button. When he was finally free, full-blow and straining, yearning towards her slick, wet heat, there was no need for stroking, no need for delay at all and he fully intended to indulged himself in exactly what his body craved, trusting in what she had told him months ago.

She was lying there, awaiting him - more than ready for him, he'd already proven to himself and to her - legs spread at his command, rendered helpless by him in both position and by virtue of her bound arms. She was his for the taking, in the truest, most primal sense of the phrase - something he'd barely allowed himself to fantasize about, but with her he had made it a reality for the both of them.

He would delay the fulfillment of his own satisfaction no longer, positioning himself between legs that his dwarfed in comparison, nudging his erection against her vulnerable opening in a way that he knew was very threatening to her, since he had never been easy for her to take, hands claiming her hips with a force that he knew would leave marks he would regret later, but this was not then. He had long since given himself over to the part he was playing there, tonight, with her - perhaps even more fully than he did each night before a crowd of eager onlookers.

This was them. Alone. Him, dominating, her submitting. This was truly - somewhat close to - how it might have been if he had been Coriolanus and she had been his beautiful, helpless female slave - one unfortunate enough to intrigue him somehow, as she did in real life.

And every single aspect of those thoughts brought his passion higher and higher, until he couldn't convince himself of a reason not to simply plunge powerfully into her, seating himself firmly within her and having to unexpectedly battle himself not to simply begin thrusting as she emitted a guttural groan and he could feel her squeezing and contracting around him in an attempt to come to grips with his big, imposing presence inside her.

Ah, but the delayed gratification element raised its ugly head, and he clamped down on his desires ruthlessly, stilling hips that desperately wanted the freedom to take her as they would.

But there would be time enough for that shortly, he promised himself.

He reached down to untie her wrists, not allowing her to regain control of them, but instead, grasping each arm just above the elbow and drawing them - and her - back so that he was even more deeply wedged into her.

The fact that she was unbelievably tight didn't help his control. Neither did the fact that, the moment he released her wrists, she began trying to fight him again.

Tom followed his urge and chuckled loudly. "Such spirit. It's too bad your side lost - and so have you. You would have bred fierce warriors for them." He grabbed a handful of hair and hauled her almost up to what would have passed for standing if he'd allowed her feet to touch the floor so he could rumble in her ear, "Instead, you'll breed them from me."

While he had her like this, more accessible than before, he pushed two fingers between those plump, wet folds as she tried futilely to twist and writhe away from his touch, struggles which he easily controlled - humiliatingly well - with just one hand.

Laughing at her feeble attempts to avoid the inevitable, he threatened, "No, you can't escape this. I won't allow it. You know your submission isn't nearly complete until I've made you cum - helplessly - as I take you." He began to piston his hips sharply, driving himself in and out of her, closing his eyes to the music that was her whimpering cries, at first of almost discomfort, but, once she'd stopped her useless fighting to relax and accepted the inevitable - once she had most truly submitted herself to him - her moans became surprisingly vehement feminine echoes of his own raw pleasure.

He pressed her over the couch again, keeping those fingers eagerly worrying her clit, feeling the gathering tension within her lower body that let him know she was fairly close as he trapped her wrists together again in his free hand, pressing them into the small of her back.

The fact that she was fairly close ricocheted through his mind. And so soon after everything he'd done to her tonight. He let that thought wash over him and send both his hips and those teasing fingers into overdrive, fucking her and frigging her with the same intensity, hurling her - willing her - forcing her to surrender control of herself to him in the most completely devastating manner any woman could to any man - to yield mastery of her body in its entirety - of her purest, most primitive pleasure - to him as he took her with him into that blissful abyss.

Her blood curdling scream was first and he clamped a hand quickly over her mouth while not missing a beat, seconds before he issued his own against her shoulder as her strong spasms around his cock sent him reeling into his own release, continuing to pump violently into her, emptying himself within her in every possible way, until he was so weak from his attempts to completely drain himself that he wasn't sure whether his legs would support him any longer.

But, after long moments during which he simply panted in her ear and tried to recover as he lay over her back, he finally forced them to, feeling that he didn't have the luxury of simply dropping to the floor behind her as he desperately wanted to. His conscience - now rapidly returning - would never allow him to do that. Instead, he let go of her wrists and stroked the length of her hair.

"Why don't you try to stand, babygirl? I'm right here. I'll never let you fall." It was a soft question, about as far from the raw commands he'd been issuing to her since he'd arrived as Coriolanus was from William Buxton. It was the first time since he'd gotten there that he sounded like himself.

He gripped her upper arm gently and helped her straighten, but her knees wouldn't hold her. That was no problem at all as he scooped her into his arms and brought her into her pretty bedroom, laying her down on her side in consideration of the abysmal condition of her bottom.

Tom sat on the edge of the bed somewhat gingerly, waiting for her to rail at him for what he'd done to her, to scream at him for the pain he'd caused her, for being eons too rough with her, knowing he deserved every bit of that and more. He expected her to slap him across the face, to punch him, or, at the very least, to throw him out of her place and call the police, to file a lawsuit against him, or something for assault.

He swallowed hard - much less concerned about what could well be the ruination of his career - hell, his entire life - than the idea that she might reject him entirely for it, not allowing him to see her, to touch her - to fuck her.

What had he done?

He did not expect what she did.

He could see the point at which the tears began to fall, both of those tiny, delicate hands coming up to cover her face against him seeing her weeping as she curled in on herself, becoming a small ball of what couldn't be anything else but pure misery, he was sure. Feeling no small amount of guilt and wanting to comfort her, he leaned down to put his arm around her when she suddenly sat up and launched herself into his arms, very nearly knocking him off the bed with the force of her little body thrown full tilt against his.

She draped herself across his lap, kind of on her hip so that her butt wasn't touching anything, arms clinging around his neck like limpets, her face buried against it as she continued to cry as if he'd tried to kill her and had very nearly succeeded.

As much as his impetus - as a male - was to try to fix things for her, his mother and his sisters - and Tanya - had all taught him to resist that impulse with everything in him. Instead, he stroked her back and rocked them both a bit, rubbing her arm and whispering soothing nothings as he pressed his lips to every part of her that he could reach without disturbing her.

When the storm had passed, he waited for her to speak - not patiently, necessarily, but he waited nonetheless. After he'd gotten her a box of tissues and she'd recovered more fully, she threw her arms around him again and kissed him with everything she was and everything she had behind it.

His arms drew tightly in around her, and she could have sworn she felt his tears on her scalp.

When she pulled back a bit, he could see that her face was bright red.

She was deeply embarrassed. But why?

"Oh my fucking Gawd, Thomas!" her voice was a husky shadow of itself from all the screaming she'd done this evening. "Were you trying to kill me with that? The outfit and the role play as him - him! - I - holy bloody fucking bollocks - how does your leading lady not fall to her knees in front of you every night and beg you to fuck her exactly like that in front of the entire audience?"

That got him laughing, both at what she'd said and from the endorphin rush of realizing she wasn't absolutely livid at him. "She has a big, strapping blonde Viking boyfriend, that's how."

She was still blushing and he found it delightful, considering the things he'd already done to her not just now but since they'd become intimate - and fully intended to do to her - with great relish, as in tonight - in the future.

Deciding he wanted to stretch out, he brought her with him, refusing to relinquish his hold on her, arranging them with their heads on the pillows - under the covers, in deference to her nakididity - as he called it specifically to hear her laugh. After . . . well, after everything, he just plain needed to hear her laugh.

He kept her plastered against him, kissing on her and touching her incessantly, as if to reassure himself that she was truly okay.

And he couldn't help but ask her outright, laying his finger along her jaw so that their eyes met. "You're all right?"

She found the myriad ways he showed her he cared for her - the blatant and not so blatant - to be so poignant, and Tanya answered very carefully and seriously, knowing he didn't want just a pat response - that he actually did want to know - needed to know for his own sanity's sake - that she was okay. "I'm perfectly fine but absolutely exhausted, in a an astoundingly wonderful way." Her hands came up to cup his cheeks. "You spoil me."

He took a page from her book and snorted, sounding nothing like the posh Brit everyone knew him as. "I really don't think that qualified . . ."

To his horror, he could see that tears were flooding back into her eyes. "Don't you believe that for a moment! You helped me realize a fantasy that I never though I'd find someone that I could trust enough to explore it with. You are that one and only person, Thomas William Hiddleston."

It was his turn to blush as the bald truth of what she was saying rang in her words and shown brightly in her eyes.

"Well, I kind of enjoyed it a bit, too . . . " he confessed in an "aw shucks" way.

"No? Really? Could have fooled me!" she teased, startled when his hand found its way between her legs, one big finger slipping between her folds to glide over that still highly sensitized area. "What are you doing?"

Surprisingly, Tom became half hard again when he pressed his middle finger up inside her and could feel that she was still having tremors - echoing temblors of the ecstasy he had wrought within her body. "Well, I know I rode you hard," he said deliberately, watching another blush spread across her face, "but I wanted to see if I've put you away wet."

And, of course, he had.

Withdrawing that intrusive finger, he hugged her to him again, whispering, "Was there ever a point when you considered using your safe word?"

She glared at him. "Bastard."

Tom tried to play innocent, and, surprisingly, didn't do it very well, at least not with her. "Whatever could you mean by that, darling?"

"I mean that there were a few instances when I considered it, but since I didn't get to choose my own and you choose one that was so horrid that I would only use it if I was friggin' dying . . . " She frowned up at him.

He was suddenly serious, one big hand cupping the entirety of her poor abused behind in warning as he rolled onto his side, saying sternly, "No, you are to use it any time you need it."

Tanya squirmed but he wasn't going to let her go anywhere. "I know."

He brought the back of her hand to his lips, kissing it tenderly. "And you know that, one day, very deliberately, I've sworn to make you scream it, and I always keep my promises."

There was that gorgeous blush again. "I know," she whispered back. "But I will hate it."

Fully knowing how much she would detest the one he had in mind, he had given her a safeword that he knew would make her think twice about using it.

She'd told him about how, when she'd seen The Avengers, well before she'd met him, she'd made up her mind that she would never, under any circumstances, kneel to Loki or beg him - or anyone for that matter - for anything, ever.

So the safeword he'd given her was "mercy".

His kiss, when he pressed his lips to hers, was exquisitely gentle, yet she had to lean away from him to yawn loudly. He laughed, saying in an almost paternal tone, "I think you need to get some sleep, little girl."

"But I want to snuggle some more. Will you stay?"

"Yes, but I'll be up and out before you wake up. I have meetings all day, then I have show prep to do."

"Thank you for staying," she whispered, entirely too seriously for him.

Tom turned onto his back and cuddled her close, enjoying how she clung to him, her head naturally coming to rest on his shoulder as his arm curled around her, his big hand landing on her hip.

"Will you get in trouble for taking the outfit?" she asked when he thought she was asleep, picking at the material of the shirt.

"Oh, yeah. I guess I should get out of these clothes, huh?" He stood and got out of them with amazing speed - from years of quick changes made backstage - hanging them carefully in her almost empty closet and returning to pull her back into his arms.

"I ought to see if they have a spare set they could part with permanently -" He waggled his eyebrows at her. "I think Martius would like to make another appearance or two -"

She squeezed him around the middle. " - or twelve. Do you think you could take his wardrobe with you, like you could ask to do in a movie?"

Tom frowned down at her. "I don't know, but I'll ask. I'll say I've become overly fond of them - and I have."

"So have I," she yawned again, very nearly asleep.

A few minutes later, when she was surely asleep, he whispered into her hair what he'd been thinking since he'd met her. "And I've become overly fond of you, too, little one."

In a very sleepy, almost sleep talking, high pitched voice, she piped up with, "Me, too, of you."

That earned her a loving kiss on her temple, and a whispered warning. "Go to sleep, Miss Tanya, or I'll warm that fanny of yours."

She giggled - Brits should never say "fanny" in her opinion, but at his very real threat she went still, then ruined it by saying, "I'm asleep. I'm asleep," actually falling asleep to the sound of his soft "ehe he he" seeping into her ears.