A/N: This AN goes out to Molly, who is my biggest VanArchiBass supporter. Who also helps, when I get sidetracked, to keep me going. Sometimes it feels like there's no time to keep up with stories, but the truth in, she helped remind me just how much we love love love VAB. So this chapter goes out to her. Love you darlin!

I also want to say that from here on out, things are going to get pretty sexual. If that's something that you aren't into, please just don't read.

For those of you who do, thank you. I really hope you enjoy this chapter and please remember to review. It really helps to know what you guys think about what I'm doing. You don't have to like it, just don't be cruel.
Also, this chapter was named after David Cook's song "Avalanche." I heart it. **Rosie

Chapter Seven

"Avalance"

Was it nothing more

Than noise inside our heads

Crashing Down

Crashing Down

Serena woke up swimming in a sea of heavy blankets. A smile immediately crossed her face as she blinked her eyes towards the window that had a stream of morning light shining in through lace curtains, casting beautiful shadows along the wall. Everything was beautiful about today. Chuck had gone out of town for the night, again, and she'd gotten to spend the evening with the most beautiful man she could think of.

Rolling to the side, she found the bed empty and a frown crossed her face. It was still early so she turned and slipped out of bed. With a robe wrapped around her body, she head down the hallway. The staff had been given the night off and told not to come back until five o'clock this afternoon. She didn't need someone talking about having Nate over.

Tip toeing through the house, she peeked into the kitchen and spotted Nate behind the stove with a bowl of eggs beside him. He scrambled up the ones on the stovetop and then served them on a plate before he spotted her.

"Hey, you ruined the surprise. I was going to bring you breakfast in bed." He said as he put the rest of the egg and milk mixture on the hot surface.

Serena smiled as she walked over to him, leaning against his back as she curled her arms around his stomach and rest her chin against his shoulder. Nate grinned, turned his head to the side and kissed her softly.

"I don't mind." She said softly. "I just don't like waking up in bed without you."

Nate's grin widened, "I don't like waking up without you either."

As she leaned against him, Serena got that devious spark in her eyes. She let her hands slip down his bare stomach and went to his pajama pants, which she untied. She saw him grin before she started kissing his neck and let her fingers slip under the fabric. "I want you," she whispered against his ear. "I woke up wanting you." Sometimes she just couldn't help herself around Nate.

It was like a moth to a flame, she was drawn no matter the cost.

She ran her hand along him and continued to kiss his neck, up to his ear, as the knot in her stomach grew, wanting, begging for more of him, more of his touch. She felt him against her palm and bit down on her bottom lip. Nate's eyes grew heavy and closed for just a second before he remembered he should be more careful with the stove in front of him.

Quickly he pushed the pan off the stovetop, turned the range off and then he turned. The twinkle in Serena's eye was incredible. He saw how much she wanted him in that one look. Ever since the first time he saw Serena van der Woodsen (he wasn't going to call her Serena Bass), he knew that he had to have her. Unlike his other teenage conquests, you could call them, Serena wasn't someone he could just have once and move on from.

She had weaved her place into his heart and he couldn't live without her.

The night before had been soft, and passionate. But now there was nothing soft about it. He wanted her as much as she wanted him, so he just attacked. He stepped in and caught her mouth with his. Her breath was brushed across his lips as she gasped, and Nate backed her up into the wall. One hand cupped under her thigh to raise it at his side.

She was bare under the robe and Nate knew this. He could feel the warmth of her soft body underneath the thin fabric, but taking time to untie the robe was out of the question. His tongue slid against hers, each breath sending fire through their bodies.

Her skin was practically on fire as she pulled her fingertips through his hair. She felt like she could climb the walls with just how much she knew she needed him. "Nate," she gasped as she hung her head back against the wall. It was cold, especially against her heated flesh, but she hardly cared. "I need you." Her voice was raspy as she stretched her neck and he kissed and nipped the tender skin.

Nate could get lost in the way she felt, and that was just fine with him. But when she moaned his name, he was taken over.

Lifting her other leg, he hoisted her from the floor and turned to a table, the nearest stable surface, and he put her on it. He pulled her legs so she was at the edge of it and simply yanked the bottom of the flimsy robe open. Her fingers were already pushing his pajama bottoms to the ground as her mouth found his again.

Serena's heart was racing as Nate closed the distance between their bodies. She cried out, arching her back and knocked a plate and two glasses off. But she didn't care.

Neither Serena or Nate noticed the pair of dark eyes that stood in the doorway to the kitchen. How stupid did they think he was, that he wouldn't notice his wife having an affair. Of course the nuptials had been made up, but that didn't mean Chuck didn't expect his wife to be his. He hadn't even slept with her since they had been married. That wasn't Chuck's modus operandi.

He never took his eyes off of them. His best friend, and his wife. He watched the robe part and let his eyes follow the line of her body as it jerked with Nate's movements. Her voice carried in the empty room and down the equally empty hallways. He watched her as she cried another man's name, enjoyed another man's body. That just was not acceptable.

It was time to teach the new Mrs. Bass a few lessons.

Chuck turned from them and walked to the living room. He busied himself by pouring a glass of whiskey from a crystal container. There was no idea so he took it as is and sat down on the couch, where the sounds of Nate and Serena's love making filled the room. He sat and he waited.

He was a patient man.

* * *

"Well I guess we won't be having this for breakfast," Nate said as he scooped up the broken plates and uncooked pan. He chuckled though because he didn't mind spending the morning making love to Serena instead of eating in bed. He just wanted to spend every day with her. He turned his head as he put the plates in the trash and walked over to where she stood in front of the open refridgerator door.

Serena smiles as she feels his arms wrap around her slender waist. She turns her head to look at him, watching him kiss her shoulder. This was what a marriage was supposed to be like. Unable to get enough of each other, to need the other so much that you could barely breathe. It was Nate she wanted to be with.

"It's ok." She whispers, "I'm not that hungry anymore." Serena easily turns in his arms, wrapping hers around his neck and leans in to kiss him. "How about we go get a shower and freshen up?"

Nate's fingers curl into her golden locks. "I'd like that." He lets his hands then trail down the lines of her body until they reach her hands. He kisses her lips tenderly, feeling his heart jump, and starts to walk out of the kitchen.

He was so wrapped up in her that he didn't even know why she went pale as they walked through the living room. She pulled from him and he perked a brow, "Serena?" She didn't get a chance to reply, and Nate didn't get a second to figure out what was going on before he heard a deep familiar voice that sounded like it was shrouded with razorblades.

"Nathaniel." Chuck speaks slowly. Steady. Calm. He doesn't even look up at them. His concentration stays on his second glass of whiskey. "I assume you won't be staying. I have a car out front to drive you home." Then he dips back into his drink.

Serena still hadn't started breathing yet.

When she'd walked out of the kitchen, she noticed a suitcase before she noticed Chuck sitting there. It was even more frightening that he hadn't said anything. He hadn't lost control. He wasn't yelling. He just sat there. He sounded like he was talking about the weather. And as much as Serena wanted to believe that Chuck hadn't heard them, she knew that she'd been loud.

She bit her lip and looks away from Nate.

Not knowing what to do, Nate just nodded. He started to head towards the bedroom but Chuck finally stood. "Your things have been collected for you, Nathaniel." He nodded towards the foyer. "There."

Nate stared for a minute. He had to tell Chuck that he couldn't help himself. He was in love with Serena and always had been. She was smart and sexy, funny and outgoing. She was perfection, and he had to be with her. "Chuck--"

Chuck however was hardly in the mood to listen to a single word of this. Instead, he turned his back on Nate. "Goodbye, Nathaniel."

"No, I really think you need to listen to--"

He whirled, "I said goodbye." Chuck could very much hold himself together in any normal situation but even in the Bass world, this wasn't exactly a normal situation.

Nate stared at Chuck for a minute before turning to Serena. "Come with me." He said as he took a few steps towards her. He just wanted to take her away from all of this. Faced with their affair becoming public news, he could get her away from here. It wasn't a permanent fix, but it could work for now. He could take her away for awhile. They could be alone and together.

But when Serena looked up, he saw something in her eyes.

"I can't, Nate." She stepped in and put her hands on his wrists. "I need to talk to him. We never talked about this before the ceremony." She didn't necessarily want to discuss this, but she was damn sure going to make sure that Chuck understood their marriage arrangement. "Go ahead and go. I'll talk to you later."

He didn't have to like it but he just nodded. He could see that she was sure of this, so he wouldn't argue. "Call me if you need me." Nate considered just walking towards the foyer but if Chuck over heard he and Serena having sex, there wasn't much reason to pretend he didn't love her. He leaned in and kissed her, then whispered, "I love you."

Serena smiled, for a moment, that worried face breaking around the golden brightness of her happiness. "I love you too." She said, giving his hand a squeeze. She watched him walk away as well. He grabbed his clothes and then slipped out. The door clicked shut and it left Chuck and Serena alone.

She raised her eyes to look at him and flopped her hands at her sides. "Okay, now you need to understand something. We may be married but it was an arrangement and that's it. We aren't some couple that are madly in love."

"Like you and Nate?" Chuck questioned. He downed the rest of the amber liquid and put the glass onto the table before he turned to face the large window panes. His eyes scanned over the tops of the buildings. He wasn't blind. He'd seen the way they looked at each other. He didn't need to have heard the words exchanged between the two. But he was the one who was going to win this. Just like in their younger days, Chuck and Nate were always competing.

This would be no different.

He smirked as his eyes ran along the tops of all the tall buildings. As he stood there, listening to the sound of her uneven breathing, he started to think again about the way she and Nate had looked at each other. There was something in that look that Chuck couldn't totally understand. Maybe it was the love aspect in general. Chuck didn't do love, but for some reason he couldn't understand he wandered what it felt like.

With that realization, Chuck turned, one hand in his pocket and looked at Serena, who seemed to be in a world of her own thoughts. "I wonder how the media would see you if they found out."

Serena stiffened at the mention. She'd been trying to think of something to say but there didn't seem to be anything. He'd caught her and Nate having sex. There wasn't much you could say after that.

Pressing her lips together, she looked up at him. "You wouldn't."

"What's my name?" He asked smoothly, voice pouring the words like wine. "Answer that then ask yourself if I would or wouldn't."

One attribute Chuck had always enjoyed that Serena possessed was her quick anger. It didn't take more than a second for it to kick in. He watched as the nervous slipped over her face and then stubborness take root. Her cheeks flushed slightly and her eyes narrowed, her brows scrunched, and he could already hear the snap in her voice before she even spoke. "I can't believe you. You know that would reflect badly on you as well. The whole fake marriage would come out and your buyers will think that good ole family boy face is just a facade, which it is." Her hands went to her small waist. "Come to think of it, maybe I should just let the cat out of the bag now, that way you can get this ridiculous notion that you have any control over what I do out of your head."

Her golden locks spun around her shoulders as she turned and head towards the door. She had full intentions of letting the world know this was a fraud. She didn't care what kind of backlash she would have to deal with. The Chuck Bass she had seen at the empty hotel, when they had danced and kissed, he wasn't real.

She should have known better.

He takes a few short steps to close the distance between them. As her hand touches the front door knob, Chuck pushes his body against her back, forcing her against the wall. She lets out a grunt and immediately starts to push back, so he curls his fingers around her wrist and spins her.

With her back now against the wall, his body pinning hers to it, he looks down at her.

"Get off of me," Serena hisses, her hands pressed against his chest.

He's still Chuck Bass, and her order has him chuckling. "I love when you squirm against me."

"Chuck!" Her heart starts racing but, she tells herself, it has nothing to do with the tingles that started to shoot up and down her arms.

"Even more when you scream my name."

This time Serena doesn't even think. Without much room to move, she doesn't get the desired impact when she smacks the side of his face. She watches his head slip to the side and he doesn't turn back at first. It keeps her from struggling against him. However, when he did start to look up, she noticed how his hair fell out of place, a strand falling over his left eye. There was something animalistic about the way he looked at her, and it made her knees weak.

But she tried not to let that show.

For as much as she tried, Chuck could still see it. He knew the way a woman in heat looked. Hell, he made most of them feel that way. Serena had so far been the one attainable thing, but he would make her his. He was Chuck Bass, afterall.

He didn't say anything as he looked at her and she stilled. Wetting his lips, he looked down the length of her body in that robe. Knowing that her body had just been possessed by another man's didn't upset him as much as he thought it would. Instead, it made him want her more. But he wouldn't just be sloppy. He was calculated.

"You like the way he touches you?" His voice was simple, and warm.

It was such a change from what she expected that it took Serena a minute to realize what he had said. She was very aware of how close his body was to hers. She could feel the heat radiating from him, and from his gaze. It was almost physical as he looked her over. His eyes were like fingers slowly drawing along the line of her body. Her breath staggered and she tried not to think about that. "I don't see how any of that is your business." She swallowed, trying to get control of herself.

"See, that's where you're wrong." Chuck said as he drew his gaze up from her stomach to her chest, where the robe started to open at the hollow of her neck.

He moved his hands from the wall beside her to gently touch her hips. He wondered if the fabric of her robe was as soft as her skin. He smirked as he drew his fingertip along the sash, towards the knot that cinched the outfit together. "You're my wife. And regardless of the way it came to be, I still find myself curious about what pleases you."

Serena turned her eyes to the side. This time she could feel just how close his fingers were to her. She remembered that first time in the bathtub. Ever since then, she had thought about what he said. He told her that no one was that out of it that they didn't realize someone was touching them. What if he had been right?

And what about the dream she'd had of Chuck taking her body? What had that been about? She had a wonderful man. She had Nate, and she loved him. In her heart, she was sure. So why did she keep thinking about Chuck?

Frustrated at the feelings going through her, she took them out on him.

Her hand flicked up and pushed his away from her. "You saw what pleased me and you sent him out of here, remember?"

Chuck's first response was anger. His first reaction was to hit her, or push her into the wall as hard as he could. He didn't like that she didn't just listen to him or fear him like most people did. However, and this was the confusing part, it was her fire that he was really drawn to. He loved and hated it at the same time.

Not loved. Liked. Respected. Not loved.

Instead of lashing out, he just chuckled and reached up to touch his jaw. It was still in place. Good.

"I do remember." As he lowered his hand, he put it back on the knot of her robe and started to pull at it. The knot slowly started to come undone. "And I also remember that he didn't even think of take you out of your clothes."

Her brain started to yell at her for not moving, so she did. Her fingers curled around his wrist. "Don't.." but her voice wasn't convincing. Not as much as she meant for it to be. How could she even entertain this idea for the smallest second? Nate had just left, and she wasn't this person. She spoke freely about how much she hated those women who let themselves get used by Chuck Bass. She sure as hell wasn't going to become one of them.

While she was thinking through all of it, Chuck just smirked. "With a body like this, it's a sin to keep it covered." His voice lowered a little as he watched the knot come untied. He let the ties fall from his fingers, and as the robe started to come open, her hands reached up to keep it closed.

Finally, she met his eyes. "I said don't."

But she was feeling her reserve depleting. She didn't know if she could manage this. She should leave. If she didn't leave.. well, she couldn't say exactly what would happen, but she did know that it would be exactly what Chuck wanted. Still, she was finding it extremely difficult to turn away from his eyes.

Chuck touched his hand on top of the one of hers that kept her robe closed. He wasn't urging, or tugging. It just rest there. "It's not always about what you say, Serena. You say you don't want me, but I hear you at night. I see your body twisting the sheets when you say my name. You think about me, and no matter what you have to say right now, you want me to put my hands on you. You want to know exactly what it feels like to have me consume you."

His eyes were so intense and she was stuck. She couldn't look away. And while she was worried about what he was saying, wondering if she really said his name at night, she knew she was fighting a losing battle. Her stomach was in knots, her pulse racing, and slowly she let her fingers loosen from the fist she had.

As she did, Chuck started to move her hand away slowly. The fabric was warm, but not as much as her skin. He felt electricity shoot through his whole body as two fingers drew a slow line from her belly button, up between her breasts, then to her neck. There, he curled his hand around the side and slowly pulled her forward.

When she didn't fight him, he brought his mouth down on top of hers. He swallowed the soft moan she made but kept the kiss innocent.

Serena was lost in this sea, swimming in emotions that she couldn't even understand. She knew her body was on fire though, and that the urging desire in the pit of her stomach told her that she needed more. Her breath shook as she tried to deepen the kiss, but he moved from it.

She shivered as his lips came down on her neck instead. Her eyes rolled shut and she bit her bottom lip. She even moved her hands against his chest, but not to push him away this time. Fingers curled around the lapels of his suit jacket and held him close.

Chuck could hear her jagged breath and all he wanted to do was to put her on the ground and take her. He gently bit her neck, feeling her body tremble with the nip. He then let his hand drop away from her neck and moved them to her hips. Slowly he trailed his palms along the curve of her body and back down, over and over until he couldn't stop the need to touch her bare flesh any longer.

Sliding under the silk, he finally felt her skin.

It was softer.

"Chuck.." Serena's voice, while unsteady, also sounded unsure. She couldn't be certain if she was trying to tell him to stop, or to keep going. Part of her knew she wanted more, the other part was afraid of more. What she did know was that her body felt like it wasn't able to hold her up. She took a breath to help steady her but it didn't work.

His hands were experienced and strong, and it made her decision for her. Yes. She wanted more. She moved her grasp from the front of his suit jacket to his back. When he moved his kisses to the other side of her neck, she started to dig her nails through the suit, against his back.

"Chuck." This time she said it with desire, with passion. It wasn't just his name, it was a plea to continue to make her feel like this.

When he heard it, a smile crossed his lips. He slowly leaned back and then looked down the line of her body. Almost painfully slowly, he nudged her robe all the way open so that it fell from her body, exposing all of her to him. From her shapely hips to her beautiful breasts. She was all woman, and in that moment, all his.

It was also all he wanted.

Despite the urging to indulge in all things Serena, Chuck leaned into her ear and whispered, "You didn't think it would be that easy, now, did you?" He stepped back, fixed his suit and then smiled that devilish smile at her.

Her face was dumb-founded.

"You should get dressed." He said as he walked around her. It wasn't easy but Chuck knew how to get what he wanted. He wanted Serena, and now she could spend the entire night thinking about how much she had just admitted to wanting him too.

He was still smirking as he walked into his office, having left Serena standing nude in the other room.