"Merlin's Beard, Bellatrix; how many drinks did you have?" Tom laughed as she stumbled through his bedroom, and she began to giggle as she said,

"I dunno. Four? Five? I lost count. That wedding was so, so dull. I can't believe Mrs Avery actually made you give a toast."

"She didn't make me," Tom grumbled, pulling off his bow tie and tossing it onto the armchair in the corner of the bedroom. "Nobody can make me do anything; I'm Lord Voldemort."

"Yes. You are." Bellatrix sighed with a happy little grin and strode up to him, pushing his dress robe off and letting it fall heavily to the floor. She tried to unbutton his white dress shirt, but she was very evidently too drunk, so he smirked at her and pushed her fingers away. He made quick work of the buttons and informed her,

"I only had a small amount of firewhisky. I'm perfectly sober."

"That's wonderful." Bellatrix sounded dreamy, airy, and he snorted a laugh at her. He shucked his shirt, yanking it from his black trousers, and he kicked away his black dragonhide dress shoes. He unbuttoned his trousers and pushed them down with his underwear. His cock, still limp but beginning to firm up from the very distant notion that he was going to be physical with Bellatrix, popped out and hung like a limb. Bellatrix whimpered and made a move to touch him. Tom sucked in a breath and let her do it, let her hands move on his firming length, his sensitised tip. He shut his eyes and whispered,

"Suddenly, I feel as drunk as you."

"Master." Bellatrix reached for his hand with one of hers, and she guided it to her waist. She begged him softly, "Will you undress me?"

"Yes." He was dizzy with want then as he reached around Bellatrix to undo the little black buttons of her formal dress. He chomped hard on his lip as he helped her slide the dress up and off, as he watched her reveal the strapless black corselette and crinoline she was wearing beneath the formalwear. She helped him find her way out of the confining undergarments, although freeing her from them was not the most graceful endeavour Tom had ever undertaken. It didn't help that Bellatrix was utterly sloshed and tripped a little as she stepped out of her satin knickers. She giggled madly and then leaned onto Tom, who was, by now, naked as the day he'd been born. He wrapped her up into his arms and helped her toward the bed, and she murmured,

"I want you so badly. Oh, I want you terribly."

"Do you?" Tom smiled to himself and climbed up onto the bed with her. He aimed his wand at her belly and mumbled a contraceptive charm, then set his wand down on the table beside the bed. He dragged his fingers though his hair and noted that her own hair was still done up in a formal chignon. Her makeup was still carefully preserved upon her face. She was so beautiful, he realised, whether she was dolled up like this or natural with her curls wild and her face bare. He reached for her and said, "You're so pretty, all the time."

She snorted a laugh and shook her head. "Are you certain you don't need glasses, Master?"

He frowned. He dragged his fingers slowly around the soft curve of her breast, beneath its round and lovely shape, and he pulled his thumb over her nipple. It peaked beneath his touch, and he smirked a little at that. He did it again, and the nipple hardened further, puckering and pinching at Tom's command. He looked up at Bellatrix, who had shut her eyes and seemed lost to the sensation of being caressed.

"Bella," Tom hummed, and she just nodded. He glanced down between her legs, at the tiny thatch of dark hair, and suddenly he thirsted for her. He sucked in air and squeezed a little at her breast, and he said softly, "Lie down on your back and spread your legs for me."

"Yes, Master," Bellatrix said at once, opening her eyes and moving to obey him. She probably thought he was going to enter her without any further pretense, though nothing could be farther from the truth. He meant to make her squirm, to make her come harder than she'd ever done. He wanted to make her wail for him, to make her moan with agonised bliss.

He meant to put his face between her legs for the first time.

"Actually," Tom mused, "I've a better idea. I'd like for you to sit on my face."

"Sit on your…" Bellatrix stared at him as though he'd suddenly sprouted a few extra heads.

"Here." Tom moved to lie on his back, and he could feel his cock standing at attention from all the anticipation. He patted the blankets beside him and smiled a bit at Bellatrix. "Hands and knees, facing away from me, and I shall use my mouth on you."

Her eyes went round as saucers, but she finally began to arrange herself. She knelt with her knees on either side of Tom's chest, and she splayed her hands down by his calves. His cock poked her torso, so Tom shifted a little. He'd come himself if he were rubbing at her too much. He seized Bellatrix's waist and pulled her down toward him, squeezing the cheeks of her backside as hard as he possibly could.

And then it occurred to him that he had absolutely no idea what he was doing.

He was completely inexperienced with this, with pleasuring a witch like this, and he would need to operate on instinct and feedback. He breathed in and smelled the musky, heady scent of her womanhood, and he murmured,

"You must tell me if it feels good, or if it doesn't."

"Mmmph. Yes, Master." Bellatrix dropped her head a little, and Tom pulled her arse cheeks down again. This time, he made contact with her clit, and he began to lick. He started with long, slow strokes that moved from the front toward her entrance, over and over. She was already a bit wet, and she tasted like metal… like licking a spoon. Tom licked again, and again and again, until Bellatrix was groaning and fluid drizzled from her body into Tom's mouth. He reached up with his left hand to caress the cheek of her arse, and with his right hand, he pushed two, then three fingers inside of her. He thrust them back and forth, pushing and pulling the fingers in tandem with squeezing motions on his other hand. He sped up the licking movements of his tongue until he was flicking deftly back and forth over her sensitive clit. Something compelled him to move his left hand from her round cheek to the button of her puckered arse, and he pressed there just hard enough to excite her without entering. All the while, Bellatrix moaned and whined. She was drunk, Tom knew, but she was sopping wet with need. He could taste the metallic tang of her excitement as it leaked from her entrance between his lips. She was mumbling frantically that it felt good, that it felt so very good.

As for his own body, he'd come alive so completely that he could hardly breathe. Tom was panting against Bellatrix's body and his fingers were shaking inside of her. He slid his fingers out of her and used both hands to rub and squeeze at the round, perfectly soft cheeks of her backside, and on instinct, he bucked his hips up a bit until the tip of his cock bumped her flat belly. He grunted, thinking that if he did that again he'd spill himself against her skin. He dug into his licking, committing to another bout of long, deep, smooth, slow strokes. Bellatrix seemed to thoroughly enjoy that, and Tom reached with both hands to yank at the sides of her walls, parting her womanhood and stretching her a little as he dragged his tongue over her time and again. She yelped and squealed, and she murmured helplessly,

"I think I'm going to come."

"You think?" Tom scoffed. He spanked one arse cheek hard and shoved three fingers rather roughly into her body. He pushed his thumb against the puckered button of her anus and massaged there with more pressure than before. Everything had become more forceful now, of its own accord. It just felt right to pound his fingers into her. It felt right to shift to his knuckle in his anal teasing. It just felt like the right thing to do to drag her clit between his lips and suckle on it. Bellatrix lost herself then. She nearly twisted out of Tom's grasp and flopped onto the bed, and she cried out so loudly that Tom smirked at the idea of his neighbours hearing.

Suddenly that tight button was cinching around his knuckle, winking with contractions of pleasure. Suddenly the walls of her womanhood were clenching rhythmically around his fingers, which were abruptly drenched with a sticky fluid. He tasted more of that pleasure, more of that satisfaction, and he felt the contractions on his lips. Tom wrenched his eyes shut and tried not to finish. He tried not to be driven over the edge by the ridiculous, hedonistic beauty of her orgasm. Instead he let her very slowly climb off of him, allowing her to collapse onto her back on the bed beside him, and he lay there staring at the ceiling with his cock aching for attention. His lips were swollen and covered in her, and he found he couldn't care less about the mess he'd made.

"You are delicious," he informed her, and Bellatrix just said in a blurry, dizzy sort of voice,

"That was very intensely pleasurable, Master."

"Why don't you climb back on?" he suggested, turning his face. Bellatrix looked shocked, but he turned up half his mouth and clarified, "Onto my cock."

"Oh." She seemed wobbly and tremulous as she made her way back over to him, facing him this time. She straddled him again, and he realised her knees must be aching by now. No matter. He'd be quick. He was on the verge of coming even as she settled her knees on either side of his hips. She sank down onto him and he hissed, relishing the tight, wet feel of her around his cock. She gasped, and he thought she must be awfully sensitive just now. But she gamely moved up and down in a way that caused her breasts to sway beautifully. She reached to hold onto Tom's shoulders, and she stared into his eyes as she bobbed. She shook her head and insisted,

"Rodolphus Lestrange would have been the worst husband in the world."

"He would have been fine," Tom smirked, brushing his knuckles down Bellatrix's arm, "but he never could have cared as deeply for you as I do."

Bellatrix faltered in her bobbing movements. Her eyes welled, and he knew why. He cared for her? Of course he did. Didn't she know how deeply he did? He urged her to keep moving, and after another thirty seconds of her wet tightness grinding against him, he came hard. He shut his eyes tightly and heard ringing in his ears, felt heat in his veins, and he huffed out a breath as his come leaped up in spurts into Bellatrix's body. He moaned her name five or six times, and then he just lay there in panting silence as she quietly and calmly got off of him. She lay beside him, and the two of them were absolute messes of bodily fluids as they relaxed. They needed showers, badly. This was more than a Scouring spell should handle. But right now Tom didn't feel like moving.

"You asked me to marry you to cement a relationship with families in the Sacred Twenty-Eight and to secure your position atop wizarding society," Bellatrix said suddenly, sounding a little less intoxicated than she'd sounded before. Tom frowned, looked at her, and said,

"Not exactly. If that was all that I'd wanted, I could have married Alivia Avery, or Nora Selwyn, or Greta Goyle… there are a number of suitable Pureblood witches I could have married to forge alliances and secure my authority. I proposed marriage to you in particular because I liked you in particular, and because it made me feel unwell to think of you marrying Rodolphus Lestrange. I was attracted to you; I wanted you."

Bellatrix was quiet then, and the two of them just lay there for a long while in the quiet. She reached for his hand after a bit, twining his fingers with his, and finally she whispered,

"I am in love with you."

"Are you?" Tom wasn't certain what to say to that. He had no idea what it felt like to truly love another human. He'd never loved anybody. Not a parent, certainly. Not a sibling, for he'd had none. No aunts or uncles or grandparents. He had never been in love. He had no idea what it really meant. So he sighed, turned his face to Bellatrix, and asked curiously, "Are you certain?"

She gave him a weak little smile and nodded. "Yes. I'm certain."

"How do you know?" he asked, and she licked her lip as she shrugged.

"It feels easy with you now. Natural. I miss you when you're not about. I feel safe with you. I feel myself with you. I enjoy myself far more when I'm with you than when I'm without you. I like just lying here, naked and dirty and vulnerable, alone with you. I'm attracted to you - but not just physically. I like your stories, and your humour, and your personality. I want to make you happy. I like the way you make me happy. I just… know."

"Oh." Tom's heart rate had accelerated a bit, and his throat had gone somewhat dry. He blinked a few times and cleared his throat. He was anxious now, for he, too, felt everything Bellatrix had described. Things did seem easy and natural with Bellatrix, as though the two of them had been made for one another, as though they had been intended to go together. It did seem as though she'd been handcrafted as his loving servant and companion. He did feel comfortable round her, as though she were the only one who could see him as an eighteen-year-old aspirational young man with vulnerabilities and hobbies and cracks. Everyone else saw the wizard who had ordered Yaxley to kill Avery, and nothing else. Bellatrix saw the Tom who attempted to learn the latest dance moves in his living room whilst the Wireless played and the two of them giggled their way through too much white wine.

Was he in love with her? Surely not. Surely he couldn't be as stupid and foolish as that. Surely he would never allow himself to actually fall in love, to careen so carelessly into the depths of vulnerability. He'd chosen her for his wife because she was a very desirable mate, but she was right in that he had serious political motivations for getting married in the first place.

"Master?"

Tom jolted and stared at Bellatrix, who had sat up and was pulling pins from her hair. She smiled a little and said,

"If I don't get in the shower now, I'm going to fall asleep."

"Oh. Mmm-hmm. Go ahead. I'll go after you."

"Thank you." Bellatrix bent and kissed his chest, and as she climbed off the bed, Tom brushed his fingertips over the place she'd kissed. She looked beautiful as she strode naked into the bathroom, and when the door shut, Tom shut his eyes and licked his lip, tasting the metal of her body's fluids. He groaned a little at the memory of what he'd done to her, and he squeezed a little at the blanket.

No, he thought. He wasn't so stupid as to fall in love. But whatever he did feel toward her was strong and powerful and wonderful. There would never be enough of her. Luckily for him, their wedding was just around the corner, and he had a sneaking suspicion Bellatrix was going to make for a very beautiful bride.

Author's Note: Whew! Better hope that shower Bellatrix is taking is cold after that lemon, right? And the wedding is just around the corner! Yayyyyy! So, there's no chance Dumbledore or the Ministry or an inside traitor would let anything bad happen before the wedding, right? RIIIIIIGHT?!