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Part Two | Pain & Fire

Twenty-Five. Kiss Me

His hand was still firmly grasped in her own as they entered the bedroom, her bedroom. She hadn't looked at him since just before they left the couch, and for some reason unbeknownst to Pansy, she was having trouble finding the courage to turn herself around and face him.

As they approached the double bed, Pansy realised their pace had slowed. She waved her wand at the lamp on her bedside table, the flame of the candle casting an atmospheric glow over the bedroom. She crossed the remainder of the room with small, tentative steps.

End of the line, now you have to face him, she thought to herself, cursing the unfortunate absence of her characteristic Pansy-poise that she was usually able to exert in droves - even in times she felt very little genuine confidence.

Except, of course, right now, when it would come in the most handy. Bugger.

She had stopped when both her knees touched the bed, and somehow Neville's hand was no longer in hers, though she didn't quite remember letting it go.

Unsure whether she heard him take a step slightly closer to her, or whether she simply felt his presence move closer to her back, Pansy didn't know. What she did know was that Neville's hands were, all of a sudden, resting lightly on the tops of her shoulders, so close she could hear him breathing somewhere just above the top of her head.

Swallowing, Pansy felt his strong, yet still tender grip gently guide her backwards. She closed her eyes as her back made contact with Neville's stomach, at the same time his lips made contact with the side of her neck.

Breathing deeply, Pansy tentatively pushed herself backwards into him, as Neville's strong arms moved down from their current position to wrap themselves around her midriff. He trailed a line of kisses towards her ear. "You okay?" he whispered.

"Mmhmm," Pansy replied. She placed her own arms on top of his, palms seeking out the backs of his hands, so that she could lace her fingers through his whilst he held her to him.

"You sure? Your hands are shaking," Neville said, pulling her closer to him as he did. Pansy, pull yourself together!

"I'm fine." Shit answer.

"Okay," he replied, and Pansy was grateful he didn't seem to wish to continue his line of questioning. "Turn around," he said, quietly.

And she did.

She did so slowly, marvelling slightly at the way he managed to keep her encased within his strong arms as she moved.

An odd sense of comfort washed over her as she found her face pressed into Neville's chest. Somehow, in this strange and twisted excuse for her final year of their Hogwarts' education, breathing in Neville Longbottom had become Pansy's refuge, whilst there were many things that Pansy considered home, ironically none of them including her actual home, it was in Neville's arms that she had found a true feeling of contentment.

In his arms, her heart had found home.

Wrapping her own arms around his torso, Pansy ran her fingertips along Neville's back, becoming more sure of herself with every movement she made.

He let out a low, throaty groan at her actions as he instantaneously began to run his own hands over Pansy's back, over her shoulder blades; his right hand came to a halt behind Pansy's neck whilst the other ventured back downwards, pausing briefly at the point where her shirt met the top of her skirt. He pushed his palm even lower, gently cupping her round behind.

The action, whilst small, seemed to break the small amount of tension within her, that Pansy had been trying hard to ignore, and she found herself in a small bout of accidental giggles.

"What?" Neville said, pulling back, clearly alarmed.

"Nothing," Pansy said, smiling, "your hand was...on my arse."

"Is that...bad? Do you not...like-"

Oh, Merlin.

"-oh, no! No, Neville, I do, it's just..." It was Pansy's turn to struggle to get her words out. "I was...all nervous and...then your hand...my arse...made me laugh, and I don't feel...that nervous...anymore."

Holy Hellsnakes, that was dire. Pansy, sort yourself out.

Pansy watched as Neville blinked slowly at her words, their arms were still fixed firmly around each other, but there was more space between them now. Shit shit shit!

"Okay," Neville replied, elongating the a sound to add to his clear perplexity, "well, that's good, I think, I thought I'd done something terrible."

"How could you putting your hand on my bum be terrible?"

At her words, Pansy was shocked to see Neville's cheeks take on a deep, red hue. "Well," he began, with a look upon his face that suggested he was having trouble speaking the words, "I don't exactly have a lot...of experience."

"Oh."

"Merlin," Neville sighed, "I'm sorry."

"For what?" Pansy asked, genuinely curious as to why he was apologising to her.

"For not being...what you...deserve," he said, not meeting the eyes she had raised to his face.

Are you joking?! "You...not be...what I deserve?"

Neville looked positively crestfallen. "Do you want me to go?"

What? "Why would I want that?"

He shrugged, dropping his arms from around her, his feet shuffling awkwardly. "I was stupid to think that a girl as beautiful as you could ever truly want," he gestured downwards himself, "this."

"I do want you!" Pansy cried, mentally forcing away her embarrassment. "And how can you possibly think that you're not good enough for me? Have you met us?"

Neville didn't say anything, however his gaze did meet hers properly once more, something Pansy was grateful for as his blue iris' gave her a piercing look that Pansy sensed somehow was a queue for her to continue.

"I'm Pansy Parkinson," she said, and with a sigh she cautiously took a few careful steps backwards. Feeling for the edge of her bed to meet her legs, Pansy sunk onto the covers when they did. Pansy continued, her face dropping southwards to the clenched hands that were perched upon her lap, "I'm in almost as deep as you can be, every part of my life, my family, is bad."

Neville cleared his throat, and took one step closer to bed. "You aren't bad, Pansy." His voice was quiet and controlled, though Pansy half expected it to waver with emotion at any second.

"Maybe not, but I'm not like you," she mumbled, embarrassed.

"Can I sit?" he queried, gesturing to the empty space on Pansy's left.

"Of course."

Pansy felt the mattress contort slightly as the weight of Neville was added to her own.

"Why aren't you bad?" he asked.

"What?"

"Well, wouldn't it be easier to just...be one of them?"

"Obviously it would be easier, but I'm not an evil shit that enjoys torturing children, and murdering innocent people, am I?" Pansy answered, her defensive tone far harsher than she had intended.

What does that have to do with anything?

"Exactly."

"That doesn't-"

"-you're basically a spy, you know that, right? You're willing to fight for the Light when almost everything in your life is screaming at you to fight for the Dark, it's...it's brave, almost...reckless."

"Ugh, stop that! You're making me sound like a Gryffindor."

He nudged her playfully, and Pansy was glad to see that his uneasiness seemed to be leaving him. "I think...Pansy Parkinson wouldn't have done too bad in Gryffindor."

"You take that-"

The rest of her sentence was interrupted by Neville's lips.

Pansy was, at first, incredulous, and then briefly annoyed, before Neville's hand found her jaw, reeling her in, closer to him as his mouth moved harmoniously against hers. Her conscious ignored every semblance of their night's momentary blip, and felt nothing but her want and need of him once more.

She busied her hands with the pleasurable task of running over Neville's stomach, and even over his shirt she could feel the impressive indentations that hinted at the expanse of muscle that his torso housed. She felt his breath falter momentarily as she bravely buried her right fingers beneath his shirt, finding her way to his bare stomach. Beneath, even from a seated position, Pansy marvelled his stomach still felt remarkable. It's mine, she thought with the faintest ghost of a smile, he was hers.

The majority of her nerves and the entirety of her flukey outburst of laughter - that she would no doubt kick herself for later - was gone. Instead, Pansy finally found herself with nothing more than a deliciously comfortable craving for his body to be on top of hers, preferably sans clothes, she decided as Neville gave the spot of her neck he had began to kiss, a small nip.

Pansy began to lie backwards, locking her hands together behind Neville's head as she did, meaning he had no choice but to move with her, something, she realised with an inward pulse of satisfaction, he showed no hesitation to do. Her legs were still hanging from the edge of the bed, and so Pansy leant up, back on her elbows, and began to seductively snake her way backwards. She heard his shoes being kicked off and then Neville met everyone of her movements perfectly, crawling over her, his body poised effortlessly above her, crouched like a large cat waiting to pounce upon its prey.

Their lips did not miss a beat, despite their continuous movements and before long Pansy had positioned them with her head now resting upon her pillow, the heated pressure of Neville's frame now pressed enticingly into her.

She found her hands beginning to move over his form again, the tips of her fingers grazing the skin at the base of his back. She nudged the annoyance that was his shirt further up his body, before making the impromptu, split-second decision that said shirt had now entirely served its purpose for the time being. Pansy moved her hands to Neville's chest, and pressed her palms firmly against him. Neville stopped the kisses his mouth had been currently attacking hers with and looked at her, his puzzled expression laced with a trace of worry.

Pansy smiled, feigning coyness, before she delicately dragged her fingernails over Neville's chest to where the topmost button of his shirt was located. She slowly, and agonisingly carefully, undid the button, before moving onto the next at a tantalisingly slow pace.

Neville flashed her a wide grin, his eyes staring into hers as she worked her way down the line of buttons of his shirt before eventually the garment flopped open entirely. He sat back on his heels and allowed Pansy, who had also sat herself upright, to remove the piece it entirely. Wincing briefly as it passed over his wounded shoulder, Neville watched as Pansy hastily tossed the shirt onto the floor.

"Does it hurt?" she asked, nodding towards his shoulder.

Neville shrugged, and then instantly looked as though he regretted the action. "You won't think I'm any less tough if I say yes, will you?"

"Of course I will," she said with a smirk and an obviously false tone of indignation, "if you say yes, I'll send you packing right now."

"Doesn't hurt at all," Neville countered, earning him a snort of laughter from Pansy as she leaned back against her pillow. Following suit, Neville twisted himself to the right and lay down facing her. He propped himself up on his good shoulder, and rested his hand on her stomach whilst his other found a way to play with a lock of her hair.

"I love your laugh," he said, tracing the hem at the bottom of Pansy's own shirt, his deft fingers running over the small portion of her midriff that was visible.

"I hate my laugh," Pansy said, realising with a surprise that she had never admitted that truth out loud before. "I like yours, though."

"Hmmm," Neville breathed into the side of her temple as he planted a short series of kisses along the side of her head.

"That feels nice," Pansy whispered, and Neville moved the focus of his lips down towards her jaw line as the intensity of his fingers trailing along her stomach increased.

"You feel nice," she heard him murmur as he placed more kisses near her ear, before positioning himself slightly further down on the bed, enabling him a better position in which to focus his attentions to her neck.

She moved her hand up to meet his shoulder. It was his bad one, and so was particularly careful not to jar him as she traced her fingers up towards his neck, pulling him as close to her as she dared, knowing that any movement could be causing him more pain.

Luckily, he seemed to either not feel very much at her touch, or perhaps a more logical explanation was that he was entirely hell-bent on ignoring any discomfort he may be currently in.

His left hand had still not left her stomach, and Pansy now felt it begin to creep up towards, she realised a second later, her lowermost button. The button came undone with an almost expert precision, and Pansy let out a small moan from her throat as she felt him move onto the next.

"Is this okay?" he asked in a whisper, between kisses. Oh, Gods, you never have to ask that.

"Fair's fair," she replied, caressing the back of Neville's neck, a sly smile present upon her face as she felt the second button pop out as easily as the first.

His hand quickly undid the remainder of her shirt's buttons, and Pansy couldn't help but grin at the look of pure lust that was evident on Neville's face. She deftly removed the shirt from her torso, and flung it haphazardly in the same direction she had cast his, and rested back against the pillows with only a plunging, black bra - thankfully is one of my nicer ones - covering her almost naked chest.

"Oh, woah," she heard Neville whisper aloud as he watched her chest softly rise and fall with her breaths. "Oh... I... err, can you pretend you didn't hear me say that?" he added, clearly embarrassed.

Merlin, no! "I make no promises," Pansy replied, secretly thrilled she'd elicited such a reaction from him.

Neville snorted, his eyes still entirely upon her scantily clad breasts, and Pansy could feel the hardening evidence of his arousal resting against her leg.

"Neville," she whispered, placing a finger beneath his chin, all but forcing his gaze to meet hers, amused at the ever so slight look of disgruntlement that briefly crossed his face as his eyes wrenched themselves away from her chest.

"Mmm?"

Pansy did not answer right away, instead she gently - still very aware of his hurt shoulder - pushed the pads of her fingers into his chest, enabling her to roll him onto his back The knowledge that he was probably now a lot more nervous than she was, he had mentioned not having much experience, and Pansy could not recall ever knowing that he had had any girlfriends, the main conclusion she drew was that his confession should be taken very literally, and she made herself to take the lead.

Once Neville was positioned on his back, just as she had been moments before, Pansy propelled herself over him until she was straddling his crotch with her own. The hardness she had felt against her thigh before now resided beneath her, where she was able to feel it teasingly beneath the already damp fabric of her underwear.

"If you don't mind," she began, huskily, "this bra is awfully uncomfortable. I think I'll have to take it off."

Pansy smirked as she contemplated whether it was at all possible for Neville's eyes to actually shoot out of his head. He placed a hand on the side of her waist and looked at her as though she was the only girl in the world, Pansy realised with a blush.

"You're far too gorgeous to be uncomfortable," he replied. His voice was steady, and yet Pansy could sense the excitement he was clearly attempting to conceal.

Pansy didn't reply. Instead, she acted, and ran her hands up her back until she felt the familiar clasp of her bra. Quickly undoing it, she then ripped it from her body before she had a chance to second guess whether she was quite this confident. Oh Gods, my boobs are loose!

Pansy felt his erection twitch beneath her, which sent an electric pulse of pleasure to her most sensitive area. They simultaneously moaned after the small movement.

"You are perfect," Neville said from beneath her. His voice sounded breathless.

She looked down at him, the nerves that had crept back over her at the removal of her bra were beginning to dissipate from the way he looked at her - with greed and hunger - yet, there was something else entirely that was present in his eyes.

Lo-

"Kiss me," he said, snatching her thoughts away as quick as they had surfaced.

"Okay," she answered, not needing to be told twice as she pressed her entire body onto his. Her mouth found his, a sense of wholeness spreading through her as his lips moved against hers and an array of thrilling bouts of pleasure erupted from the way his hands made her feel as they began to explore her breasts, combined with the building friction that was now present, as she shifted her most sensitive spot over the tip of his erection.

Oh, I'm so glad you stayed here tonight.