Under My Skin

"You already have a fake I.D." Loki stated to me as I adjusted the blonde wig on top of my head. I fluffed out the ends of it as he appeared in the doorway of the bathroom. I reached into my make up bag, taking out my mascara as he went on, "You said you were going to get another one…"

"Exactly," I replied to him with a slight smirk. "The one I have is shit though. I need a better one, but it'll do for the cashiers later. They don't pay attention to how real it is." My mouth fell open as I went to apply it to my lashes. I wanted to say more to him, but talking would have ruined my concentration and he… well, left before I could. There were a few things that I had to tell him before we would go to the casino. I wasn't going to go to the one in our hotel, most certainly not.

Sooner or later, he returned, knocking on the already-opened door before letting himself in. My eyebrows perked up to see him with a tie hanging loosely around his neck. "Do you mind?" He asked me. My eyes went down to it before I had set my things down. I gestured for him to pick his head up before I had my hands on it. My thumb smoothed itself down on one of the ends before I gave him a small smile. I moved to do the tie after a moment, going slowly and feeling his breath on the tip of my nose. I swallowed thickly, glancing up at him. I felt his hands on top of me faintly as I finished it. I hardly noticed that he moved so close to me.

My hands fell on top of his chest after I pulled the tie closer to him. There was a small part of me that wanted to get away from him, but the larger part begged me to stay. I decided to indulge the latter. "Relax… you are tense."

"I am…" I said slowly, but it wasn't the reason that he might have thought it to be. "But I… I'm fine. I've done this before. You haven't."

His eyes searched mine and an expression came as if he knew already. His hold that kept me in place didn't release as he moved to lean against the counter. My hand rested on his shoulder as I, sort of, seated myself on top of his lap. I was haphazardly on top of him. "Do not worry, we will be fine."

"Easy for you to say." I looked up at him with a smirk before laying my chin down on top of his shoulder. "We will do fine, I know we will—."

"You're just anxious." Maybe I was just a tad worried about tonight also just because of what happened before. I didn't want it to repeat.

"Yes," I admitted to him with my eyes going downward. His hand went away from my waist to go onto my cheek, caressing it. He moved back a fallen piece of my hair before his hand lingered close to my cheek, his eyes going to my lips. My eyes went to his lips as well as I adjusted myself. His hold on me loosened as I made myself more comfortable by him. But before I could do anything to act on the urge I felt, I shook my head to him, "No… no I can't." His hand fell from my cheek immediately as his head tilted up. But his slight hold on me never went away, nor did I really move away from him. I begged myself to move away from him but I didn't.

My body sucked in complying with me. I tried to correct myself, giving him a small smile, "We can't, uh, the guy will be waiting for us."

"I didn't know we were starting anything."

"I, uh—."

"Alexandra…" his brows perked up when he said my name as he held his chin up towards me. I immediately closed my mouth before I said something that would make me regret it later. I had a lot to say, but where to start with it was a complete mystery to me. He held my gaze for a while, the silence between us was perhaps the most deafening it had ever been, before he moved from the countertop, holding out his hand towards me as if he was about to help me down. It caught me by surprise. But knowing that I wanted to stay there with him for… I don't know how long… I jumped off the counter. His hand awkwardly fell at his side as both of mine fell sheepishly in front of me, being gripped by each other.

That didn't please him. I saw it in his face, how his lip was sucked back and how he stared off, looking annoyed and away from me. I told him, "If you have something to say to me, I want to hear it now." 'Stop acting ridiculous', 'You're a complete fool', 'I love you so let's just stay in the Jacuzzi and make out and fuck how you want it because you won't be getting any six feet under.' I honestly had no idea what I was expecting with telling him that.

His eyes narrowed at me. "Why would I have something to say to you?"

I didn't expect that. I felt his bite from where I was; the animosity behind the retort was clearly there. "You looked like you were about to say something, that's all."

"So did you."

"I was, and you cut me off. Unless you did it to only to beckon me to you, Loki."

"'Beckon'," Loki practically scoffed at the word. My brow immediately furrowed before I followed him out of the room. He walked over to the bed where his shoes were neatly placed beside it. I bit my bottom lip nervously. I couldn't help but feel the curiosity bubbling in my chest though at his comment. I think I knew it already. Loki pulled on his shoes before continuing on, "as if you are my dog that I call upon at will." Not what I was expecting, I was thinking that he was going to say along the lines of that he was surprised that the word was in my vocabulary. I didn't… I didn't really think that… all the way.

I frowned to myself before I moved silently toward him. "I know you don't think about me like that." He paused in tying his shoes as I leaned against the edge of the bed. "That… that was a poor way of choosing my words. I didn't mean it like that." He glanced up at me, before I watched his mouth part. It was rare to see him with his back hunched over like that and his hands away from his chest or his sides. I moved to sit next to him, tilting my head towards him before I moved my hand onto his thigh—a gentle, emotional hand there for comfort, not wanting to give him anything more than that.

He placed his hand over mine before I went to ask, "We're never going to go back to the same before I go, are we?"

The words surprised me as they left. What did I actually mean by that? My free hand wanted to cover my gentle smile, but a part of me didn't allow it. He looked at me puzzled, but I knew he understood. "I don't know what you mean."

I stated, "You do." We both remained silent for a moment before I crossed my legs over one another. There were things that we did have to do, but they could wait—I had other things to take care of with him that I didn't really want to. Or would rather avoid doing. I questioned, "Do you know why we can't…?"

"Perhaps," he said quietly, turning his head away from me. That meant yes. He might even feel the same way toward me. I felt my chest swell up at this, feeling the excitement go through me like an electric surge. It also left me feeling nervous. But then his next words almost crushed me. He said shortly, "Perhaps not."

My eyes narrowed at him as he stared back at me, with a frown on his face. I looked downward at our hands, swallowing thickly. "Loki… I…" I started to him, straightening up but the words trailed off when I realized that… I didn't know what to say to him. There was no emotion, no expression, on his face that told me that he would be receptive of anything I said to him. So I shook my head to really myself, I was stupid for thinking that he actually felt the same about me… he wouldn't—I was a mortal, the one he was going to kill… he couldn't have had feelings for his tool toward power.

The small smile on my face made another appearance as I moved my hand out of his hold. "Kenny, would be waiting for us…" I said awkwardly, now not looking at him. I stood up, fixing my dress before moving to the closet to pick up my black heels. "We… have to be in the casino in fifteen minutes, and we still have to walk there. So, I'm going to fix myself a bit and then we'll head out." I sat down in the chair furthest away from him to pull my shoes on.

"Alex—." He started, but I held my hand up to stop him before he went on. I didn't want to hear it.

My smile grew sadder as I looked up at him. He probably didn't know how or why he had hurt me. It was my fault anyway, for believing that he thought anything of that with me. He probably meant something different. To think that he had feelings for me, that he actually might love me, was just ridiculous… I couldn't even think about it like that. Even if he wanted me, he couldn't have me. And… why would he want me?

I slipped my feet into my heels, strapping them on before I said, "We have bigger things to worry about, Loki."

I heard his loud sigh from where I sat. "Yes, we do." With that, my head turned away from him. All I knew was that the only thing that was going to make me feel better was being in that casino again. I needed to control something in my life when I felt everything was crashing around me.

I stumbled into Loki as if I had a few well-needed drinks as we approached the table. The grin on my face, the most fake and stretched it ever felt, was almost hurting me. "Hullo, friends," I greeted, slurring my words. After this, I wanted those well-deserved drinks I pretended to have already. There was no way that I would be sober tonight after what just happened. He brought me closer to him as he sat down next to him, and he quietly indicated that just him was playing. Sitting beside me (as I was leaning against Loki's side) was our man, Kenny Stevens.

Kenny was the man I had met on the boardwalk. He was perhaps the least susceptible person there could be in a casino, counting. He looked as though he stepped out of Yale to test out this theory, and he did not hide his youth. He had to be in his early twenties. He wore too much gel in his black hair, and dark eyes that looked almost the same color.

He only glanced at us before muttering to the dealer with blonde hair pulled into a ponytail, "You're killing me, Viola. First I read that Jennifer Aniston is engaged in a magi, next I'm losing so much money."

"You wouldn't be able to afford Jennifer Aniston," someone replied to only receive a huff from him. I nodded my head to myself as Loki placed the money onto the table. The count was at 19—perfect. It took all that I could to not smirk to myself.

Loki did as I told him the night before, transferring everything into chips and then putting in a few at a time. We didn't need to look like high rollers. "5,000." Okay, maybe we did, but we weren't putting it all in at once.

"You're gonna have to teach me, hun, because I don't know a thing of this game," I stated to him before the dealer gave him all of his chips. He brushed the blonde hair away from my face, his fingertips bringing me away from the game briefly as I was trying to watch the cards being dealt out by the dealer shortly after.

I had to be careful in keeping the count. I couldn't dwell on what had happened before, nor could I focus on anything other than that. I had to stay on this—one wrong move could ruin everything—and I had to do it all with a silly grin on my face. "Don't worry about that, babe. Just watch and learn." Babe sounded so unnatural coming from him that I felt like we would have to have a serious talk about him never using it with me again—I actually might not have to worry about that.

The silly grin stayed the majority of the game. When the first hand was dealt out, I made sure to actually mark the count as it went. Loki followed the rules, not doing what his heart told him unless I told him to do otherwise. We lost our first hand, but then the second one came, the third one shortly after. This deck was indeed hot when we got there. Based on my actions, Loki followed what I said—amazingly.

We brought in other people, some of them watched while others actually sat down to play with us. It was beautiful, when the chips slowly gathered at our side. I watched the piles go up with my chest swelling with pride by the minute. I threw in some incredibly ridiculous praises. One of them was, "I had no idea you were so good."

"It's all about chance, love." He was really playing up the British act that night. "I'm just in good fortune's favor."

"You're on fire!" Kenny said to us. I tried not to glare at him. For some reason he almost made it obvious that we knew him.

Some of the players were getting annoyed gradually. I noticed it when people got too eager in making their choice. The people who actually followed the rules before no longer did. They tried to abide by them, but they caved in eventually.

However, once I saw that we were getting a lot more chips and the amount that we had, I gave him the sign to lay off. I wanted him to lose a bit. We needed to be careful in how we proceeded now. From the corner of my eye, I spotted a man in a dark suit, tall with his hair slick back. He was hovering around the casino but I had a feeling that his eyes were mostly on our table. There weren't many cheers in Blackjack, but a crowd did not happen often—it was a boring game to watch and sometimes play. He was careful in what he started to put in.

Every tap on his thigh was a hundred. If we were putting down a few hundred or thousand, we would be obvious. Kenny commented on this, clearly he wasn't as smart as I originally thought him, "Dude, you were on a roll. Why not bet more?"

"Better to be safe than sorry, mate."

"If you say so, but I think your lady—."

I had to cut him off, "My man is smart, sir. In fact, I'd rather him stop this game so I can have him all to myself in our room."

"Lucky twice over!" It was so hard to not bite my bottom lip and throw something at his head, perhaps chips since it was the closest thing to me. Almost as if my anger was sensed, I felt Loki grip at my hand. My mouth parted before a smile eased its way back onto my face—I barely knew it fell off, but I was happy for the familiar feeling of his hand touching mine.

As my eyes were calculating the count still, he turned his head into my arm before murmuring, "He'll get his own." Faintly, his lips were on my arm, giving it a small kiss. He briefly had let go of my hand before bringing his up my arm. His lips were so tender; I almost felt my eyes go up from their slight touch. I was losing myself. But it was a good thing that he was doing this. I wasn't able to give him signals so he was able to do what I wanted. We wouldn't look suspicious, if we were trying to lay on the down low.

But soon, I noticed Kenny was not being careful like we were. I saw that he was still counting; it was plain to see—while I was too involved with Loki to barely mind it. He needed to pull out soon, so we both could leave the table and go back to our room. However, before that was going to happen, I moved my hand to take the top chips from the pile he wasn't playing.

He didn't notice me putting them in my small purse. A few extra hundred, not too fancy. When I looked up though, I noticed the dealer's eyebrows perk. She saw me, but I saw that she wasn't going to say anything.

Soon, I gave a look behind my shoulder. The man in the suit had gotten closer to us than how he was before. The anxiety rose in my chest once I saw how his eyes were watching our table like a hawk, mostly focusing on three people sitting there—Kenny, Loki, and I. We had to get out of there. Forget about looking less suspicious, we didn't have time to actually do that. I had to remind myself to not panic. Panicking was not the way to go. However, my screaming mind was being more irrational than rational—not that it ever was in the first place.

I went back to our old—old—safe word—the word we would leave with. "That tomato sauce we had for dinner, hun, had too much oregano." Loki looked up at me, the annoyed look contorting his face as I used my eyes to glance over at the man staring at us. Loki's eyes did not follow, but I saw him regard it by looking into them.

"Hit," he said to the dealer with a grin though—a moment before she had asked him to hit or stay. "I don't think so, sweetheart. The sauce was made perfectly."

My brow furrowed down at him. I almost had forgotten myself. It was almost as if he was repeating what… he wouldn't dare do that to me. I shook my head, shrugging my shoulders. A part of me smirked down at him—the physical part of me, while the other wanted to scream at him for being foolish. Although… I also had a feeling that he knew what he was doing. He had a calculating gaze as well, looking at all the other players—he was tauntingly playing with his chips also while staring them down.

Loki glanced over at Kenny and pointing at him, he stated, "Kenny, right?" Kenny looked up from his hand in front of him, giving him a stiff nod. "I'm parched, Kenny. D'you mind getting us a drink?" The question did not only confuse him, it also confused me. Why would Kenny get us a drink? There was no need for it if we were leaving soon, and Loki could very well call someone over—ah, okay. My thoughts didn't even complete themselves when I realized what he was doing. "We'll meet you at the bar—once we pull out and cash in."

I tried to follow along with this, giving him a slight smile and nodding my head. Kenny looked between us, and I thought that, right then and there, that he was going to agree with us. His eyes lit up at 'drink', he didn't even guess that Loki was asking him to pull out first. "Sure, sure—a round on me."

"Oh, great!" I stated, clapping my hands. Before the other hand was dealt out, Kenny signaled to the dealer that he was about to leave.

Loki's nose brushed against my arm as we watched him move his chips out to cash them in. "Take some," Loki told me. It was almost like he read my mind. I carefully looked around me before swiping a few of his chips when he wasn't paying mind. The dealer called out his amount, which was a really large amount from what I gathered (I wasn't sure with how many hands he actually did win), and then just before he was about to take his chips and leave to cash them in, the casino host came up to him.

My head immediately fell on top of Loki's, as his lips moved against my arm. For him, I pushed a few chips into the game to signal that we were still playing. "Sir, we'd like you to come with us."

"I'm sorry?" Kenny said to him puzzled. "Who the fuck are you?"

Loki made me not pay any mind to this. "Our conversation before did not go well before, did it?" The mention of that conversation made me swallow thickly. The frown wanted to show but I didn't let it. "You can make your move for me, darling."

I did exactly that. I signaled for the dealer to hit when it was clear that our hand would bust. The dealer had blackjack. I knew it already. Then, with a shake of my head, answered him, "It didn't for me."

"Me neither." What…? My whole body went tense at that. I barely noticed the casino host pulling Kenny away from the table. I wasn't even looking at him. "Would you want to go now? I feel as though we lost our little friend to go to the bar with him."

My quick answer came out, "Yes." We almost didn't let the dealer finish the hand before we decided to pull out and run back to the hotel room.

When I walked into the hotel room with the amount of cash we had, a small smile came onto my face as I closed the door. We made it. We were one step closer to Iceland—one step closer to my fate. It almost felt bittersweet, knowing this would all soon end, mostly because I expected myself to not be alive after it. The smile slipped off with that thought in mind, but as I turned my head I noticed Loki by the window of our hotel room, looking out of it. He looked majestic to me then. I placed the envelope of money on top of his nightstand, taking off my scarf and wig.

My eyes never left him as I removed my jewelry save for the necklace I wore still from my party. Something told me to just go up to him, wrap my arms around him, put my head on his shoulder, and look out with him. Another part of me though, thought that he wouldn't want that. No matter his words to me before—that the conversation we had in here didn't go as he liked it—I wasn't sure if he felt the same way as I did for him. And… I didn't know if he would express it to me—ever. I wouldn't if I was going to leave soon.

"I know why we can't." Loki stated, bringing me out of my thoughts. "I should not have said what I did before, and I apologize." My mouth parted. All of my thoughts disappeared into thin air. It wasn't because he apologized for what he said earlier. No, he said what I wanted him to say—and didn't also.

I frowned, going over to my bag. My words came out completely on their own, "You… you don't have to apologize." But then my mouth just kept moving, mouthing words that I didn't even know what they were. It was like I was in shock. I took out a pair of shorts and a big t-shirt. I hardly knew that he was making his way over to me. "But, uh, I… look, you don't have to do—."

"Stop it," Loki cut through my sentence, putting his hands on my arms and turning me toward him. The shock of him doing this made me stumble forward. "Alexandra, don't say anything more." His hand went up to my shoulder, gliding itself up my neck, before skimming it over my cheek. I leaned into his touch, an almost immediate reaction, and the clothes I had in my hands fell on the floor. His face held little expression, it was almost stoic, but his eyes said it all for me. It was unclear what they said, but I remember feeling the sadness swell in my chest. I think I had gotten their meaning.

I shook my head against his hand, my own going to it as my other stayed on my side. "Don't say anything more," he stated again to remind me. I took in a shaky breath, trembling as my eyes closed. His head fell on top of mine as my eyes closed. The silence didn't bother me. Not at all. Just as much as he did, I wanted this silence to relish in… this moment. I wouldn't be able to stand with him like this soon; nothing would be like how it once was. I shouldn't have felt what I felt, but I did—and I assumed he did too. It might have not been the exact same way, but… there was something that he felt.

The longer I stood there, the less resistance I felt. It was all slowly going away. He soon asked, "Do… do you want to say something?" Maybe the silence was killing him instead.

I wanted to say a lot anyway, but I only came out with, "You did great tonight… and I'm amazed… and proud of… of you." I couldn't even say a complete sentence, my God, the fuck was wrong with me?

His face softened toward me as his eyes scanned my own. He didn't expect those words to come out; I saw it in his expression. He wanted something else to come out of my mouth… but… I couldn't say anything. I was in shock that this was even going on—why did I have to be gone soon? His touch didn't go away though. I didn't scare him off. "You were great as well," the compliment felt so strange leaving him—it was almost as though he did not know what to say or do from my sudden subject change. "And I…" he trailed off, his eyes looking directly into mine.

His hand dragged itself into my hair, pushing it back as his eyes moved elsewhere. They were focusing on something behind me. I tilted my head, staring at him confused. I took a step closer to him, an almost unnoticeable one, but it didn't catch his attention. I tried prompting him, which was something that he would probably do with me, "You…" My brow furrowed toward him to express my concern.

He briefly shook his head to me, or I think to himself, before looking back at me. He brought the subject back to the one before. "I do not care for what is going to happen in the future. It does not matter to me."

My face fell. "W-What do you mean?"

"It's a truth I have faced long ago, from the moment you have gotten that mark—I knew what was going to happen," he went on to me. I wanted to so badly look away from him, I knew what was coming, but I didn't know if I was prepared for what I was going to hear from him. My eyes, however, were glued onto him, and I felt myself hanging on every single word that left his mouth. "Alexandra, I think you know the knowledge of what will become of you did not stop me with what is happening between us."

My chin picked up slowly as his head dipped down. "There is something between us?" I wasn't going crazy; there was something there? Something that I felt was love? Did he think that too? He didn't answer me. I wasn't really surprised with that since I knew his answer well enough. "I…" I swallowed thickly; this was all too much to take in. I didn't know what to say to him. "I… I don't want it to matter to me." Before I knew it, I felt the tears come into my eyes and I turned my head away from him before he was able to do anything.

"I'm sorry," I said quickly, pulling myself away from him before backing away so I could get my scarf. "It matters to me, it may not matter with you, but it matters to me."

Loki stared after me for a moment as I pulled my scarf; my hands were fumbling with one another as they tried to tie it. But the tears that welled up in my eyes were coming out, rolling down my cheeks several at a time. As my hands soon just fell down, giving up and my eyes closed painfully tight as I felt his hands come back to me. I didn't realize until he was holding my shoulders that I was trembling. "Alex, look at me." His voice was so calm, why was his voice so calm? Why did it help me actually do that? My eyes opened for him. "We cannot change what is going to happen."

"I know that," I said shortly. My voice sounded so small, so feeble, that I almost sounded like a child.

He asked me, "So that means we let it stop this between us? You want to ignore it, and try to go back to how we were before? Before the mark?"

I closed my eyes reluctantly before leaning against the wall. "That can never happen," I stated. "We will never be how we used to be, and I don't really want to go back."

"Nor do I." Loki muttered, his hands dropped from my shoulders, going down my arms. My eyes fluttered open to see his on my mouth, and then matching mine. "Not before the mark. I am more in favor of where we are now."

"Yeah," I nodded my head. "But… this'll hurt more." With that, I looked up at him, and that was my final note. I frowned up at him before his hands disappeared from me, no longer making their way to my hands. "I need… I need to take a walk." He took a step away from me. I wasn't ready to face this. I thought I was, but really I wasn't. I needed some time to myself, time away from him to really think.

When I was picking up my scarf, I had half the mind to actually stay with him—I knew what I wanted, and it wasn't to take a walk. But… I needed a cigarette, a drink, or something, or else I would go insane. "I, uh…" I started to him before I went towards the door. He seemed confused though; I noticed the puzzled look that consumed his face. He wasn't looking at me, more toward the floor, but I saw how he was still listening to me. "Don't wait up for me." I turned around and jogged to the door before he was able to stop me.

Hi everyone! I'm sorry for the long wait. Things have been crazy and I have a lot going on concerning family, so I am unsure when the next update will be because of that and the fact finals are coming up. And I am also sorry if this chapter sounds forced because I've been trying to write it amidst all of what's going on. However, thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed it, and I'll see in next time!

Review reply:

Jo: I'm happy you enjoyed it, but oh no! That's awful. That happened to me when I was in school, so I know the feeling. Did you get it back?