Words
"Did you always want to work for you dad?" Annabeth asked once the pair was seated and had ordered.
"No," Percy faint smiled, his eyes flicking downwards before flicking back up to her with a forlorn look. "He had always implied I would, said I needed to take over the family business."
"But—" Annabeth began, her brows furrowing in confusion.
"It's not a family business," Percy finished for her with a slight dip of his head. "Yes, I know. I said the same thing, but it didn't change his mind."
"So what did you want to study then?" Annabeth questioned, taking a sip of her drink.
"Biology," he revealed with a sigh, "marine biology."
"Really?" Annabeth grinned wonderstruck. "I had no idea. Why?"
"I loved the sea," Percy explained, and Annabeth was warmed by the way his eyes light up so brightly at the subject. "I had always been fascinated by deep sea diving and marine life in general—Still am, if I'm being honest—and then one day, on bring your parents to school day, someone brought their mom, and she was a marine biologist. She described how she would use an underwater drone to observe life at a certain depth and then catalog her findings and analyze the results to find patterns and trends."
He chuckled to himself, shaking his head slightly. His features were so relaxed, so joyful it hurt Annabeth's heart. She wondered why she had never seen him like this. Why had she never asked him what he was passionate about before? How had she managed to learn the intricacies of his personality without understanding such basic truths?
"I don't even think I really understood what she said," he laughed. "I was eight years old. I didn't know what it meant to catalog a finding or analyze a result, but still, somehow, in that moment, I just thought to myself: this is what I want to do for the rest of my life."
"So why didn't you pursue it?" Annabeth asked, a slight frown imprinting itself into her forehead.
"I did," he admitted, "or tried to at least."
"But I thought you got your MBA at NYU," Annabeth posed, the dimples in her expression deepening in confusion.
"I—I did," he nodded. "Eventually."
"So what happened?" Annabeth inquired after a beat of silence.
"I graduated high school and got accepted to Eckerd College down in Florida for marine biology." A flash of something darker flickered in his eyes, and he paused. "I was so excited. It was right by the coast. I could study and dive at the same time."
He paused again, this time pursing his lips, as if uncomfortable continuing.
"Oh," Annabeth said blankly. She licked her lips in the tense silence, trying to find the courage to speak. "If it's—if it's too hard, you don't have to tell me."
"No," Percy shook his head. "I want to—it's just—" he cut himself off again, harsher this time.
"Percy," Annabeth reached out and placed her hand over his on the table. "It's okay," she reassured him, squeezing his hand so he would meet her eyes. "I don't need to know." She curved her lips into a warm smile, though inside she felt her stomach doing flip-flops. "There will be plenty of time to talk about your past when we get back to New York."
"Okay," Percy agreed, throwing her a grateful expression.
Just then, the waiter returned with their dishes. As he served them, Annabeth kept her eyes carefully trained on Percy. She bit her lip when she spotted the sliver of hurt still shinning in the blue of his irises. She swallowed harshly, her throat suddenly dry.
It hurt.
It hurt to—to see him hurt.
Annabeth forced herself to breathe despite the discovery. She felt her heart begin to beat rapidly in her chest, the pressure building uncomfortably, warning her something big was coming—or perhaps it had already arrived. She didn't have time to dwell on it. She pushed it out of her mind and turned back to Percy, forcing her expression into an untroubled one before giving him one final reassuring squeeze.
"Do you read much?" Annabeth asked him suddenly, quickly brushing past the prior subject and onto a new one.
"A bit," he smirked. "Not as much as the great Annabeth Chase I'm sure, though."
Annabeth rolled her eyes and shoved his hand out hers playfully. Then she took a bite of her meal and listened as Percy described his favorite book. As she listened, she found the pain in her chest lessened. She found though, troublingly, that she didn't if she hurt as long as he didn't.
They spent the rest of the dinner just talking, though there were heated glances and respondent blushes interspersed between sentences. Annabeth was astonished by how easy it was, by how comfortable she felt around him. Even after dinner, when they'd stood up from their chairs and Percy had wrapped his arm around her shoulder, the blonde was struck by how secure she felt in his grasp. She wondered if that was normal, if this was love. Not that she would know. Gods, no—she had certainly never been in love. In lust? of course. But in love? never.
Piper had told her once though, leaning over an empty bottle of wine, a half-filled glass of rosé teetering precariously in her hand, that lust was hot and heavy and made one's heart race. Love she'd said was different. It was warm, not hot. It was light, not heavy. It was knowing someone was behind you, no matter what. It was knowing someone so well, butterflies had turned to flowers, flourishing steady and strong every day.
Annabeth had never been in love. She had nothing to compare lust to, but as she considered Piper's words from that drunken night, she queried if the warm, tender feeling that rushed through her when Percy wrapped his arms around her was anything close. If it could mean she was close.
No, she decided inwardly as Percy led her out of the restaurant. She wasn't there yet. She couldn't be there yet. Piper had always said she'd know when she was there. When you're in love, you just know, Piper had said. No, Annabeth reaffirmed, she was still entirely confused, so she couldn't be—
"Hawaiian shaved ice?" Percy prompted, noticing a sign for the weirdly out of place dessert, completely oblivious to her internal strife.
"In the Bahamas?" Annabeth laughed incredulously, meeting his eyes with a smile. "Why ever not?"
But maybe.
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They were both laughing as they strolled back into the hotel that evening. Annabeth found she could laugh for hours with him. Laugh about nothing at all. Just looking at his eyes, shining with mirth, she couldn't help but burst into laughter.
That final tidbit might have had to do with the fact that she had drunk three ostentatiously full glasses of wine, however.
"Elevator?" Percy questioned as soon as they entered the lobby, his gaze gleaming as he too had his fair share of wine. They had purchased the entire bottle, though, what else were they supposed to do? Just take it home?
Annabeth shot him a weird look at the question, biting her lip in order to keep the very sassy obviously from slipping out. At her nod of approval, Percy placed his hand on her lower back, ushering her forward towards the lift.
"You look nice tonight, Chase," Percy stated smoothly as they waited, his eyes running up and down her body.
"Percy Jackson," Annabeth mocked, pretending to be shocked. "Are you attempting to seduce me?"
"Mh," he affirmed, leaning forward to press the elevator button as he realized neither of them had done so before. "Though I am rather offended that you didn't feel a need to dress up for me. I mean, I definitely recognize that blouse and skirt from the office."
"You recognize a plain black pencil skirt?" Annabeth asked dubiously, a smirk plastered on her face. "How do you know this isn't one of many?"
"I know," Percy assured her with a wiggle of his brows.
Annabeth still didn't buy it.
The elevator slid open, jarring them both for a moment as they stepped into it.
"I know," he explained, "because it was only two weeks ago, that I stripped it off of you. There is a very distinct distressing near the end of the zipper where I was a bit too hasty."
"Really?" Annabeth questioned, her brows high, her eyes flickering with disbelief.
"Really," he nodded with a devilish smile, stalking towards her. He put his hand on either side of her, boxing her as the elevator doors slid shut and the machine sparked to life.
"How do you know it's not some other guy's fault?" Annabeth inquired lightly, reaching up to play with the tie around his neck.
"Annabeth," Percy growled meaningfully, his hot breath spilling into the air between them.
"Fine," the blonde rolled her eyes. "You're right, this is that skirt." She watched him through her lashes. "Though I do have many others, so you could have easily been wrong had you not noted that tiny, little detail."
"But I did," he hummed, tilting his head so it was perfectly opposite to hers.
"Besides," Annabeth sniffed. "I shouldn't have to dress up—but let's just say that if I did want to, that I might not have packed anything but work clothes."
"Hypothetically, of course," Percy added, dipping his head to lick a filthy strip of her neck.
"Of course," Annabeth replied, her head falling back as a gentle gasp wracked her body.
The elevator dinged—rather loudly in the blonde's drunken opinion—and the grating sound broke them apart, though only slightly, Percy pulling back and Annabeth straightening herself.
"So," Percy said between pants, his gaze utterly captivated by her sinfully untouched lips. "Sex?"
"Obviously," Annabeth harrumphed, placing her hands on the flat of his chest and shoving him backward out of the elevator.
"Yes," Percy agreed breathlessly, his eyes not leaving her, even as his back crashed rather heavily against the wall behind him. "Just making sure."
Annabeth threw her arms around his neck, pressing her lips to his before breathing appreciated which he, in turn, swallowed, appreciative himself. The blonde carried her lips across his jaw before trailing down his neck, making sure no portion of his collarbone was left untouched.
Though he was still fairly dazed by, what he assumed, was 10% the alcohol and 90% Annabeth, Percy used the lack of lips on his as an opportunity to steer them in the direction of his room, only tearing himself away from her when they reached the door in order to unlock it.
"How'd you get this?" asked Annabeth, dragging her fingers along a scar that spanned his forearm.
"Complicated," he swallowed quickly.
"Oh," Annabeth sighed, blankly, looking up at him with a wide smile as his door swung open.
"Shall we?" he grinned, motioning for her to enter before him in some drunken act of chivalry.
"Gods," Annabeth laughed loudly, taking his hand in hers as she crossed the threshold. "You're dumb sometimes."
She pulled him after her and shut the door with a harsh kick, flattening him against it immediately after. She crashed her lips upon his, reveling in the way his hands sought out her waist, fingers curling roughly into her skin.
Percy slowly backed her away from the door until the back of her knees were knocking against the bed. His lips left her mouth then, bending to line sloppy open-mouthed kisses down her neck, his hands reaching for the hem of her blouse.
"Careful," Annabeth advised, her eyes closed and her head thrown back.
Percy halted his movements, a concerned glint flittering across his half-lidded eyes. He wondered if he'd hurt her, if he'd been too rough, if—
"You ripped the blouse too," Annabeth explained hastily, removing it herself.
He laughed to himself and couldn't find it in himself to care about the state of her shirt. He continued his descent, sucking delightfully at the skin of her stomach.
"Seams are delicate, you know—" she gasped, cutting herself off as he reached the edge of her skirt. "Clothesmakers generally don't plan for your savagery—"
"They're not Percy Jackson proof?" he inquired as he undid the zipper of her skirt, allowing the garment to slip down her body.
Annabeth laughed, loud and breathy, and the sound was enough to catch Percy's attention, bringing his gaze back to her face. In the process, he noticed something quite odd but unreasonably exciting.
"Annabeth Chase," he smirked, a smug expression setting into the lines of his demeanor as he eyed her white lingerie. "I thought you told me you only brought work clothes on this trip."
"Oh, these?" Annabeth feigned surprise, eyeing her own scantily clad body. "These are work clothes," she assured him with a devious smile.
"Really?" he countered, his fingers just brushing the lace of her panties. "I'm considered work?"
"Yes," Annabeth answered, trying to keep her mind straight as Percy lowered himself between her thighs. "Why? Does that bother you?"
"Not at all," Percy replied against the skin of thigh. "I know how..." he licked her skin, traveling dangerously close to her heat with every word, "dedicated you are to your work," he whispered before nipping the very place he had so easily carressed with his tongue just a second earlier.
"And—" Annabeth couldn't help but groan at his ministrations, "what else am I?" she asked.
"Hm," Percy pretend to think, his breath skimming over the satin of her panties. "Zealous," he continued, his lips moving against the thin fabric separating them. "Devoted," he added, licking her through the satin, his tongue surging forward.
Annabeth moaned above him, her world twisting before her eyes.
"Enthusiastic," he laughed, his tongue now tracing where the edge of the panty met her thigh.
His fingers hooked under the sides of her lace underwear, dragging the article down excruciatingly slow. She could feel the heat of his breath against her, the roughness of his calloused fingers, the timbre of his voice. It was too much. Her head was spinning.
"Absorbed," Percy said as the panties slid off and a single finger dipped into her.
"Mh," she agreed, though she had lost all sense of reality.
"Attached," he added a finger, pumping in and out of her.
"Uh huh," Annabeth breathed.
"Addicted," he growled, turning his fingers and pushing against her, his lips wrapping around her clit and sucking. She wondered if she'd ever known what sex was before this. What erotic meant for this—before him.
It was—
Gods, it was—
"Fuck," she swallowed, her throat uncomfortably tight.
"Fuck," he agreed, his breath scarce and uneven against her neck.
a/n: first of all, a bit short so sorry about that. Also didn't edit. I never edit. But will edit eventuallys—maybe.
Second of all, I leave for college in 2 days, and I have officially abandoned my extreme writing project. That's not to say that I won't be updating my stories anymore, I just didn't get to my goal of 20 chapters. But whatevs, I still have a lot of chapters done so I'm gonna start posting them. And, in a last ditch effort to get a ton of writing done, I'm gonna go to a cafe today and just sit there for like 10 hours and see what I can pump out. So you know, wish me luck with that.
I'll try to stagger what I have written, but you know me—very little self-restraint and all that.
iciao! c ya a lot sooner than b4
p.s. Chapter is dedicated to Chlo Bingham even though I doubt they'll see this. But they have been leaving me a ton of reviews as they read through Hotel Escape, and I really love hearing their reactions. Also dedicated to Laurenthehunter for sharing my love for angst rather than fluff. Just remember yall, fluff is nothing if there isn't angst building up to it beforehand.
p.p.s. check out my new story Legacy of Steel. It's another royalty au, and I'm stupidly excited about it.