Argh. The only thing worse than trying to figure out a good way to end a chapter is figuring out a good way to end an entire story... Hope y'all enjoy :)
Dov rested his head on his forearm so they were level. "Do you wish you'd had a normal childhood?" Taken piano or dance and been free to decide her own future...
"Do you?" she hedged, hating that question as much as she hated herself for the few times she'd allowed herself to entertain it.
"I did, mostly." Being a child of divorce was the new normal, wasn't it?
More normal than hers surely, but hardly normal in the traditional sense. That hadn't been what she'd meant, though... "Do you wish I had." So she would be more 'approachable' and he wouldn't have to work so hard for so little in return...
Dov didn't have to think twice. "Yes."
His answer wasn't really a surprise but the vehemence was, and it stung far more than she cared to admit. "But I wouldn't be the same 'awesome' Gail Peck..." She left the 'you fell in love with' part unspoken for fear her voice would crack.
"We probably wouldn't have met at all," he quickly explained, his thumb tracing soothing circles on her arm even as he cursed himself for the note of insecurity that had crept into her tone. "But at least you'd have had a better chance of being happy."
"Dov..." That he would give her up if it meant the possibility of her happiness made Gail's chest tight, but it was the thought of never having known him that had her eyes burning with unshed tears. Shifting onto her side, mirroring his position, she put a hand to his cheek and forced herself not to flinch away from his concerned gaze; muttered a hoarse, "If I did before I don't now." That just wasn't a trade she was willing to make, even with 'happy' the prize... After a beat her lips twitched into a watery smile. "Besides, from what I hear 'normal' is grossly overrated..."
Dov couldn't speak for the meaning behind her words – reinforced by a variation of her 'regrets are for losers' declaration from the arcade – and in that moment he swore to himself he'd do whatever it took to get her the happiness she deserved.
"Guess I just found another way to keep you from talking," she teased into the awkward silence, pulling his shirt free of his pants so she could massage his abs. "Gotta say I still like my other way better, though." Ironically it was the sexual stuff that didn't make her feel the need to shower…
In the ensuing calm, his mind wandering as he enjoyed her ministrations, Dov realized they hadn't been moving for a while. "Hey, how long have we been parked?"
Gail had clearly let him distract her into forgetting to distract him, and she covered for it with a winked, "Not sure. Tony must be letting us finish up." As if on cue there was a knock on the window and she got up to knock back twice for all clear. She gathered her things just as the door opened.
Dov followed her out of the limo to find they were in front of a shady factory in an old run-down industrial area in God knows where. "Uh... did you bring me here to kill me?"
"Yes," she confirmed without hesitation, exchanging a bill for her keys in a handshake with the driver. "And Tony here has been well-compensated to forget seeing you. Haven't you, Tony?"
"Yes, Miss Peck. Sir, good luck." Tipping his hat he disappeared back into the vehicle.
Tony had barely pulled away before Dov's curiosity got the better of him as he looked around. "Okay, seriously..."
Gail held up her [two keys-heavier] chain with a Cheshire grin. "My new place. Signed the papers today."
"It's a little big for just you, isn't it?" And a little dilapidated... She'd rejected all of Andy's castoffs for this?
"Old textile plant." She started up the walkway in her stockinged feet, carrying her shoes. "One of my dad's buddies is a developer, turning these defunct warehouses and factories into high-end condos. The outside may not be much to look at but the apartments are to die for." Especially on the other side of the building.
"And the neighborhood?" To quote Dr. Egon Spengler, it was like a demilitarized zone.
Sensing his lack of enthusiasm she defended her choice as she opened the outer door: "It's up-and-coming. Lots of transplants from Montreal so I'll be able to practice my French."
Dov didn't know which was more surprising: that she spoke French or that she planned on speaking to her neighbors... At least now he knew why he hadn't understood her conversation with the concierge. "Since when do you speak French?"
"Since most of our vacations were spent in the Mediterranean. I can get by in Italian, too – they're easy enough to pick up if you speak Spanish." Unlike Russian, which she'd attempted to learn after Tomas and had quickly given up on.
If he hadn't been taken aback by the conversation he would have been by the building's interior that couldn't have been any more different from its exterior, the lobby spacious and gleaming like a hotel beyond the glass.
Unlocking the inner door she led him into the building proper. "Don't tell anyone, though – I like to hear what people say about me when they think I don't understand."
Of course she did... "Are you saying you already spoke Spanish?" He'd heard her say things in different languages before but he'd figured they were just the common expressions most people picked up. Like curses...
"Mom went back to work right away so most of my formative years were spent with Estella. Pretty sure my first words were Spanish." She pointed down a hallway on their right. "Indoor pool, sauna, fitness room."
Okay, he was officially jealous... And speaking of jealous: "Your mom was okay with that?"
Gail shrugged. "Not really but she had her priorities. It wasn't a problem until I made the mistake of asking Estella to career day." Approaching the freight elevator on the opposite wall she told him, "I think it adds character but it's the next thing to get upgraded. Apparently it ruins the aesthetic..."
And the safety rating, and the utilities bill... When she didn't continue her story he prompted, "I'm sure that went over well."
Gail closed the gate and hit the '3' button. "About as well as you'd expect with my mother: she tried to fire her." Even though Gail had sworn she'd only done it because she'd assumed Elaine would be too busy. Gail hadn't but it hadn't mattered – Elaine had been. In the end no one had gone.
Noticing the button she'd pushed was second to last he lifted a taunting eyebrow. "Princess didn't get the top floor? Couldn't convince daddy to shell out the big bucks for a penthouse?"
"Third floor is the top floor now," she informed him with a haughty smirk. "They're two-level apartments." She hadn't really needed a penthouse – though she did like their loft layout better than the normal ones on the first two floors – but her dad had insisted on it because the exterior walls were all glass and he didn't trust the one-way film. Apparently it was good enough to use at the station but not good enough when it came to his baby girl's privacy...
He returned to their conversation as they ascended. "So what happened? You said she 'tried to.'"
God, he was like a dog with a bone… "We'd just learned about Gandhi that week. I decided to stage a little protest of my own." They jerked to an abrupt halt and she opened the gate to start down the hallway.
"Hunger strike?" he 'guessed,' remembering his talk with Bill earlier.
"Something like that." It had gotten Estella her job back but Gail had known to keep her distance after that. "Ready?" She'd unlocked the door and was waiting with her hand on the knob and a grin on her lips.
Dov nodded. Her excitement was contagious, and he was wearing a matching grin as he walked in behind her.
"Storage and half-bath," she waved out on the left, and on the right, "Open kitchen." Her purse and coat were tossed onto the island and her shoes dropped onto the hardwood floor as she passed. She heard his things join hers behind her.
He could tell those were irrelevant to her, and when the wall on the left and the ceiling ended and the room opened up he could understand why: they were in a huge open space with a two-story glass wall separating them from the world outside.
Gail threw out her arms as she did a spin. "Isn't it gorgeous?"
"Breathtaking." It was the closest he'd ever seen to pure ecstasy on her face.
"There's space enough for a living room and a dining room but who the hell even eats at a table anymore?" Before he could answer the rhetorical question she concluded, "So I figure I throw a couple of stools at the island to give an appearance of adulting and put a pool table here instead."
Dov laughed at her palpable enthusiasm, and perhaps lack of foresight. "You know if you do that your place is going to be party central, right?" Especially with the swimming pool and sauna. "You're going to have a hard time staying antisocial."
"I'll charge admission – it'll help with the mortgage." Her father may have donated a sizable down payment but perfection like this didn't come cheap... "But seriously, why do you think I didn't take the doubly awesome corner unit? If I had an extra bedroom people would assume I wanted houseguests." And she most definitely had not come that far...
"You'd still have a couch..." Probably two, given the size of the room, and the same way she didn't require a bed for sex most people didn't require one for sleep.
Gail shrugged. "It's broken."
"The couch is broken?" he repeated, dumbfounded.
No? "Bed bugs? Yeah – bed bugs works better." Unless it was Traci in which case she owed her one, but if it was anyone else...
He should have known better than to think she wouldn't have an answer, flimsy as it may be, for everything... "Does the 'no houseguests' rule apply to me, too?"
She quirked an eyebrow. "Did you want to sleep on my couch?"
"Uh... no." Not that he'd spent an hour watching her sleep (and snore) in his arms before finally drifting off himself that day at his mother's, and in no way was he anxiously awaiting being able to do it again.
"Well, then you're exempt. Except..." Taking him by the tie she drew him close to huskily warn, "My bed comes with an entirely different set of rules."
The combination of her voice and her nimble fingers slowly working his tie loose had Dov swallowing hard to inquire, "And what would those be?"
Gail slid the fabric from around his neck and lobbed it onto the kitchen island with the rest of their things. "I'm sorry, Officer Epstein, but that information is strictly need-to-know..." Undoing the top four buttons of his shirt she ran her blunt nails down the skin she'd exposed. "And, by your own choice, you are not need-to-know..."
Dov wasn't aware he'd briefly closed his eyes to the sensations but one second she was there touching him and the next she was at the window.
"Have you seen the view?" Opening the sliding door her hair was picked up in the cool breeze.
Once he'd recovered from her hasty change in direction, both figurative and literal, he went to stand beside her in the open doorway; realized that what he'd felt in the air upon their arrival was in fact moisture from the bay. "Can we go on the balcony?"
Gail hesitated, leaning against the doorframe instead. "I was thinking I'd save it for the summer. You know, for barbecuing and stuff."
Dov's eyebrow lifted of its own accord. "Don't tell me the indomitable Gail Peck is intimidated by heights..."
She wasn't fond of them, no... "I'm more worried that the balconies were added to an almost entirely glass structure years after the fact..."
"I'm sure the contractors knew what they were doing," he reasoned, moving past her onto the gallery that ran the width of the apartment.
Oh, she was sure. Still: "I'm good here."
He did a test jump to prove it wouldn't collapse then held out a hand to her. "Are we going to have to add 'Petrified Peck' to your already impressive collection of nicknames?"
Gail glared at him – not least because it was horribly unimaginative – but took his hand with a gruff, "If we die..."
"Then I'll die happy." Removing his suit jacket he draped it over her shoulders and stood behind her, arms around her waist to grip the railing.
They watched the lights from the city across the lake join the moon in casting playful reflections on the water.
"It's so peaceful," she murmured after a minute, allowing herself to lean back against him.
Dov pressed a kiss to her temple. "Thank you for sharing it with me." And thank whatever deities had seen fit to give them a chance.
"You're the first one to see it. Other than my dad, obviously." And Tony.
That surprised him. "Not even the girls?"
Gail shook her head. "McNally had already absconded when we found it and it would have been weird to bring Nash to see it without her."
"Aww. Has Andy wormed her way into your clove of garlic?" Seemed that was happening more and more lately...
Ugh... "No. Just, she was the first one to..." It would sound sentimental whichever way she finished that sentence so she just didn't. And if anyone asked, the only reason she was going to wait for Andy to get back to have her housewarming was because it gave her two months to paint and furnish the place and make it ready to evoke the utmost envy... "You know what? Shut up."
Dov chuckled into her hair. "Mmm. If only you knew a way to make me shut up..."
Turning in his arms Gail raised onto the balls of her feet to lay claim to his mouth, her fingers dancing over his ribs to grip his back through his shirt.
If Dov could freeze one moment in time to keep forever it would have been this one, kissing in the glow of the moon with her arms around his waist in a position he inherently knew meant she trusted him enough to not seek control.
Gail broke away to give him a come-hither look. "Speaking of making you shut up," she began in that 'infuriatingly sexy' whisper, "I haven't shown you the best part yet..."
Uh-oh... Dov knew she was referring to the as-of-yet unseen bedroom. Still, he let her lead him back inside and over to the stairs; let out a shaky breath when she smiled back at him and let his coat drop seductively from her shoulders to pool on the floor. "Is this how girls usually feel? Expected to put out after a date?"
"You're asking the wrong girl." Used to be her sole intention was to put out and she skipped the date altogether. "First thing I bought this afternoon was an air mattress..."
"Gail..." God, she was a test to his willpower. And his self-confidence...
Reaching the top of the stairs she pulled him into the room then stepped aside so he could take it in. "Second thing I bought? A TV and game console."
The TV was already mounted on the wall closest to them and hooked up to the console, and in front of it sat two camping chairs, a cooler nestled between them. The air mattress was made up on the opposite side of the room but out of the way against the wall.
"I thought this would be better than the arcade," she quietly explained, his non-reaction making her question that decision. "I didn't have much time because of the fundraiser so no food or frosty drinks but I had Tony go pick up ice and a case of..."
Dov put a stop to the uncharacteristic babbling with a gentle finger to her lips. "It's perfect." He couldn't have thought of a better end to the night himself, and that she had thought of it meant more to him than anything.
The look in his eyes made Gail's breath hitch. "You know, I'm going to start wondering about this pathological need you have for me to beat you at video games."
Playing was the most free he ever saw her – the most alive – and he would lose to her a million times over to keep giving her those little moments of escape... "What do you care as long as you get to keep proving yourself the superior being?"
Gail shrugged as she moved to the cooler. "You'd think that would be enough but after a while it just gets sad..." Grabbing two bottles she waved one in the air; proclaimed, "Like watching a blind rat repeatedly slam its head into a maze wall trying to get to the cheese behind it."
"That pretty much sums up our entire relationship, doesn't it?" He took the proffered beer and tipped it at her. "Just goes to show, even the blind rat gets his cheese sometimes."
"Did you just call me cheese?" Was that a step up or a step down from carrot?
Dov smirked at her, exchanging the bottle he'd opened for the unopened one she was still holding. "I did, and I can't help but notice you took issue with that but not the 'his' part."
Gail took a swig of beer to prevent whatever dismissive comment would've tried to make its way past her lips.
When she said nothing – even after swallowing – he lifted a suspicious brow. "What? No snark about how I'm hearing what I want to hear?"
She shook her head. "I'm feeling good right now – I'm gonna let you have that one."
He almost choked mid-gulp at the unexpected 'benevolence;' couldn't help but ask, "Because it's innocuous or because it's true?"
Well, it was definitely less commitment than 'soul mate' or getting married... "You can't just take the win, can you?"
"It's probably the only one I'm gonna get tonight," he predicted with a shrug, "I need to get as much mileage out of it as I can." And absent her declaration that it was the former he was going to go ahead and assume it was the latter.
Aww… She would feel sorry for him, except… "There's one way to guarantee we both win but you don't want to play that game..."
Dov sighed. "You know it has nothing to do with 'want,' Gail." He couldn't remember a time he'd known her that he hadn't wanted her, if only in a hate sex kind of way.
"Then maybe you were too busy dissecting my words to notice but there was no shortage of guys there tonight I could've gone home with." She dropped into one of the chairs as she dropped her truth: "If all I'd wanted was to get laid I wouldn't have had any trouble..." Or invited him…
Suppressing a flinch he took another drink before tightly acknowledging, "Yeah, I know."
She'd meant it to allay his fear that she only wanted sex – which still didn't make any sense to her – but his demeanor told her she'd failed and she had no idea why. "Then what's the problem?"
"That's the problem." He regretted it as soon as it left his mouth; ran a frustrated hand through his newly-shorn hair.
Gail's brow furrowed up at him. "Dov, you're gonna have to front me a vowel or two here because I'm nowhere near ready to solve the puzzle." Nor did she have the patience to wheedle it out of him bit by bit.
"You sure you want to know?" The presented out was as much for him as for her – not sure he wanted to risk facing the mockery – and he fully expected her to say no.
"No." That little [defective]-heart-to-[defective]-heart with her mother had met her 'uncomfortable conversations' quota for the next week, if not month... "But it's obviously bothering you and I'd like to get it out of the way now so I can start kicking your ass at DeathDomain."
Her tone conveyed a concern her words didn't, but instead of taking the chair next to her he crossed the room to walk across the mattress, sitting on it with his back against the wall and his legs extended. Taking a deep breath he told her, "You know, you've been with all these guys..." Tonight had been a barrage of little reminders of that...
He'd put the distance between them intentionally so she wouldn't follow (wasn't sure she even wanted to right now), but she did angle her chair to face him, an eyebrow lifted to heights previously unknown. "Dov, you realize this is like driving cross-country to buy a horse and then worrying about its pedigree? Since when do you care about my past?"
She sounded more hurt and confused than offended and he rushed to clarify. "I'm not judging you for it, Gail – I'm judging myself against it."
Huh? "What are you talking about?"
"You have all this..." He stopped to search for the right word. "...experience... that I don't."
She just barely managed not to laugh, part amusement, part relief. "Seriously? That's what you're freaking out about?"
He gave her a look that managed to be at once both defensive and critical. "Hey, you're incapacitated by fear of your mother and feelings – at least fear of disappointing someone is normal."
He wasn't wrong, but hadn't they just established that normal was overrated? She much preferred to be singular... "Okay, but you were with that stripper, right?" Gail hadn't been with one herself but she figured that alone had to have been worth like ten times the XP.
Dov shrugged. "She was used to dating doped up criminals – it wasn't a very high bar to clear."
"Okay…" Suppressing her ire at the mere thought of them having sex she offered a derisive, "Well, I'm sure your most incredible Hurt Locker girlfriend's bar was much higher."
Edie was a toss-up but he knew she remembered Sue's name... "Was the most incredible girl I've ever dated," he gladly amended, then used her earlier rebuke against her: "You can't just take the win, can you?"
Her first instinct was to deny that it was a win (or that they were dating even) but she ignored it. "The girl forced me to watch stupid dancing shows and tracked me down on the job to talk about feelings. What do you think?"
Dov could guess which of those was the lesser of two evils but he still didn't understand why it was an evil at all… "Why do you hate dancing shows so much? Seeing people humiliate themselves is, like, the life-blood of your vampire soul."
Gail rolled her eyes, both at his assessment and that he thought she would incriminate herself. "Anyway, I never heard her complain."
"Why would you?" he wondered, filing her refusal to answer away for later examination. "You weren't exactly besties."
Understatement of the year… "No, but she wouldn't have put up with me if the sex were bad. Trust and believe." Not with how hard Gail had tried to passive-aggressively drive her away.
Regardless of whether he did believe her or not... "She's not you, Gail." The concerns he'd shared had been more about baiting her than actual reservations about being good enough for Sue, and he didn't want to say he hadn't cared about disappointing his girlfriend but he couldn't say he'd really been all that invested in not, either.
Gail studied him, trying to figure out whether he was saying Sue wasn't as shallow as her (probably a fair evaluation – not many were) or that he was just more worried now because the consequences were seemingly greater. Either way she'd failed to reassure him, though, and if she couldn't convince him he was wrong then she had to convince him that it didn't matter if he was right. Which meant making it about her instead of him and she wasn't sure she could do that...
The quiet was deafening, her blank stare unnerving. "Look, just forget I said anything, okay? Let's play."
"No. Dov..." She was able to make her way over in the time it took him to awkwardly scoot his way to the edge of the air mattress. Sitting next to him she pulled his hand into her lap to prevent his escape. "Do you know what all my 'experience' has gotten me, Dov? Plenty of bad ones I'd like to be able to forget. And I'm talking bad bad. Like only one person in the room was important and it wasn't me bad."
"An unforgivable transgression." Despite the mocking tone he absolutely meant it.
She gave him a muted smile. "Exactly. And I don't need references from the previouslies to know you're not like that." She couldn't think of one time he'd failed to put her first – not even at the beginning when she'd taken credit for his collars – and she very much doubted that would change now.
Normally Dov tried to discourage her proclivity for belittling her 'enemies' (as amusing as the product of that proclivity might be), but he would let this one go because if she was designating them as previous then it followed that she was conceding her own status as current.
Gail took his silence to mean he wasn't yet persuaded but she hesitated to use her other argument, not knowing if it would do more harm than good because it made indirect reference to Chris. Accepting that it was all she had left she held his gaze and bit the bullet. "You know what else it got me? I can appreciate the difference between just sex and, you know..." She made a disgusted face. "...that other thing."
"Making love?" he deduced, then immediately chuckled, "You can't even say it, can you?" He could picture her as Jim Carrey in Liar, Liar, making strangled noises, unable to finish the word.
"Not without puking, no." Her exaggerated revulsion had also had the intended effect of keeping him from looking too hard at what she had said... "Dov, at the risk of undermining the 'queen bitch' reputation I've spent years building myself, I really don't care if you're not an Adonis in bed. Actually, it's better you're not because you know how much I love being better than you at everything."
She probably didn't want to know how much damage that reputation had already taken, at least in their little group… "Are you lying to make me feel better?"
Gail scoffed at the very notion. "I can barely even bring myself to tell the truth to make anyone feel better – do you really think I'd lie to do it?" He should know by now she rarely lied, that if she did it was usually to make people feel worse, and that if she made a point of saying something [of consequence] then it was sincere...
On first glance it seemed ass backwards – that lying would be easier for her – but Dov knew she meant that if it wasn't important enough for her to make herself say it then she definitely didn't care enough to lie about it. He assumed there was some complicated formula she used to determine whether or not she would tell the truth, likely involving how uncomfortable or painful it would be for her, what the expected gain was from it, and the amount doing so would benefit her directly. He also suspected the high level of the first factor (and the conversely low level of the third) was responsible for her inability to just say 'I love you.'
"But just in case you still don't believe me..." Which he didn't going by his lack of response... "...I'm taking sex off the table."
"What?" He'd been lost in thought; must have misheard and she'd actually said she wanted sex on the table.
Of course that got his attention... "I said no sex. I won't even torture you about it anymore." After a brief pause she revised her promise. "Okay, much, because it's just too entertaining to give up completely and I'm gonna need something to make up for the no sex thing." Squeezing his hand she gave him a sly smirk. "And when we finally do it it'll be because you begged. You know, just so I know it's not because you feel it's expected..."
Dov's brow furrowed. "Why does this feel like punishment for daring to doubt you?"
Her free hand flew to clutch overdramatically at her chest. "It wounds me deeply that you would even consider me capable. I'm just trying to be supportive and sensitive to your feelings…"
"You don't know the meaning of any of those words," he teased, gently tackling her backwards onto the mattress.
Gail's laughter faded and she shrugged as well as she could in her prone position. "I'm learning." She didn't think she'd done too badly tonight, considering...
Shifting his weight to lay beside her Dov brushed out her hair with his fingers. "It was a joke, Gail. I don't expect some miracle transformation, and if I ever made you think that..."
"You went to Liam," she interrupted, eyes narrowed.
Shit... His fingers stilled and he gave her his most sheepish look. "I may have panicked a little when you got too 'busy.'"
Taking a calming breath she tersely reminded him, "I was busy. Working and apartment-hunting and practicing for the fundraiser." And mentally preparing herself for him, which turns out had been more exhausting than all of the rest combined.
"I know that now." Then he'd thought she'd had buyer's remorse and was trying to ghost him. "If you'd just told me..."
"Dov, you know I don't like just sharing things; it only makes people feel entitled to ask questions that are none of their business and then either a: I don't answer and I'm a bitch for not wanting to give them information they have no right to or need for, or b: I do answer which just leads to more pointless questions." Just look at how an offhand remark that she spoke French had turned into revisiting one of her earliest memories of hating her mother… Still, she would've sucked it up and told him if she'd thought for one second it would have made a difference. "Be honest – would you have believed me?"
He considered it for a minute before having to concede, "No." He was paranoid enough when it came to her that he would've assumed they were convenient excuses.
Gail swallowed hard, the validation bittersweet. "I want to change, Dov. I don't want you to worry that I'm pulling away, or about disappointing me, or about what'll happen if you disagree with me." Didn't want to make the same mistakes she had with Chris. Didn't want to condition him to do all those things the way she had Chris. But it was starting to look like it was already too late and that scared her...
Zero for three so far (unless he got partial credit for worrying his ass off but going against her anyway), Dov got her point. "Okay, so that's probably going to take a while. You willing to put in the time?"
"Are you?" she volleyed, head turned away to focus on the city lights twinkling beyond the window.
He leaned in to put his lips to her ear. "Do you really think I'd give up now?" Not a snowball's chance in hell.
Right now? No. "What if I can't change? What if your expensive thoroughbred turns out to be a hobbled mixed breed not worth the cost of its feed?" She was just broken beyond repair?
Backing away he cupped her chin and turned her face to him; swore, "If you want to change that's up to you but I don't need you to. I fell in love with you just the way you are." He was going into this eyes wide open, no delusions or expectations. "And for the record? I have never thought of you as anything other than a mustang: majestic..." He pressed a kiss to her shoulder. "...And fierce..." To her nose. "...And untamable." To her pouting lips.
Gail grabbed onto his shirt to deepen the kiss, releasing him only when the pain in her chest was due to a need for oxygen rather than overwhelming emotion. "You know what that means, don't you?"
"That I have better taste than self-preservation instinct?" he guessed with a grin.
"Well, obviously," she smiled back at him, her thumb running across his bottom lip. "But also that it's gonna be one hell of a wild ride..."
Wasn't a doubt in his mind… "Looking forward to it." Good and bad and everything in between, as long as it was with her.
"Mmm. Then you'd better get to begging..." She knew he wasn't talking about sex, and she hadn't been either (not entirely, anyway), but she just couldn't seem to help herself…
Suspecting she'd reached (and surpassed) her limit of 'heavy' for the evening, Dov went along with the change in direction. "Just how much begging are we talking about here?"
Gail gave him a wicked grin. "Depends on how convincing you are. Remember, I'm a skeptic by nature."
How could he forget? Nevertheless: "Oh, I think I can be pretty convincing." They were there weren't they?
Oh, really? "Without resorting to blackmail?" For his sake she hoped so, 'cause there was no way he'd be able to use her mother to his advantage in this particular situation…
It was cute that she thought he would have to blackmail her or beg when all he had to do was smooth-talk her until she threw herself at him just to get him to shut up... He didn't think she'd appreciate being told she was that predictable (in that regard, at least), so instead he pretended to accept defeat with a huffed, "Are we gonna play the game or what?"
"Sure," Gail agreed, laughing at his petulance. "Why not? You'll still be begging, just for mercy instead."
He stood up and held out a hand to help her do the same. "So basically you're happy as long as I'm begging…"
"See, that makes me sound like a bad person." Using the momentum of his tug she 'stumbled' into him, smiling when he pulled her in to steady her as predicted. Their bodies flush, her fingers digging in just at the swell of his ass, she purred up at him, "I prefer to look at it as me being willing to compromise. For now…"
"Uh…" Dov realized that his plan to smooth-talk her into becoming the aggressor would only work if she didn't manage to seduce him into begging first, and judging by his body's reaction to her when she wasn't even really trying his odds suddenly didn't look so great…
Boys are so easy… Taking pity on him Gail vacated his space and went to set up the game.
He went to join her in front of the illuminated TV, his eyes widening when she unexpectedly took hold of the two sides of her skirt and gave them violent yanks in opposite directions, extending the slit clean up to her hip.
She noticed his expression as she sat in her chair, folding her legs up onto it. "What? I forgot to bring extra clothes and I want to be comfortable." Quirking an eyebrow she suggested, "I could just take the dress off entirely…"
"Yeah, no." She really didn't need any more of an advantage. "You're good."
"Your loss," she shrugged, handing him the other controller.
Oh, of that he was absolutely certain… Sitting in the other chair he set his controller in his lap and began to roll up his sleeves.
"Ooh. Shit getting serious up in herre…" She gave him a cheeky wink before returning her attention to finding and loading the game.
He'd somehow forgotten how obnoxious she could be…. "If you can destroy a five thousand dollar dress to get comfortable, I can roll up my sleeves."
"Except my dress can be fixed and long sleeves aren't the reason you suck," she countered without looking away from her task.
And how much he loved it… "You know, maybe you should play by yourself for a bit first; wouldn't want you to be able to use the excuse you're out of practice when I crush you…"
Gail's head swiveled towards him, her mouth agape at being preemptively called out. "Bastard."
Dov turned back to the TV with a pleased smile.
And we're done, my friends. Only 7 years to finish this mammoth thing... Thank you for sticking with me and I hope it was worth it :)
If anyone is interested in the sequel following season 3 let me know. Promise it won't take another 7 to finish lol