"Alright, so what did you need my help with?" Numair asked as he got out of his car, sounding both long-suffering and amused. "This favor so urgent that you needed me to drop everything to put in an appearance at your prom night at... ten in the evening?"
Impatiently, Daine ushered him back into his car, this time into the rather spacious backseat, and he folded right into it, pliant and amenable. He was dressed nicely, she noticed, in a pressed button-down that stretched across his broad chest, rolled up to the elbows and revealing his tanned forearms, and sinfully tight light-wash jeans. The casualness of the outfit contrasted her shimmery blue prom dress, a garment that clung snug to her torso and with a voluminous layered tulle skirt that ended just above the knee.
She picked up a handful of it as she entered the backseat after him so she didn't kneel in it and rip it.
"Daine?"
She slammed the door shut behind herself and crawled forward into his lap, kicking off her painfully lofty high heels, and his hands automatically went to steady her. "I need you to help me lose my virginity," she announced crisply, once she wouldn't be overheard by any passerby. Not that there were any passerby—she had asked him to park at in the long-forgotten lot behind the science building for a reason—but it was better safe than sorry.
Numair's hands froze on her hips. "I'm sorry—what?"
"Virginity. I must be rid of it by the end of the night, and I need you to help me." She twisted in place and leaned over the front seat so she could wrench open his glove compartment. "Preferably by taking it."
He was silent for a long moment while she attempted to navigate the stash of paper and boxes and knickknacks, then rather mildly asked, "And why, pray tell, do you need to... lose it?"
"Miri," said Daine by way of explanation, then gave up on making heads or tails of the thing in the dark, and fumbled her phone out of her bra. Turning on the flashlight, she said, "She insisted that nobody was going to leave this night a virgin, and that anyone who did would owe her fifty dollars. I don't have fifty dollars, so I called you."
"You're in luck—I do," he said, sounding strangled. "Ask for that, not... not sex."
"I don't much like borrowing money from people," she explained, "and, besides, it won't work. I've put her off too many times already, and she's going to start trying to set me up with more and more boys if I don't do something soon. I think she's trying to get Perin to do the deed right now, and I'd rather not with him."
"Is Perin not your boyf—?" he started, then cut himself off. "Listen, Daine, when your friends pressure you like this, that's your cue to come to Alanna or Jon or me, so we can help you sort it out, not—"
She emerged with three different boxes of condoms of varying ages and sizes, and held them up, silently asking which was the correct one.
He pushed them away. "No." Then, at her pout, he added, "Absolutely not."
She scowled at him. "Why?"
He pried the boxes from her hands—or tried to, anyway. She kept her grip. "Far too many reasons to count," he gritted out, the timbre of it pooling heat in her belly.
"Such as?" she demanded, holding the boxes so that even with his longer limbs, he would still have to struggle for them.
"To start, there's this fine law called age of consent that says seventeen year old girls shouldn't be fucking men fourteen years their senior," he snapped, reaching for the boxes but unwilling to get as close to her as he needed to to reach them.
"I won't tell if you don't."
He half-sighed, half-groaned and said, "It's about the morality of the thing..."
"Is the age of consent above seventeen in all countries?" she asked innocently, pretending to be distracted by the mystery, and he took the bait.
"Well, no," he said slowly, turning his head to her in confusion. "Among first world countries some are as low as thirteen or as high as twenty, but—"
"Then it's cultural, not fundamental," she cut in. It had been the topic of debate on their way to her archery competition last week. "And if you're still squeamish, then—at least I'm not sixteen."
He gaped at her in open disbelief; she ignored him in favor of inspecting the boxes of condoms. There was an old multi-pack of assorted sizes, a half-empty newer box of only the largest size, and an unopened specialty box of the next size up. He plucked the multi-pack from her hands and frowned at it. "Why do I still have this?"
"Beats me."
He tossed it over the front seat, presumably to remind himself to throw it out later, then reached for the other two, only for her to squirm away again. "Secondly, I am your teacher—"
"Tutor," she corrected, "and a good thing, too, because I haven't a clue what I'm about to be doing, and I could use some tutoring."
Even in the dark, she could identify his pained look. "Any tutor who touches his student like that should be fired on the spot—and jailed besides."
"My calculus grades shall weep."
"Daine—for god's sake, why is it so important that you..." He trailed off and made another swipe for the boxes; she refused to relinquish the contraceptives. "This is the point at which rational, mature young ladies lie to their friends and—"
"They'll know," she assured him, "and then Miri will try even harder to 'get me laid' and if it's not Perin, then it will be someone worse. Much better to get it out of the way now than have to deal with that, I should think."
"'Get it out of the—'" he spluttered, outraged, then shook his head. "And there's no one your age that's acceptable?" He sounded like he despaired of many things. "Surely there is someone. If not Perin, then—Nealan? Kaddar?"
Daine let her guard down for a moment as she thought about it, but he didn't take advantage. "Kaddar might have been... acceptable, I suppose—" If he hadn't decided to study internationally before he got sucked into his parents' business. "—but even then I'd still rather you."
Numair fell into a coughing fit like he'd inhaled the wrong way, and she rubbed what she could reach of his back, still keeping the boxes of condoms out of reach.
She contemplated the two boxes she had left—obviously the smaller size had proven effective enough for use, but he'd bought the specialty ones for a reason, surely?—until Numair, catching his breath again, finally succeeded in snatching them, and then it was her turn to flail for the prize. Her limbs were much shorter, but she was also much less shy about climbing him for them.
They struggled for several seconds, the slide and press and knead of firm flesh making her lose her breath and tingle oddly all over, until finally Daine's beglittered nails dug into the flap of the opened box and yanked it out; a line of foil packets spilled from within. She snatched it with a quiet, ha! and ripped one off from the end before he could snatch it back.
They were both panting, their faces close, when Numair spoke. "So your friend made a bet, said that you would owe her fifty dollars if you didn't experience a major, very personal rite of passage before the party ends, and instead of calling an adult to help you out of this situation or going home or, god forbid, just saying no, you called an adult to force yourself upon for the sake of, what—pride?"
He was scathing, the tone of his voice one that only came out when he was uncomfortable in ways he didn't want to admit, and, knowing that, Daine's attention was caught by the one detail that she hadn't considered: "...'Forcing myself on you'? You don't want it? Me?"
He stilled.
It made sense, she thought, rejection cooling her body, and that it had never even crossed her mind was... surprising. She wasn't even close to his type. She had just assumed that she would be as welcome (or at least as tolerated) here as she was everywhere else in his life—that, and she had had faith in his willingness to save her from a worse fate.
It was terribly quiet in this back parking lot she'd made him choose.
"If you don't, then I shall be stuck with Perin, or Evin, or even Farant," she pointed out eventually. Perin was well enough and she was fond of Evin in a distant way, but she had about as much of a desire to view Farant's cock as she did foot rot.
Abruptly, he twisted in place, trying to reach the latch of the door his back was braced against. "I'm driving you home."
Daine squeaked in alarm, clutching at him for balance and also to try to keep him away from the door latch. She was much smaller and weaker, but his size was working against him here; between his considerable height and solid build, the backseat was much more cramped for him than it was for her.
"I haven't even been here two hours!" she hissed at him as they wrestled, the condom packet held awkwardly against her palm with her pinkie and ring finders. Her heart pounded with adrenaline and the scent of his cologne both.
"Obviously that will have been two hours far too long," he growled, sending a shiver down her spine. He stopped trying to twist in the position he was in, circled one long arm around her waist to grip her hip from behind with one large, warm, strong hand, and levered himself up. She squirmed in his hold, attempting to prevent whatever it was that he was about to do, and then her foot slipped on the carpeted mat on the floor—
She fell into him, pressed against his torso from chest to groin, and he froze.
Slowly, it filtered into her awareness that his squishy bits were considerably less squishy than she had expected to find them. The line of his cock was actually quite firm against her own bits, trapped as it was in his tight jeans.
Normally feeling such a thing was her cue to carefully disengage from whoever it was that happened to be kissing her and make her excuses, but here and now, with Numair's heart pounding under her fingertips and his spices-linen-soap scent under his cologne and his well-muscled form under her, her gut tightened and unfurled at once, molten heat blooming in her sex. She had already been overwarm all over inside from the bodily contact, but now a fiery blush raced over her skin to match it as her hips loosened and thighs spread on instinct.
Neither of them spoke, or even breathed, for a long moment.
"...Hey, Numair?" Her voice came out higher and sweeter than she'd known it could, and his cock gave a tell-tale twitch. Her blush burned hotter. "You... you never did say you didn't want me."
He didn't answer.
She bit her lip, heedless of her makeup, and tentatively pressed into the ridge—and those big, strong hands clutched her body bruisingly tight, his breath leaving him like she'd punched him and then starting up again in a pant.
Suddenly, the idea of him pushing that thing inside her and fucking her until she couldn't see straight was much, much realer than it ever had been before, and she could feel her body eagerly soaking her panties at the prospect.
"Say it," she whispered urgently, taking a chance, heart on the line, and rested her cheek on his collarbone, nose an inch from his neck. "Say it, and—I'll apologize. I'll let you drive me home. I-I won't ever ask again." (Oh, it would kill her not to, but—)
He swallowed, the muscle of his jaw jumping, and still didn't speak.
She let the condom packet slip from her fingers as she first fiddled with the highest button of his shirt, then slid up to cup his jaw. His five o'clock shadow scraped her palms, and the skin underneath blush-hot. She raised her head and drew him down in the same movement.
"Say it," she rasped—commanded—begged one last time, their faces barely a centimeter from contact; his dark, heavy-lidded eyes were fixed on her, unreadable.
He didn't say it.
So she kissed him.
Gentle as his lips were on hers, she felt it ten, twenty times harder than anything she'd ever felt before, the pulse of Numair, Numair, Numair in her veins enough to overwhelm her all on its own. His groan, so wonderfully, wonderfully low, resonated through her bones, his powerful grasp making her weak, the tension and hardness of his body demanding she melt—and, oh, melt she did.
They broke for air twice before she started to whimper in her need, and once after that before, "Please, oh, Numair, please?" spilled off her tongue, mewling and hazy and desperate. He'd never turned her down before, because she wasn't in the habit of asking for things he couldn't give her. She was bone-deep terrified that this might be the line—
The tension in him broke, his eyes slipping shut in what looked like pain. With a raw, humorless laugh, he whispered, "Anything for you, sweet."
She crushed her mouth to his, and he let her fumble with his clothing, bracing her thighs and slipping his hands up her skirt.
All the windows were fogged up when she stumbled out of the car on watery legs, gloriously full-up on the inside and sore between her legs. She had to brace herself against the side of it to slide her heels back on and fix her hair—there was nothing to be done about her makeup until she had access to her supplies and a well-lit bathroom mirror, because half of it had ended up on him instead.
He avoided her kiss but accepted her hug and nuzzled the top of her head before he drove off, and then Daine was free to stagger back to the festivities in the gym.
Miri whistled long and loud when she caught sight of Daine (she'd nipped by a bathroom on her way in but there had only been so much she could do, and she hadn't packed any concealer) and yelled, "Well that's me out of fifty bucks!" Then she grinned over her shoulder at Perin. "Or should I say one hundred...?"
Perin looked very, very undisheveled and very, very sour. After as many times as he'd refused the hint that she didn't want to sleep with him, Daine could only feel so guilty.
"Oh—my," said Miri, hand to her mouth but a glint in her eye. "Only fifty?"
"Only fifty," Daine confirmed, her voice rasping, as she tried not to look too smug. Her dress was scraping friction over her sucked-tender breasts and it was rather thrilling.
She was immediately grilled for details and refused to relinquish a single one, with only Maura (who had sneaked in with Kalasin while Daine was gone, apparently) and the chaperones to give her the disapproving looks she deserved, and did her best to enjoy the rest of prom with grace—or as much grace as one could when one had been fucked very thoroughly and their boyfriend rather explosively broke up with them and there were several others lining up to take his spot while rumors of their promiscuity grew more exaggerated by the minute.
She made it to the end of the night largely unscathed.
Alanna came to pick their group up at fifteen to one A.M., found that it had grown by enough people that they could no longer all fit in her minivan, and called for backup.
It was, of course, Numair.
"Sorry to interrupt your night," she heard the woman saying apologetically when he arrived, "but the kids want to go to a diner before they go home and I think most of their parents are asleep."
"It's no trouble, Alanna," he reassured her, though the sentiment was undermined by a jaw-cracking yawn. "How often does a prom night happen? They deserve to have a good time."
Alanna punched his arm because she couldn't gracefully reach his shoulder, then walked off, and he looked up to discover Daine eavesdropping.
He'd cleaned up, his hair left loose to dry, a rumpled v-neck and jacket replacing his lipstick-stained button-down and much darker, looser jeans replacing the ones that had her juices smeared all over the zipper. He hadn't hid the hickey she'd left low on his neck, though.
(There was something—new about seeing him like this and knowing what it was like to see him come undone. An inexplicably deep sense of intimacy to go with the lovely familiarity she'd already had. She thought she rather liked it.)
He narrowed his eyes at her, and her responding grin was half-sheepish, half-shameless, then she went back to her friends.
She claimed shotgun in Numair's car—and immediately found the box of condoms he'd forgotten to throw out.
She spent the ride playing with it between her feet and finally conceding to relay a few choice details about her encounter at Miri's urging—purring over the size of him, sighing over how gentle he was, giggling over how she never knew getting a hickey could feel that good—until Perin looked fit to murder and Numair was bright red, struggling to maintain his poker face, and Kalasin was wincing and stealing glances at Numair and poking Daine's side to stop.
Their two A.M. breakfast at Denny's with the rest of the group was considerably more awkward than it could have been.
Kalasin begged herself and Maura off early, and then Daine remembered she had to be at the wildlife reserve she volunteered at in about seven hours, and in the end, Numair was roped into ferrying the three of them back home.
Onua called when she and Numair were the only ones left in the car, watching Kalasin knock at the door of the Conté mansion and waiting for her to be admitted by the butler.
"Numair?" said Onua, tinny over the speaker. "Sorry to call you so late. I hope you weren't asleep..."
"Don't worry about it," Numair replied, waving to Kalasin when the door opened, despite her likely not being able to see him through the gloom. "Alanna needed help bringing the kids back from their prom, so I'm driving right now."
"Oh," said Onua, sounding rather relieved. "Then that makes things easier, I think. You see, I have an emergency at the clinic. I won't be able to take Daine to the reserve tomorrow morning. Can she stay with you tonight and then you take her in the morning? You're closer to it than we are."
The knob of his throat bobbed, and cool, sweet awareness pooled in Daine's belly.
The promise of alone with him took on a new shine when it was paired with for the night.
He glanced at her—her rumpled prom dress and her still-smeared makeup and the stubble burn and bitemarks on her neck, not knowing of the bruises on her thighs where he'd gripped her too hard and exactly how her sex ached for him, by him, every incriminating detail Daine's guardian was unaware of—and cleared his throat, a strange, haunted look in his eyes. "That... should be possible."
"Great, thank you," Onua said with a heavy sigh, then there was a commotion on the other end of the line and she muttered something that sounded like a goodbye and hung up in a hurry.
He idled there for a moment, the car engine humming loud in the silence, and then carefully set his phone down in the cup holder and pulled away from the curb.
Neither of them spoke during the ride back, the silence thick and oppressive as the chill of the witching hour seeped in through the windows. Daine's spine tingled as she watched the scenery go by.
The woodsy area surrounding the Conté estate blended into uptown, then into the suburban stretch, then into the slum side of downtown, and then into the upscale side of downtown, then into the ritzy side of downtown, then back into a much cleaner upscale and into the cluster of apartment rises where his home resided.
The white floodlights of the underground parking lot for his building were harsh and clinical, illuminating their faces much better than the one behind the science building had. Numair hesitated before getting out.
"Nobody seems to think a single thing of you staying alone in an older man's home," he muttered to his steering wheel. It would have been an idle observation if not the darkness laced in his voice.
"Nobody thinks anything of me staying with you," Daine corrected, her spine tingling all over again as she involuntarily wondered how many times he could get away with pounding her into his California king bed under the pretense that things were absolutely normal before they got caught. It had never occurred to her just how much of the time they spent together was unaccounted for. "Quite right of them, too." She looked out at the lot. "You saved me fifty dollars."
"By committing a felony, yes." He exhaled sharply, fingers tapping an agitated rhythm on the steering wheel. "Daine—listen. What happened tonight can't happen again. I can't—I won't do that to you. To either of us. I—"
"Because it's a felony?" she said, cutting him off. Her dress was all tulle and cheap satin and shimmer, plastic and scratchy, and its sharp chill sent pulses through her sex when she pressed it against the bruises he'd left.
He faltered for a beat, then continued, "Yes—among other things. Listen—"
"Three hundred and ten days," she said, not listening.
"—What?"
"In three hundred and ten days, it won't be a felony. I'll be eighteen." She glanced at the clock; it glowed 2:34 at her. "Well, three hundred and nine days now, I s'pose."
He processed this for a long moment, then, carefully blank, said, "You've... thought of this before."
She felt herself blush at the tone of his voice. "I'm not an idiot. I don't actually want you to go to jail."
"...Daine," he said slowly, "exactly... how long have you been keeping track?"
She shrugged. The question was entirely reasonable and uncomfortably loaded. "Not long. A few months."
(Since day -514, when one too many fantasies of his hands wandering had been interrupted by worries about the possible consequences, but somehow even after he'd recently spent a solid half hour getting rigorously acquainted with her body in the most intimate ways possible, admitting that still felt like crossing a line of some sort.)
"'Months'," he repeated flatly.
She didn't deign to answer that. It did sound... somewhat more intense aloud than it had in her head.
"And... might I ask what you planned to do once your countdown finished?" His tone was pleasant and guarded, though distinctly less dangerous than it usually was when it got like that.
"I had no 'plan'," she sighed. "I just... thought it would be nice to know."
He was silent for a long moment, then repeated, "You thought it would be nice to know... exactly how many days are left until I wouldn't be committing a felony if I touched you."
"It's not as though I think of it all the time," she said, exasperated, then decided that this was entirely too much time spent under questioning and grabbed her heels, sliding her feet into stiff, shiny, baby blue vinyl shells.
"No," he agreed lowly, and her movements slowed as she felt him watching her with a dark, heavy gaze. "Just often enough that you can cite the number on command."
She flushed from her hairline to her chest, bared as it was by her dress's sweetheart neckline, her pulse thumping painfully in her mouth and between her legs, making her aware of just how her uncomfortably sticky underwear clung to her skin. The sensation of being caught out quivered hot in the pit of her belly.
His right hand left the gear shift and smoothed one hairspray-stiff curl over her shoulder, his touch feather-light on her mostly-bare upper back, and gooseflesh prickled her all over. "Three hundred and nine days?"
It was only enough of a question that she knew she was required to nod.
His touch trailed up again, still light, and came to a stop when his middle finger rested on one of the reddened marks he'd left on her neck. Pressing down just enough to make it sting, he rubbed the raw skin in horribly stimulating little circles.
Daine clamped her thighs together and struggled not to gasp, the sensation tugging on her breasts and clit.
"Three hundred and nine days," he murmured, velvety with promise, and Daine wasn't sure if she was glad of the distance, wished it were three days instead, or desperately wanted him to be a slightly less law-abiding sort of man so he could bend her over the hood of his car right here and now.
(The latter was winning out by miles.)
Then he dropped his hand and found one of his old coats to wrap her in so she wouldn't freeze on the way up to his apartment and asked her what the reserve had in store for her tomorrow, and she reminded him that he needed to shop for groceries and call the pool man and take his suit for dry cleaning before his conference on Thursday, to which he laughed and wondered what he'd do without her—and a cool veneer of normalcy spilled over the night, challenged only by ache between her legs and the box of outdated contraceptives sitting at the bottom of the parking lot's trash bin.