HERE WE ARE AGAIN AT LAST. FREAKING FINALLY, RIGHT?
I own nothing, everybody is Dreamworks, blah blah please don't sue me. Thank you to KarenBJones, the who is the most best beta.
Check back tomorrow for a followup to last Christmas's fic and an update on what Minion is up to back in Metro City!
Whatever holiday you celebrate, I hope it's a good one. And if you don't celebrate, I hope you and your family are well and that the upcoming year treats you better than the last.
I love all of you very very much.
Chapter 14
Traffic isn't awful on the way home, probably because it's so late at night and even though it's the holidays and tomorrow is Christmas Eve, most people have turned in for the night.
Unfortunately, 'most people' does not include the police. Red and blue lights flash in the rearview when Roxanne rolls through a stop sign close to home. "Shit," she swears, and glances at Megamind. "You have the watch?"
"No," he mutters, sitting up and glancing over his shoulder. "We'll be fine, just follow my lead."
"Your lead?" she asks, incredulous. "I'm the one driving!"
But, sure enough, when the officer walks up and Roxanne rolls down her window, he leans down and says, "Evening, Ma'am, have you been…Ah."
"Don't look at me," Megamind advises him, smiling and twiddling his thumbs in his lap. "Much less paperwork if you just turn around and walk away."
The officer sighs and straightens up. "Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to step out of the car and place your hands on the roof."
"What?" Roxanne exclaims, looking around at Megamind in alarm. "What? Why? You can't do that!"
"Yes he can," Megamind says as he sighs and unbuckles his seat belt. "He has reasonable suspicion."
"Suspicion of what?" she demands, but he's already out of the car.
He stands patiently, making silly faces at Roxanne through the window while the officer pats him down and disarms him. Roxanne is obviously appalled, but Megamind quite clearly isn't. It's fairly routine for him and while he'd have really preferred to have been left alone, he's not worried. After the search is complete, the officer directs him to sit on the curb beside the patrol car while his partner runs his papers.
Meanwhile, he approaches the driver's window again to address Roxanne in a low voice. "Ma'am, you know what he is?"
Oh, great, a guessing game. "A…Pyxidisian?" she answers, thinking 'alien' might sound cocky.
The officer blinks at her. "A supervillain," he says.
Right. That. "Former supervillain," Roxanne corrects him, with only the hint of an edge to her tone. "He's retired."
"Is that what he told you?"
"More or less," she says. That specific word has never come up in conversation. But, seeing as how Megamind's primary adversary is "dead" for the indefinite future, how Megamind himself had voluntarily returned the city and all its spoils, and how he's more likely to be called a hero than a villain in Metro these days, 'retired' does seem to fit.
The police officer sighs and shifts, doing a spectacularly poor job of hiding his irritation. "All right, look, I don't know what line he's fed you, but guys like that don't change. You shouldn't mix with his kind."
Roxanne stiffens. "His kind?"
"I'd hate to see you dragged down into his world, is all. Villainy is no place for a young lady."
She isn't sure that statement could be more offensive, but she manages to keep her tone polite with an effort. "I appreciate your concern, but the company I keep is my concern. And I rolled the stop sign, not him." She half-smiles, hoping she looks disarming rather than furious. "You gonna pat me down, too?"
The officer straightens, his jaw clenched. "Not at the moment. You been drinking?"
"I've had a couple drinks, but none recently. If I'd been tipsy, he would have driven us."
The officer pulls out a flashlight and shines it into Roxanne's eyes. "Follow the light," he instructs, and watches Roxanne's eyes as she complies, then clicks off the light and makes a mark in his notepad. Apparently, she passed the test because he doesn't ask her to step outside.
"Where are you two headed tonight? You're a long way from Michigan."
"We're staying with my parents for Christmas. We were just headed home."
"Your parents know about him?" the officer asks, glancing over at where Megamind is still waiting patiently on the curb, humming under his breath and looking up at the sky. "You brought a supervillain to…visit for the holidays." It does sound shockingly mundane when he puts it like that. Roxanne hasn't thought of Megamind as a supervillain in so long.
"That's most of why we came all the way out here. Introduce the boyfriend to the family, you know?" Her friendly smile turns nervous as she watches the officer pinch his lips together in what looks like disapproval. She hurries on to another subject. "Listen, I'm sorry I rolled through the stop sign. There wasn't anyone coming, but I know I should have stopped completely. That was my mistake. I'm really sorry. I usually obey traffic laws much better than that, but it's late and I just want to get home."
He nods and says, "Wait there. I'll be back in a minute." He flips the notebook closed and walks over to Megamind, where he asks the blue man some leading questions while he waits for his partner to return with the warrants.
And he's surprised when the first thing she says when she walks over is, "He doesn't have any warrants."
The first officer stares. "How can he possibly have no warrants?"
She shrugs. "I checked twice. Nada."
"He's a supervillain. I recognize him, he was in the news last summer. He killed a superhero and took over some city up north."
"Well, evil twins aren't uncommon among supers," she says, and ignores the sound the blue man makes at that. "Anyway, this guy doesn't have any warrants. He's clean."
Megamind peers cheerfully up at them but doesn't move. "Does that mean I'm free to go?"
"Yeah," answers the second officer, "You can go."
"Thank you," he says, pushing himself to his feet and brushing himself off. "My things?"
Roxanne rolls down the passenger-side window. She's beginning to feel ignored. "Is everything all right?" she calls.
The second officer half-turns—she's clearly more relaxed than her partner, who is still tight-lipped and disapproving. "Well, to be fair, it was a California stop. And we are in California, and there's not exactly a lot of traffic tonight. So we'll just give you a warning and let you go. Have a good night."
All the paperwork and Megamind's knife are returned to him, and soon he's back in the car and they're on their way. They don't have much further to go, but he still settles back into his seat and throws an arm over his eyes.
"Wow," Roxanne exclaims as she pulls away, "I was sure they were going to arrest you."
"Fun fact," he says without moving, "I've never officially been arrested."
Roxanne snorts. "What? Bull."
"No no, it's true. Nobody's ever read me my rights and actually processed me. Even when it's the cops who catch me," he laughs. "They just kind of…take me to my cell and tack on a few more years, maybe a life sentence if it was an especially big explosion." He shrugs. "But I don't have any paperwork in the system."
Roxanne shakes her head, laughing now herself. "That's ridiculous."
"Oh, I completely agree," he says. "But that's the MCPD for you. I was Metro Man's problem, not theirs. I love them. How's your brother getting home tomorrow?" he adds as they pull up to the curb. The house is entirely dark.
Roxanne shrugs. "He'll catch a ride with someone, probably. Or he'll ask me to come get him. Come on, let's go inside."
Megamind doesn't move. Roxanne goes around to the passenger door and grabs his hand, trying to drag him to his feet. "Come on, you," she says again. "Up."
"I don't like up," he complains. "I'm comfy right where I am."
"Up," Roxanne insists, tugging ineffectually at his arm. Megamind closes his eyes and grins. Roxanne huffs, then sets her heels and pulls, and Megamind yelps and has to flail to avoid falling out of the car and onto the pavement.
"Okay, all right, I'm up!" he exclaims, staggering to his feet. "Leggo my arm!"
Roxanne laughs and lets him go. "Got you moving. Now come on, I'm cold." She presses a button on the key fob, locking the car and making it vanish with a cheery chirp. She'd parked in front of the garage on the side used for storage, since Drew has a habit of parking on the street and would probably run into the invisible car. Visible, it's a conspicuous vehicle with Michigan plates and right now, with news of their relationship soon to make headlines, she doesn't want it to be too obvious that they're here—she'd prefer to spare her family the paparazzi. That done, she turns around and walks up the lawn to the porch.
Megamind grabs Roxanne's hand just as she starts to reach for the doorknob to go into the house. "Wait—what if they're in there?"
She blinks at him, surprised and squinting in the darkness. "What?"
"They'll know. I mean…look at me," he mutters, glancing down at the vest, and that's when Roxanne knows for sure that he'd dressed up to get her attention. She's not the only one who has plans tonight. "It's pretty obvious, isn't it, what we'll be doing upstairs?"
"Not exactly what we'll be doing, I hope," she grins. "And anyway, they're asleep. Mom always forgets to turn off the porch light when she goes to bed, but Dad remembers. I'm pretty sure they thought we'd be out all night." She tries the knob, and sure enough, it's locked. "See?" she says, and she unlocks the door and steps inside, flicking on the hall light.
Megamind huffs as he closes and deadbolts the door behind him. "Well, since you won't even tell me what you've got planned, I—umphf!"
Roxanne, quite predictably, has backed him against the door and is kissing him soundly with one hand on his throat to keep him still. She figured out a while ago that if she's going to actively take the lead, the quickest way to throw Megamind off his game is to grab him by the neck. She doesn't need to squeeze or anything, just keep one hand there to remind him not to try anything funny.
Then, just as suddenly as she'd started, she stops kissing him and backs away. He shakes his head at her, half-laughing as he whispers, "What are you doing? Why'd you stop?"
"Not here," she says quietly. "Upstairs."
"Upstairs," he repeats. "Yeah, upstairs sounds—upstairs sounds good."
0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0
Upstairs, Roxanne has to figure out how the vest works. Luckily, there aren't any laces or anything; since it was tailored to fit and is more of a decoration than anything else, the clasps down the front serve the same function as buttons.
But they're way more fun to pop open because the sides of the vest just fall away, and then they hold their shape while she starts unbuttoning his shirt. She starts at the top and works her way down, since down is pretty much where she wants to be right now, and once there she makes quick work of his belt.
"Okay," Megamind says, blinking very rapidly and taking a step back when she goes to her knees in front of him, "Okay but seriously, Roxaa aane what are we going to do if your parents wake uh —whoa ho hoa. Up. Aaaagh."
She pauses. "Would you quit squirming?"
"Nnnno I don't think so," he says, holding himself stiffly back. "Having you down there is just weird. There's a power dynamic there that I…um."
She sits back on her heels, baffled. "A what?"
"Well I used to kidnap you," he says in a rush, looking here-there-everywhere but never down at her. "So this isn't—I mean, on your knees is sort of—"
She puts her hands on his hips. "Do you want me to get up," she asks flatly, "or do you just think you should want me to get up?"
He puffs out his cheeks as he exhales, looking slightly abashed. "I…the second one."
"Thought so." She resumes nuzzling into his groin, even going so far as to tug down the zipper on his jeans with her teeth (which is something she's always wanted to try but never quite thought she could pull off without getting laughed at). After a few seconds, she reaches up and grabs him by the wrist, puts his hand on her head.
A moment after that, she glances up to see how he's doing because he really is being unexpectedly quiet, and then she pauses and rocks back again. He's gazing down at her with his heart in his eyes and he's kind of stroking his fingers through her hair and he just looks completely wrecked. "You okay?" she asks.
He nods. "Yeah," he says huskily, "yeah, I'm okay."
It's his I'm-so-lucky-it-hurts face, which happens sometimes when they do things like this. Roxanne sighs and stands up and puts her arms around him—he looks mildly worried, then relaxes into her as she rubs her hands up and down his back. "I had some stuff planned but you look like you'd be more into what we're used to, tonight," she says quietly. "What do you want to do?"
"I don't care," he replies, turning his face towards her and almost sticking his nose in her ear. "Really don't. Wanna have sex with you."
She chuckles and steps back a little so she can see his face. "Okay…are you okay with maybe being tied down? Maybe try a gag?" She glances down at him, and then inexplicably she frowns. She steps back again and mutters something under her breath.
Megamind leans forward. "What?"
"I said, you're too hot," she says loudly. His tie is still fine but the front of his shirt is open and so are his jeans, and he's almost more gorgeous in disarray than he was with all his clothes in their proper places. "Like, you're…nobody should be allowed to be this sexy."
His face twists the way it always does when she tells him he's hot. "If you say so."
"Mm-hmm," she agrees. "I almost don't want to even do anything. I almost just want to sit back and just look at you." But she makes the mistake of pulling her gaze back up to his face just as he sucks his lower lip between his teeth, so of course she has to pull his hips flush against hers and make him stumble forward so that their mouths crash together. Megamind grunts, surprised. "I lied," Roxanne mumbles. "Looking's for losers."
He chuckles and puts his hands on her shoulders when they come up for air. "Honestly, now, what are we going to do? I'm…in answer to your question, yes, tied down is okay. But I'm not a quiet man, you know this."
"Here's my hypothesis." She raises her eyebrows and smirks. "You just haven't had the proper incentive to figure out how to shut up."
He smirks right back and taps a finger on the end of her nose. "That's a conjecture, not a hypothesis. A hypothesis needs to have a dependent and an independent variable and it needs to be testable, and that's just for starters."
He may be scoffing, but he hasn't vetoed anything yet. "Hmmm." She tips her head back and stares up at the ceiling, pretending to think and smiling when he leans forward and quickly kisses her neck. "Okay, how's this one? If you have a proper incentive to be quiet…" She looks back at him and runs her index finger around the shell of his ear. "…You'll learn."
Megamind stares at her. Roxanne stares right back.
"It's not a hypothesis," Megamind says in a strangled voice, "but I suppose it'll do." He still thinks this is probably a bad idea, but Roxanne isn't the only one who's ready to go. Even his massive brain is subject to the dumbing effects of sexual arousal, and the risks of proceeding don't seem so important at the moment. Being quiet shouldn't be too hard, right? "What incentive did you have in mind?"
She shoves him back and kisses him again, pushing him up against the wall with a quiet thump she hopes isn't audible downstairs. She picks up right where they'd left off before, sweeping her tongue between his lips, urging him to reciprocate. Her hands are everywhere, frantically exploring him, claiming him with her touch. She brushes his eyelids, the narrow black brows above and the planes of high cheekbones below; runs her fingers over the swell of his cranium and down his long neck and out along his delicate collarbones. He pushes himself up on his toes and then slides back to standing flat-footed, the delicious friction between their bodies making him shiver.
She trails her lips up his jaw to his ear, exhales hot breath into the sensitive passage, nips at the translucent shell and presses it between her lips, then sucks on the skin behind it at the slight depression where tendon meets skull. Just as he lets out a small moan of pleasure, she pulls back. "Quiet," she says, and her meaning is clear—if he makes any noise, she'll stop.
His hands at her waist pull her firmly back against him. She's not surprised.
She kisses down his throat to the lump of his Adam's apple, fits her mouth to the understated ridge just above it, presses her tongue flat against his skin, and hums low in her throat against his hyoid bone. Megamind cuts off a gasp before it can turn into an involuntary warble, and Roxanne laughs. Neither of them is sure why it happens, but when she moves his hyoid a certain way and he inhales, it draws a round, two-toned oscillating sound from deep in his chest.
He pokes her in the side and hisses, "Don't do tha-aahaaa—" He bites back a cry; she's just pushed a knuckle into the soft crook of his elbow, which is one of his weirder erogenous zones.
"Quiet," she replies, and she grins at him as the world tilts dangerously and little tingles of warm electricity trickle through him, then she jerks him away from the wall and spins him around, making him stumble. She has the vest off and his arms pinned behind him even before he recovers, and he feels something wrapping around his forearms. He lets her bend them, dizzy and intrigued by how securely she's tying him, locking his arms in a bar across the middle of his back.
Weeks ago, they'd had a rambling conversation that had touched upon, among other things, his skills as an escape artist. Part of him is flattered that she'd remembered what he'd told her about tying someone securely. Another part isn't sure about being tied this securely; he'd feel less nervous if he knew he could get loose with a twist of the wrist and some wiggling.
Not that he's nervous. Of course he's not nervous. Why would he be nervous? He tells himself he's being stupid. His elbow aches where she poked him, but it was worth it if he gets to see this side of her. Nerves aside, he can't deny his arousal.
One of these days he's going to have to ask when she developed a rope fetish. "Roxanne, what…?"
Warmth on the back of his neck and then teeth almost pull sound from him, but he fights it. It isn't too difficult, yet, but Roxanne is not making this easy for him and he can tell it's only going to get harder from here on out. The triangular gland on his lower abdomen that marks his sex is tingling in anticipation already.
Roxanne trails her fingers up his side as she steps around to face him again, untucking his shirt as she loosens his tie, then grabs his jaw with both hands and pulls him into a kiss. He's off balance without his arms, and when she rubs her thumbs against the sensitive nerves on the outer edges of his pectorals, he staggers and nearly falls again. Her hands gripping the sides of his chest keep him upright.
He resists the impulse to plant his feet and push her off. Even with his hands literally tied behind his back she's not a match for him physically, but he's surprised at how much he likes letting her control the situation. It's kinky as hell and he's eager to see what else she has in mind, so he lets her manhandle him as she likes.
She looks at him for a moment out of blue eyes that are only slightly less hazy than his green ones, an odd little smile playing at the corners of her mouth. "We could try a gag," she says. "I brought one. But you seem like you're doing okay without it."
"Uhm." Megamind tries to focus, but the thought of Roxanne tying and gagging him is somewhat baffling. As enticing as the idea is, this is entirely new territory, and maybe they'd better not just yet. He opens his mouth to decline, but what comes out is, "Maybe?" Is that what she'd meant about being prepared?
"Here, lemme show you…" She turns away and he leans back against the wall again, watching her.
"So…you're really prepared, here," he says slowly while Roxanne hunts around in the nightstand. "Did you bring all this with you, or…?"
"I've…had this stuff for a while now," she admits, but her voice is just a little too high and Megamind knows she's blushing.
A while? he thinks. How long has she been planning this, anyway? And why didn't she bring it out before now? He cocks his head at her. "You've thought about this a lot," he accuses good-naturedly. "Come on, let me see. I know you've found it by now." Roxanne finally turns around, and she's blushing much harder than he'd suspected. Megamind leans away, his eyes dancing with mischief. "Oh, oh hey now," he says, "I smell a story."
"You're such a butthead," she huffs. "Okay, fine, yes. Yes, I've been thinking about this for…" She trails off, opening and closing her mouth. Her cheeks are flaming.
"For…?" Megamind prompts, grinning wickedly. This is fun. "Weeks? Months?"
Roxanne gapes at him for a moment, nodding helplessly, then squeaks out, "Years."
Megamind's evil smirk drops into a blank stare. "What? No. You're joking," he says suspiciously, but Roxanne clamps her mouth shut, shaking her head. She honestly doesn't look like she can blush any harder. "You're serious? You've—thought about—about me this way for—"
"Years," she says again. "Not all the time," she adds quickly, because Megamind's eyes are saucer-huge, "It was originally, well…revenge fantasies?" She ends on a questioning note because she's really not sure how he'll take that, but he just continues to stare. "Y-you know, tie you up and hurt you, embarrass you…sometimes drag you into jail myself instead of always giving Metro Man the satisfaction.
"But then, after a while, I started thinking about—other things. Mostly at night."
Megamind knows exactly what that means, and his mouth falls open. "You what—you mean you—while thinking about me—?"
Okay, either they can take a break and hash this out, or Roxanne can try to bring it back around to the sex. She steps in close, bends her nose into the curve of his neck, and Megamind stops talking. "Yeah," she whispers. "A few times. Never thought I'd ever get to try anything out, though." She kisses him lightly where his shoulder meets his neck, and a little thrill prickles down his spine. "Love you."
It's a shame Megamind can't hug her; he really wants to. Instead, he kind of curls himself against her, turning his shoulders inward and sticking his nose in her ear. "Love you," he says, then quickly bites the ear that's so close to his mouth.
Roxanne jerks back and mock-glares at him, then smirks and holds up the gag, which is red and round. "Open," she says. Megamind pinches his lips together and raises his eyebrows. "Open," Roxanne says again, and he obeys this time—which is good. She slips the rubber ball between his teeth, buckles the two ties closed behind his head, then licks a wide stripe down the side of his neck before stroking her hands down his sides to his hips again and dropping to her knees.
She tugs his jeans down and then puts her mouth against the skin below a jutting hipbone and sucks, and oh, that's going to leave a mark. Megamind isn't easy to bruise, but Roxanne has gotten pretty good at it. She pulls back with a pop, rubbing the sore spot with her thumb for a moment—this is the only context in which she ever considers hurting him anymore.
"I know you worry 'cause you're flat, but you really shouldn't," she says quietly. "I'm not missing anything." She licks quickly at the lower point of his roughly triangular sex, which is speckled dark blue and a little bit rough. The lower point is a particularly sensitive spot and Megamind wasn't expecting her to do that; he lets out a low moan and of course she stops.
"Quiet," she says, and waits for a couple seconds before starting again. As hard as she was sucking before is how hard she isn't sucking now; feather-light kisses brush across the dark markings, which Megamind swears are pounding, and then oh oh warm WARM, licking—
His head falls back against no support at all and his neck turns in a way that it really wasn't built for and pain flinches over his skull. He tries to yelp but it gets caught in his throat; he tries to swallow but he isn't used to the gag and that has got to go.
One minute everything is fine, and then the next thing Roxanne knows, Megamind chokes and staggers back, jerking his head from side to side. She's on her feet in a heartbeat. Her hands fly up and she pulls open the buckle and tears out the gag, tosses it in a random direction in favor of holding him by the shoulders as he slumps forward and braces his forehead in the crook of her neck while she fumbles with the ropes tying his arms.
All she can think is that something went suddenly horribly wrong and she has to get him free—she squeezes his shoulders, rubs his arms. "What, what happened, what did I do, did I hurt you? We can—we can stop, it's fine, I'll stop, I'm so sorry. Are you okay?" Stupid stupid stupid, she thinks at herself, too much, too fast, now you've gone and hurt him…
Megamind lets out a few rough coughs and then subsides, gulping and panting. Roxanne continues to pet him, waiting for him to respond and trying not to let on just how startled and worried she is.
Finally, in a low, unsteady voice, Megamind says, "I am so hard right now. Figuratively speaking."
Roxanne snorts and lets out the breath she hadn't known she'd been holding in a rush of relieved and breathless laughter. Thank god.
"No, seriously," Megamind continues in the same voice as before, but each word trembles with strangled mirth, "if you leave me like this I think I may have to kill you. Don't you dare stop." He lifts his head and looks at her with those obscenely vivid eyes of his, eyebrows quirking up in chagrined amusement.
Roxanne brushes a thumb over his lower lip, breathing deeply. "But what happened?"
He colors. "I'm not used to a gag and I'm not sure it fits right, or maybe my anatomy just isn't right for it, and also standing up is new and so is being tied like that—I like it," he assures her quickly. "It's different, very nice. I like ropes, you might have noticed, and I'm thinking we're going to have to explore this in greater depth because we may just have discovered that my control kinks are a lot stronger than I thought—but the standing up, I, my head, it, well." He's babbling; his eyes are screaming for her to say something, anything, so that he can stop talking, but she just grins and waits. "It fell, and I, and it fell. Back? And. I. That wasn't, wasn't good. And then I swallowed but I'm kind of deficient and it went down wrong and please for the love of Albert will you make me shut up before I embarrass myself further?"
She kisses him, which has always worked before and doesn't fail them this time. There's a moment of shared quiet after their lips part, and then Megamind backs up and sits down on the bed. He's blushing furiously, but he doesn't say anything – just tries to move so that he can lie down the right way. Roxanne, laughing, helps him shuffle backwards until they reach the pillows at the head of the bed.
"Let's try…how do you think?" she asks. She does want to tie him up. "Arms up, legs down?"
"The word you want is spread-eagle," Megamind says, knowing she knows it already, "and yes, I think. But—" And he quickly stops talking, as if he hadn't meant to continue.
Too late. "But what?" Roxanne asks.
"Nothing. Wait until I'm tied, then I'll tell you."
Roxanne nods, brings soft leather cuffs out of the nightstand and binds his wrists out to either side, with enough give that he can hitch his shoulders but not roll. Megamind stares up at the ceiling, his expression wiped carefully blank, as Roxanne starts on his legs. By now, he's totally nude.
Gentle tugging and tension as she pulls his leg straight tells him she's tying the other end of whatever it is to the bedpost. And then she does the same thing to his other ankle. Heat curls in the pit of his stomach. He pulls a little, tries to bring his knees together. He almost can. Almost. If he turns his legs a funny way.
Roxanne sits back. "Okay," she says, watching him. "How's that?"
Megamind frowns a little bit, wriggles again. "That's fine," he decides. Then he looks at her, the glance pulling his eyelids down as he finishes his earlier sentence, the one he'd cut off. "But no gag."
"You sure?"
He nods emphatically. "No gag," he says again. "Not like this. Not on my back. No." He doesn't elaborate, and Roxanne doesn't ask. Maybe there's a reason, and maybe there isn't; either way it doesn't matter.
"Okay, sweetie. That's fine. I don't want to do anything that makes you uncomfortable, but you do have to keep quiet or else we'll have to stop." She cracks a grin. "I don't think either of us wants my dad coming up here thinking something's wrong."
Megamind chuckles, remembering how Orson's arms are about twice as big around as his own legs. "I'll certainly do my best," he promises. Then he says, "Earlier, you mentioned a blindfold. I'm not sure, but…we could try that." Her bright smile is more than worth the uncertainty.
"Okay," she says. "Um. I actually—I left it in my purse."
His eyebrows fly up. "What? In your—what's it doing there?"
Roxanne is crimson now. "I'll be right back." She hops down and dashes on tiptoe out the door.
Megamind is left lying on their bed, embarrassed beyond belief, stark naked and more aroused than he has ever been in his life, with the door open. He squeezes his eyes closed, hoping, praying that he and Roxanne have been quiet enough thus far and that nobody has woken up and nobody is going to come in and find him like this.
A full minute ticks by, and then Megamind hears soft footfalls on the stairs. They're fairly regular, luckily, so he's pretty sure it's Roxanne, but he does briefly consider rolling off the bed. He grits his teeth and twists his arms, struggling to free himself; he folds his thumbs in and writhes his hands against the restraints, but all the knots hold.
But, sure enough, it's just Roxanne who appears in the doorway. Grinning at him, she shuts the door behind her. She's holding something soft-looking and black in one hand and a cylindrical bolster pillow in the other, and it was nice of her to remember that if he's going to be on his back for any length of time he'll need something under his neck.
"If you go away again," he says, wrinkling his forehead at her, "can you close the door behind you?"
She blinks. "Sure," she says, coming over and crawling across him. "Sorry, I didn't even think about it."
"I figure you know what you're doing, I really do," he says quickly, "but, I just…the lights are on and I'm naked, and there aren't any blankets."
Roxanne glances at the lamp on her bedside table, then down at Megamind, who has spent his whole life hiding in the shadows, wrapping himself in leather, spikes, huge collars, and capes to pull attention away from his body—and who is now extremely exposed. "If you don't like the light, I'll turn it off. But you're made of sex and I really want to look at you. C'mere. Up." She lifts his head a little, slips the round bolster pillow behind his neck. "Better?"
He wiggles around for a moment, then nods. "Blindfold?"
Once it's in place, Roxanne hesitates for the first time that evening. "Can I kiss you?"
His face cracks into a smile. "You don't have to ask."
Roxanne kisses him slowly, cradling his head against her mouth with both hands, then nuzzling against his ear. For a moment, they just bask in each other.
Then she kisses him again, moves a hand to hold him gently by the neck, turns his head to the side so that she can run her mouth down the side of his throat while shifting her fingers lightly over the sensitive skin just under the curve of his skull. It's the surest and fastest way to make him go weak at the knees when he's standing, and buck his hips into empty air when he's lying down.
"…Nngh," he says, his mouth falling open and his eyes falling closed behind black silk. She dips her tongue into his open mouth as his chest heaves, stroking quickly across the hard cartilage behind his upper teeth and making his breath hitch. She pulls her arm out from behind him, being careful not to dislodge the pillow, and runs her lips down his body to his hips, crawls further down the bed to nudge his legs apart and curl up between his knees. His steady breathing shudders, then catches again.
She's wanted to do this for ages—it's been a while since the last time they tried it—and when Megamind arches his back and gasps she can't immediately remember why she hasn't. It's not the taste, which is bizarre but not bad, and she really doesn't mind the way the heady scent of him tends to creep into her sinuses and stay there. It just means that the more they do this, the more she thinks about it. He's a little addictive.
She fights off an orgasm; if she has one like this before Megamind does, she'll be good for absolutely nothing for the next little while. Ah, yes. That's why she doesn't do this very often. Megamind's—well, he calls them 'secretions' but that sounds the opposite of sexy—are a complex blend of hormones composed of the same chemicals that her brain produces during orgasm and are designed to be absorbed particularly well by mucous membranes. Any mucous membranes, including the ones in her mouth and throat.
Mouth orgasms had taken a lot of getting used to.
The first time it happened, Roxanne had crawled off her boyfriend on trembling elbows and collapsed face-down on the bed beside him, half-blinded, her head spinning. Megamind had been worried, and Roxanne herself wasn't too sure what was going on. All the nerve endings in her nose, throat, and eyes were humming and sparking for the rest of the night; her jaw had spasmed intermittently while she had been talking until the next evening, much to her boss's consternation and Megamind's amusement.
Luckily, that only happened the first time, but she'd still needed to adjust to the sensation. And anyway, Roxanne doesn't really care much about getting off, not tonight. She'd much rather get Megamind off—there are some new things she wants to try, and besides, they've learned from experience that if she's grinding against him or licking him when he comes, she'll peak just as hard as he does. Apparently shared orgasms come with the territory. Roxanne is fine with that.
Something else that might as well come with the territory is that Megamind is fastidiously clean, inside and out, always. Roxanne has never asked why, but he'd had one of his rare I'm-totally-calm-about-this-and-not-awkward-at-all moments after the first time Roxanne had gone down on him and said: "Listen, if I taste weird or something and you'd rather not do that again, that's okay. But if you still want to, you know, do things? Cloacal penetration is something I'm more than okay with. Don't worry, I'm clean."
She'd been hard-pressed not to laugh at him for that, not because it's funny but because it was so extremely unexpected. Prison or not, she's pretty sure he was a virgin before they started dating, so how would he know? But further explanation revealed he'd tried it on his own once, years ago, and been surprised at how very enjoyable it was. It makes sense. Megamind might not like everything they try, but he's generally up for trying new things at least one time. And as long as he's clean, right? Though she had needed him to explain what a cloaca was.
And now…
…Now he rolls his hips and throws his head back, bites his lip to stifle his moan and twists his hands in the blanket. He throws his palms flat against the mattress a moment later, when she bends her fingers and tries a new angle. "Ahaggghhh fuck! Nnnn."
"Shhhh," she tells him. She runs her tongue over him, humming quietly, then pushes her open mouth against the middle of his triangular gland and sucks. Megamind lets out a choked gasp, another muffled curse, and Roxanne grins.
Then he kicks a little, arches his back and rolls again, teeth bared, but she follows his movements and flicks her tongue at the rough-silk gland. "Roxanne," Megamind whispers, "Roxanne, you should—nng 'm gonna—gonna come—oh yes there, there—" He grabs his lower lip with his teeth again, bites down hard…and she lifts her head, takes her hand away.
He stares at her, incredulous. "No, no, no," he hisses, "what are you doing?"
"You," she hisses back, and sits up. Megamind blinks when she doesn't straddle him, frowning. This is new. This isn't the usual routine.
She cups his face, which he hadn't expected. "I have something new. I don't think it will be a problem and I want to surprise you, but Megamind, if you need me to stop at any point, tell me. Understand?"
He grins and snaps his teeth at her, making her jerk her hand back. Then his face softens into a smile. "Unless we're going to be trying knife play, I think I'll be fine."
"Nooo," she says, leaning across him to the nightstand once again—why doesn't she just take everything out so she doesn't have to keep doing that? It's not like he can see what's in there anymore—and pulls out something small and silver and oblong. "No knives, no thank you. Open." Megamind obeys, closes his mouth around the silvery egg. "Suck. Oh, and pick your head up."
The mattress dips as she crawls back onto it, climbs over his leg. She brushes her hand over him, making him jump at the unexpected contact, then bites him, hard, on the inner thigh. He chokes back a yelp.
When she slips her finger into him, he shudders. When she twists, he flinches. She takes her time working him open, adding a second finger long after he's ready for one, then a third. She knows what she's doing; they've done this enough times that she knows exactly which angles will tease and which will draw strangled noises from him. What's really maddening is that she stops whenever he makes a noise.
She reaches up and taps his cheek. "I'll have that back now, please," she says lightly, and Megamind obediently opens his mouth again and lets her take the egg out—though he can't resist another good-natured snap at her fingers once it's gone.
But when she pulls her fingers away and something cold presses against him, he freezes. "Easy," Roxanne murmurs. "Relax. This is a little bigger than what we've used before." She hooks one of his legs over her shoulder and lifts him a little, pulling him open wider and easing the toy in.
He can feel when it's all the way inside. It's not what she'd given him before, or maybe it is, but it's not just the egg anymore; it's in some kind of case now, a plug of some sort. She must have lubed it at some point, judging by how easily it went in.
Then she puts him down, backs up and crawls over him to lie down at his side once more. Megamind's head is spinning. She's not moving the toy. Why isn't she moving the toy?
"Okay, now," she murmurs, "let's see how this works. Remember to be quiet."
Megamind has just enough time to wonder what she means before something clicks somewhere nearby and the thing starts humming, and he very nearly screams. It's a good thing she reminded him to shut up.
He twists desperately, wriggling with his whole body, but the toy stays firmly in place and there's no contact right where he needs it the most. He grits his teeth and forces himself to relax slowly, by degrees. This is okay. He can do this.
Then there's another click, and the toy hums harder, and he arches his back and writhes. He kicks, thrashes from side to side and starts to try and sit up, and suddenly there's a weight on his chest, pinning him down, and he knows now she's straddling him. "Fuck," he breathes again, and the toy stops for a second then slams back at full power. He whimpers and bites his lips, not making any loud sounds.
It feels good but he needs to move, he can't lie flat and still with the little torture device lighting up every nerve in his ass. He fights it. He has to sit up; if he can just sit up, he'll be able to figure out some way to get leverage, but Roxanne is relentless. He bares his teeth and growls, low in his throat, but the growl turns into a whine when she kicks the toy up another notch. The whine is cut off when she pinches his nose, reminding him once again not to make any noise. He breathes through his mouth, panting, until she kisses him.
She stays there, draped firmly across him, and he can feel the fabric of her dress, can picture the way it must be rucked up around her thighs. It's not fair that she's still dressed and he's completely nude, not fair at all, especially since he can't do anything about it. The very small part of his mind that's still capable of rational thought makes a note to get back at her for this soon. Possibly later tonight.
The rest of his mind is just spinning because of what her lips are doing to his neck right now. God, he wants to be able to just touch her.
Roxanne herself is having a grand old time toying with him. Honestly, not much can make her more aroused than teasing Megamind like this—dragging noises out of him is what really gets her going, and the fact that Megamind is having to try so hard not to make any noise is just. Perfect.
She runs her lips down his throat, nipping gently at the tendons and licking a broad stripe up to his earlobe. Then she goes back down to his shoulder and starts kissing and licking in the space just at the base of his neck above his collarbones, knowing that will make him go absolutely wild. She's rewarded when he thrashes in his bonds, jaw clenched tight.
He doesn't make it the full ten minutes. He barely even makes it to six before he lets out a noise that sounds like a low cry, and Roxanne finally stops tormenting his neck and chest and sits up and oh, wow.
He's still moving, but slowly, involuntarily. His mouth is open and his thin chest is heaving. He's practically fucking the air with his hips—the dark-blue glands are darker than Roxanne has ever seen them, nearly black.
She adjusts the settings on the vibrator again, adds a little more power, and she's rewarded with a soft whimper and a flicker of movement in his face. He tilts his head a little, straining as if in pain.
Curious, she takes off the blindfold. Megamind immediately looks at her, blinking in the light, his pupils dilated with lust, but his voice when he speaks is surprisingly even. "Roxanne," he says quietly, "Roxanne, I am begging you, please—"
She reaches down and pushes lightly on the end of the toy, and his whole body spasms, but he doesn't cry out.
"Okay," she whispers, and gently slides down the bed. "But if you make any noise I might have to leave you tied up while I go take a shower."
Megamind gulps. "Please," he whispers again, spreading his legs even wider apart and twisting desperately, pushing on the mattress with his heels for leverage. "Oh god oh god. Please please. Don't just leave me lying here like—fuck, so close—!"
Roxanne leans over and sweeps her tongue across his sex and he jerks in his bonds, and then she presses her mouth against him and strokes hard with her thumbs and sucks and Megamind comes with no warning at all. His orgasm rocks into her from the top down, making her vision white out as heat like lightning flickers down to her core; he throws his head back, his mouth flying open in a silent scream.
There's a long few seconds while Roxanne just focuses on blinking and breathing before she's finally able to realize that she's sunk her teeth into his hip. She unlocks her jaw with an effort and lets go of where her fingertips are digging into his sides, then just puts her head down on him and hugs his hips with one arm.
His voice makes her open her eyes. "…Shoulders hurt."
With a groan, she pulls the toy out of him and crawls up to fumble absently with the cuffs on his wrists until they come loose. Then she just drops her hands again and flops on the bed beside him. She'd like to help him sit up, rub his arms for him; she can feel him wriggling around, but lying still and focusing on breathing is about all she'll be capable of for the next couple of minutes. Or at least until the stars stop dancing around the corners of her vision.
She feels him twist onto his side, and slim blue fingers stroke and fluff her damp hair. She has a little of his cum in it. "You're all messy," he murmurs, still breathless.
She manages a twitch that's meant to be a shrug. "'ll take a schower."
Megamind chuckles. "And you're slurring."
She wags a lazy finger at him. "I blame you," she mumbles. "'s all yer fault. Stupid alien with your stupid sex chem'cals gettin' me high." She turns her head and presses a quick kiss to the part of him that's closest—in this case the side of his ribcage—and then pushes herself up and drags herself into a sitting position, yawning hugely. "Don't tell m' mom. She'll organize an invertension." She frowns. "Intervention."
"You okay?"
"Yeah, it'll wear off soon. There. See, didn't even slur. I wonder if whatever you give me shows up in drug tests; I wouldn't want to have to explain that to HR."
He chuckles, rubs a hand down her arm and closes his fingers loosely around her wrist. "I don't think I excrete any controlled substances. But I guess we could check if you're really worried about it. We live in a laboratory, after all."
She smiles sleepily down at him. "No, not really worried. Just rambling. Ignore me."
He raises himself onto his elbows and kisses her. "I'd never ignore you," he says, and wraps his arms around her waist for a quick hug. "Go take your shower, I can get out of the ankle cuffs."
She nods and pats his leg before finally getting up and stumbling into the bathroom, relying on muscle memory to walk because of the way the room is spinning around her.
Megamind comes in a minute or so later, blushing under the harsh lights of the bathroom, and somehow they end up curled around each other on the floor of the bathtub, hiding behind the shower curtain and the warm spray of water.
But when Roxanne stands and reaches for the shampoo, he smirks up at her and backs her against the wall.
Despite his thin frame, Megamind is very, very strong, and it's easy to forget that he is more than capable of overpowering her if he ever wanted to. But he doesn't want to overpower her—what he wants to do is pin her hips to the shower wall and rise to his knees and just explore for a while. She certainly isn't complaining.
He has a grip like iron, and when he takes one hand away to move it down, to slide cold fingers up deep inside and make her shiver, he uses the other to hold her in place one-handed. The hands disappear at one point but only for a few seconds, and Roxanne barely notices anyway because of what his mouth is doing.
"Megamind," she rasps, and he cocks an eyebrow up at her. "Bite me."
His eyes narrow in laughing acknowledgment, and he bites down, harder than Roxanne expects him to and somehow still not hard enough. Her head slams back against the wall with a thump.
He's on his feet in an instant, eyes blazing, one long hand over her mouth and the other working expertly between her legs. "Miss Ritchi," he hisses, and oh lord, the old growl makes her go weak all over again, "you will maintain control, or I—" he shoves one slim blue leg between her thighs and uses his knee and hand to hitch her higher against the wall, "—will maintain it for you." He twists his hand in her hair and his mouth crashes roughly down on hers just as he flicks the fingers of his other hand against that sweet spot deep inside and rubs.
Gone is the shy, blushing creature who had curled up with her on the floor only a few short minutes ago. This is Megamind, the Master of all Villainy in all his glory, and he will not be denied. Not that she would anyway. When he shifts her around, gets both legs between hers so that she's straddling his hips, something bumps against her pelvis and her eyes fly wide. She tears her mouth away from his and looks down, manages to gasp, "Ah, I see you looked in the drawer."
Megamind glances down, too, and falls briefly out of character. "Yeah, I wasn't really sure how the buckles are supposed to go and I was kind of working blind to get it on while I was down there. Don't expect too much; I've never done this before." Then he grunts and grabs her by the butt, uses the wall as a support to lift her higher still, and then he slowly, slowly lowers her down. The strap-on isn't very thick, but it is long.
She doesn't even register that she's making any noise until his hand claps over her mouth again, and she opens her eyes to find that the villain has returned and is glaring at her, his stormy eyes shuttered and dark. Nobody, nobody, can pull off an Evil Glare like Megamind can. It shocks her to her core, and that's when he rocks into her, making her squeak.
"Silence," he hisses. "Do you want someone to find you like this?" He grips her by the forearms, lifting them high and away and pinning them to the wall above their heads.
This can't be easy for him; Roxanne isn't exactly a lightweight and Megamind is currently supporting both of them, and the muscles in his arms coil and bunch as he pounds into her. He juts his head forward and cleaves his mouth to hers before dragging away and planting the top of his head against the wall for added stability.
"Do you have," he pants into her ear, "any idea—how long I've wanted to try this? Longer than we've been dating, that's for sure. You're not—the only one—with fantasies." He kisses her shoulder and speeds up his thrusts, angling again for that spot deep inside, and that plus the reminder that the former supervillain had been thinking of pinning her to the wall and fucking her until she's dizzy even when he had been kidnapping her is enough to send her, shaking, over the edge.
She bites her lip to keep from crying out, then goes helplessly limp against him. Megamind pauses for a moment, panting, before dropping into a slow, careful crouch, waiting until her feet are flat on the floor to duck his hips and slip the phallus out of her.
She swallows, still gasping, then turns and cleans herself off under the warm spray while Megamind fights with the strap-on's buckles. He'd missed one and tangled another putting it on, so it takes him a minute or so to figure out how to get the thing off and by that time Roxanne is done with the soap and shampoo and everything—which is a little disappointing; he'd been looking forward to helping her with that. He's discovered recently that soapy boobs are one of his favorite things.
She steps out of the shower, wrapping herself in a towel before holding one out to him. He turns off the water and rubs dry quickly, then wraps the towel around his waist and faces her, only to find that she's staring at him, hard.
She holds the stare for a long few seconds, and it's all he can do not to fold his arms over his chest and back away—he's really, really exposed under the bathroom lights.
Then she speaks. "What the hell."
He blinks. Had he inadvertently done something wrong? He hadn't really asked—
"Don't expect too much?" She makes strangling motions, her eyebrows creeping up under her tousled hair, the beginnings of a wild grin capering around the corners of her mouth. "Oh my god, Megamind. I mean, wow."
The knot of tension that had been gathering in his shoulders uncoils and bleeds away. "I did okay?"
Roxanne's eyes widen, and she steps to him and brushes the backs of her fingers gently over his cheek. "Okay?" she echoes, and he answers with a relieved smile. "You did awesome."
He beams and leans forward, pushes his forehead against hers and rests his hands on her hips. Roxanne grins and nuzzles back, leaning her arms on his shoulders and crossing her wrists behind him. They stand like that for a minute or so, not saying anything, just standing and reveling in the afterglow. The bathroom fan hums and the condensation on the mirror stops forming droplets and starts evaporating.
Someone downstairs flushes a toilet, but Roxanne can't really bring herself to wonder when they woke up. She straightens and sighs a little. Megamind opens his eyes, and the quiet look he sends her makes her want to sing and cry and laugh and dance, but she does none of those things; she only takes his sharp chin in her hand and kisses him softly. "Time to get ready for bed," she murmurs, and he smiles and nods and closes the door quietly after him so that she can have a little bit of privacy—which seems unnecessary, considering, but it's a nice gesture and it's another of those little things he does that make her fall in love with him all over again.
She brushes her teeth. Finishes towel-drying her hair one last time, and wipes the steam off the mirror and looks at herself. She looks happier than she's been in a long, long time, and suddenly she bursts into quiet, helpless giggles and has to lean on the sink. She shakes her head, looks back up at her reflection. "Ohhh," she sighs. "What am I doing?" She stares at herself for a second longer, then exhales a warm breath on the mirror and draws a happy face in the rapidly-evaporating moisture and chuckles. She's having the time of her life, that's what she's doing.
She bounds out of the bathroom and hops into bed, flicking off the light and then cuddling up to Megamind, who freezes for a second. "Hullo," he says, surprised.
"Mmmmm hello," she replies, tangling their knees together as she tugs the covers up. He's shirtless, to her surprise—usually he wears full pajamas when they go to bed. It's a pleasant discovery but she doesn't mention it, not wanting to put him on the spot.
Megamind wraps an arm over her, worms his other arm in under the curve of her neck. "You're awfully cuddly this evening."
"So are you," she says into his bare chest, her arms curled in the limited space between their bodies. "You're not wearing a shirt. I like it."
"Well, yes," he says, suddenly shy. "You see, there's this…there's this girl I like. And she likes looking at me. So I thought, I thought I'd give her something to look at, when she woke up. Maybe."
She squeezes him. "I love you so much."
He smiles, kisses her damp hair and tucks her head under his chin, feels her wiggle for a moment until she's comfortable. "Goodnight, Roxanne. I love you too."
"Night, love."
0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0
Megamind actually sleeps through the night, and as usual when that happens he startles awake feeling muddled and slow. He can't say what woke him up. Maybe a sound, a step on the stair, or maybe it was the pressure change that comes with a door opening.
He lifts his head a little and blinks his eyes open. Yawns. Frowns.
He carefully disentangles himself from Roxanne—they don't seem to have moved from where they went to sleep last night—and stands and stretches, reties the drawstring on his pajama bottoms. Then he pads quietly over to the door and steps into the hallway, pulls the door mostly shut behind him, and faces Linda in the shadows by the stairs.
He squares his shoulders. "May I help you?"
"I doubt it," she says, turning towards the stairs and gripping the railing.
He speaks to her back. "Etiquette dictates you knock before entering a room you suspect may be occupied."
Her voice is cold. "I didn't suspect it was occupied. I didn't see your car outside, I figured you'd stayed over with Drew's friends."
He wilts a little. "Oh." That's right, they left it in invisibility mode. "No, it's out there, it's just…hiding."
"Hm." Leaning heavily on the railing, she starts to make her way down the stairs. "Well, I was coming to see if there was any laundry in the hamper, but as long as you're up…Orson's making breakfast before he heads to the summit, if you want any."
Megamind sucks his lip between his teeth and chews on it. Linda had her knees replaced recently, she shouldn't be navigating the stairs—should she? "Um—may I help you?" he asks again, but this time it's an honest question. "Down the stairs, I mean."
Linda turns around, her expression flat, but then she looks at him and blinks twice and actually takes a moment before she replies. When she does, some of the ice has left her tone. "I would prefer if you didn't touch me."
"Oh…" He furrows his brow in thought, then smiles when the obvious solution pops into his mind, never mind that it's overkill for the situation. He often overlooks practicality when in problem-solving mode. "I don't have to. I can dehydrate you and then rehydrate you at the bottom of the stairs."
She raises an eyebrow. "You aren't serious."
He grins sharply and holds up his hands, index fingers pointing at the ceiling. "Wait a second," he says, and darts back into the bedroom. He's back in the next breath with a strange-looking gun she's only seen pictures of. "Never leave home without it."
"May I see that?" she asks. Not looking at his face. Instead looking at the blue skin just above the low-slung waistband of his boxers. I was right, she thinks as Megamind steps closer, that's a bite mark. She bit him.
…That's an interesting place to bite somebody. Luckily, human that she is, her mental filters are fully functioning and she keeps that thought to herself.
Megamind hesitates, but only for a second. He doesn't notice that she's distracted, which is probably for the best. "Here, careful of the trigger, it's pretty sensitive."
"It's a ray gun, of course it's sensitive." She hefts it, testing the weight and keeping her finger off the trigger and deliberately not mentioning the mark above his hip. She's only half-thinking about the gun; the rest of her mind is preoccupied with what that bite mark implies.
Megamind stands like a stick until she hands the gun back to him, and then he relaxes a little. "So?"
The corners of her mouth twitch into something that could, conceivably, be called a smile. "I'm not letting you point that thing at me."
Fair enough. He nods. "But…the stairs?"
"I made it up, I can make it down."
"But it would be easier if somebody helped you," he presses.
Linda holds up a hand. "I'm old, I'm not fragile, and stairs are easier for me now than they were before I had my knees replaced. Go get dressed, wake Annie up, and get your butts downstairs for breakfast."
He sighs and nods and starts to turn around, but then he stops. "Uh—we didn't wake you up last night, did we? When we came in? We tried to be quiet—"
"No." She resumes her slow trek down the stairs. Thank God, she thinks to herself, glad she hadn't heard any of whatever went on to lead to that bite. Especially considering what else she'd glimpsed in the room.
Satisfied, Megamind nods and reaches for the bedroom door handle, but what Linda says next stops him dead in his tracks.
"Be sure to put the cuffs away when you make the bed. Leaving them out is tacky."
Megamind's very impressive brain goes completely blank. Linda glances back over her shoulder, but her expression is completely unreadable. "Did Drew loan them to you?"
"I—I really wouldn't know," he stammers, desperately trying to figure out what to say, "It wasn't—I mean, she was the one who—I was—I didn't—"
She turns back around too quickly for him to get a good look at what that does to her face. "That's my girl," she mutters, and leaves him standing thunderstruck and blushing all the way to his shoulders in the hall. Linda is no fool; she knows perfectly well that you don't typically bite somebody like that when you're tied down, and Megamind's reaction confirmed her suspicions.
She's been trying very hard not to think about her daughter having a sexual relationship with her former kidnapper, but the knowledge that he would willingly submit to being tied down—in any capacity—is rather telling. She isn't sure yet what it says, but she's having a hard time convincing herself that he'd do that for the sake of an act. It takes a lot of trust, and deceitful people tend to have trouble trusting others.
Unless he—No, she reminds herself sharply, I'm going to try. I have to try. But it would have been so much easier to try and get along without the reminder that Roxanne, in addition to dating and living with her ex-kidnapper, is now sleeping with him, too. Not that she didn't know that, of course, but it's still jarring to have it confirmed.
She suppresses a shudder.
Well, she probably shouldn't have said anything about the cuffs, but the opportunity was just too good to pass up. Besides, she's interested to see if he says anything to Roxanne.
0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0
Roxanne has just finished getting dressed when her phone buzzes at her, telling her she's got a text. Megamind is still struggling into his jeans, so she flops down on the bed and checks to see what's going on.
She doesn't recognize the number, but it's a local area code. Is this still Roxanne Ritchis #?
She frowns. 'Still?' Who is this?
Nubia. Is this Roxanne?
"Oh!" she exclaims, her eyebrows flying up. "I haven't heard from her in years!"
Megamind blinks over at her. "Who?"
She jumps and looks at him. "Oh—one of my old friends just texted me." Yeah it is! she texts back. What's up omg haven't heard from u in ages!
Nubia texts back right away. I saw a picture of u n ur bf online I didnt kno u were home? Wanna do lunch at Molly's?
Roxanne hesitates. On one hand, she really wants to visit with her friend; on the other hand, she doesn't want to abandon Megamind with her mother all afternoon if her father is going to be gone for the day and they don't know when Drew is coming back…
Then the door swings open. Megamind yips and falls over behind the bed with a thud, but it's just Drew sticking his head in. "Morning, losers! Dad says hurry up."
Roxanne flings a pillow at him, laughing. "Out! Get out! And knock next time!" Well, that takes care of that problem, she thinks ruefully. "Hey, are you guys okay on your own for lunch? Nubia wants to catch up."
Megamind shrugs, popping back to his feet and then nonchalantly dusting himself off as though he didn't just take a nose-dive behind the bed. "Sure, why wouldn't it be okay?"
"Fantastic." She smiles at him. "Thanks, hon."
He grins back. "Come on, let's go downstairs. I'm hungry."
"I'm hungry too," Drew says.
"You're always hungry," she says, and then her phone rings. "Oop—Hello, this is Roxanne. Oh—" She winces and holds the phone away from her ear as angry-sounding masculine gabbling issues forth from the earpiece. Megamind raises his eyebrows and she rolls her eyes. "It's Carl," she mouths. "Yeah, hey, sorry, I'm listening. No. No. You're out of your goddamned mind if you think…what?"
This time, Drew raises his eyebrows. Megamind glances over at him. "I love the dynamic she has with her boss," he says in a low voice, just as Roxanne swears again.
"Yeah, fuck you too." Incredibly, she doesn't sound angry. "What? No, he…yeah, we're living together, we've been living together for months. …Ask Jo, she knows!" She's quiet for a moment, and then she sighs. "Yeah…okay, I'll put him on." She holds the phone out to Megamind. "It's for you."
"Joy," he says, looking all but enthused. "Hi, Mr. Wentworth."
"Is this Megamind?" the voice on the other end demands.
"It's certainly not the Queen of England. How are you?"
"I'm fucking pissed is how I am! It's Christmas fucking Eve morning and my phone won't stop ringing! How long has this been going on?"
Megamind grimaces. "Since…July?"
"July?" Carl moans. "I've been betrayed. They are gonna crucify me for this. Ohhhh I'm going to wring your skinny neck when you come back, see if I don't. This is sick, you know that, this is vile, this is a new low, Megamind, you are fucking disturbed."
"Thank you," he says, just for lack of anything better to say. And he does feel oddly pleased.
"You…you evil son of a bitch, you…" Something slams in the background, possibly a door or a window. "You couldn't have the good sense to keep this under wraps?"
"We can't hide forever."
"But you killed her boyfriend—ughhhh no, you know what? I don't care. I'm done. I'm turning off my phone and I'm locking all my doors."
Megamind grins. "Your ratings are going to go through the roof."
Carl hesitates. Then he says, "Why? What you planning?"
"Come on, man, get with the program," Megamind cries. "Interviews, expos! I need good press!"
Carl's voice snaps in his ear, incredulously shrill. "And you think I'm going to give it to you?"
Megamind blinks. It hadn't occurred to him that Carl, of all people, might turn him down. "Um…yes?"
"No! I take care of my people!" Carl shouts. "I do not support this. Not on my network, no! No!"
"You're not going to fire her," Megamind says, the bottom falling out of his stomach as he makes eye contact with Roxanne.
"No I'm not going to fire her, you moron," Carl snaps. "What did I just say? I'm not gonna cut her off. She might need this job, I won't have you isolating her. And I'm through talking to you, that's it, I'm done, I'm done. I want to talk to Roxie. Put Roxie on the horn."
Megamind relaxes very slightly and passes the phone back to his girlfriend without another word. Believe it or not, he's kind of relieved. This means Roxanne, at least, will have one source of support in the coming storm.
"Yes," Roxanne says. "Yes, I know what I'm…look, don't worry, okay? He'd never…hm? Thanks, Carl. Yeah, that means a lot. I know. Yeah, love you too, you old goat. Merry Christmas." She hangs up the phone and sighs, then tips her head back and stares up at the ceiling for a long moment.
"And so it begins." Megamind's wry voice makes her look around at him. He's watching her with an odd, tight little smile, the kind that says, I knew this would happen. He cocks an eyebrow and his lips thin.
Roxanne, however, shrugs. "All in all, not a bad start."
Megamind nods and stands. His posture is odd now, as well as his expression. Back straight, head up, elbows in. "Yes," he agrees. "But it won't last."
He leads the way out the door, and Roxanne can't help but think he looks like he's going off to war. He has a kind of resigned, nervous air about him.
Drew, on the other hand, thinks he looks like he's headed for the gallows, and begins very quietly to worry.