A/N: This one's another modern AU. And...it just sort of ended up like this, but...there are no names used. Just pronouns. Regardless, this is about Arya and Jaqen, because I wrote it, and I say it is. The chapter title is taken from the Matchbox 20 song that inspired this. Yay Rob Thomas! Thank you to GrowlingPeanut, Killthebeast, and Violet for reviewing 'Runaway', and to everyone who took the time to follow or favorite this story. Your support is greatly appreciated.
Disclaimer: A Song of Ice and Fire and its characters all belong to George R. R. Martin.
Rating: M for strong language and suggestive content.
He didn't know why he let her do it: walk all over him like she fucking owned him. She was a bitch; no way around it. But with her wicked sense of humor, and those leather pants that perfectly hugged the curve of her ass, and the look in her eye that told him she wasn't as innocent as she sometimes pretended to be, she was irresistible. And he couldn't get enough.
It had started innocently enough. She was a student at the college nearby, and she answered his ad in the paper for a roommate. What sort of a nineteen-year-old read the fucking newspaper anymore anyway? And there she was. Standing on his doorstep in her Metallica tank top and cutoff shorts, a cheeky grin on her face and a single suitcase in the hand that wasn't resting on her hip.
For the most part, she had left him alone at first. She would offer a good morning when he walked into the kitchen for his cup of coffee: 12 ounces, strong, and black; didn't seem to mind that he never responded.
Their relationship was professional. Businesslike. She might as well have been one of the many nameless, faceless secretaries at the plastic surgery office where he worked. She slept in his spare room, ate the groceries that she bought every other week, used his shower when he wasn't in it, and paid him the agreed upon rent. It was simple; predictable; ideal.
And then, the girl had to go and make things difficult. It was a Sunday morning a few months after she had moved in, one of the few days that they were both in the house together for more than half an hour at a time. He had overslept, something that was rare for him, and after he was dressed, he opened his bedroom door to see her standing before him in the hallway. Completely fucking naked.
Her large grey eyes blinked in mock surprise and a smirk tugged at the corner of her lips. When he continued to stand dumbfounded in the doorway of his room, she turned to face him fully, moving her hands to her hips and giving him an innocent smile.
"I'm sorry. I forgot to do the laundry when I got home last night. We're out of towels." And with that, she sauntered—sauntered—toward the small laundry room, her perfect ass still glistening with tiny beads of water. He almost hoped that she had been able to hear the sounds of his release as he took himself in his hand in the shower, the smell of her shampoo still clinging to the porcelain.
After that, he made a point to avoid her. His employer trusted and valued him enough to let his schedule remain flexible, so he simply hid behind the safety of his bedroom door until he heard her leave for her morning classes and made sure that he was back to their apartment before she returned. It worked, for the most part.
Perhaps it was just paranoia, but he could've sworn that with each day that he spent avoiding her, she tried harder to ensure that he couldn't. First, she took her class schedule down from the fridge; thankfully, he had memorized it long before. A few days later, she inexplicably returned back to the apartment when she should have been at her evening chemistry lab. That time, he had barely managed to gather his things from the kitchen table and retreat into his office before she had gotten the front door unlocked.
When he closed his eyes at night, he was haunted by the image of her standing there before him, completely exposed to his gaze. He had never before found anyone so infuriating; or so irresistible. His only consolation was the knowledge that they had agreed to revisit the terms of her rent at the end of her first semester. She would be back out on the street before she could even set down her pen.
A few weeks before she was due to take her finals, she stayed out late one Friday night, and he refused to let himself worry when she didn't return to the apartment by her curfew. As he had both expected and feared, she came staggering through the front door while he was on his way to work the next morning, wearing the same short dress that she had worn out the previous evening. He tried to hide his scowl at the thought of her spending the night with another man, but as always, she saw right through him, stopping in the doorway of her room to glance over her shoulder and give him a coy smile and a wink as he stormed out of the apartment.
It had to stop. He couldn't sleep anymore, couldn't even think without seeing her.
Gathering his resolve, he threw his blankets off one night, not even bothering to get dressed before slamming open the door and marching down the hall to her room. She was waiting in the doorway when he got there, an almost triumphant smirk on her lips. Before he could speak his mind, she stepped forward, pressing her small frame against his and slanting her mouth over his. He couldn't even think to respond before she pulled away, a feral grin on her face. By the time she had closed the door between them, he couldn't even remember what it was that he had wanted to say.
Neither of them spoke of the kiss after the fact, though he could practically sense how self-satisfied she was whenever she cast him a glance from beneath her eyelashes. Needless to say, it hadn't helped his problem in the slightest.
Her finals kept her on campus for much of the last few weeks of their contract, and for that he was grateful; or so he told himself. He kept himself busy with work, and fewer and fewer of his nights were spent with her name on his lips before sleep finally took him.
It was a crisp, clear December morning that found them together again, sitting across from each other at the kitchen table, their agreed upon contract between them. All she had to do was give him a final payment, sign her name, and walk out. Her hand disappeared into the purse at her side and withdrew the money, sliding it across the table where he set it in a neat pile beside his elbow. Her eyes met his briefly before the hand departed again, this time returning with a pen. The cap was removed, and she scanned the document once more before poising to sign.
He wasn't sure exactly when he leaned forward, or when her lips parted to give his tongue the entry it desperately sought. By the time the pen clattered to the tile floor, it had been long forgotten.
He knew that he shouldn't let her do it: walk all over him like she fucking owned him. But he just couldn't help himself.