Chapter Thirteen: Heartbeat

As Barton turned a corner, he heard the steady click of heels behind him. He didn't need to turn around or check, he knew who it would be. Since their kiss, he had been feeling a sort of constant uncertainty. He wanted nothing more than to grab her and kiss her again, draw her back into his room and put off their assignment for an hour or two. There was something in his mind, a roadblock, that stopped him from acting so impulsively. When Natasha caught up, he was jarred out of his thoughts. "We should head out now," she suggested calmly.

"Fine, sounds good, just have to get a couple things from my room," he replied. His tone wasn't necessarily cold, mostly hesitant. Their kiss was something they'd both undoubtedly been thinking about for some time, and it had ended abruptly and uncomfortably. What could she say? She didn't even know what she wanted to come of it. Of course she had feelings for him. Of course the kiss had been spectacular. She shook it off. At that moment, they had a job to do. She waited for him outside his door and he reappeared a few minutes later, ready to go.

While it was ordinarily a struggle to get him to agree to let her drive, he allowed it with no dispute. She laughed before hopping in the driver's seat and decided it would be no fun working with him if an awkward what exactly is going on between us hung above them. Before starting the car, she stared at him until he met her eyes-mostly out of confusion due to their lack of movement. "You're being weird," she stated, hoping to get the ball rolling toward un-weird.

"No."

She furrowed her brow. "No?"

"Okay, fine, maybe I am."

"Not maybe," she corrected before realizing she was going to have to take the reigns for the entire conversations. "We kissed."

Her bluntness caused him to widen his eyes, but it wasn't a surprise to him. That was just the way she operated. If she wanted something, she got it. It seemed that now she wanted something cleared up. "Yes, we did."

"And now you're being weird. Is it because we kissed?"

"I guess," he ventured deep into his own mind, puzzled. "You never came back. I thought that maybe…"

"Oh! Fury gave me an early morning mission and it was already so late. I needed to rest, I guess I didn't think to-"

Something clicked. "Yes! That's it!" He exclaimed.

"What's it?"

"The fact that you were so focussed on your job that you didn't even think to say goodnight to me."

At last, the source of his trepidation. Natasha started the car. For the first time in a long while, she wasn't sure what to say.

Elsewhere

Eve's brain was filled with static until she felt his fingertips glide off of her back, resulting in her return to the moment. The seriousness in his approach convinced her-he'd seen right through any of her spiteful intentions to use her body to distract him. In her defense, no official plan had been fully formed. She simply noticed something odd and tried to capitalize on it, rather unsuccessfully. This was partly due to her own apprehension. She'd engaged in sexual activity plenty of times before, sometimes on a whim, sometimes more meaningfully-but those experiences couldn't compare. Loki was so confident, he never seemed to suffer even a moment of doubt. Whether it be in his own actions or his presumptions about others. The ability to read minds gave him a finite advantage over her in every sense of the word. He could see her intentions with his own two eyes and listen to them unravel as she questioned herself internally.

"I'm not sure what you mean," she tried to back away from her teasing, separate herself from it. Maybe, just maybe, she could convince him he had imagined it. He couldn't always be reading her mind. Could he? She hoped this conversation would be her answer.

Loki rested his hand back on his lap, rubbing his fingertips together briefly to forget the sensation of her skin. When he was done with this, he realized the motion had no effect. He couldn't and didn't want to forget. "You know exactly what I mean," he responded.

"All I did was open my book," she went on, pumping every ounce of confidence she could find into her words.

"Oh, I see," he feigned complacency with this explanation. She let her eyes leave his, worried of what harsh words would come next. "Do you think it wise to lie to me? Even if I couldn't hear your every meaningless thought at my leisure, your body speaks louder than your mind ever could. Stay still for a moment, I'll show you." He leaned toward her and she struggled not to lean back. He put one hand on either shoulder and held them where they were. "If you had been upset that I touched you...angry, scared-any negative emotion, really, you would have leaned away. Now, as you can tell," he moved his hands to her shoulder blades now and then delicately to the small of her back, "this angle you're making is leaning into me, not away."

Eve tried to remain emotionless. She tried to take in whatever point he was making without reacting in his favor, but he held her with such finesse, his hands pressing her lightly toward him yet not forcing. When his hands moves again she mourned the loss of contact.

"That's not all," he told her, taking in her absent gaze. He placed his palms on each arm once more and slid them down, all the way to her wrists. "Your arms are on either side of you, even closer to me than the rest of your body. They're open, inviting me in. If you were angry, they would typically be crossed or on your hips." He took his hands away again and grinned. "Isn't it fascinating?" She was stuck in a fog, a haze of desire trickling down her spinal cord and branching out to the rest of her body. She tried to chase the sensation away with logic, but logic was nowhere to be found. Upon seeing her blank stare, he continued. "Do you need more proof?" he wondered aloud.

No, she didn't. Everything he'd pointed out made perfect sense. Proof wasn't what she needed, but she did need something. So she nodded.

He slid his right hand onto her neck and drifted it until his fingertips touched her collarbone. His palm was dangerously close to her chest, grazing the top of her breast slightly. He slipped his thumb underneath the neckline of her shirt and that movement on its own seemed more intimate than anything she'd previously experienced. "Your heartbeat," he observed, his voice low and lustful, "is quickened. Do you feel it?"

Again, she nodded. She neglected to see him now as a criminal. She chose to ignore the indecent things he had done, filled instead with notions of him doing indecent things to her. Everything about him was coated in irresistible sex appeal. His appearance, for one, but every bold, self-assured action, the way he aspired to make everything and everyone his understudy. No one she'd ever met could compare to him, and the strongest attraction she felt was to the fact that he knew it.

Loki could smell her thirst for him growing with each passing second. If she hadn't really wanted it before, she did now. He moved his thumb up and down slowly, caressing her silky skin, and hooked it under her bra strap. She bit her lip-the most telling sign of all. He glided the strap off of her shoulder so it hung down her upper arm, and she made no move to fix it. He was enjoying toying with her, his own personal plaything. As he gazed upon her plump lips, which quivered slightly, he felt a familiar urge in his gut. Would it be so wrong to act on an emotion rather than rage for once? Would it be so wrong to abandon his mission just for a bit to have some real fun?

Eve was shuddering periodically, body unable to handle the ferocity with which he touched her. The motions were simple foreplay, nothing at all, and still she felt more fervor than she'd ever experienced before. If she'd felt at all in control, she would have kissed him by now. There was something thrilling about waiting, wanting him so badly her heart felt full to bursting. She made absolutely no movements apart from her involuntary shivers, desperate to avoid him accusing her of tempting him again. She wanted nothing to stop him this time, whatever hesitations that existed before were extinguished by his touch.

He looked away from her, toward the door.

"No one will be here, you know that," she encouraged him. She felt his hand lift up and leave her and lamented the loss of closeness. She had to speak. He was like a deer she'd frightened away. She felt keen to apologize, but what good could come of it?

"Someone is here," he whispered, "I'm going to change my form again and go check it out." Before she could object, he sprang up and landed his feet elegantly on the ground. She was underwhelmed by the news that someone was at her home, thinking it a lie to be rid of her, and her thoughts seemed to hover around how spry he was, how fluid his body's movements were. He picked up her phone before exiting and winked at her. Her vision trickled down to the curve of his smile, sinful images floating through her brain now.

Loki walked confidently down the hall and peered out the front window. He shut his eyes, trying to get a better feel for where the sensation was coming from. He stepped out the front door, only slightly, and kept one ear listening for Eve. One look to his right and he saw down the street a car parked with two figures sitting inside. He cast an aura around the vehicle so that it would appear to them as though he went back into the house after retrieving the mail. Instead, he strode casually over to it until he could see them clearly. When he spotted the red locks and pouty lips he recognized, he grimaced.

He made his way back to the house, then to the bedroom. The girl hadn't moved even slightly. Her bra strap still hung down her arm loosely. Even though his mind was racing, full of plans to divert the spies, he couldn't help but smile at how nicely she'd waited for him. "I was right," he informed her. Her eyes snapped to his in anxious worry. "We're being watched."