"So. There's nothing between the two of you, eh?" Andromeda said the next day at the family dinner table. Bellatrix glared at her over her bowl of butternut squash soup. She flicked her eyes to her parents, who looked mightily curious, and to Narcissa, who kept eating as though nothing were happening.

"Nothing between…?" Druella asked, leading Bellatrix on, and Andromeda barrelled,

"Between her and Tom Riddle. They've had dinner and tea now, and they've gone to the Wimbourne Wasps match, and they danced at the wedding, and I saw her go outside there with him, and she had dinner with him again last night."

"My. How marvelous," said Cygnus Black III. "He's certainly exceeded my expectations for any bargain we made when we -"

"No, Daddy. This has nothing to do with bargains," said Bellatrix firmly. "He asked me to the Wimbourne match because he had an extra ticket, and we were just getting air at the wedding, and he asked me to dinner because…"

She glared at Andromeda again, knowing how her sister felt about the movement. She decided to let her father find out on Friday that she was becoming a Death Eater. Best to keep that secret.

"Because he wanted to discuss the movement with me," she fibbed, and she insisted, "I really don't want to talk about this anymore."

"There's something between the two of you," Andromeda nodded firmly, and Bellatrix tossed her spoon down into her soup. Her mother gasped, and Bellatrix snarled,

"You Mudblood-loving wench! There is nothing between -"

"Would it be the worst thing, Bella?" asked Narcissa gently. Bellatrix opened her mouth to answer, but suddenly their House Elf came toddling into the dining room, clutching a scroll that was bound with a wax seal.

"A letter for Miss Bellatrix," she wheezed, and she handed the scroll to Bellatrix.

"Pardon me," Bellatrix said, and as she rose from the table, she heard Andromeda say from behind her in a scoff,

"Mmm-hmm. There's nothing between them."

"Silence, Andy," Cygnus demanded, and Bellatrix hurried out of the dining room. She went out into the corridor, put her back to the wall, and cracked open the seal on the scroll. Her heart beat a frantic tattoo in her chest as she unfurled the scroll and read.

I'm bored. Come to Malfoy Manor. -L.V.

She grinned. He was bored? He wanted her to come now? She put her knuckles to her lips. Maybe there was something between them, after all.

Lord Voldemort paced in his office, listening to a wizarding record from the 1940s. Orsino and the Bears. He had brought a drinks cart into the office, for he intended on getting profoundly drunk tonight. He had had meetings all day - with Avery and Nott about their new Ministry postings, with Malfoy about paying rent (which Malfoy refused), with Lestrange about the Daily Prophet. He'd been busy. But now he was bored, and now he was craving Bellatrix.

Bellatrix. She'd been like an insect rattling around his brain these last days. Why she was so insistent in his mind, he didn't know, but she was. She was there, ever-present, ever part of his consciousness. So he'd sent her an owl asking her to come - no, commanding that she come - and he knew she would do it. She'd be here any moment now.

There was a knock on the office door. She wouldn't need House Elf introduction tonight.

"Enter," said Voldemort, and the office door creaked slowly open. Bellatrix came walking inside, looking pretty in a calf-length, modest black velvet dress with long sleeves. Her hair was pulled into a braid, and he could tell she'd been pulled away from something.

"Did I interrupt dinner?' he asked, and Bellatrix shrugged.

"It was just butternut squash soup and bread, My Lord," she said, "and I'd nearly finished. Besides, the dinner conversation was less than enlightening."

"Was it?"

She shut the door behind her, and as she walked into the office, he asked her,

"You didn't mind my summons, then?"

"Not one bit, sir," Bellatrix grinned, eyeing the drinks cart. "Are those for us?"
"Yes. What do you like to drink?" asked Voldemort, and Bellatrix looked thoughtful for a long moment.

"I haven't been drinking long," she confessed. "I'm only seventeen. I like Elf-Made wine."

"Wine it is." He uncorked a bottle using his wand and poured her a generous helping, which he Levitated over to her. He poured himself some firewhisky, and he held his glass up in the air and said, "To calls answered."

"Cheers," said Bellatrix, sipping deeply from her wine. She sipped and sipped and sipped, until Voldemort guffawed and told her,

"You'll be sick."

"Sorry." She lowered her glass of wine and smirked a bit at Voldemort, who sipped more prudently from his firewhisky. He watched her finish off her glass of wine and set it down on her desk, and then she said,

"I know this song! Orsino and the Bears, isn't it?"
"Yes. It was very popular in my youth. But that was ages and ages ago," Voldemort admitted, sipping more firewhisky. Bellatrix walked over to the drinks cart and poured herself more wine, which she drank quickly, so quickly that he told her again,

"You'll be sick."

"I'll be careful," she grinned. But she looked woozy now, after two enormous and quickly downed glasses of wine. Voldemort set down his glass of whisky as the record began playing a slower song, a 40s ballad by Orsino that had been very popular at weddings just after Tom Riddle had graduated Hogwarts.

"Shall we dance?" Voldemort asked, and Bellatrix grinned more broadly than ever. She let him sweep her up into his arms. He put his hand between her shoulder blades, and he clutched at her hand with his. They began to sway, and he confessed,

"I prefer this to dancing at the wedding. At a public place. This is better."

"Is it?" Bellatrix stared up into his eyes, her own gaze glittering, and Voldemort murmured,

"I asked you to come because I was bored."

"That's what you said," she affirmed. "You were bored."

"What did you tell your parents?" he asked curiously, and she scoffed.

"Nothing. I just Disapparated from the house. They don't need to know my whereabouts every minute of every day. I'm seventeen, not twelve."

Voldemort winced a little at that. He rubbed at her back and wished she were older. Why couldn't she be twenty-five, at least? He wouldn't feel like such a… such a…

"My Lord?"

He must have looked distracted. She seemed concerned. He stopped dancing and chewed his lip.

"I wanted you," he whispered, and Bellatrix's eyes went wide.

"You wanted me," she repeated. "What did you want, My Lord?"

"You," he specified, "and it couldn't wait until tomorrow at tea."

Bellatrix's eyelids looked heavy all of a sudden, and she murmured,

"Take what you want. My Lord."

He released her back and her hand and slid his fingers into Bellatrix's curls. He squeezed at her scalp a little and bent down, kissing her forehead and then her cheekbones, one at a time. Her lips came next, gentle kisses planted on her mouth. She parted her lips to let him in, and he pushed his tongue between her lips and dragged it around, coursing the roof of her mouth and twining their tongues together.

He pulled back and whispered,

"You're too short for this."

"I'm sorry. I can't help it," Bellatrix mumbled, laughing a little. Voldemort smirked at her, moving her over along the perimeter of the room until they reached Voldemort's desk. When they were there, he pushed her up onto the edge, so that she was sitting just like she'd been on the table in the dining room the other day.

Bellatrix parted her legs a little, and Voldemort strolled up until he stood between Bellatrix's legs. He threaded his arm around her back and pulled her close to him, and he knew she'd be able to feel his burgeoning erection against the inside of her thigh. His breath mingled with hers, and he pushed her hair away.

"Let me kiss you here," he commanded, though in a way he was asking permission. He put his mouth to Bellatrix's neck, and she moaned gently as he began to lap and suck at her flesh. He dragged his tongue harder and harder, and then, very suddenly, his cock went so hard that he wasn't sure what to do with it.

"Oh, Bella…" The shortened name felt right, and she liked it. She moaned louder at the word. Bella. His hands were all over her then, groping her breasts through her dress, squeezing her waist, grasping her thighs.

"Please let me touch you," she begged, sounding breathless. "Please let me touch your… your…"

"Cock. Say it. Say cock." Voldemort reached down into his robes and unbuttoned his trousers.

"Please let me touch your cock, My Lord," said Bellatrix, and Voldemort tipped his head back as he realised he wasn't going to last half a minute once she touched him.

No. This was going too far. He needed to stop this.

No. He wanted her. He wanted her hands on him. He whipped out his cock. He jerked it toward her and snatched at her hand, wrapping it round his shaft, showing her, teaching her. He showed her how to focus on the tip, how to pump with just the right amount of pressure. She did as he demonstrated, and she breathed through wet, parted lips, her eyes heavy as she stared at him.

"My Lord," she whispered frantically. "My Lord, My Lord, My Lord…"

"Damn it." Voldemort could no longer ignore the tightening within him, and everything snapped. As he came, his ears went hot and his chest went tight, and his come leaped out all over Bellatrix's thigh, all over her black velvet dress.

He should clean her up, he thought. He should touch her until she came. But instead he just kissed her and kissed her and kissed her until their lips were bruised and they could hardly breathe. Bellatrix reached for her wand and Scoured and Siphoned up the mess herself. She tasted like wine. She tasted sweet. She was so delicious.

Tomorrow she would taste like tea.

Author's Note: Things are definitely heating up between these two. What happens when he makes her a Death Eater? How will Cygnus react? How will the others react? To answer a PM for everyone - no, this won't be novel-length. This will just be a romp, and then my goal is to write Part III of the Storm Series.