It was only two days later, that Bellatrix found herself sitting by a fire in Tom's sitting room, staring up at him as he paced in front of her.
Her own fury had not yielded in the slightest.
"He said no?" Tom asked as he turned on his heel to walk back again. His usual blank face was set into a permanent frown wrinkling his handsome but aged features. "Are you quite sure of that? There is no hope."
"No," she snapped angrily up at him, "As I have told you a dozen times, no. The bloody fool is more than ever deluded by Grindelwald. He will not change his mind."
For a fraction of a moment, she swore she heard Tom mutter something under his breath, but, by the time she was concentrating completely, there was nothing to be heard. There was only silence until he eventually spoke, "What did you tell him? Who does he suspect is involved?"
It clicked in her mind why Tom was so worried: He feared she had implicated him. She let out a hollow laugh as she shook her head. "Do not worry, Tom, I did not mention you. Rodolphus believes it is only an idea I had."
She knew Tom would probably prefer to hide it, but she could see he relaxed slightly. He turned back to her and his voice was calm again. "That is good. Very good."
"I do not think he will say anything," she replied firmly as she watched him sit down on the armchair opposite her. "Strangely I think he will stay silent about what I said. It does not stop anything. We can still go ahead as planned."
"Then you should try once again to convince him-"
"No," she snapped interrupting him and probably earning his ire. She did not care. "Just leave it, Tom. Rodolphus will not help us."
She did not like this conversation at all. She did not like sitting and discussing Rodolphus with Tom. It could have been tolerable if she could stop thinking that the firelight played wonderfully on his cheekbones and how tempting it would be to just to push him into the leather armchair and straddle him as she rocked against him.
Her cursed longing was back again. She snarled and hissed at it, but it still returned spurned by something about Tom's presence that would not disappear. She countered against it by whispering to herself in her mind, half blood, half blood, half blood, half blood.
Only Tom's voice broke her from her tormented thoughts. "You are quite sure you are ready?" he asked. She thought she might have heard concern in his voice, but she penned it down as a flaw in her ears.
"Yes!" she snapped once again. "It will all go according to plan."
Tom looked at her and smiled slightly.
She cursed her body as a part of her started to tingle.
Erasing any sense of previous decorum and muting her previous mantra, she sprang from her seat. Before Tom could even react, she was straddling him and kissing him passionately.
She still could not understand how she had fallen like this.
It was quite strange. She thought he did not seem like a half blood as he leaned over his desk to examine the list of names they had both been staring at and discussing for the past hour. Each had a tick, a scratch through them, or a small note beside them written in one of two types of handwriting: They had both fought over the quill many times during their debate. They were at least near the end of their list.
It had been six months since she had agreed to this. She was not sure how. One moment she had let slip one minor criticism of Lord Grindelwald to Tom Riddle and she had been sure all her future ambitions were finished. She was Head of the Aurors, a relatively prestigious position for a woman who was only thirty, but Bellatrix had greater plans: Next to the Head of the Department and then to leading the Ministry itself.
After that one slip, she had thought she was finished. She and Tom Riddle had never been friends. She had always loathed the little half blood upstart, who was Senior Undersecretary to the Minister, purely on principle: With his blood status he deserved to be wallowing in some gutter, but instead he had been gifted with prestige and power. She always had made it quite clear she despised him for that fact alone. Her disrespect had earned her his hatred which had only seemed to spiral into more passionate fury with every moment they were in each other's presence.
She had known he would report her words.
He had not.
Instead, he had been surprised by her display of disloyalty and they had both been granted an ally who shared his same goals and aspirations.
Even if they still detested each other.
From Bella's side, she was sure her feelings were the same, despite working together: Only a means to an end
Riddle paused over a name where she had made a note and a very large tick.
"Are you sure about him, Lestrange?" he questioned with a raised eyebrow and an unimpressed gleam in his eyes. "From what I hear, the only thing Wilkes can do is lace his shoes and even then he makes an error."
"Sure," she snapped, not backing down in the slightest. She loathed the challenge to her decision. "I trained him myself. He went through the Auror Training and I personally mentored him."
She did not miss the elaborate rolling of Riddle's eyes. "Then of course he must be fine if you trained him yourself," he drawled sarcastically.
Bellatrix did not miss the implication.
"What does that mean?" she demanded finding her feet and resisting the urge to pull out her wand. She found her heart was racing faster and faster. She wanted nothing more than to curse that smug smile off his face.
It was almost painful to restrain herself.
"You know exactly what it means," Riddle replied smugly, not backing down in the slightest as he faced her with a cool look on his feature and also found his feet. Calmly, he even dared walk around the desk to face her so there were only a few feet between them. "You have no skill. You are only good for your blood status and connections. My dear Bellatrix, you are weak."
Bellatrix lost whatever patience she had managed to muster. Her hand darted for the wand in her pocket faster than most would have been able to catch. Somehow, he did. As her hand brushed the fabric of her robe pocket, Riddle shot his own hand out and tightly gripped her own. Automatically she tried wrenched away from him, but her only reward was for him to grip her other arm the same way.
"Let me go," she seethed with venom looking up at him. She was tall herself, but she hated how he still managed to be a good five inches taller than her.
She pulled harder and harder, but he did not yield. He only stepped closer to her so there was barely any room separating their two bodies.
Smiling he lent closer and whispered into her ear, "No."
She wanted to scream. She wanted to shout or even just use one of her knees to kick or even for her head to strike out against him in some way.
Just not all of her felt the same.
As he was withdrawing with a cocky gleam on his features, somehow something went wrong. Somehow something in her body screamed for something else and all that hate exploded in the wrong way.
Her lips smashed against his in a fiery furious kiss.
It was not unpleasant. He reacted faster than she would have thought. His mouth was strangely cool as their mouth moved against each other's each demanding control. Neither party would surrender, but still the war continued. Her arms continued to flail against his grip, but it was strangely half hearted as he pushed her onto the lounge.
She did not fight that.
As he pressed her into the cushioned surface, her hands were released. In that moment any thought of a wand was forgotten as she struggled to get what she sought out of his trousers and he tried to get her robes off. In all the passion, fire and anger on the couch that day, the anger did not leave.
They merely found another outlet.
In the fogginess of her sleep addled brain, Bellatrix watched the replay of herself in her memory let out a wordless cry as she came on the lounge in the arms of the man she still hated. She might have continued to watch it pan out, if the niggling feeling that something was not quite right had not settled over her. With the practice of one who had learned a number of mind tricks, the feeling increased as she steadily started to waken and finally found the cause.
With a snarl, her eyes fluttered open to stare into the deep blue eyes of Tom Riddle. She was lying on the same bed they had shared before and she must have asleep.
Tom sat beside her. Resting against the head board his wand was in his hand as he focused on her.
"How dare you?" she snipped, pushing herself up into a seating position, she rounded on him not caring about the fact she was naked and the top half of her was exposed. "Do you see me using Legilimency on you when you are asleep?"
"Not that you could," he replied smugly, his eyes scraping down to her breasts.
She scoffed rather than admit the truth. She may be able to use Legilimency but from previous unsuccessful attempts she knew he was right. Sensing this fight was lost, she moved to slide away from him and out of bed, but he caught her around her middle and tugged her back to him.
"I hate you," she hissed, now almost out of practice, as he kissed her. She did not fight back this time.
She would get him back later for now she would keep trying to keep faith with her hate.
Bella loathed admitting it was becoming a losing battle.