AN: Ok, this is toned back from the original version and I hope it's toned down enough to pass for M. I suppose I'll soon know if not, because I have no doubt someone will report me as they have done or threatened to do in the past. I'm gonna say this now, even though I know it won't do a damn thing for me in the long run. K – you need to get that damn mind outta the gutter! ;)
The Funeral of a Good Girl
By – TempestRaces
Chapter Three – Of Dares and Drunken Decisions
When they arrived someone put the stereo on blast and some techno track began to emanate from several speakers all over the lower level at about a million decibels.
The first thing Tempest did on arriving back in the house was move to sneak up to Mia's room to retrieve her own, comfortable clothes.
"Going somewhere?"
She turned to look behind her, a guilty look on her face. Standing at the foot of the stairs was Mia. "The bathroom."
"You better come back in the same clothes you have on now or I will find you and make you change into something you won't like half as much. Live a little, why don't you?"
"Fine," she huffed before stomping up the stairs and locking herself in the bathroom. She braced her hands on the sink edge and stared down the girl in the mirror. Who the hell was that person looking back? The mouthy sarcasm was just her, she couldn't help it. But the being willing to basically fuck a guy just because he was there and knew how to kiss well enough to curl her toes wasn't really her style. She wasn't a prude. She didn't believe in waiting on marriage or anything like that. But she didn't really just pick guys up for the night either. Yet, that was exactly what she was contemplating doing with Jesse's friend, of all people.
Surely an adult had the right to have a vacation fling if she was so inclined? But was she? She left the bathroom. She decided she could only make up her mind after several strong drinks. With a grin, she acknowledged the foolhardy nature of her decision. She always knew she over analyzed everything too much. Maybe she'd give flying by the seat of her pants a try. She walked into the living room and didn't see anyone she knew. Next stop was the kitchen, where she found Mia and Letty.
"Where's everyone else?"
"You mean where's V?" Letty asked with a sly grin.
"No, Jesse actually."
"The boys made a corner store liquor run, they'll be right back."
"Cool." She shook her head, exactly what Mia had just told her sinking in. "It takes four of them to go to the corner store?"
"It takes four of them to carry all the stuff in from the corner store," Mia elaborated.
"Shit."
The girls talked for a few more minutes before the back door banged open and Dom walked in, followed by Jesse, Leon, and finally Vince. They were all loaded with cases and bottles of liquor.
"I didn't think you got to the liquor store cuz so I bought you a quart of gin."
"Jesse, you are my favourite cousin. What'd you get me for mix?"
"Orange juice, lemon juice and grenadine."
"Gin and Sin, my two favourite things aside from my cousin!" She named her favourite drink.
Jesse laughed before kissing her cheek and offering his own for her return, which she pecked there immediately.
"I'ma guess you still drink beer? Mexican beer?" A look of supreme distaste twisted her mouth and crinkled her nose.
"You can have any brew you want, long as it's a Corona," Dom answered for Jesse.
Tempest made a gagging noise. "You will never catch me drinking any beer. Not Corona, not any beer, ever."
"So, gin and sin huh?"
"That's what we named this drink when I came up with it. Not that it's that complicated, but it had something to do with Gin, and things I'm willing to do while I'm drinking it," Tempest answered Vince's question as she added ice to a tall glass before adding about a triple shot of gin, juice and a splash of the red syrup Jesse had provided before stirring it with a straw.
"That sounds interesting."
"Maybe I'll tell you the story someday," she answered with a wink and headed away from him, back toward the living room.
"Not so fast," Vince called, catching up to her and grabbing her arm. "I think we need some ground rules for our contest."
"What contest?" she asked, feigning ignorance.
"It's ok. If you're scared'a me kickin' your ass, I understand."
"Oh it's on now. What rules?"
"Well, if you're going to be mixing triples, either we need a time limit on how long you have to wait between drinks because it's gonna take me a hell of a lot longer to drink three beer than it is you to drink that one drink or some other way to let me keep up."
"Maybe you need to let the pussy drinks have a night off and drink something with alcohol in it." Her raised eyebrow invited him to have a comeback to her comment. He let her down, for once.
"Done. Rum and coke it is. I'll even be nice enough to say my one beer counts as the same as your one first whatever that is."
"Who's gonna keep score?"
"How so?"
"Well, as we get drunker, who's gonna keep track of how many shots each of us has had?"
He seemed to think for a second. "Mia," he finally answered. "She doesn't drink. Too young."
"So'm I. What's the point?"
"Wait up. You're too young to drink?" He wondered what he might have done at races. He hadn't figured her for a minor.
"Well, in this country. Jesse's only two months older than I am."
He breathed an internal sigh of relief. She was legal, just not over twenty one. "Ok then, let's ask Mia if she'll keep track."
"Lets." Mia had told her to party, hadn't she?
After an explanation of what was going to occur, Mia reluctantly agreed to keep score.
"Guess I can't let you outta my sight now," Vince said, forcing his voice to sound like that was a real trial for him.
"Why? Mia can keep track. All we have to do is make sure to tell her each time we make a new drink."
"Yeah, and trust you not to lie about how strong you're making yours."
"Fine, follow me around all night. Makes me no never mind." She headed for the dancing area of the living room.
"No way you're going out there then, Mouth. I don't dance."
"You don't need to dance to watch me from over there and make sure I don't go back to the kitchen."
He shrugged. "I'll be watching you from my chair."
"You do that." She headed into the middle of the crowd as the song changed from straight techno to Whigfield's 'Saturday Night'. She started to dance with Mia and Letty in the middle of the floor and was mildly aware of Vince picking up his guitar on the side of the room, but she decided to tune it out. When the song was over, so was her first drink. She held her empty glass over her head as a signal of what she was doing and started to slide through the crowd to the kitchen. By the time Vince got in with her she was already starting to pour her gin into a shot glass. He made a show of inspecting her glass to ensure it was empty before he let her put anything in it.
He watched as she made herself another triple. "Damn, you feelin' that yet Mouth?"
"Maybe a little. Lemme get this one down and I'll let you know. You gonna make yourself somethin' or are you conceding your defeat already?" By the time he had his drink made she had half her second down. "You better suck it up or you're gonna fall way off the pace."
"But I'll catch up when you pass out."
"I've never passed out. Never."
"I find that hard to believe if you often drink like you are now."
"There's another way to drink?"
"Yeah, they talk about something called in moderation all the time. Never figured that one out myself." He made show of scratching his head.
"I bet there's a lot you never figured out yet though, so who's to say if it really means anything."
"You got a smart answer for everything, don't ya?"
"Mostly." She sucked down the end of her second triple and started making another. "Better remember to inform Mia how much I'm up to now. Third triple vs. you and your beer and one triple."
He swigged his drink down like it was water before grimacing at the strength of it. "Here comes two."
"Now that's what I'm talkin' 'bout." She waited until he had his drink in hand before slinking back into the center of all the Toretto's gyrating friends. She looked toward the corner and saw her cousin making out with one of the blonde airheads from races. She turned away with her finger down her throat mockingly. She went up to Mia. "This makes my third triple. Keep track."
"You're gonna make yourself sick."
"Don't sweat it girl, I know what I'm doin' here."
"He's a big boy. You can't win this one."
"I'll give him a good run for his money. Just watch."
The evening wore on. Vince couldn't believe how much Tempest managed to drink and yet continue to stay upright and continued to dance. He was really feeling all the liquor in his blood and he'd bet she was too, but she was really good at hiding it. By the time the first slow number came along he realized almost her whole quart was gone. Then he looked back into the living room and noticed she was dancing with some guy. Dancing with some guy to music by the Dave Matthews Band. Oh hell no!
One well placed shove and the other man was looking for someone else to dance with. She looked up, angry with him. "What'd you do that for?"
"Cause I'm the one watching you tonight."
"You're startin' to show your drunkenness. That makes no sense. You can still watch me if I dance with people." She watched him shrug. "'Sides, you said you don't dance so if I don't dance with other people, how'm I gonna?"
"I'll make an exception if it means I get to be the one with my hands all over you."
"You had your turn."
"I'll take another one."
She looked around the room. There was only half the crowd from the first of the night left around the place. Dom and Letty were no where to be found. Jesse was gone. Leon was occupied with a blonde girl in a chair in the corner. Mia was sitting on a couch talking to a girl she knew. "Maybe you can leave my ass alone for five minutes this time."
"Where's the fun in that?" He took her question as an invitation to go ahead and grab her. He aped the other men who were dancing with girls, simply swaying around in a circle with his arms around her. Simply to aggravate her, he allowed his hands to roam farther down her back and past her waist. Rather than spitting fire at him, which was secretly his wish she threw her head back and laughed.
"Men are so predictable."
He trailed his lips softly over her shoulder, up her collarbone, and up her neck before nibbling gently on her earlobe. "Still predictable?"
"Nope, you definitely violated my expectations that time."
Despite the fact he was pretty sure he'd decided not to go where he knew it was going with Jesse's 'baby cousin' as the kid called her, he found himself running his hands into her hair to tilt her head up from the place it had come to rest against his shoulder to allow him access to her mouth. When she realized his intent her lips parted slightly in anticipation. He stopped the half assed dancing effort he had been making and held her still with his hands in her curls, cradling the back of her head as he nibbled at the corner of her mouth.
The feeling of his shaggy beginnings of a beard against her cheek made her smile.
"Something funny?" he asked with a smile.
"You tickle me sometimes with all this hair," she chuckled, stroking his jaw line.
"Is that a good thing, or a not good thing?"
"I'm sure it's likely a very not good thing in the long run, but it seems pretty good from the place I'm standing in right now."
Her reminder of how what they were doing was likely going to complicate things threw him for a moment. "You look like you need another drink."
"Since we're tied up I guess that means you do too."
"I guess you're right. Say," he stopped in his tracks on the way to the kitchen. "Do you drink tequila?"
"If I want to wake up as sick as a dog in the morning."
"What are the odds that ain't gonna happen anyway?"
"Not great."
"Exactly. Come on, I got an idea."
"That doesn't bode well for the future of the human race."
"Ha ha." He dragged her into the kitchen and backed her up against the counter. "Wait there."
"Yes sir!"
He didn't retort, just shot her a withering look. He was back a second later with a bottle of pale amber liquid and a shot glass in one hand and a salt shaker in the other. He set them on the counter beside her and got some lime wedges out of the fridge. "We don't have lemons so lime will have to do."
"Are you thinking what I think you're thinking?"
"Likely." He pressed a lime wedge peel side in against her lips. "Come on. I know you know what to do."
She surrendered to his plan, taking the fruit between her teeth. He licked her shoulder, sprinkled her with salt, licked the salt, shot the tequila and took the lime out of her mouth with his own. He shook his head with a grimace as the fiery liquid slid down his throat. "Your turn."
Mia found them a few shots later, Vince sitting in a kitchen chair in a sprawl, Tempest straddling his lap, about to lick salt off his shoulder for her 'absolute last shot of the night, period' which was an ultimatum she'd issued twice already and had allowed him to pressure her past twice as well. Mia waited in the shadows and watched the Canadian girl's eyes screw shut as she sucked the juice out of the lime. As soon as the remains of it were out of her mouth, Vince was hauling her lips down to his. Mia had her worries about where things with them would end everyone up, but she kept it to herself. "Everyone's gone home. Time to head to bed guys. Nights over. It's four am."
"Shit, really?" Tempest leaned over backwards and looked at Mia upside down, using her grip on Vince's shoulders to ensure she didn't tip right back onto the floor. "It's that late?"
"Yeah. You're gonna be so sick tomorrow. Should I get you a bucket for beside the couch?"
"Yes please," Tempest answered with a grin. "I'll likely be using it." She had to go along with the act and she knew it.
Mia left the room to get a bucket, shaking her head in disbelief that anyone could sound cheerful about needing a bucket to throw up into.
"You're not gonna be bunking on the couch tonight, are you?"
"Dunno. Am I?"
"Hell no," he grabbed her hips and pulled her down tight to his lap. "You know what you do to me."
"Annoy you, anger you, tease you, frustrate you?"
"Yes, yes, yes, and oh yes."
She smirked. "Good."
Before he could answer, Mia returned to the room with a bucket in hand. "There you go. Bed. At least the basement stays dark all day long."
"Small blessings," Tempest agreed and climbed off Vince's lap to accept Mia's offering.
"Night." Mia walked toward the stairs.
Leaving Vince to turn off the lights if he was so inclined, she headed down the stairs and started pawing through her suitcase.
A moment later he walked up behind where she was bent over and stopped to enjoy the view. Her borrowed skirt barely covered her ass when she was bent over and he fought an urge to push it up just enough more to see what kind of panties she had on under it. "What're you doin'?"
"Lookin' for my PJs."
"Why?"
"So I can change for bed."
"All the PJ's you need for tonight you got on already under that skirt."
"Smooth," she teased. "You try that line out in your head first, or just go with it?"
"Always runnin' that mouth."
"I can't come waltzing out of your room in the morning without a stitch on, genius."
"I guess not," he agreed. He also grinned at the thought.
She stood up and handed him a bundle of her clothes and Mia's bucket. "I'm gonna take a quick shower and use the facilities. I know where to find you."
"Aw, that's not fair."
"It's not attractive for a half grown man to pout."
He took her hand and pressed it to the front of his jeans. "Does that feel half grown?"
She licked her lips compulsively. "No."
He pulled her closer and put his lips to her neck in the sensitive spot he already knew she liked, where her shoulder joined her neck, before murmuring, "come to bed with me, Trouble."
"Give me five minutes. I swear I won't be any longer."
"Better not be," he relented and watched her wander into the bathroom, slightly unsteady on her feet. He took personal comfort from the fact she'd made out with him sober before she'd done so drunk. She knew what she was doing, it was of her own free will. He took her stuff into his room and turned on the lamp to wait for her, kicking back on his bed after taking his shoes and socks off.
As soon as she had the bathroom door locked she started the shower running full blast. Before getting in she bent over the toilet and made herself throw up. When she stopped the first time she did it again, just to be sure her stomach was empty. She knew it was stupid but the only way she kept up with guys the size of Vince was purging as much of what she took in right back out as soon as she could. She got drunk enough to fool them, but stayed sober enough to avoid having her stomach pumped. She brushed her teeth very thoroughly before drinking three big glasses of water. She used the elastic she'd slid on her wrist in the other room to tie her hair up so it wouldn't get wet and stepped into the shower. She washed quickly and got out. That was about when she realized she hadn't thought to ask for a towel. Then she realized she'd sent all her night stuff with Vince into his room. It was either try to put a leather skirt back on over her wet ass, or just dart to his room in her birthday suit. She opened the bathroom door a crack and peaked out. The living area was in total darkness and there was only one bedroom door with a crack of light under it. She was fairly sure it was the room Vince had indicted as his.
She rushed the door and opened it a crack. She saw Vince reclined on his bed with his eyes closed. She stepped in the room and shut the door. When she turned back to the room his eyes were open and focused on her.
She stepped into his room without a stitch on and still covered in little beads of water which glistened on her skin in the lamp light. He got up with a growl and stalked her across the room.
She watched him come at her like a jungle cat, predatory and graceful. She fought a need to cover her 'private areas' with her hands, not used to letting strange men see her naked, let alone with the light on. To fight the need she fixed her eyes on his and watched him make his way over to her. "I was worried you'd fallen asleep."
"As if I could, hearing the water running and thinking of you naked in the shower." He pulled the elastic out of her hair, letting it fall around her shoulders and back. He took the one step needed to back her into the door and crowd her there, his big body lining up with hers and her hips finding their way into his palms. He claimed her lips with a growl. He never thought back when she was teasing him that afternoon that the night would end with her naked in his room. But she had, and he was going to make the most of it.
Some time later, he settled her against his side with a satisfied smile. She settled in with a happy sigh, draping her arm over his stomach with her hand resting on his hip. She seemed ok, but he knew after the way she had cried out earlier he was going to have to ask. "You ok?"
"Fine, why?"
"I hurt you. I could tell."
"A little, just at first." She shrugged. "It was worth it in the end."
"You're sure you're ok?"
"I'm better than ok. I'm fan-fuckin'-tastic."
"When you say stuff like that to me I want you again. If I wasn't so tired, and starting to downgrade drunk to hung over, I'd keep you up another hour or two."
"I'd have to let you," she finished her answer with a huge yawn.
"I'd have to keep you real interested or you'd fall asleep on me," he chuckled. Something told him he should be insulted, but given what her night had been like he couldn't find it in himself to take it personal.
"Maybe," she mumbled sleepily. Since she had been driving since eight am the day before, she had been up for close to twenty four hours. And what a twenty four hours they had been.
"Go to sleep, Trouble."
"Mkay," she sighed against his chest and did as ordered, for once in her life. He watched her sleep curled against him, her chest rising and falling softly as she drifted before he reached out to pull the sheets over them and turned out the light.
He was always doing things to complicate his life. Jesse's cousin wasn't someone he could just play around with. Of course, he mused to himself, it likely wouldn't be such a hardship to treat her well for two weeks. If they were two weeks with nights like last night, it wouldn't be much of a hardship at all. They both knew she was going home weekend after next, so it wasn't like she was expecting more out of him than company for those two weeks. He had to think she was too smart to think that kind of long distance relationship would work.
It had been nice to sleep with a girl who he was sure wasn't faking her responses simply because of who she was with. Tempest didn't have the personality to fake anything. He had no doubt she hadn't been kidding in the least when she'd told him that if she didn't like the way he did something in bed she would just tell him to do it again. He was sure he more passed out than fell asleep right around then, with questions about how she'd managed to drink so much and not become alcohol poisoned running around his head.