Private Finished And still you call on me...

He received Guinevere's text and was at her apartment an hour later.

Surprisingly, Lochlann was dressed rather formally, or as formal as he would get. He had on a pair of grey dress pants, a collared shirt, and a tie. His shirt was even tucked in and the sleeves weren't too wrinkled.

He had his jacket thrown over his shoulder despite the cold of the day. In the same hand he held a bag that emitted a painfully delicious smell. He looked prepared, even if he didn't feel prepared, when he walked into the apartment and announced himself at the desk. It was weird signing himself in and heading up to the floor.

It was weird to being going to Guinevere's apartment without sneaking in there, but here he was.

He wrapped on the door with his scarred knuckles.

"It's me," he said, and then felt stupid.

———————-
@Kyros

Lochlann blinked in surprise but recovered quickly.

"I can't come tonight," he told her. "So I came now."

It was a testament to the absent year between them that Lochlann managed to avoid the temptation of throwing everything on the floor, picking Guin up, and delivering her to the kitchen table.

He kept his eyes on hers because he knew he would be unable to help the filthy thoughts if he looked at her in pajamas. He didn't look at the gun, either. That was just as bad.

If he could avoid thinking about it, he could avoid the damage that he might cause from it. He swallowed and held out the bag he brought with him. There were two take out containers.

"I brought lunch," he said, ignoring the fact that it was morning.

Normally, Lochlann would have been passed out in bed with a hangover until he woke up in the early afternoon. Now, he barely seemed to sleep.

"My phone died," Lochlann said. "This was easier. I was only a mile or two away."

He hesitated for a moment when she left before he followed her. It was weird doing this, he realized. There was no threat of violence or real fear that kept him tethered in Guin's apartment. She had not ordered him to follow him, so when he came after her--after she'd already stored the gun-- Lochlann realized it was of his own accord.

He felt powerless and powerful all at once.

"You don't have to eat it now," he said, although he was a little bit disappointed for reasons he didn't want to think about.

"And yes," he said. "We need to talk. Do you want to do it, here?"

He glanced around her apartment and frowned.

"I suppose you have some way of documenting my presence," he said. It was something he never really thought of before, but it didn't make sense for there to be any other way. Guin always had information. She was good at remembering details, almost like she had a way to play things back and forth. It was a guess, of course, and she could deny it at any moment.

"If you're planning on black mailing me, though, it won't work," he told her.

He waited for her lead, still holding the two take out containers, although he set his dark jacket on the counter.

Lochlann tossed his head back and laughed.

It wasn't a laugh where he was sharing a joke with her. It was a cold laugh. It was the kind of laugh he gave when he thought he might actually be able to kill her.

"Isn't that pretty much how this whole...relationship...got started?" he asked. He said the word relationship as if he was uncertain of the meaning of it, as though someone else supplied it. But what was he supposed to call it? Their tom foolery? Their fuckery?

She caught her expression though and now he was troubled. He wondered if that fleeting glimpse was because of who he was going to ask the information about.

He almost said I want you but he didn't.

He said, "What were your plans for today?"

The putting on of clothing shouldn't be erotic. It should be taking it off that got him worked up

But maybe it was because Guin bent over and Lochlann had a sudden, viscous flashback to fucking her like that. When she sat down and started to put on the pair of fuzzy socks (for some reason, the detail that she wore fuzzy socks surprised him. She seemed so practical that he expected plain white crew cut, and then he was ashamed that he spent so long thinking about her socks) Lochlann had to close his eyes and take a deep breath.

"I know that you--" he was about to say something pornographic when he shook his head.

"I know that someone is taking photos of students, particularly students with a delinquent background," he said.

He did not sit down on the couch next to her. He did not sit near her. Instead, he pulled out a chair from the table and angled it so he was facing her instead. This seemed safer. There was less of a chance of his resolve crumbling when her leg brushed his or something horrible like that.

There was also less of a chance that she'd stab him.

"I need to know what prompts this person to start taking the photos," Lochlann said. "And who it is. Do you think you can help me?"

"That's what I would like to find out," Lochlann said. "I have my suspicions, but they're just that...suspicions."

He was having a hard time sitting still while her eyes wandered him. He felt strangely hunted, which made him want to hunt her in return. Lochlann was not prey.

He wondered if he should cut to the chase so finally, after a moment's consideration, he did.

"I want to make sure there's no photos of the night she died."

He looked at a space on the carpet inbetween them as if observing a particularly dark spot. Out, damned spot. Of course the carpet, like everything else in her sparse apartment, was bare.

"I just want to get that night behind us--me," he said, unaware of his initial slip-up.

His thoughts drifted back over the last year and his eyes drifted up to her hair.

"You look nice," he said. "With your hair up."

He hadn't been planning on complimenting her and now that he did, he wasn't sure how to take it back.

Lochlann hesitated.

She was blushing and for some reason, that made him want to tell her. It made him want to reveal to her the thing he'd kept secret.

He'd taken a photo of her, with the gun, over Dani's dead body.

He closed his eyes and Lochlann was surprised to hear the faint echo of six shots in his ears. Maybe his ears were just ringing. He gripped the chair he was holding onto.

"I wasn't out of juvie that long, Guin," he said. "It makes sense they'd be keeping tabs on me."

And Dani, too, Lochlann supposed. That thought chilled him further.

"I'm glad you're fine with the idea of people discovering what really happened that night, but I'm not," Lochlann said. His voice had turned a little bit bitter. He'd pretty much lied for her. When his case worker, Hudson, had taken him in for questioning, he hadn't believed Lochlann.

But Lochlann had obscured the truth. Fae weren't supposed to be able to lie, but that's how Lochlann knew he was a real monster. He knew that's why Dani's death was still on her hands.

That night, Guin had said she was there to save him.

To this day, he didn't believe her. Maybe he could understand why she didn't want to seem to believe that he was trying to save her.

Lochlann had expected Guin to ask questions, but he hadn't expected her to ask that question.

For some reason, he didn't blush. He was caught off guard by the question, but he didn't feel guilty.

"No," he said. "I came here to talk to you."

It actually disturbed Lochlann, now that he really had time to think about it, just how very little he and Guinever really knew about each other.

He could count the things he suspected to be true about her on one hand. She had more, probably, but only because Lochlann couldn't really lie.

He'd fucked her more than any other woman in his entire life. The nights they spent together scared him, sometimes, with how intense they were.

And she was pretty much a stranger.

In a way, it was alluring but now?

It just made Lochlann feel kind of sad.

He'd asked her once before and she never really gave him an answer he knew what to do with, so Lochlann decided to ask her again.

"Why did you fuck me?" he asked her.

He meant the first time.

Lochlann considered that.

He might have believed the answer. He was self-deprecating enough to believe it.

But he shook his head.

He didn't believe it.

"No," he said. "I don't think so. You had a knife to my throat. You shot me in the past. You aren't afraid of hurting me. If you wanted information that badly, Guinevere, you had ways you could have gotten it."

He considered this and then his eyes narrowed and he held a low, predatory grin.

"Or are you saying that's what I should be doing now?" he asked. "Should I be trying to seduce you to get information?"

He thought about getting up from the chair, but he didn't. That would be a bad idea and Lochlann was trying not to make too many mistakes this time around. He had the feeling that, no matter how badly he wanted to, sleeping with Guinevere Haze again would be a horrible mistake.

He had never really understood that there might be power in not sleeping with Guin. It just felt like they were both losing.

Lochlann had not been expecting Guinevere's sudden move.

He did not expect her to touch him, either, and he found being kept in his chair by her a rather disconcerting feeling. She did not restrain him in any way--if he really wanted to escape, he could--but he still felt his heart make an uncomfortable flip as though she'd pulled out a pair of handcuffs.

He was trapped under her small, cool hand.

In the past, Lochlann's skin would have been on fire. For much of the time she'd known him he'd been abusing his body and running a constant low-grade fever, a fact Lochlann was oblivious to. He always tended to run a little hot, but it wouldn't be visible to the touch. He'd feel cold, like he did now, but as usual Guinevere was colder.

She looked into his eyes and Lochlann wasn't sure what she was expecting to find.

So far, he'd been honest with her, and so far, she hadn't believed him.

He didn't blame her for thinking his motives were sexual. Even now, with her close, he could feel the tension between their bodies like heat lightning in the summer.

"I came to talk," he said.

He knew he was in danger. He knew he needed to get up and create distance between them or he was going to kiss her. Her lips were so close--all he had to do was angle himself and stand up and then she'd fall right into place.

He could see how easy it with be. He could see how he could fuck her with perfect clarity.

Lochlann was cold but he felt like he was starting to sweat. He swore he could smell sea water.

He put his hand ontop of her own on his shoulder and realized he'd made a mistake. His intention had been to move it but now he was trapped further.

"Please, Guin," he said.