Issues

Who: Brett and Eris
Where: Her loft
When: Afternoon, around dusk
NSFW

He'd been watching her place for a while before he'd headed over, making sure as much as he could that there was nobody watching. It was a risk, he knew. They were only meant to be swapping notes, keeping away from each other, but he'd moved things along a lot in the last couple of days, and he wanted to bring her up to speed and the easiest way to do that was to go round. Anyway, the secret was out now. Jackson knew, and his employers seemed pretty much to be scattered to the four winds. The rules were changing, and fast.

Still, he'd waited until it started to get dark, and kept an eye out for an hour or so before he headed over, taking the stairs up to her apartment. He was still wearing the new suit he'd gotten that morning, though by now he had a hint of a five o'clock shadow - still much less than he usually had, but not the perfectly shaven look of this morning.

She'd given him a key to her loft some time ago, seeing as how he kept breaking in, so he didn't bother to knock, just letting himself in - noting that the fact that he'd managed to get in meant she was either not at home, or that she'd omitted to fasten all her supplementary locks.

Eris was sitting on the love seat, the record player quietly playing, candles lit around the loft. She was giving herself a manicure, shaping her nails up for the first time since she'd woken back up into the world. There was a soft click as she eased the hammer back into place on Brett's gun, setting it back on the table top when she saw it was him. She had a glass of wine next to said firearm on the end table, and she went back to doing her nails, not actually paying all that much attention to him. "I had been under the impression that there were to be written communications before face to face ones." she stated, tone light.

"Things change," Brett told her, crossing and pouring himself a glass of wine to go with hers. It wasn't his first choice of drink, not that he really drank a whole lot anyhow, but it was the kind of thing that went with the damn suit, and everything else he'd been doing today - certain things he just had to learn. Things definitely change.

A frown flickered over Eris' features as Brett actually poured himself a drink--and wine at that--and that was more when she noticed the suit, and the shave, and everything. It was a little bit like she was looking at a different person, and it threw her. Just a little, but it did. "Bad day?" she asked, holding her hand out before her to be sure her nails were shaped all evenly, and since they were, she set the file down as well and picked up her wine instead.

Brett walked over to stand before her, taking a sip of the wine and swallowing it down. It had a heavy aftertaste that he didn't much appreciate and it didn't have the familiar burn of whisky, but he could deal as long as he didn't have to drink much of it. He wondered if it was meant to be good stuff or not - or if he'd even know the difference anyhow. "That depends on your definition. I put a downpayment on a place for us. And, apparently, if you throw enough money at a tailor, he'll work through the night for you." He paused, trying to decide whether to ask her opinion or not. On the one hand, he felt like he shouldn't give a damn. On the other, he not only did, but he knew that it was important to get things right and she was a much better judge than he was. "So - would I pass?" he asked, an edge in his tone reflecting that indecision.

She let her gaze travel over him, then stood up, and made a slow circle around him, til she was standing more towards his side as opposed to stopping in front of him, like she probably would have if her mind were in a better place. "It's nicely tailored." she told him. "You pass." It was nice. It was something that had very much the look of something that had been made specifically for him, nothing off the rack. Previously, she may also have reached up and adjusted the lapel, even if it didn't need any adjustment, but she didn't. One thing that stood out for her was she liked him better with a day or so of scruff, as opposed to his shaving properly. Turning, she took her glass up again and sipped from it, sitting back down on the loveseat in the manner she had been--feet up on the cushion with her, and she eyed her toes critically. That was one thing about being a part of high society--every piece of you had to be perfect if you were a woman.

Brett downed half the glass of wine and set it next to hers before breathing a heavy sigh and shrugging off the jacket. "Good," he said, actually sounding relieved for once. He loosened the tie as he threw the jacket over one arm of the loveseat and sat down in a nearby chair, pulling it slightly closer. "They say the tux is gonna take another day or so, but I wasn't as concerned about that one. I ordered another suit as well, and they threw in some shirts, and some silk ties. Hope you don't mind me spending that money of yours." He didn't sound very much like he'd be sorry if she did though. He'd spent what he'd needed to - he was just hoping he hadn't actually been ripped off doing it. He was well out of his comfort zone here. He'd been relying on his physical presence to stop people from thinking that conning him was an option, but he kept to himself the worry he had at the knowledge that he might not be able to tell if they were.

Without looking up, she picked up the file again, and started in on her toes. "Don't throw your jacket there. Hang it up." she instructed. "Nice suits stay nice by not tossing them around like you got it from a thrift store." Eris took another sip from her glass and set it down, filing more. His talking about the money had her thinking again about what was in the box. The other things that she'd had in there that she'd meant specifically for him, even if she'd not mentioned. It had really only been in her death wish, that he'd eventually get the box, and the last little shreds of Julia could belong to him. Now it was different, and she still didn't know what to do. Or if he even had looked or if he'd thrown them away, or what. He'd of course not said. She wasn't bringing it up now, either. "Good." she said to what he had set up. "Where is the building?" she asked. "What's it like?"

She was all but ignoring him and that irritated him. He'd come here still all dressed up and he'd never admit it, but some of that was for her. And she'd hardly glanced at him, except when she was inspecting him and yeah, he'd relaxed and all, but he wasn't used to things the way she was and she was just treating him like part of the furniture anyhow. He stood and grabbed the jacket from where he'd tossed it, saying nothing as he went and hung it up and then returned to sitting again. "Probably smaller than you'd like," he said, his voice tight and he stared at her, almost daring her to look up now, since she wasn't. "Top two floors in a brick built, uptown. Elevator's decently done, guy on the desk at the front. Office space with an apartment attached, and there's space to grow on the lower floors, once we start making money," he told her, keeping it simple.

"Two floors is bigger than I expected." she said, a note of at least mild approval in her tone, even if she still didn't look up. It wasn't that she missed his tone, it was more she was just not letting herself fall into the same sorts of traps she usually did with him. Which meant keeping herself to herself. Or, that was the running theory. "And an apartment--very good. How many floors is the building in total, and the man at the desk, what's he like?" she asked. Business. Dealing with business, like the stupid little touches she was doing with her nails, and her hair, and her skin, trying to get everything just right. Sure, there was the absolute glaring wrongness that was the scar ringing her neck, but she was trying to think around that at the moment. She was dealing with what she could, and trying not to overly focus on what she couldn't.

He hated the fact that he caught onto the approval in her voice and felt better for it. Even more so because she was still fucking ignoring him. He wasn't like some damn puppy that had just done a trick for the first time. "Eight floors. And the guy knows his business. Polite, well presented - looks like the kind that can keep his mouth shut and his hands to himself. And I don't know him, which means that he probably doesn't have a record, and it's unlikely he works for the Syndicate. That's two out of three, and it's not in DiGiovanni territory. About as neutral as you can get."

Nodding, she set the file to the side, and picked up the blood red nail polish she'd picked up, and she started to carefully paint her toenails. "Sounds about as ideal as we're going to get." she told him. "Thank you for taking care of it." And she was still ignoring the issue of what was in the box. She was. She was she was she was. Though in 'ignoring' that, she latched onto another subject. "Have you spoken with Jackson?" she asked, tone far lighter than was indicative of her mood or her feelings on the matter.

"You could say that," Brett said, not sounding exactly happy about it. "Went and found him yesterday - it... He's going to be a problem. He says he's not going to be, but I don't fucking believe him. We need to factor him in as being a problem." It was one of the reasons that Brett had stepped up what needed to be done, had moved quicker on everything that he'd first thought he would. He'd taken some risks, but the biggest risk of all right now felt like it was going to be Jackson, so they couldn't hang around.

"What did you tell him?" she asked, her tone the same. She ticked her gaze up towards him, but only for a fraction of a second before she went back to painting her toenails, letting the curtain of her hair fall to obscure most of her features from him. Even if she was doing a decent job of covering, it was a natural tool to use in that respect.

He caught her gaze as she looked up, but then she looked away again and he tightened his jaw. She was giving more attention to her fucking feet than to him. He knew this game, people had played it with him before - superiors wanting to put their damn 'minions' in their place, and now she was doing it to him. Like he was just there to report. "To stay the fuck away," he told her, his voice tight, controlled, verging on angry. "That I had plans, that they were gonna get me out, but that I needed you for them and he was gonna screw them up if he kept sniffing around."

She paused momentarily, before finishing a final paint stroke, and then she set the nail polish aside, and leaned over to blow gently at her toes. She didn't answer him for a few long moments, assessing what he said. "How did you word it?" she asked. "If you took my advice, we'll need to change our plans." she said. "At least so far as how our...arrangement...will be viewed by the public." she said, opting out of naming things by the 'r' word. After all, hadn't she been brooding on that for the past few days to begin with? That she'd thought there was one present when there wasn't one? So, she definitely kept the word out of things entirely, not wanting to go anywhere near there.

"I didn't tell him we weren't involved," Brett told her, all but twitching now about the fact that she was continuing to ignore him, treating him like he just didn't matter at all. "So nothing needs to change there. I didn't actually lie to him at all. ...Wouldn't have made any difference anyhow," he added.

Again, there was a pause, and she ticked her gaze back to him for another just tiny flicker of a moment, before they were back on her toes, blowing on them some more. "If you didn't tell him that," she said, not repeating his wording, keeping it vague. "Then it may well have to change. It turns up later that he can catch you in a 'lie', that may make it worse." she said. Part of her wondered if she was trying to put the out out there. But whether it was for Brett or for her, she wasn't positive. Now, before everything happened, she would have known exactly what her motivations were, and how she expected him to react. Hell she would have set it up specifically so he went in a certain direction. Which just reminded her that she wasn't nearly up to par here. She wasn't good enough to be doing this. And she'd decided that was what she was doing, too, this wasn't a very adept start. You had better get a lot better a lot faster.

"Are you trying to tell me you want to change it?" Brett asked, amending what he'd thought before, considering that this might actually be her way of telling him that whatever they'd been doing was over now, distancing herself from him. He inserted this new possibility into his assessment of things and tried to ignore how it made him feel. "Because if you do, just fucking tell me straight, instead of fucking painting your damn nails and leaving me hanging here," he snapped, standing and stalking off to pour himself a proper drink.

She looked up again, watching him cross to get a drink. Well at least it wasn't wine. Though it still told her that something was the matter. Brett just wasn't the guy who ran for a drink first thing. That was her job. "I'm painting my nails, because I have to be perfect." she told him, tone light, that same sort of tone she'd been hiding behind since he'd arrived. "As a woman in this city especially, but in this business in general, in the public eye and high society, I have to be flawless. It's just one of the rules. I also have to look as if I've been flawless the entire time. As if even when I was 'missing' that nothing ever so much as made a dent in that. They're insignificant details to you, but I know what I'm doing." she finished. "You can get away with looking fine, and falling back on looking intimidating. The fact that the scars on your neck just slightly show is even a benefit, in your position. I don't have the luxury." And hey, here was her not thinking about things again. Like the scar on her neck. "I was saying that things may need to change, depending. If I had wanted to tell you I want to change it, I would have said so plainly." Which, at the moment, wasn't strictly true, since she still didn't know if she was putting the out on the table for his benefit or hers. She was just ignoring that. "What's happened today that you're drinking?" she asked.

You did. He downed the rest of the drink - not that the one he'd poured himself had been that large in the first place, but it felt good to throw it back properly. "This?" he asked, pointing with the glass at her, but he stepped away from actually following that up with his answer at the last moment. "You're always fucking perfect," he told her, before heading off toward her bathroom. "I need a shower," he threw back in her direction, without looking at her. It was a lie, he knew. What he needed was to not be around her for a few minutes. She'd well and truly gotten to him and he needed a few minutes to even out, get back on top.

It reminded her of when they'd been arguing, and she'd been in the bath, and he'd abruptly announced he was going to bed. Just, in the middle of apparently 'things' even if they weren't shouting at one another, and whee! Bailing out. "No, I'm not. I have to fake it." she said, though it was more under her breath than said for his benefit. They'd had that discussion at some point. The night she'd gone to see him at Gray's, dropped everything, and gotten what she considered 'pretty' for him. She'd dressed up, worn perfume, tried to do her best with what she had, and not only had he not noticed in the slightest, but he later more or less told her that he wasn't ever going to tell her anything like he thought she was beautiful. As far as she was concerned, it was well possible he didn't. Beauty was, after all, in the eye of the beholder. Purely subjective. "You've not answered the question." she said, this time more for his ears. "Either one, really." Vaguely, in the back of her mind, she realized she was doing it. Asking him what was wrong, and not really letting it go. Like she usually did, like it always annoyed him to no end. Deeper down there was that needling sting that reminded her that if the situations were reversed, he'd not care and never ask. Hell, even she knew that aside from this sidetrack into irritating him because of her inability to let things drop with him, she was likely behaving strangely. But he hadn't so much noticed, as far as she could tell.

He stopped, and then turned on her. "I didn't tell him, because I didn't need to - he's already got it into his head that I'm... Some kind of lovesick fucking fool for you. Most of what I had to say was damage control on that front, trying to convince him that I knew what I was doing and you weren't just leading me around by my dick. So, no, I don't think our plans need to change. And I don't think it'd do much good even if they did. And I'm drinking because you... You... Are the single most annoying fucking bitch around."

Eris stared at him for a few long moments, just letting that sink in. She knew there was something to examine in the first part of his statement, that she really needed to revisit that because it sounded different that way than it had earlier with what he'd said--but her mind was stuck on that last bit. The 'single most annoying fucking bitch around' part. That was slightly more pressing in her mind. She reached for her glass of wine, and took a bigger drink of it than she normally would have, almost killing the glass, but not entirely. Really, it was only because it had been a rather large glass of wine to begin with, and she couldn't swallow it in one go. "What exactly have I done now?" she asked.

"Right. So, what? I have your attention now?" he snapped at her. Yeah, he really should have gone and had that shower, but he'd been holding everything in for the last couple of days. Trying to be good, trying to play the role that he'd need to be able to play for this to work and damn but it felt good to have an outlet, though he knew that he'd regret it, because this outlet would tell her things that normally he'd keep to himself. Blowing off like this always left him vulnerable. "First fucking time. You've hardly looked at me since I got here - except when I specifically asked you to. I've been working my ass off, last few days, getting things organised and I know that game - that 'let's show you how little you actually matter' game. I just didn't expect it from you."

"You think this is some display of power, some play set up to show you where you're meant to rank?" she asked, blinking a little at his sudden tirade. Really, she hadn't expected that. Like she hadn't expected to have it thrown in her face that she'd been specifically keeping her eyes off of him. First off because she hadn't much expected him to notice, but beyond that, that it bothered him. Apparently enough to shout at her about it, at any rate. "Why is my looking at you or not important here?" she asked, truly mystified there. It didn't fit in with what she knew of Brett, her experiences with him. Hell. With the self-image he had going on and the scars he was so twitchy about, she probably would have guessed that he'd be happier if she paid less attention to him, since she knew her natural tendency was to watch his every move. So, she was thrown there. "And I've thanked you for what you've done, and you even did better than expected. I--would it not come off as less of an arranged equal partnership if I had opted to give you a cookie for doing your end? Wouldn't that come off more like you were just a minion doing my bidding?"

"What the hell am I supposed to think? Since it's a fucking one-eighty to how you'd normally be," he pointed out. "So, yeah, I think you're doing it for a specific-fucking-reason. And I'm not after any fucking cookies either, or a pat on the fucking head," he snapped, thinking for a moment back to the approval he'd actually gotten from her, that barest hint, and how it had made him feel better. Damnit. That just wasn't fair. And made him feel like he didn't know what he was doing here, which made him question whether maybe she was right here and he was just overreacting - which just made everything worse.

Not letting herself snap back at him, she looked away, still trying to piece together what the fuck was going on here. Because she felt out of her depth. Like she'd missed a step somewhere, and she wasn't sure where that was. Considering she'd felt that way since the other night in the first place, it was particularly unnerving for her. "How am I meant to be?" she asked, tone even lighter than it had been since he'd arrived. She also didn't look back at him until after she felt slightly less ready to go find the bottle of wine she'd started and finish it off from there. The urge for another drink was looming in the back of her mind now, the promise to drown out all the bullshit emotional confusion she didn't want to be feeling.

He didn't exactly know how to answer that question, and the fact that he didn't have an immediate comeback stalled the angry tirade some. He could only actually keep it going if he got into a rhythm with it. As it was, she cut through that, as she had a tendency of doing. "I don't know," he told her, after a moment or two, sounding more annoyed that angry now. "Yourself?" He stopped again, for a moment, looking away, then back at her once more. "What was that about? If it wasn't... what I said. Or was it really just that your damn nails were more important?" he asked, waiting for her to tell him that it was just all about her nails. If that was what it was, he knew he had a hell of a lot to learn about women, but at least he'd know.

Myself? And how is that exactly? Plus, sweetheart, you don't like me. I think that's been fairly well established in our tenure together, and you've really done nothing to change that point of view. Or more, I just learned my lesson, and it took me a while. But it's learned now. It's there. What's your fucking problem with it now? went through her mind, but she didn't share it. Instead she did get up and went to pour herself another glass of wine, filling her glass up to full before she started. She decided her habit of drinking from the bottle was the first one she had to start avoiding. That wasn't ever acceptable. The motion allowed her to turn her back to him for a few long moments as she gathered herself back together. "You'll need to be more specific. Are you talking about the part where I wasn't looking at you, or the part about the public face of things?" She was still avoiding the word 'relationship'.

Brett tracked her as she moved, and for once didn't try and take the alcohol away from her. They were already in one fight, he wasn't feeling up to another right now - and it would only sidetrack things. Right now he was feeling pretty damn lost, and he hated that feeling. "Let's go for both, should we?" he suggested to her.

"Fine. What would you like me to answer first?" she asked, taking a long drink from her glass, and she turned, leaning her back against the cabinet, glass held in against her shoulder lightly, her other arm hugged across her waist. She looked towards him, but not necessarily at him. She didn't make eye contact, at the very least, even if it probably looked like she was looking at him fairly appropriately. Since that was one of the things she was up on trial for tonight.

"Pick one," he told her, never taking his eyes off her. He needed her to straighten things out for him, and feeling as he did like he'd gotten lost somewhere along the way, he couldn't direct her in that. He didn't trust himself to know how to.

She briefly rolled her eyes, glancing fully away this time, because that was a nice cop out for him, now wasn't it. Demanding answers, and then not even giving her some clue as to which answer was most important to him--the reason she'd asked him to choose in the first place. In the end, she exhaled slowly, took another long drink, and tried to line her thoughts up properly, aware the longer she took that the more it would appear that she was trying to make up a plausible reason as opposed to her real ones. "You've stated that you have assessed Jackson as a threat. That he will be a problem. When I asked you about things, how you phrased it seemed as if you had merely set me up to be an asset to you, presented me as a tool you required to meet your own ends." Much like I think you have, even if it isn't in this way. "It's a sellable line. I'm fairly used to being an object anyhow," Am now, as a matter of fact. "He could likely understand that and feel better that you weren't held under some ridiculous sway. Considering how I understood what you said to me, I presented the possible necessity of needing to change things, to fit what you've said to him. If he's already a threat, you coming out looking like you were lying to him would only exacerbate that." She finished, drinking from her glass again. "Why exactly did it bother you?"

"You phrased it like you wanted out," Brett told her. "I told you that I'd handled it, and you kept pushing, saying that we might need to change things, depending on what I'd told him. Wouldn't be the first fucking time you've tried to say something's for my good when it was just being what you wanted it to be." If you don't want me any more, I'd prefer it if you just told me to my face. He couldn't think of a way to say that that didn't make him sound needy, so he left it out. "Jackson assumed that you had me under your thumb. When I went to talk to him, that was his starting point. That I couldn't see straight, because you were blinding me. I didn't try and deny there was something between us - if I had, he wouldn't have believed me anyway and I didn't want to lie to him. And not just because it would cause problems in the future. But, yeah, I set you up as an asset - but not just an asset. I tried to balance it out some. If he walks away thinking we're using each other, then so be it." Brett could live with that.

Eris exhaled in a long, controlled sigh that she made sure had no sound to it. "Actually, I didn't word it like that. As a matter of fact, you immediately yelled at me for the fact that I didn't. You were pissed that I wasn't just 'telling you straight'." she pointed out. "And I hardly pushed. You told me what you did, I thought about it and put out there the obvious possible course of action." You know what I'm like when I push, and that wasn't it. It made her wonder why he was putting it like that. Maybe it was just because that was her expected behavior. So even when she didn't do it, he was imagining she was. It was possible, she'd used that very tendency in the way the mind worked to her advantage before. She just didn't happen to be doing so now. She ignored the part where he was back to all but saying she was nothing but a selfish bitch. That she was used to by now, though it played into the growing darkness in the back of her mind that was this mess. She caught the implication that it was true that there was 'something between' them but she chalked it up to the physical. Her first impulse was to try and look for how else that could be taken, but that was what had got her into trouble in the first place, so she stamped that down pretty quickly. That's how the little delusions started in the first place. she reminded herself.

"You might not have..." Brett started, then stopped. God, he hated this. He hated that fact that this put him out there, that this was even an issue. And that he was going to have to admit it to her. "It sounded to me like you were suggesting that we just called it a day. That side of things. Kept things strictly business. That that was what you were after. And yeah, I got pissed at that - because if that's what you want, you can say that to my face." He knew he could say more, but part of him felt very much like he'd said too much already.

And why would that even matter to you? Anything we did in public was meant to be some display in the first place, wasn't it? But you're not talking about that. Or I don't think you are. But I don't know if I can tell anymore. "Maybe you should go take your shower." she said. She recognized that she hadn't even answered the other question, and that she wasn't actually addressing what he'd just said, but she didn't even know how to start there. If she did, if she actually got into it, it was going to wind up going back to her and how she felt about things, and mistakes made, and--it would be a mess. She knew it would be a mess. But he hadn't asked her anything there. He'd not requested more information. So maybe it would be safe. Or maybe it would set him off like everything she was doing seemed to just now, not that that was new. Actually, thinking about it in that light, it just sort of added more fuel to the fire. Apparently no matter how she behaved, it was 'wrong'. Fabulous.

He didn't move, but her words felt like a confirmation, even if she'd denied it before. "Do you want this just to be strictly business?" he asked her, not entirely sure he wanted an answer there. But still, he'd asked the question. Maybe he should have just gone and taken that shower.

This time when she drew in a breath and let it out, it was more obvious. She shut her eyes, and finished off her glass of wine, pouring herself another. It gave her something to look at that wasn't him while she spoke, even if she felt wholly unprepared for speaking. "The public face of our arrangement, as we discussed initially, was always going to be a play, was it not?" she asked. It was kind of rhetorical. "It was meant to look however we were going to present it, not necessarily indicative of anything else." She took another drink, a big one, and topped herself off. "So at the moment, I'm quite confused as to whether you've forgotten that, or what it is you're really asking about. So please, sweetheart, clarify for me. It would be appreciated." She looked back over her shoulder at him, but didn't turn to face him again.

"I'm not that good an actor," he told her, hating to have to admit it. "If our public face is that we're not... together... Everyone's still gonna know that... I want you. So, it would make no difference what I told Jackson. So if you're telling me you want to play it a different way. I guess what I'm asking is - do you actually want it to be different. I..." He bit his tongue at that. He'd read the situation entirely wrong, let his own fucking insecurities get in the way and this is where they led him - looking like a fucking needy idiot in front of her, entirely exposed, waiting for her to shoot him down. Right where he'd never wanted to be.

This time she turned, and she looked at him for a few long moments. She didn't actually clear anything she said with her brain first, and part of her blamed the alcohol, and part of her blamed the brain damage, but whatever lay at fault, part of that wall she'd had up around herself cracked. "Look, I had things wrong." she said. "I...misinterpreted things, and you were clear--I know you were, looking back, I'm aware that you were very, very clear with everything so it's my own fault on this, but I understand now." And none of that made any fucking sense. "I'm just trying to keep things where they're supposed to be, and it's a little hard for me, and I really hate that it's hard for me, that I'm not...right." She made a vague gesture towards her temple to indicate what she meant there. Her slightly scrambled brains. She stopped a second and tried to get things to line up in her head so she could make proper sense, understanding she wasn't. The words she was saying only made sense to her only held meaning within context she hadn't given. "You've said you want me but you've made it plain that that's where it stops. I was...straying from that, I suppose it's just my own faulty wiring, but I'm trying to correct it. You're making that difficult, when it now appears that no matter what my behavior might be, you're upset with me for it. I don't understand why." She recognized her voice had gotten more and more strained as she spoke, and she took a moment to drink a little more wine, and try to reign it in again. "I don't understand what I'm doing wrong now, unless you really just came here to take out your frustrations." as usual.

"I came here to bring you up to speed with where we were. I came here to check I hadn't missed anything. I came here because..." I wanted to see you. "This isn't what I'm used to," he told her instead. "Any of this. The suit, the building. The wine. I don't know if I'm doing any of it wrong, or right, or at all. I have this idea of how I'm meant to act, but I need you to tell me if I'm screwing it up. My life, right now? Any of this, everything - I don't know... What. Any of it. On any level. Fuck." He turned and walked away, running a hand through his hair. "You said you misinterpreted, Princess - what did you mean by that?" he asked, without looking at her.

"That. That right there." she said, making a vague gesture towards him even if her tone lacked any accusation. "You came here to work out the kinks of the business ends of things that you aren't used to." she said. "See? You're clear. Only I still don't quite understand because...everything's business, only you're seeming angry with the idea that it's all business, and--" she stopped again. Rambling wasn't going to help her. In fact, it probably would only make everything worse. Funny she was looking at him now and he was the one averting his eyes. "I thought...things might be different." she said, having trouble with the words, very clearly. She sounded unsure of everything, her word choices, what she was saying at all, the sentiment behind it. "When we laid things out, you said you wanted me, and that was it. I worded it...differently, and you very much indicated it wasn't acceptable, but I didn't quite get that properly then. I do now. I'm correcting it." Now please just stop fucking making it harder than it already is. Please. I really can't deal with this.

He got it then, he saw what this was about. "You - This is because I didn't like the word 'relationship'?" he asked, though it didn't overly sound like a question. She'd said that she'd hoped things might be different. Did that mean she'd wanted...? Or was he just reading things wrong again. He had no idea. He didn't know about any of this, or how to handle this. Things were complicated, really complicated. he didn't know how to deal with complicated.

"No, Brett, it's because I'd thought it was one." Eris said, and she was looking away again. "I'm going for a walk." she added right on top of that, taking a few moments to down the glass of wine, and she set the glass down with a clink, and started to head towards the door. She kept her eyes away from him, not really wanting to see him flinch over that little revelation of hers, certain that that would be his reaction. Some level of twitching, since he'd been so clear about how it wasn't one, and she'd of course gone and blurred the lines. She needed to be better than this. jesus.

He did flinch, rocked by that. But he still managed to cut her off before she reached the door, stepping in front of her, putting his hand on her shoulder. "Wait," he said, not entirely sure how he was going to follow that one up.

She stepped back immediately, outside the range of where he could touch her, but only just. "What?" she asked, looking off beyond his shoulder, instead of at him. It was a middle-ground look though, she wasn't really focusing on anything. "I get it. You're in the clear. This is my personal fuckup, and I'll deal with it. Just...make a slight attempt at being patient with me." I know it's not your forte.

"It's just a word." That sounded wrong, as he said it. A sop. He didn't entirely know what he was suggesting with that either. Except he knew that he wanted them both to be okay with everything. He wanted them to both be on the same page. It was important to him. It was necessary. When they'd talked before, agreed - he hadn't realised. Now, he didn't know what that meant. But he couldn't just let it go.

"If it was just a word, then it wouldn't be a problem." Eris said first, without thinking it through. But, after it was said, it made the most sense. "And beyond that, I've just told you that it wasn't about you not liking said word." Because it wasn't, really. That was just the clearest example. "Can you please move?" she asked, moving over across from him, so she could get her shoes. Not that she should be putting shoes on at the moment, with her nail polish just done, but she could start over later.

"Not a problem for you, or for me?" he asked her, not answering her request, but not moving either. "What else was it about?" he asked.

She skipped the first question, because the second one was the more pertinent, and the one she least wanted to go into. She'd already pretty much made a fool of herself, and made herself wide open and full of vulnerability, right there for him to shatter all he wanted, and so yeah. Going into the rest of it wasn't something that made her list of things she wanted to do today. "Does it matter?" she asked.

"Until you tell me, how am I to know," Brett said, not taking the out he knew that he could do. Drop the subject, let it go, step back, not have to go into potentially difficult territory.

Store issues up for the future to explode at the worst possible time.

There. That was the rub. Maybe once he would have done it, but now there was more at stake. Fuck.

Eris shook her head, and looked away for a long, hard moment as her jaw set and she tried very hard not to do something rash. She managed to hold it back, but it was difficult. "The fact that it may not is fairly telling, don't you think?" she asked him as opposed to just launching into an explanation she didn't want to give. "It's pretty obvious even if it matters, it doesn't to you."

"It matters," Brett told her. If it matters to you, it matters to me, he thought and would have said if he hadn't been sure she'd latch right onto that as him saying still that it didn't matter to him, not really. "Tell me."

She walked away, towards the window, needing space from him and if he wasn't moving from in front of the door(and she wasn't stupid enough to even try to make him move), she was going for the second best thing. She went to the window that overlooked the incredibly hazardous fire escape, and opened it wide, sending the lighting in the room dancing as the air current flickered the candle flame. She sat on the sill and drew in deep breaths, trying to get a little calm and clarity. This was a process that proved much less helpful than she would have liked, but it wasn't entirely ineffectual. When she started talking, it was also far less planned than she would have been comfortable with. "I don't know what you want from me. I've been doing a lot of thinking, and that's where I caught my...let's call it an error, shall we?" she asked rhetorically. "I know you require me for things. I am, for all intents and purposes, an asset to you. Not the wisest of choices, but we've gone over that and I'm not up for arguing it again." She paused, still drawing in deep breaths, feeling a little like she was suffocating again. That feeling she'd been having for a while now. "While I understand being an asset, I had believed there was more to it than that, in the various ways we can consider the term. I am aware this was in my head, I apologize for..." she tried to find a word but failed, and in the end she just didn't finish the thought.

By the time she finished talking, Brett looked well and truly confused. Not that she was looking his way at all. "You're... You know that whole... Thing was just what I told Jackson..." he said, sounding as baffled as he looked. "I don't - I didn't mean it like that. I had to make him - they were terms he could understand. I - You asked me if I understood about the public face. Now I have to ask you if you do." What did she think - that this was all actually just for show? That he just wanted her for sex like she was still some... whore. He hoped not. He felt dirty just entertaining the idea that that was what she thought.

"Yes, I do. The public face as it had initially been thought of--thought I admit that at the moment I may be mistaken on this--was that we'd play a playful sort of 'couple' that was unofficial as of society standards, but the worst kept secret we could make it. You would behave as if you were jealous should anyone pay more attention to me than we were happy with. So on, and so forth." she said. She was silent for almost two minutes before she spoke again, watching the rain outside. It had been on and off all day, and she kept watching drops form then drip off the rusted metal of the fire escape. It was a jump when she started talking again, a real break from where she'd left off, but that was where her mind went to. It tracked from where she'd left off, there were just leaps in the meantime that she didn't articulate. "Everything you know about me I have told you." She paused, frowning to herself and looking down. "Nevermind. Strike that from the record."

Not everything. I know what you looked like when you were a girl. But even that, and the rest of the things in the box - she'd told him where to get that, hadn't she. And he still felt uncomfortable that he'd seen that, as though he'd invaded her privacy. He didn't know whether she'd meant him to. Or whether she'd forgotten that it all was there. Maybe she'd just forgotten and she hadn't meant him to see at all. "You're not mistaken," he confirmed for her. "But maybe I am. You seem to have a firmer line between what is real and what's for show."

"What was your assessment?" she asked, having mixed feelings again. It was harsher this time, because it was all so close to the surface. But she was relieved that he left the last comment entirely untouched, and upset because it yet further confirmed that he didn't care about anything of the kind. It was a double edged sword if there ever was one.

"I would be jealous of anyone paying you that much attention," he told her, his voice tightening slightly at the very idea of it. "And I couldn't just stand by. What we set up? You're not asking me to 'pretend' there. The only thing we're pretending with that set up is that you're the one in charge. The rest... Is just how it is. That's my assessment."

It was news that he'd be jealous. That was what hit her first. It was also news that apparently the play they'd talked about wasn't such a front, just that minor detail altered. It had her looking back over her shoulder at him finally. He was still by the door, not having moved from there. She had an irrational little distant thought where she wondered what he would do if she actually attempted to leave via the fire escape. Saying nothing for a few long moments, she just watched him. "When we'd discussed it, I had been under the impression that it was a public face, not..." 'real' was where that sentence ended, but she didn't want to say that for some reason.

"I didn't mean to mislead you," he told her, almost formally. He'd thought she knew. He'd thought it had been pretty clear. When they'd started this, that he didn't just... She'd known how he'd been with her girls. Or, rather, not been. He didn't just cave for physical gratification. She'd known that about him. Only, apparently, not.

Her first thought was she wasn't sure about that. That she'd thought maybe he had meant to. That maybe he wanted her to believe that it was or...something. She didn't know. She reached up and rubbed at her temples a little, leaning forward to rest her elbows on her thighs. In the end she didn't comment to that, not even sure what she'd say. So, instead of saying something she was going to regret, she opted for the wiser silence.

Brett didn't know what to say to her silence - and he almost admitted that. He didn't know what to say, and he had no idea what to do. "...What did you think I meant?" he asked, eventually, staying where he was.

"What did I think you meant with the public face?" she asked. "I thought you were playing up what people would view, and that things would be less...involved when people weren't watching." she answered, unsure if that was the right answer or not. Or if there was a right answer. She really wasn't sure there was at this point. "That was what I thought you wanted, and set up with how you presented things to me. And we've already discussed that I mentally took that further and shouldn't have."

"Are things not involved now?" he asked her, trying to keep emotion out of his tone altogether, though he could tell some slipped in. She was talking like he should have everything figured out, when he knew he didn't. He didn't know how this was all meant to go. He'd not felt anything real for a woman for years - his girlfriends had all been bad fakes, at least on his part, and even that he'd given up on three years ago. But then again, was it just a case of the blind leading the blind here. She'd told him, hadn't she, that this wasn't really her thing either.

It took her a long time to answer. It was the heart of the matter, or what equated to it, part of what had built up, or more what had ultimately led her on her little path of not so nice discovery. In the end, she didn't so much launch into some deep answer, letting the rest of what was needling under her skin out. She asked a question. "...define 'involved'." she said. Maybe she'd understand better if he actually did that. She didn't know. At this point she wasn't positive she could get more confused.

There as that instinct to run again. Hard and sharp. To get pissed, or turn on his heel and just leave. So he didn't have to deal with that. It was almost physical, the reaction, as his heart hammered and he had to forcibly stop himself from moving. "You know I want you," he said, after a moment or two. "And I know the feeling's mutual. ..It was, anyhow." Oh look, there were his insecurities slipping through - they really needed to go back into their box. "There's no one else. For me. There... hasn't been. In a long time. On purpose. There's not going to be. And - I'd really prefer that to be mutual too." Meaning he wasn't going to take things at all well if she decided that wasn't mutual. "And, I've been there. For you. For a while now," he added, really having a hard time raising that. Because they didn't talk about it, not generally. He knew he'd said, once, at Gray's, about the things he did for her, about the things he knew and kept note of, but that had been the only time and the conversation had moved quickly on.

She watched him as he tripped over his words, clearly having a hard time articulating...well. pretty much anything. But she gave him the time to try it. She appreciated the effort, anyhow. "Anyone trying to touch me who doesn't have express permission is going home with less fingers than they started with." she said. "You're the only one who's got permission." Why she put it that way she wasn't sure, but there was an edge to her voice when she said it. It did mean something to her, there was something to it when she'd decided after waking back up into this life that she was done with her previous way of doing things. Her previous way of life. Granted she'd not thought it was going to lead her here, but that wasn't the point. But it also cleared up that bit about whether or not she wanted him. And while it wasn't really a fix all or anything, hearing he wanted her was nice to hear, even if it was unclear if he did mean just on a physical basis or not. After all, it was turned in with a phrase that suggested he would be displeased if they weren't practicing monogamy. She didn't answer the rest of it for a few minutes, though, clearly trying to find the words she needed to address that. "You've been there. I appreciate it." she said, the genuine sentiment there clear in her tone. "But making sure I don't overdose on my medication and bedding me is a little different than being actually 'involved'. Or, it was in my head. This...this is where things get wrong, and I keep trying to tell you that I see where that went wrong. Where I went wrong."

"Is that all I do?" Brett asked her, toned more as asking her for her opinion on that, rather than that being all he thought. Was that all she saw. "How would you define it then? If - if this isn't it, what is?" Now that was an actual, real question, because he was confused and he was wondering whether he actually knew the answer here.

She reached out, and let her hand catch some of the falling rain, before she dragged it through her hair, getting it first out of her face, but then she let it fall right back down, over the shoulder nearest him so she could hide behind it again. Intentional, even if it probably didn't look it. "Does it matter?" she asked, not for the first time that night.

"Yes. It matters." Right now it did. Right now, he needed to know, they needed to know. he watched her draw a hand through her hair and seriously considered going over to her. He stopped himself though. Not now - not until he knew better where he stood. Until then, he'd stay here.

Eris was pretty sure that was the first time he'd said that. She didn't know if that made it better or worse, or didn't influence things at all. It again, for the millionth time that night, took her a long time to answer. "You don't know me." she said eventually, tone significantly quieter than it had been, though it retained that light tone she'd been using earlier. It was easiest to hide behind. "You don't want to know me, either. Anything you know about me, you learned because I volunteered the information. You never ask. Not about anything. I gave you the box, with the only two things inside that could ever be considered 'personal' to me, and you haven't even said you saw them. The other night, even knowing something was the matter with me? You opted to roll over and go to sleep because it doesn't matter to you. If it did, it would have bothered you. I do know you. When you're bothered, it's like a needle under your skin. You don't let things go very easily. Like I don't, only I do want to know. And I know you hate it, that it irritates you when I keep digging, wanting to know more about you. Or what's the matter if something is. But that's--" Because I care. And she'd said everything else, all the shit she hadn't wanted to put out there, but that was where she drew the line. Why, who knew. But it was like the words got stuck in her throat, like they refused to come out at all. "We even talked about talking. I always want to, you never do. I'm interested in you. I don't hold your interest. Not like that." That was easier to say.

Brett was quiet for a long time after she finished speaking, though he didn't look away from her in all that time. Eventually, though, he spoke. "Maybe you don't know me as well as you think you do." He didn't add to that, didn't try and explain. but he did turn and head for the whiskey bottle again, pouring himself another drink. He still had half a glass of wine on the table, but that had only ever been for show. Part of the act, abandoned with the suit. Only maybe he should have kept it all. Maybe she'd feel like she was on solid ground that way.

"I had thought after things...changed...that possibly other things would as well. Or they had. In retrospect, they were never going to and you were clear on terms. And with what you just defined for me, it still holds to your definition." So she maintained it had been some random hallucination of hers. She was going to say more, but wound up not doing so. She felt that hollow sensation she'd been plagued with lately set in again. It just felt heavier this time. It was out there now, she may well have run out of things to say.

"Was I meant to ask?" he said, after a moment or two. "About the photo. About the locket? I didn't know whether you even remembered they were in there. Or whether... You needed me to have what else was in there. It felt like those two were just something else that was there. Not that you wanted me to see them, but that you had to allow that for me to get to the rest. I still have them - I put them back in the box," he told her. He didn't know how to put how he'd felt about them. How without her express permission, it had felt like an invasion of privacy.

She thought about her answer before she gave it, though what she was going to say wasn't even going to answer his question. But she opened her mouth to explain, and then stopped, shutting it again. This was pretty much a moment of revelation for her. Not a very pleasant one, either. She'd been about to just talk to him, explain, and it was something she needed. That interest, someone wanting to actually know about her. He was the only one who knew her real name, and she wanted him to want to know her. Only they were back to the part where he never actually wanted to know. They'd been in close quarters for months and...yeah. Everything he knew was just because she'd wanted him to know, not because he'd wanted to know it. "Nevermind." she said eventually, even if she'd not actually started speaking in the first place.

"No," he said, frowning, annoyed by that. "No - not 'nevermind'. What. If you have something to say, say it. Because I'm assuming from all of this that I did the wrong fucking thing here. So - I'd like to know what the right thing was, because you told me where to find that fucking box and I went, and I got it and just like you'd told me, there was money in it. And diamonds - some of which fetched a pretty price, by the way, but I held some back. And then there, with all of that money shit, were things from your past. And I felt like I was intruding. Because you hadn't told me about them. So, I put them back, because your past is yours and - it's private. And I don't get to see that without your permission," he told her, trying to explain how that had made him feel, and why.

Part of Eris was distantly aware that at least they were back on familiar ground so to speak. Brett was back to snapping at her. "If you didn't have my permission, I would have got the thing myself." she said. Because that much was true. She'd have risked it. It wasn't like it was any secret that she was kind of okay with the idea of not making it out the other side of things. "And there wasn't a right thing. If you haven't noticed I'm not angry with you." she pointed out. "I just figured out how my own head was fucking everything up. There isn't a right or wrong answer there's just things being how they are. That's all."

Brett finally took a sip of the whiskey he'd poured himself, thinking things through. She said that there wasn't a right to all of this, but right now, he was feeling very much like he was in the wrong here. Fucking contrary women. "Does that mean I can ask about the picture?" he said, eventually. "That was you, right?"

It said 'Julia' on the back, didn't it? Eris was feeling a little the same, wondering why the fuck he cared now. Why he was deciding to ask questions now when he'd pretty much gone out of his way their entire time together til now avoiding any such thing. It needled at her, though she recognized a little that if she was suddenly pissed when she'd just told him she wasn't, it would be a little wrong. The truth was she wasn't angry he wasn't doing the things she'd said. She was hurt. There was a major difference. In the end she nodded, keeping her voice to herself but answering in some form.

"The bruises - where were they from?" he asked, remembering those. It wasn't the question he really wanted to ask. He wanted to know whose blood was on the locket, but somehow - he couldn't come out with that one. Not right now. There were easier things to ask. Plus he'd never mastered the art of asking questions without sounding like he was interrogating someone.

She felt a little like a parrot, but repeated herself again. "Does it matter?" she asked. "Why do you want to know now?" she asked, finally looking back at him again. "Is it just because I pointed out that I've finally caught onto the fact that you don't give a damn or want to know and haven't from the start? That apparently your idea of involved is just getting physical, and you making sure I don't drink too much or fuck up my meds?" she asked. "Don't do me any favors. It's hollow." She'd been doing pretty well with keeping her emotions out of her voice for a while, but she failed pretty miserably this time. It was laced with it, putting more out there of her emotional attachment to the proceedings that most of what she'd already said aloud.

"I can never do anything right by you, can I?" Brett challenged. "Anything physical, you claim can be faked. Anything I could possibly say, you've heard it all before and you don't believe a word of it either. Anything I try and do, that's not enough. The choices I make are the wrong ones and then when I try and make it up, or change them, that's wrong as well. You say you're not angry with me when you're clearly pissed and don't give me some bullshit about misunderstanding how things were going to be and that you just have to 'adapt'. Because that is, that's bullshit. Nothing I ever do will be right for you. You'll always see it another way. So, fine - let's keep up our little act and everything else will be just... whatever it turns out with being." He hated saying that. It opened up a hole in his chest, but right now, he'd had enough. It just seemed like every time things threatened to get a little better, shit rained down and made them worse again.

Getting up from the window, she stalked back over to him, that sparking up oh, everything. She'd thought she'd done alright with keeping her emotions as beneath the surface as she could, but that sent that right to hell. "When have I said that what you do isn't enough? When have I said that I've heard it and I don't believe you? I just fucking told you that you weren't wrong, didn't I? And I'm not pissed! ---I wasn't! I am now." Because he'd lit that fire good. "When have I been--you know what? Nevermind, that's right, I remember, you've always thought I was just a selfish bitch, so that's where the part where 'nothing I ever do will be right for you' comes from. Have I bitched about things? Have I given you hell? Not unless you've deserved it and never for anything you've done for me." she snapped. "Now you explain to me how I was meant to take your overwhelming, clinical fucking continued disinterest in me over the months that we've known each other. Explain that. You said maybe I didn't know you as well as I thought? Well fucking lay that out for me. How the fuck would you feel?" she asked. "In fact just look at all your own bullshit and try and puzzle out how you'd react if you were me." she continued. "Here, I'll help. You wake up into a complete fucking nightmare, and you've got one person there. One person in all the world who you actually trust on some level when that's pretty goddamn new a concept to start with. And you're sick, and weak and everything's going to hell but hey at least there's a constant. And after a while, maybe despite some glaringly fucking overwhelming personality flaws, you get a little attached. But they never seem to have even the time of fucking day to find out a single goddamn thing about you. Never actually want to have a real conversation that isn't pulling teeth. And then, things miraculously side to another level, but hey! Wait. No, it's not anything that can have a name pinned onto it, no, of course not. It's just want. Which, by the way, to someone like me? Sounds one hell of a lot like 'object'. Smack on top of that your whole never wanting to know shit about me thing? Yeah. That's where I landed, so explain this shit to me. I want to know."

"Try this one," Brett snapped right back. "Since we're doing scenarios. Try the fact that you've woken up into a complete fucking nightmare, only it doesn't go away and you've been living in it for three fucking years and all of a sudden you make a change. You do somethign that you know you really shouldn't have done, but you do it anyway, because you know - you just know that it's the right thing to do. Possibly the only right thing that you've done with your life since the nightmare fucking began. And you know that that one choice is probably going to bring all the armies of hell raining down on you, but you don't care. And then you try and walk away, but you can't. But you keep getting called back in. And at first, you hate it, because you're scared. Because the more you get called back in, the riskier it is. Only then you start going of your own accord, because you get a 'little attached'. But you've been living in a nightmare for three years and you can't trust anyone. Not even one single person. Not even people you'd like to, because you've forgotten how to. Because the people you trusted most in the world were the ones that put you down in the nightmare in the first place." He dropped the analogy then, it wasn't working for him anymore. "Yeah, I know I'm far from fucking perfect. But sometimes I don't know how to take things with you. And... They killed off your life. And look what they left you with. I know what they left me with and I'll tell you this much - being reminded of what I had? Being asked to talk about that? Is the last fucking thing that I ever want to do. So I'm not going to put you through that unless you tell me you want me to. You can dress that up as disinterest, if you want, but trust me, Princess, it's nothing personal - I don't do 'past', especially not with people like us." there was more, he knew, so much more, points that he could pick up on, but they were all over the place, and it just all added up to one clear fact - she didn't get it. And that meant that neither did he. They were both missing each other's point. And he had no clue what to do about that.

She knew his story. She'd even researched it. And, she got the rest of it from him, eventually. So she didn't have to try and think about things from his perspective, or she didn't think she did, because she always kept trying to find out more. Not just who he was but what was going on with him now. "What you had was something you were proud of." she said, though she'd stopped snapping at him, mostly because a new point was in there. "You had everything taken away, and it's all things you miss. Of course you don't want to talk about it. But that doesn't mean it's unimportant, either. It makes you who you are. That's why I want to know, even if you don't especially want to tell me." even if eventually he had. "It's different with me. I--" she started, then stopped, and started over. "I created Eris because I didn't want to be Julia anymore. And I never wanted anyone to know who that girl was, either. Til you. Which was part of why you got the box. The last two pieces of evidence she existed at all." She looked away, and took a few steps away while she was at it. "It's not just past. It's more than just not asking me what happened before. You don't ask about now either. Like the other night. I know you knew something was wrong. You can always tell." Like she got it when he was fritzing about things. Not necessarily what was making him twitch but she could tell when he was twitching in general. Thinking that had her saying it, too. "I can tell when you're upset. I can even tell sort of the varying shades of your levels of upset. Like if you're just vaguely irritated with the world and I'm a nice and convenient place to take your aggression out on, or if you're pissed enough that I wonder when you're going to crack, and hit me." Since she'd been there a few times with him, wondering, waiting. "But the other night you knew, and you just...didn't care. You went to sleep instead. And we talked about talking, and..." she trailed off, dragging her fingers through her hair again to pull the same hair-trick she had twice already. "I started thinking. About everything, really. You know it bothered me, the idea that you'd be ashamed of me?" Which had been what she'd been upset about that night in the first place. "I thought you would be. And, recognizing that, I realized that it mattered to me if you were or not." Where'd she put her wine? She found Brett's glass and picked that up instead. "And with everything else..." she trailed off and took a drink of the wine. She vaguely lost her place a little, mind drifting over everything.

"I told you I wasn't ashamed of you," Brett pointed out, not understanding her point there, because he'd told her and he'd told her without her having to ask. "And I would never hit you. Never." That was another point that bothered him, that she would think that he might. That he could be that guy. For all they played rough sometimes, he would never be that guy. He took another sip of his whiskey and again didn't try and stop her from drinking. "...I have... problems... with talking," he said, somewhat reluctantly. "It's not that I don't..." There as that 'c' word, hanging there, like a web waiting to trap him, looming large between them. And there was that familiar kick of adrenaline, that urge to run. Caring meant trust, meant giving yourself over to someone, meant willingly making yourself vulnerable. Meant everything he'd been avoiding for years now. "I don't know how to do it," he told her instead.

"It wasn't that you weren't, it was that it mattered to me in the first place. That said something to me. That meant, your opinion on things, on me, on how you reacted to someone else knowing there was anything there at all, that had an emotional impact on me. It was like realizing that when I thought you were hurt, in the stairwell, when you dropped the tool kit, that I didn't try to run. It didn't even flash across my mind to save myself. I went to you. Even if I thought you were probably already dead and if you weren't you'd be in the process. That's...that's jarring for me, to say the very least." she told him, moving to the record player, to put on a new record. It was just like what she'd been doing with her nails, giving herself something to actively do with her hands, give herself something to look at. "I know you have problems with talking." she added, because she did. "I'd just thought that things would be different. That you'd...show interest. Or at least want to know what was eating at my insides. But if you don't ask, and don't even show a flicker of even wanting to know..." she trailed off, not feeling the need to spell out exactly what that meant. She was sure he'd pick up on the meaning.

"I would've done the same for you," he told her, after a moment. "Princess, there's a reason that I won't do this without you. Even though you've suggested it many times now. There's a reason that I kept coming back, why - as you've also pointed out many times - that I've made some really fucking stupid choices when it's come to you. And yes, that's jarring for me as well. Real jarring. And I'm still - I don't know how to do this," he admitted in the end. "But that's pretty fucking obvious right now, isn't it?" he added. He didn't sound pissed, just slightly flat and a little lost, coming to the realisation that he'd screwed up and there didn't seem to be any way to rescue that.

"What, come for me if you thought I was down?" she asked, looking over at that. There was an unreadable expression on her features, something that edged towards a frown but wasn't quite. She'd always figured that he wasn't in a position to do any such thing. And if push came to shove, then he'd have to sell her out, otherwise it'd be curtains for him. She was aware of it, she'd thought he was too. But maybe he wasn't talking about that. So she gave him the opportunity to explain.

"Yes," he confirmed. "Like I came for you at Gray's. The moment I could after I'd heard he was missing. Would've been there sooner but I physically couldn't get away." He shook his head, comparing the two. "Maybe you don't think that was the same." Because he didn't have her death wish. Because even when something was that important to him, he had a certain level of caution. He'd waited until he knew that his absence wouldn't be noted - no more than a couple of hours - until he was sure that he wouldn't be followed, that he wouldn't be bringing more trouble along with him. Then when he'd got there, he'd scoped the place out, checked to see what he'd be walking into, so that he could plan. Still, if there had been trouble, he still would have gone in, he just would have changed his approach accordingly. Maybe that wouldn't be enough for her. Maybe what she expected was a gut-reaction of throwing himself into the fire without thought. If that's what she wanted, he couldn't give her that. He couldn't give anyone that. It just wasn't who he was.

"I don't think it is." She confirmed. "But I didn't ask for reciprocation, either." she continued, because she hadn't. "If anything, I know full well you're an intelligent man, and a survivor." she explained, still ticking through her records. "We've talked about this, I think. ...maybe we haven't and I just think we have. I'm not sure at the moment." Nope, she really didn't trust her recollections on things a lot of the time. "I thought maybe we'd talked about what might happen if I got tossed in jail. How you'd have to sell me out. Or if I got caught by the O'Malley's, you'd have to do the same." She paused, seeming to choose something, but then she went on looking further. "Yours is the healthier way to do things." she said, knowing that really well. "I don't think I'd accept it very well if you suddenly changed that." she admitted. It was easier for her to understand and rely on the fact that he would walk away if he had to. But then, he'd just been saying as well that there was a reason he hadn't yet. "You said there was a reason that you won't do things without me...but it's because you require me, right?" she asked, that last bit an honest question. She really didn't know, and there was a note of confusion in her voice as well.

"You know, before I met you, my life was really fucking simple. Fucking sucked - but it was simple," he told her rather than directly answering her question. "I did what I was told, I kept my head above water. I stayed alive and I made sure that I wasn't noticed enough to be asked to do more than I had to. Everything I did I did for one reason only - because I had to. You complicate things. And, Princess - it was you who said what I'd have to do if things went downhill. Who told me I'd have no choice and that I'd have to abandon you, or sell you out. I never accepted that I'd have to do that - no change here. I just never thought that in the first place. I never planned what I'd do, but you know my opinions on plan B. As for the the reasons I won't do this without you. Yeah, I 'require' you. But that's not the only reason. Things aren't that simple anymore."

"The only logical ways to go about things and still come out the other side would be for you to walk away and forget you ever saw me, or to sell me out." Eris said. It was logic, she was sure of it. There was conviction in her tone. "And like I was just saying, you're a survivor. You're not going to do anything that'll wind you up hurt or dead or...whatever." She repeated it like she needed to have it out loud, said plainly. "Anything less would not serve your best interests. Hell they wouldn't serve you at all, they'd probably get you killed. I'm aware of it. I'm very very aware of the fact that my presence in your life puts you at risk like that. I know you never actually bought what I told you, but it is why I left your place to start with. I depend on you not to entertain the notion of doing anything that would put you at even more risk, if anything happened." There was a little part of her that kind of wanted to panic at the idea. It was clear it really bothered her, if nothing else, like she was looking at him again, and her expression kept flickering.

Brett gave her a look. "Princess, if I was that guy you just put out there, you'd be in the river right now," he pointed out. "Yeah, I don't have a death wish, and yeah, I'm pretty cautious sometimes, but never do anything that could end up with me hurt or dead? You're talking about some other guy here. If something happened to you, I'd come for you if I could. I'd try. You just need to accept that because it's not gonna change."

"Not necessarily, you never intended to see me again, right? You'd just meant to drop me at Gray's, and pretend you just dropped me in the river and it wasn't your fault your coworkers were inept." Eris said, watching his eyes. It was the first time in the course of the evening that she was doing that properly again. "So at worst, you might have been asked a question about it, but you'd have more than enough plausible deniability." And he'd explained to her before his position, how he was in fact, trusted. "Hell you'd even be right, that the people who showed just didn't do their job right." They'd fallen just short of the mark. She was quiet for a moment. "Name a situation where you'd actually have a chance. Because I can't think of one. If I was put in jail, I wouldn't even make it to trial. I'm aware of this. I think I've said it before, but I'd give myself forty eight hours tops. And if the straggling remains of the O'Malley's caught me, they'd have a field day with me. Honestly? What would you do? And I'm not sure there'd be much left worth the effort by the time they were done with me."

"And if Gray had told? Or someone had seen me? Don't try and make out what I did was without risk. And yes, we both know that I'd meant to walk away - but it's been a long time since then. And time enough since I came for you and brought you home - which was, as you keep pointng out, less than my wisest choice ever. Which was why you left. Again, something you keep pointing out to me. And then I tracked you down, which meant finding you, since you hadn't told me where you'd gone. Which meant asking questions of people. Again, hardly risk-free. But I wasn't just going to let you go. And if you get thrown in jail, I'd do what I could. And maybe that wouldn't be enough - I'm not exactly flavour of the, oh, century over there. And we both know that the one person who gives me the time of day won't listen to a fucking word I say when it comes to you. But that doesn't mean I wouldn't try." She always seemed so convinced he was going to leave, but he knew that even when he left her, he never managed to go particularly far.

"I'd stop pointing it out if you actually accepted it and didn't either dismiss it or outright tell me it was bullshit and I was just being a selfish bitch." Eris pointed out, tone even, there. There might have been the very hint of an upturn of the corner of her mouth, just for a second before it was gone. "And I'm not saying you didn't take risks at all, just that with your position and the trust you've been afforded, you had a pretty decent chance of coming out the other side." she said. "You're smarter than any of them think you are, and that's an advantage for you." She exhaled, and leaned her hip against the record player, eyes still on him. "If I was in jail and you started poking your nose around or trying things, all it would do is attract attention to you. Not the best decision ever, and there likely wouldn't be anything you could do." She paused, eyes still on him. "What about the O'Malleys?" she asked. "What would you do there?"

"Sweetheart, the O'Malley's as a family are scattered to the four winds. At least, that's the word on the street tonight. So, it would depend on the situation. I've told you before - you can't predict something like that. And I can't say what I'd do before I knew what exactly was going on," he told her. "What do you want to hear here, Princess? Would it prove something to you if I told you I'd blindly go in whatever the risks, get myself killed coming after you? Would me saying I'd walk away make you feel better. You know, you'd get to tell yourself then that I didn't give a damn as well - hold that up as proof. Do you have a problem with the reality? That I'd take calculated risks for you. That I'd do what I could, but I'd be trying not to get myself killed in the process. That I'm aware of reality, and I know that if you got taken, got caught, there might not be anything I could do about it, but that I'd try. Even if all I could achieve was failure, I'd give that a go. Is that not enough for you, is that too much? I don't know what you want from me here. You give me this whole thing about how you reacted - how the fact that your gut reaction was to come for me showed you something about yourself. Yet when I do the same thing, that's wrong. So I'm back with the fact that nothing I ever do seems to be right for you. I can't win here."

"I might disappear if you told me you'd walk blindly into something and get yourself killed coming after me." Eris told him, because that was topping her list of things she didn't want in any way shape or form. "I don't think you would, because I hold you as more intelligent than that. And again, I'm not even asking you to prove anything. Maybe some other woman out there would want that. Would accept nothing less than that from you but not me." She was quiet for a moment. "My reaction showed me...certain things about myself. Which I need to be aware of, and hadn't been til that point. That when push came to shove, that was how I reacted. I had to reassess things for myself. I didn't tell you to swap comparisons, I was just...telling you something about me. You're putting this in the context of being judged. I'm not judging you. I just...would really appreciate if you behaved the most rationally. As for if I'd hold it up as a reason you don't give a damn...that wasn't ever on the table. That habit was something I counted on."

If you disappeared, I'd only come looking for you. He didn't say that, because it didn't need to be said, but it was there. He wasn't going to let her go. "But you don't think I do give a damn, do you," he said, instead. It wasn't a question, he already knew the answer. She almost seemed to work at it, it seemed sometimes. With one thing, and another, it all added up to that feeling that she didn't think he gave a shit. Or, no - he didn't think that was quite right. Sometimes he felt like she'd prefer it if he didn't. And then she'd turn round and seem hurt in her belief that he didn't care. It didn't help at all with the fact that he didn't know what to do, or how to act, that neither option seemed to be the right one, and that he didn't know how to do this in any event.

She didn't answer that right away and that was when she went back to picking out a record, something she started at the beginning from again. "I think you wouldn't be overjoyed if anything happened to me." she said. "And I know you don't want me overdosing on my medication, or drinking too much." she added. "The part I don't think you give a damn about is..." she trailed off a moment, picking something, and she took time to put the record on as opposed to finishing her thought. Mostly because she didn't know how to say it. In the end, she said what she meant, even if it was less clear than other ways of putting it. "...Julia."

He didn't say anything straight away, but he wasn't silent for more than a few moments. "I give a damn. And not just about those things. The meds, and your drinking." They were just the easy things, the things that didn't get messy. Everything else was messy. Or, apparently, didn't count. He didn't know what did and didn't count. And he didn't want to tell her all the things that she would have heard a million times before as Eris. Words that he knew she would believe were empty, meaningless. But he figured she wasn't talking about that right now anyway.

"You don't show it." she told him. It wasn't an accusation, though. That was absent from her tone. She also didn't know what to believe there. It was like being asked to go on faith when she was a woman who lacked it. Just 'here, this'll never get said or showed, but it's there, really! Just believe!' It didn't work for her. Even if sure, if he randomly decided to have a personality transplant and become some sentimental fool, she'd be vastly unhappy with it, but showing her a little, that would be accepted. She took the time to start the record, and she put the old one away. "I got the bruises at home." she answered him, mind sort of half reminding her far after the fact that he'd asked that earlier.

"I don't know how to." The admission was quieter than normal, his tone almost empty, though he maintained eye contact. It was the closest he could come right now to opening up to her. An admission that he was lacking, somehow. And for Brett, showing weakness was one of the least acceptable things to do. He dropped his eyes enough to finish off his whiskey, then attended to what else she'd said, looking back at her. "I take it you didn't walk into a doorpost..."

She heard him, and looked back over, taking up the wine glass and finishing it before setting it down again. Though she did walk back over towards him as she set it down on the cabinet. She let her gaze drift up from his collarbone towards his eyes where they remained. "You don't actually have to do much." she told him. Her tone was light, soft. She recognized that was hard for him to give voice to. "Just show an interest." It wouldn't even technically be difficult. They'd both said before that any of that 'fluffy' romantic stuff was out, and that still held true. She didn't want sweet nothings because to her they were just that. Nothing. "I didn't walk into a door. Or fall down the steps. Or take a tumble in the play yard." Not that she'd lived anywhere near one. Or ever been to one, really. Not when she was a child, at any rate. "The old man had a temper." she told him.

"...Is that why you think that I'm gonna hit you?" he asked her, simply. That bothered him, knowing that she thought that. He knew he had a temper, knew that he even worked at it at times. He knew that they could get rough with each other - even if that knowledge that he enjoyed that kind of thing had come as a surprise. But he'd never raise a hand to her. Not in anger. And he'd never raise a fist to her, not even if she begged him to.

There was a flicker of a frown that went over her features, though it didn't stay. Mostly it articulated that she wasn't sure why he'd ask. That she was confused why he'd have to ask in the first place. "I've never known a man who wouldn't." she told him. And that was pure truth there, something that maybe lit up and spotlighted how jaded she was again. Occasionally they hit on those, little moments where it was clear her world and his world were different places.

"You know me," he pointed out. He didn't add anything else. He wasn't going to give her a long spiel about how he'd never do anything like that, about how men who beat on their girlfriends were the lowest of the low. And not just because it would mean using the word 'girlfriend', but because if she didn't believe him already, words weren't going to change her mind on that.

"It feels the same." she said, making some attempt to explain, since it seemed to bother him. And she knew he'd mentioned on more than one occasion before that he wouldn't, but still. People said things, and then later it went all to hell. It was just happened. "Sometimes, not all the time. Just once in a while when you're angry with me. And you're nothing but tension, and anger, and you look at me like you want to. Sometimes you're so close you're looming. It just...feels the same as any other time anyone's hit me." There wasn't any condemning tone to her voice. That wasn't what she was going for at all. It wasn't even her telling him he was going to do it at any point, she was just trying to make him understand what made her think it.

"Would you prefer it if I stepped back?" he asked her. "When things get like that - if I stayed out of reach." He couldn't promise not to be angry, but he could try to give her that. "Would you feel... safer."

"...what makes you say I don't feel safe?" she asked. Yeah, occasionally she thought he'd hit her. It wouldn't be a pleasant experience by any stretch of the imagination, but that didn't necessarily mean she didn't feel safe. Sometimes there was a pinch of fear, but to Eris that was just how things were. But she did trust him not to cut her, or do any permanent damage, or probably, he wouldn't do anything more than crack her one then stop. She couldn't see him continuing to beat her after she went down. For some reason she deemed that beyond his character.

"Because you think I'm capable of hitting you," Brett said, not seeing how that could sit alongside her feeling safe. It wasn't like the girl would want to be hit, and she thought it a possibility, therefore there had to be an element of fear there, surely. He wouldn't ask for her to trust him, he knew they both had issues with that, so he could create a situation where she didn't have to.

"That doesn't mean I don't feel safe with you." she told him, that flicker of confusion back again. Like maybe he wasn't understanding something, or she wasn't. One of the two. Hell, maybe both. She glanced at the bottles again, though she felt less like she needed to drown herself in alcohol. She'd probably even already had enough, even if she didn't know that it had done anything for her. Maybe she should stick to drinking whiskey. He did.

He didn't understand, he felt like he was missing something. "But - you think I'd hit you," he pointed out, dumbly, with a side of confusion. "How the hell does that sit alongside feeling safe?"

She exhaled, watching his eyes. "You wouldn't kick me when I was down. You wouldn't keep hitting me after I was down either. I know you'd never pull a weapon on me. I'll not walk away from any encounter with you with any permanent damage." she explained. "That's more than I can say about...well. Most men I've known in my life. And the ones that wouldn't pull a weapon on me were the cowards that would just hire someone else to do it for them."

He didn't know what to say to that, and he was aware that he was staring at her. Just flat out, unavoidably staring. "That's your benchmark?" he asked her, in the end, his voice sounding a little odd.

"Why's it so hard for you to grasp?" she asked, equally as confused about things. "I'll never hear the words 'stay still and quit screaming or I'll cut you' from you. I know you won't do anything like that. So, I'd be safe. You'd never make a trip to the hospital a requirement for me."

There was more staring for a moment or two. "'Why is this so hard for me to grasp'?" he echoed. "How about because that is in no way normal. I've seen some fucked in the world. And then some - between my years on the force and the O'Malleys, I seen... things that I don't really wanna go into again, but - that's not acceptable. That is in no way acceptable. You deserve better. You should expect better."

"It's just the way it is, Brett." Eris said, sighing and this time she did pour a drink--though it was whiskey, not wine, and it was a smaller glass than she'd been drinking previously. "That's the way it's always been. Started at home, never actually stopped." She paused, looking back at him. "There was a reason I had a bodyguard. He hit me once...though to be fair, I did goade him into it." she said. "There was a reason I put myself in my own building at the very top where anyone who wanted to do that kind of thing to me had to pay for it--or go through other people to get to me." she said. "The ones who shelled out...they paid well. But I'd be lying if I didn't say there were a good portion of the higher class that secretly wanted to do that. How many fucked up people with power and they just want more of it so they get a little more depraved each time, seeking some unattainable feeling that they were actually in control. It's acceptable because that's how it is. And I already said, it, I've never met a man who wouldn't hit me."

Brett froze as she said that, stilling, the only movement in his throat as he swallowed, thinking about the first time they'd been together. And then what she'd said in Gray's basement, about faking it. He'd thought that she'd meant she hadn't been, but now... If she expected certain things - there was no sense that she wanted it here, just that she didn't think life could be any different. The idea that she might just have been letting him do those things, that she hadn't been entirely there with him. It made him feel sick. Made him feel like he was sick. Was he just another one of her depraved... He couldn't say the word, couldn't even think it. It was like someone had just pulled the rug out from under him.

She was about to say something when she looked at him properly, and she stopped. He...looked not at all okay. In fact, if she had to guess, 'sudden onset illness' might be a phrase she'd use to describe things. "...Brett?" she asked, stepping a little closer to him, frowning. "What's...?" she started. Then internally rolled her eyes at herself and said what she meant. "Are you okay?" She'd seen him in the middle of rages before, she'd seen him upset, she'd seen him depressed, all sorts of things. This was a new one.

It took some effort to get the words out, but he eventually managed. "Was that what that was about?" he asked her. "That night. At my place. What we did - was that... acceptable just because that was 'how it was'?" he asked her. I thought you liked it.

She frowned again, at first not seeing what he was getting at. Then she blinked as it clicked. "No." she told him. "No." Shaking her head for emphasis, she stepped a slight bit closer again. "Brett...I don't lie to you. You even got my actual name. I'm not going to start at any point. And I'd even decided a while back, that if I was ever going to be with anyone it was going to be because I wanted to, for no other reason. And...with what we did, that..." there was the hint of a smile on her lips for a moment. "I wouldn't change a thing." Because she wouldn't. Really not.

He didn't say anything, he just looked at her. He wanted to believe her, he really wanted to believe her, but there were those seeds of doubt. It hadn't even occurred to him before, and now he'd thought about it and it was just there.

His not saying anything wasn't helpful. It certainly didn't make her stop worrying about it. She took up the glass of whiskey she'd poured for herself, and knocked back a good bit of it, then looked up at him again. "What we do has nothing to do with violence." she told him. "It's a very important distinction." It was the simplest way to describe it to him, and she hoped he listened. That something sank in there.

It was - and it was one that he'd firmly made in the past, to himself. He'd known the difference, the question that had arisen in his mind had been whether she did. "Is it different for you. Different than... Before?" he asked her. He tried to avoid talking about her previous profession when he could. With the kind of person he was, she had to know he didn't really approve, couldn't approve. But he wasn't going to pass judgement on her either, and he knew she wasn't going to go back to that, so it didn't matter to him. But, sometimes, he couldn't step round her past, not this part of it. Like right now.

"They aren't the same thing." Eris told him, very clearly defining for him that yes, it was different. "I don't even...they aren't even in the same breath for me." She stepped in til she was directly in front of him, and reached up to remove his tie, eyes on that instead of his. "I mentioned desire to you before." she said. She even remembered when. When they'd been down in the pitch black of Gray's basement. "That's what it is for me, when it comes to you." She wouldn't have said it before, but she did now, because he was twitching and wondering about it. "I want you. Just you. And it's got nothing to do with how things ever were for me before. And I've got no inclination towards just giving you what I think you want, just because you might want it." Then she ticked her gaze up to his. "I've never been the type to make your life easier, or just tell you what you want to hear. I don't placate you in any way. I wouldn't start that here." She paused again. "It's...important to me that this be..." she didn't know the word. Or she did, but she didn't think it in any manner could be attributed to herself. 'Pure' just didn't really fit with her.

"Real," Brett supplied for her. "I want this to be real. Whatever this is, and I know it's not what you want. But what I can give you - and what I want from you - is real. No pretence, or lies," he told her, slipping the tie from her grasp, sliding the silk through her hands slowly as he spoke.

She liked his word better. She could agree with that word. She didn't try to hold onto the tie as he took it from her, but appreciated the feel of the material against her skin. "What is it you think I want?" she asked. She wasn't necessarily sure he knew, and so she wanted the clarification there. The reality thing, that was definitely something she was coming to realize she required. The bare bones truth of things, without any of the sugar coating or anything else people usually did.

"For me to be better at this," he suggested to her. "For me to actually know how to do this - to know what you want, and how to give you that." He took the tie and hung it loose around her neck, evening up the ends as he did so. It was a dark grey, slightly lighter than the suit he was wearing, with a blue stripe that almost matched his eyes running through it. He hadn't chosen it - the tailor had done that. Had chosen everything, in fact. Brett had just gone with the man's recommendations.

She let him do what he was doing, curious what that was going to be. "I'm not asking you to know what you're doing. I wouldn't say I know what I am." she told him, tone a little softer, possibly a little warmer than it had been too, but that wasn't really due to the subject matter, it was more a reaction to maintaining being close to him, and whatever it was he was doing with the tie. "Let me ask you a question. Because you don't know, does that mean you're giving up on figuring it out?" she asked.

"What you want, or what this is?" he asked her, still holding lightly onto the ends of his tie, though there was no pressure there, not right now. He didn't make a move to answer either question, waiting for her clarification.

There was the light little flicker of a smile that showed up on her lips for a moment, and she used his line from earlier back at him. "Let's go for both, shall we?" she asked, tone light. She was really aware of the tie around her neck, and how he was holding onto the ends. It was more distracting than one would think, really. Or maybe more than she would assume, but it was. It held a certain amount of her attention, and he wasn't even doing anything.

"I'm not known for giving up that easily," he told her. Even when he'd given up on the force, he'd kept with his job, when he could. He'd managed to ferret away bits of information over the years. She knew for a fact that he was a damn stubborn bastard. "I'm just not rushing in either."

"You haven't been asked to." she told him. Because he hadn't. Really, if he did randomly go full tilt and start going through massive behavioral changes, she wouldn't know what to do with him. She just wanted a little interest. That was basically what it would take to make her feel better. Everything else could either evolve or remain the same, or whatever. She imagined they might evolve--or she did now. Before he'd arrived, not so much.

"I know," he confirmed. But, for him, that was part of not really knowing what she wanted from him. Especially now that it was clear that what he'd been doing wasn't right. He'd thought they'd had an agreement, but clearly they hadn't. She'd just been adapting to what she thought he wanted. And the one thing he didn't want was some girl who just did what she was told. "So - do I have to figure it out? What you want? Or do I get to just ask you?" he asked, since one of the issues seemed to be that he wasn't curious enough. Or, at least, that he didn't express his curiosity.

"Wouldn't it defeat the purpose of being a mysterious woman if I just told you everything?" she asked, tone that little bit playful. Just a tiny hint of it, like the hint in her expression that she was amused. Not necessarily at him, but with things. "But you can ask. If you want to know anything you can ask. I can't promise everything'll be easy for me to answer, but you can ask. I won't ever fault you for it." she promised. She didn't think he'd actually take her up on it, at the moment. Or if he did, it'd be a long time coming.

"Who says you have to be a mysterious woman?" he asked her, recognising the amusement in her face for what it was and feeling a little better for it, as though not everything was falling apart anymore. "What do you want?" he asked her, not figuring he'd get a real answer. He didn't think she'd lie, but he figured she'd come up with a different approach to the question. Still, he wanted to know what she'd say.

"Wouldn't I not hold any appeal if I wasn't?" she asked to the first question. And then she thought about her answer to his second one. She was still aware of their position, and that he hadn't moved. It was almost maddening. "Interest." she said. "A little evidence that you might actually want to know me. Or that you want me. Find me...desireable." She'd been going to say 'attractive' but that wasn't quite the word that was most appropriate.

"I would have thought that you'd know those last two already," he observed, lightly, still not moving. He still had hold of the tie he'd draped around her neck, he was still standing in front of her, looking down at her. But he'd taken things no further. "Whose was the locket?" he asked, instead of pursuing the former line.

She'd been going to answer the first question, but the second one stopped her. It was a visible little flinch, and she closed her mouth, and ticked her eyes down for a moment. "My mother's." she answered him. "Was her blood still on it?" she asked. It had had the crusted brown blood on when she'd put it in the box, but she didn't know if it would have flaked away entirely or not. It had been in there for years, after all.

"Yes - was she wearing it? When she was killed?" he asked, his voice actually turning gentle for a moment. He knew what had happened to her mother, knew she'd been knifed in an alleyway. It wasn't an uncommon way for people in the city to go, but that didn't make it any easier to bear if it were one of yours.

"Yes." she answered, noticing the tone he was using, and she appreciated it on some level. "I saw her before the cops did. I took that. She was always wearing it. Obviously it wasn't worth anything. Whoever killed her didn't even bother trying to take it. There used to be this little snip of hair in there, think it was mine, but it blew away when I opened it that night. I hadn't known it was in there." And there was a part of her now that felt bad about that, even if at the time she hadn't cared. But that was the brain damage talking, it had given her unchecked emotions and all that. Maybe it was just a really really delayed reaction. Who knew. She certainly didn't. She ticked her gaze up for a moment, not sure what she'd see on his features, in his eyes. She did know that she felt extremely vulnerable, though.

"Do you know why she was killed?" he asked her, acknowledging that it was the cop in him that asked that question. The look in his eyes had an edge of compassion to it, something of empathy as well. He'd lost both his parents as a child and whilst he'd never seen his mother's body, and actually hardly even remembered what she'd been like, he knew what it was like to have that missing.

"No." she answered. "Took the cops a long time to even show. I remember that. And it was just another dead whore in an alley, so no actual suspects. Just...someone who shoved a knife into her a few dozen times then walked away like nothing happened. Happened all the time in that neighborhood. Probably still does." She wouldn't doubt it, at any rate, even if she'd not gone back there since she'd left in the first place.

"Which neighbourhood?" he asked her, wondering where actually in the city she'd grown up. With the way she talked, he could think of a few contenders. There were a good few bad neighbourhoods in this city, and over the years some got better and some got worse, that was just the way of things.

"About half way between the docks and the sixth street bridge." she explained. "Pretty much a cess pool, all things considered. The cops never liked to show their faces around there." She paused, watching his eyes. "Why?" Since the location was kind of a weird thing to ask, or she thought it was. Unless it was just perspective on the type of living environment she'd had, which she'd thought she'd laid out. She'd had an asshole of an old man, and her mom was murdered. Oh and was a hooker, too. That was pretty clear.

"You're right," he told her. "The cops never did like showing their faces round there. Half the calls that came through were cranks. Or someone trying to get a couple of guys to show for an ambush. Lost more men in that neighbourhood than the rest of the city put together, one year." He almost surprised himself, telling her that. Maybe she already knew it, but that aside, Brett didn't talk much about being a cop. No even if he'd phrased it in such a way that didn't involve himself directly. "And why? Wanted to know where you grew up." I'm meant to be showing an interest, right? he thought. That seemed like as good a place as any to start.

She nodded a little. "I saw a few dead cops there too." she admitted. "Think I saw my first corpse when I was...five? Maybe?" she suggested. "That's the first one I remember anyway. It was in the alley behind the building I lived in. I went out back because the argument inside had escalated to 'let's break dishes over each other's heads'. I remember wondering why I could hear so many flies." And, thinking back right now, she could even picture it. It had felt hot that day, and the stench had been enough to make her eyes water.

"I didn't see a dead body til I joined the force. My folks both died when I was a kid, but nothing like that," he told her, but didn't offer anything more - the focus was meant to be on her right now, and he didn't like talking about his past anyhow.

Eris' head tilted to the side slightly, picking up on that of course. She'd read in the papers that he didn't have family, really, but it was the first he'd said anything of the kind. "Who raised you?" she asked. She also wanted to ask how his parents had died, but for some reason that was slightly less important than who he'd grown up with. Whoever it as had instilled some values in the boy. People didn't get like that naturally, as far as she saw. That was learned. If one wanted to see human nature left to it's own devices--her neighborhood growing up was a perfect example.

He almost brushed off the question, but apparently she wanted to know and right now, he was minded to give her what she wanted. Maybe it would work better than fighting her every step of the way. He knew it wouldn't be something he would be willing or able to maintain long term, but for now, he could try it out. "My aunt - my mother's sister. She had an apartment at the other side of the docks from your area," he said, knowing she'd be able to identify that as another shit hole dive of the city, not much better than where she was from.

"I'm assuming she was a damn good influence, then." she said, definitely picking up on the whole he wasn't in a great part of town either. "How did you avoid getting dragged down?" she asked, honestly curious about that. He'd become a cop. A good cop at that, even. He'd been a hero, even. That wasn't the kind of kid that usually came out of neighborhoods like that. It was usually the people getting hauled in for knifing someone over the five bucks in their pockets that hailed from there.

Brett actually chuckled a little at that as he thought back to the woman. "Fear?" he suggested, wryly. "Aunt Claire had a way of making you believe that if you crossed her, she'd make you wish you'd never been born. She used that as a base and went from there. Then I joined the force, soon as I was able and lived with her legacy. Least, I did..." Until three years ago, but that didn't need to be said, She knew that.

She smiled, when he laughed a bit. He didn't do that very often, after all. "Sounds like a woman who knew what she was doing." she said. She did a better job then most, then. ...a lot of my girls were ones who's parents had either disappeared, been killed, or just gave them to someone else. It's...odd for me, but nice to know that didn't always mean you wound up someone like them." Then she paused. "Or me." Sure, she'd changed the very face of prostitution in this city but that didn't take away the fact that she had in fact, been a whore.

"Not everybody does, you know," he told her, meaning that. "You've always seen the worst that's out there, I think. It's not all like that." He paused for a moment, thinking about what he'd just said, the way he'd just put that, reflecting on his own life and the moment of positivity vanished, the light and humour disappearing from his eyes. "At least, some people try. And maybe they can keep it going for a while. City'll swallow them in the end," he told her, dropping his eyes from hers.

In a moment of affection and genuine sentiment, Eris pushed herself up on her toes, and she leaned in towards him. She kissed his cheek, as opposed to anything else, and if asked about it she wouldn't have been able to say why she opted for that, but she did. It was a gentle little gesture. "I'm working on something for you." she told him, voice very quiet.

Brett looked back at her, confusion flickering across his expression as he didn't make the connection between that and what they'd been talking about. "What do you mean?" he asked. he almost added that he didn't want anything from her, he was so used to telling her that she didn't owe him anything, but not right now. Not today. Anyway, they'd been making plans together, and it was written nowhere that he was the only one allowed to execute them.

"I mean, I've been working on something for you." she said. "I hadn't been going to say, not til I knew more, but..." But they were talking about things, and in that moment, where everything just died in his eyes there as he recalled that oh yeah, his life had gone to hell, she'd wanted to say something. "You didn't do what you were accused of. I'm seeing if there's a way to clear your name. Only I don't expect you to go running back to the force like some people's pipe dreams, but...it wouldn't be over your head anymore."

He finally dropped his hands from the tie, though he left the silk round her neck as he turned away slightly. "Don't waste your time - there's no way to clear my name," he said with some conviction. He was sure of that. If whoever had done this to him wasn't entirely sure he was stitched up completely, Brett figured he'd be dead by now.

"I don't believe that." she said. "So, I'll just keep following up on that, and I'll let you know when I find what I'm looking for. Someone has to know. Someone always leaves things for that 'just in case' they think might come someday. I know people. I know shady people. I know the mentality that goes into ruining someone. Something's out there. I'll find it. And you can't tell me what to do with my free time." she said, taking up the glass of whiskey again and taking a drink before setting it down.

Ruining someone. Brett visibly flinched at that, and as she set down the glass, he picked it up and drained it. He knew what had gone on in his life, but to hear it put like that. That was something else. He didn't want to be talking about that. He looked back at her, his eyes dropping to her neck. "Are you going to do anything about that?" he asked her, gesturing with the now-empty glass. "The scar. Either you're gonna need something hefty to cover it, which I don't know if we'd be able to afford straight away. Or you leave it. As a fuck them all - give them something to gossip about."

That made her twitch a little, and she reached up to trace her fingers along it. Where the belt had cut in. She didn't say anything for a long moment, reaching out to pour a little more whiskey into the glass, before she spoke. "What's your opinion on the matter?" she asked, tone light. She took a sip of the drink before she turned her eyes back on his. And she was annoyed with herself that what he said was going to matter a little too much to her.

"I say leave it," he told her, watching her trace along the scar then reaching out to tilt her head up and to the side by her jaw, gently. "They made an attempt to kill you. It didn't work. The people who tried got ruined. And you have your trophy from their ashes." That would be him, even if he had to come clean to Jackson about the game they were playing. Maybe he would, maybe he wouldn't - they'd hardly be running in the same circles, and Jackson was straight, which meant he'd be missing a lot of the gossip out there. "So, why try and hide it. Wear it as a reminder."

She didn't fight him turning her face at all, letting him look at the scar line. "It detracts from that whole needing to be perfect thing I was talking about earlier." she told him. And she kind of hated herself for it, but she asked the question that was truly on her mind about it. "Do you not think it detracts from my appearance?" she was watching him even with her head tilted, sort of wanting to try and judge from his reaction to that. Since it wasn't as if he was going to tell her he thought she was pretty or anything. She wasn't stupid enough to believe he'd do anything of the kind.

"I think we wanted to turn heads," he told her, dropping his hand to the back of her neck. "And it's either that or you hide it and I don't think we'd be able to do that well enough. It would be a weakness if we decided to hide it." He was ignoring the fact that he habitually hid his own scars and wouldn't even let her see them. "And I think that, with the rest of you. No - it won't detract." Not for him anyway. He didn't know about anyone else. And he didn't care about them, and whether they found her attractive or not. He knew that part of him at least would really prefer it if they didn't.

If 'we' decided to hide it. You're not the woman here, sweetheart. You have no idea what it means to be one in this world. went through her mind, but it wouldn't help anything to share, so she didn't. "With the rest of me?" she asked, arching a brow slightly. She could follow the rest of the logic. She got what he was saying and all, though it still made her nervous. Because it was just the way things were. The rules were women didn't have flaws. They weren't allowed to have flaws. They were meant to be a fantasy. And lower down the food chain, it was easier to let things slide, but at the level they were at? God. "You realize that I'm going to be the only flawed woman there."

"No you're not," he told her. "You're going to be the only woman with the confidence to not have to hide them. You're not like them and they know it. And some of them at least are gonna be a little scared of you. And the rest of you is already perfect, Princess. Even without the polish."

"So you think it'll be the defining trait that sets me apart?" she asked. "And I'm already perfect?" she asked, smiling a faint bit. "That's good to hear." There was slightly more truth in that statement, in her tone, than she would have liked, but she wasn't much up for trying to edit her tone right now. She took another drink of whiskey, setting the glass down again. "I hope you're right. If you think the boys play rough? You have no idea what happens with the women." And that was pure truth, there.

"I think it'll be the thing that will never let them forget what happens to people who try and fuck with you. And that's a good thing - we need them to remember that." He couldn't comment on the women - she was right, he had no idea how they played. That wasn't his world. but then, high society wasn't his world at all. He could only go off what little he knew, and what he knew about people in general.

She shifted a little, moving closer to him to look up at him, reaching up to pull her hair back, twisting it a little so it fell a little around her face, but left her neck exposed. "Think I should draw attention to it?" she asked him. "And aren't you going to help remind people what happens when they fuck with me?" her tone was just edging into a playfully innocent tone at the last bit, a light little amusement there.

He was very aware of her proximity right now, especially when she spoke like that, moved like that. he slid his hand from the back of her neck, slowly down her back to her waist. "I think that your way is less likely to get us kicked out of parties we need to be at," he said, his voice dropping, but not in a threatening way.

"I think we should get kicked out of a party or two." she told him, watching his eyes, liking how his voice changed. "After all, they need to fear you too. They need to know you aren't just for show, that you will mess up those pretty boy faces, if you have the right provocation." All of what she was saying was true, but at the moment she was still kind of saying it in those tones, keeping it more a playful sort of conversation than anything.

"They need to know the rules have changed - you're not who you were. And if I have to show them that, I will. Nobody gets to touch you but me," he told her, now his tone turning a little dangerous. That part most definitely wouldn't be an act, not at all. She might be being playful right now, but he wasn't - if she ever tried to change that rule (which he didn't think she would) it would be a dealbreaker for him.

There was part of her that really loved that tone. That appreciated that she was the one who could evoke it, and not because she'd set it up that way. But because that was how it was naturally. Letting her hair drop back behind her shoulders, she slid her hands up his chest to put her arms around his neck. She kept her gaze on his, just giving herself a moment to appreciate the situation. It was novel for her. Yes, she'd set people up to behave like that towards her or for her in the past, but it really had been that--a set up. This wasn't. "So if people decide they want to meet me off on the terrace and get themselves a feel...?" she trailed off, not letting her gaze stray from his.

"...Then they're gonna learn very quickly that that would be a very bad idea," Brett told her, not feeling the need to go into any detail. He wasn't entirely sure what he'd do, but he knew that that would tap right into his core of anger. And whilst he would never be violent towards her, the same rules didn't apply to the rest of the world. If people needed to be put in their place, he could, and would, do that.

Holding his gaze, she gave a moment, then nodded. "Good." she said. "I don't want any of them thinking they can lay a hand on me, 'friendly' or otherwise." she said, tone serious then. "You are the only person who's got permission." And she was sticking with that, too. Where they were headed? They'd be running into former clients who she knew for a fact would want to pick up where they left off. Clients she'd seen off and on for years. Once she hit the scene again, they would be circling, wanting back in. She just wasn't happy to let them.

He kissed her then, finally, possessively, hard and certain and not asking for permission at all. After all, she'd just given it, if that even needed to be said. He pulled her into him, holding her tightly against him.

There was part of her that felt a rush with that, getting that as a response, or just being kissed with that possessive sort of tone to it. She liked that quite a bit, and not only because it would help their cause. Because it was something she personally appreciated. She pressed against him, not that he was giving her much choice in the matter anyways with how he pulled her in, but there was a willingness to it anyhow. She also very lightly scratched the back of his neck, with those now perfect nails of hers.

He took his time over the kiss, running it to his rules, holding her hard and fast and only pulling back when he was good and ready, appreciating what she put into it, that willingness there. That helped finally put to rest his questions and doubts of earlier on. As much as she'd said that if she faked it he'd never know, he didn't believe that. he was sure that he would, that somehow he'd be able to tell. This was real, there was no other way about it.

She looked up at him, catching her breath a little and she drew her lower lip between her teeth, then released it, watching his eyes. Lightly, she trailed her nails back and forth along the back of his spine, like she might dig them in at any given moment but hadn't chosen which one it would be yet. She was also waiting for him to decide what came next. He did so like being in charge. Then, after a moment, she leaned back slightly, like she might be considering moving away, just to see if he'd keep her there. That was part of the fun with him. The struggle-that-wasn't.

He let her move just enough for her to know that he could stop her. Barely an inch before his arm tightened around her. "Going somewhere?" he asked, arching a brow and looking down at her.

"Not anymore. Someone's stopping me." she told him. "I was thinking about someplace over that way." she said, making a vague gesture, not that she paid the slightest attention to where she was gesturing in the first place, because it was wholly untrue that she wanted to be anyplace but where she was. "Did you need me here for something?" she asked, tone innocent and she even effected the expression, smiling at him and fluttering her eyelashes, the only real thing giving her away being the glint in her eye that spoke otherwise.

"Tell me what you really thought of the suit," he told her. Which wasn't exactly what he meant. What he meant was 'tell me what you thought of me in the suit', but he couldn't bring himself to ask that. He'd only asked her at all in the first place because he was still stinging from her mostly ignoring him when he'd first arrived.

She looked up at him again, and then did her best to look him up and down from her position, as if she needed the refresher, which she didn't. "I think it's very nice." she said. "I think it's not very you, and I would like to say here and now that I prefer you with some stubble." she said, reaching up to brush her fingertips across his cheek. "But no one could deny the imagery is striking." she told him. "Why?" she asked. Because it was fairly random, there. "And I better get a real answer." she tacked onto the end.

"'The imagery is striking'?" he asked her, looking slightly puzzled at the way she'd put that. But he moved on without actually waiting for her to clarify what she'd mean. "And because you're a better judge than I am. And because when I first got here... What was that, anyhow?" he asked her, flipping it back to her.

Even if he continued she did address the first question. "Yes, striking." she told him. "You're striking anyhow. Memorable. When they see you, especially in context, they will recall you. You'll stand out in people's minds." she said. "If you want a baser opinion...I've always thought you were attractive." she said. "With having thought everything through, and being as..." she hesitated on the word but then went with the truth. "hurt as I was, I tried to go for the least painful transition into attempting to revert to self." Which probably sounded a little convoluted. "I'd decided what I was to you was a warm body who'd at least tried hard enough with you to get you, so that was in play, and possibly I represented certain things to you, even if it wasn't just for that. But it wasn't...personal, either. Plus, with our plans, you needed her. So, I was being her. You realize I didn't do that much, yes? What about 'that' bothered you? I did give you an answer, I looked you over entirely, and I was paying attention to everything you said."

"You treated me like they treat me. And I'll take it from them because I have to. And I'll take it from you in public, because that's the plan. But I won't take it from you in private. That's not how things are going to go, Princess. We might need her in public, but in private, I want you," he told her.

"It wasn't what you took it as." she told him. "It wasn't any power play. What about it exactly really got to you?" she asked. "Treated you how? I was listening. I gave you your answer when you asked for it, though apparently it wasn't quite a good enough answer because you've asked again." she added, keeping her eyes on his. "So, what was it?" She really did want to understand there. She knew the one thing she'd been keeping herself doing was not looking at him. Was that it? She didn't want to guess. She wanted the answer.

"You weren't giving me your attention," he told her, not sure how that was so difficult to understand. "You might have been listening, but your attention was on your nails. I know that game. Your nails aren't important - sure, you've gotta have that whole 'perfection' thing - but not right now. If it had waited five minutes, you wouldn't have lost anything. But you didn't, you gave them your main attention - or made it look that way. You put me back to the part of a messenger boy. Standing before you to deliver what I had. You took the balance away. If we're doing this - and we are doing this - then we're going to be equal. No matter what we let other people believe. They can believe what they want, but between you and me - that's how it is."

"I was giving you my attention. You had pretty much my entire attention." she told him. "I just wasn't looking at you while I listened." Which she was now, anyways, even if she'd likely spent more time this evening avoiding that than any other encounter they'd had. "Is that what it was? You wanted my eyes on you?" There wasn't any accusation in her tone there, but she was curious. If that was the defining factor. "Also...you were the one who even told me you came here tonight just to give me business details. And that was all you did."

"I don't want 'pretty much' your entire attention," Brett told her, still holding her tightly against him. "I want your entire attention. And what else was I likely to do, when you were treating me like that?" he asked her.

It was then that it sort of clicked into her head. That apparently, she wasn't the only one who had assumed there would be changes in the way things were between them. Or, that was what it seemed like at the moment. It was...interesting, to say the least. "What might you have done if I had been looking at you?" she asked, a little fascinated with the whole thing right now. Mostly because she'd never figured Brett even actually cared if she paid attention to him or not. In fact, she was pretty sure that quite often, he would have given a hell of a lot not to have her undivided. So this was a switch, and a fairly significant one.

"I don't know - because you weren't," Brett pointed out, never one to play to 'what if' game that way. He was beligerently refusing to admit that he'd come still all dressed up and shaved for her, and she'd ignored that almost entirely.

"But it really pissed you off that I wasn't." she said, not really a question. Yeah, that was interesting. She was going to remember that. She wondered if it was because he'd gotten the suit going, and spruced up. If it was, she was thinking it was a little of a hypocritical situation, considering he never seemed to notice if she was ever dressed nicely. And he'd seen her before, with the nicer dresses. There'd been the night at Gray's where she'd specifically dressed up for him, and well. She might as well have arrived in a burlap sack for all he paid attention.

"It bothered me," he confirmed for her. "You've done this before. I haven't - this is your world we're going into, not mine." Which was the closest he'd come to admitting that he felt vulnerable in this, that he maybe needed her support. He was a man who liked to appear as if he coped with anything, but the truth was that he didn't always feel that way.

"And, you did a good job." she told him, drifting her fingers into his hair just a slight bit at the back of his neck. "I even told you so." she said. "But you wanted my eyes on you. You wanted me to see you." she continued. "Does it matter to you?" she asked. "That I find you handsome? Attractive? That I liked the tie, because it brought out your eyes?" Because it had.

She could always see right through him. Or, clearly not, since she'd read things the wrong way earlier on. But she always seemed to see just what he wanted to keep hidden. Fucking annoying bitch. "I wanted your attention," he told her, sticking to his reasoning, but he was far too aware of her fingers in his hair all the same.

She nodded, a little, eyes still on his. Then she pushed herself up on her toes, nuzzling at his throat as she pushed up towards his ear so she could speak softly into it. "You always have my attention." she said. "You want me to be thinking about what I could do to you later." she continued, letting her breath ghost along his skin, into his ear lightly. "You want me to appreciate the view."

"Turnabout's fair play," Brett told her, pulling his head back away from her lips slightly, so she'd have to stretch more if she wanted to touch him, but not enough so that she wouldn't be able to reach. "You've given me enough to appreciate in the past." The difference was that she was easier to appreciate. He didn't think he was all that, for all she told him he had nice eyes. As far as he was concerned, that was mostly where it stopped. Unless covered with an expensive suit.

Smiling to herself, she did push up that little bit more, so her lips brushed against his ear slightly when she spoke again. "I have? You've never indicated as such." she told him. "Do you do that? Fantasize?" She'd be a bit surprised if he did, because, well. Yeah. Up til fairly recently, she'd been under the impression he didn't see her in any light that wasn't 'dirty whore' that he didn't especially want contact with. So, that was interesting to hear, and she wanted to know more.

"Princess, you had a habit of wandering round my apartment dressed in nothing but a small towel," he pointed out to her, shifting his hands so that she was still held tight against him - and couldn't drop back down again now that she'd stretched that little further. "Did you think that I didn't notice?"

She nodded, enough to let him feel the motion of her head with a nuzzle against his cheek. "That's what I thought. You do realize that you've never commented on what you may think about me, how I look, or anything of the kind, right?" she asked. "You asked me once how many people had told me I was beautiful, and if any of their opinions mattered." she continued, pausing a moment before she finished. "Yours does."

"I figured you'd heard it all so many times before, and had it been so much empty words. Think I mentioned it before, Princess - whatever I do with you, I risk hitting a cynical wall. When I asked you if you wanted me to tell you that you're beautiful, you didn't properly answer me. You said you wanted to know that I wanted you - which put me right back to the fact that you don't believe words, and you don't believe actions either. But if you want my opinion? You look good in red."

"You never say anything just to say it." she said. Because he didn't. Not really. He wasn't that kind of guy. He especially wouldn't say something just to make someone else feel better, no matter who they were. "I don't want you to tell me anything you don't believe, you don't feel. But if you do...yes I want to hear it." But she did smile at the comment about red. She'd keep that in mind, most certainly, and she was suddenly glad she'd chosen red for the bit of polish she'd gotten herself. She tried to ease herself down a little, though it was mostly just to see if he was keeping her there like she thought he was. But he was going to have to work at it just a tiny bit.

His arm tightened around her as she tried to get away, keeping her right where she was. "I'm not going to start telling you things right now just because you've said that," he told her. He wouldn't do anything just because he had a request. Or permission. She needed to learn that, if she didn't know already. It did, however, suggest that there were things to tell.

Eris grinned at that, and she nipped lightly at his earlobe. "I can live with that." she told him. She could. Plus there was enough implication going on that at least she was under the impression that he had opinions and they may be favorable. When he put his arm tighter around her, she pushed up higher on her toes, but after she was finished speaking, she tried to drop back down again, sure he was going to stop her, or something, especially with the nip she'd given him.

This time he did rather more than stop her from dropping back to her previous position. This time he lifted her, just enough off the ground to suggest that maybe she would be able to touch if she stretched enough, but for that to be a vain hope. It wasn't a hard thing for him to do - she wasn't the world's largest woman, and he was a pretty strong man. He very definitely had her and she wasn't going anywhere. He was reminded of the night that he threw her over his shoulder, which made him wonder how she'd actually felt about that. Given where they'd ended up not long after that, it definitely was a question. Just not one he was sure he was ready to ask.

She made a small little sound when her toes left the floor, and then she abruptly brought her knees up, so if he was really going to pick her up he'd probably have to do so properly. She also nipped at his throat, not near hard enough to leave a mark or anything, but it was a sharp thing. She of course recalled his little rule about no visible marks. That she could deal with. Actually it just made it more fun to see how much could be gotten away with that didn't leave any trace.

"Why, no biting, remember - or have you forgotten that already," he asked her, pulling his skin away from her teeth, though he knew it wasn't hard enough to properly mark. Still, he wanted to challenge her. He liked challenging her. Picking a fight that wasn't really a fight, and that was as good a place to start as any.

"Mm." she said. "I don't actually recall there being a no biting rule." she murmured, tightening her fingers in his hair slightly, pulling a light bit. "I remember there being a no marks rule, but that's hardly the same thing." she continued. She shifted more against him, which was hard to do without any leverage. "Besides, I seem to recall you biting me at one point...that definitely left a mark." It had been a pretty deep bruise, too. Coverable if she wore the right dress, but definitely there. She'd rather liked that one.

"Is it not?" he asked, lightly, knowing full well it wasn't. "Hmm - do you want me to put you down?" he asked her, toying with the ideas of options. Thoughts.

"It's not." she told him, giving his throat another little nip, making sure it was in a different place. "Do you want to put me down?" she asked. "I mean, there could be places to go that weren't right here. I could always try and get away if you did that. Or, I might be a good little girl." she tsked. "Choices, decisions....what're you going to do? What do you want?"

"You wouldn't be a good girl - you're never a good girl," he told her, not minding that in the least. He found that good girls irritated him, he didn't have the time for them. They didn't hold his interest. Then again, nobody had ever held his interest like she did. Sure, he'd called her the most annoying bitch he'd ever met, yet weirdly: that was a compliment. "I don't think I should let you down."

"So what are you going to do with me?" she asked. And she started to let herself go, started to drop her grip from his shoulders and neck, though she didn't actually release her hold on his hair. She wanted to see what he would do, how he would alter things, because she wasn't helping him keep her up off the floor, now that he'd just said he didn't think he should let her down. If that was the case, then he was going to have to do better.

He let her slip just enough to make her wonder if he was going to keep her up, and also just enough to allow him to shift his grip when he wanted to, which he did after a moment or two, hoisting her up and over his shoulder, just as he had that night, only this time he held her in place rather more intimately, carressing the top of her thigh as he did so.

She gave a little laugh, an amused, appreciative one as he did that, and she did like she'd done that night too, bracing her hands on his lower back to steady herself. "Where are we going?" she asked, grinning as she attempted to look back at him, even if she couldn't quite pull that off. She noticed, of course, where his hand was, and she let herself appreciate that. She also possibly shifted her hands a little so her nails were 'helping' hold her in place.

He felt the bite of her nails in his back through the cotton of the shirt, but didn't answer her, heading for the bed and then dumping her down on it hard enough that she bounced. Not for the first time, he cursed the scars over his body. She'd said that she didn't care, but he still held back because of them, still couldn't let himself go. Still couldn't let her see him. There were things he wanted to do here, moves he wanted to make, but that reality stopped him every time.

She was looking up at him, expression amused, though in a almost dark manner. She was pleased, if nothing else. She'd liked that. Eris laid back, propping herself up on her arms as she gazed up at him. "Now what?" she asked, watching him. Tilting her head a little, she let her hair fall back behind her shoulders, and she then let it tilt forward again, so she was looking up at him through her eyelashes.

He paused, then smiled slightly. "You tell me - you were the one trying to be what you thought I wanted earlier on. Let's see how you do," he challenged her, not moving, wondering what she'd come up with - and whether he'd let her see it through.

She eyed him, considering that. Slowly pushing herself up, she kept her eyes on his. Getting to her bare feet, she made a slow circle around him like she had earlier only this time she was letting her fingertips trail along his body as she did so. "The only real issue with that, my dear," she said, stopping in front of him, fingertips on his belt buckle. "Is what you want?" she said, keeping her eyes on his. "Is control." She slid her nails back and forth, enough to draw attention but not distract it entirely. "So what we'd really require? Is you, and a few..." she ticked her gaze away for a moment as if she were considering the phrasing. "Helpful suggestions." she landed on, though 'helpful suggestions' sounded a whole lot like 'forceful demands' when she said it like that.

He'd been watching her as much as he'd been able without moving as she circled him, then as she played with his belt, spoke. When she pointed out what he knew was the truth, he reached out, grabbing her, fisting a hand into her hair near the base of her head, pulling her back slightly, enough to let her know he had her, pulling enough for that awareness. "Tease - do I have to do everything myself?" he asked her, harshly, knowing that he needed this - he needed to be pushed enough to lose control, to be able to get over his fears and disgusts about his own body.

She grabbed a little of his shirt as he pulled her back, helping retain her balance. She gave a dark smile as he asked her that. "If you're not up for it, I suppose I could just go...what, bake some cookies?" she suggested deliberately choosing some ridiculous susie homemaker task, then started to make a move to walk past him, to dismiss him entirely even if she knew a) she wasn't going to get very far with the grip he had in her hair, and b) even if he didn't have her held like that she wasn't going to get anywhere. She wasn't supposed to get anywhere. She was just meant to try to. To show that defiance, and let him decide how to deal with it. How to thwart her from it.

He let go of her hair as she started away, because he didn't actually want to hurt her, and that would bring her up pretty damn short, the way he had her. but he moved his hand to her shoulder, spinning her around and back into him. "You don't bake," he said, before kissing her again, pulling her into him and letting his hands explore her body, not bothering to be overly gentle about it either.

Eris made a soft little sound into the kiss as she returned it, pressing against him though she didn't put her arms up around his neck like she wanted to. She let him map her out, though, as she bit at his lower lip when she needed the air, not that she drew back far, or even did much in the way of breathing. It was just a gasp, before she threw her all into it, making it hard, and anything but sweet. Then she abruptly tried to push away, to see how he'd react to that.

He brought her back again, pulling her back into him and once again lifting her off the ground, only this time he turned them and pressed her back hard against the wall, pinning her at his height between the wall and his chest, hardly missing a beat as he dropped his head to her neck and started in on the skin there.

Now that was better. She even especially liked the fact that while he had a perfectly good bed not only within reach but he'd barely have to take a step to put them on it, he'd opted not to go for that at all. No, instead he went for the wall, where she was trapped there, and in such a nicely pleasant way. She brought her foot up to brace herself against the wall as well, thigh resting in against his hip, as she let her eyes fall shut, head tilting to the side to give him the access to her neck he wanted. One hand braced against his shoulder, the other was at the back of his neck, letting her nails dig into his skin just a little.

He pulled at the neck of her dress, aware that there would be fastenings for it somewhere, but not going for looking for them. It wasn't nice enough, in his opinion, to bother being too gentle about it and if she wanted to stop him ripping it, then she'd have to speak up. Then he'd consider it, maybe. He'd have to see how he felt about things.

Eris really didn't actually mind if he tore her clothes. That wasn't a problem for her. It was something she found compelling, even. But, it was something she could use, and put into the game, which she did. She reached up, and grabbed his face by the chin, wrenching it back towards her so she could see his eyes. "You keep ruining my clothes, you're going to have to buy me new ones." she told him. Which actually left things open for several courses of action, so far as she was concerned. He could disregard that entirely and make a worse mess of her dress, or he could try to find a different way of getting her clothes off of her. There she could think of a few ways too. So, it was a wide array he had.

"You keep leaving them places, you're gonna need new ones anyhow," Brett pointed out, referencing their first couple of times together, when she'd left without certain items, which he'd kept. Still, he stopped pulling at her clothes, pausing for a moment before letting her down from the wall and taking a step back. he indicated she could leave where she was and he wasn't going to stop her. "Go on then," he told her, his eyes on her all the time. "...I want to see you," he added, toning it in a way to indicate what he really wanted.

"Maybe I left them as a reminder." she told him, since hey, that was pretty much the truth there. She had. She'd wanted him to think about it all later, wanted it to bring up certain imagery in his mind, give him something to distract himself with. When he set her down, she smirked, staying in against the wall for a moment. That, before she moved past him. She walked into the deeper shadows of the loft, over towards the candles, and the record player, which was still playing. Not far, though she made sure there were a few things that might obstruct his view, so he'd have to move if he wanted to see her in entirety. She turned her back to him, then reached behind herself, and started to tug the zipper of her dress down, taking her time with it, swaying almost impercebtably to the music.

He did move, though he stayed back, moving to sit on the loveseat, watching her move, taking in that view, his gaze intense.

She was aware of him moving, but didn't look back over her shoulder at him yet. She made sure she got the zipper down all the way first, then let it fall just a little, the shoulders of the dress dropping down a little more down her arms, the straps of the black bra visible. Then she shifted slightly, looking back at him. Her hair fell down her back, something she purposely did just so it would still obscure a bit of her. Eris could appreciate the way he was watching her, that intensity in his gaze. Again, she moved just a slight bit, a tiny sway to the music playing. She let the dress drop down a little more, a little more, just by fractions. Well. Until she'd drawn it out about as much as she could, and then she dropped it so it pooled at her feet.

It was as the dress dropped that Brett became aware of the play here. not that they hadn't played before, but this specific one. The act she was putting on for him, so smooth and practised. And sure, it was one he'd basically told her to do, but still, it made him uncomfortable, this particular one. He hadn't realised it would, but it was there now as he stood and crossed to her again. "Stop," he told her, putting his arms around her again, feeling her skin against his palms. "Don't - I... Not like that," he told her.

Okay, she'd done something wrong. She didn't know what she had done wrong, but whatever it was, she'd kind of...what. Spooked him? She wasn't sure. She looked up at him then, sliding her hands up to rest on his chest. Saying nothing for a few moments, she watched his eyes. "Then how?" she asked. It was better than asking him if he was alright, which she wasn't so sure he was.

He'd had some of her girls try that one on him, at one time or another in the past. When he'd turn up at Babylon, and they'd take him into their room, and he'd show no interest in doing anything. Those girls who wanted to 'persuade' him that they could have some fun. And watching her there, like that, it just reminded him. "I don't just want to watch you," he told her, knowing that it was a flip from where he'd been minutes before. "I don't want you putting on some kind of a show for me. Just take them off," he told her instead. She wanted to see her, he just didn't want her to do that.

Eris narrowed her eyes just a little. In that 'I know that there's something going on right now' way. Saying nothing for a few long moments, she kept her eyes on his, ticking them back and forth as she searched. She really had to decide if she was going to continue on, or stop things where they were and ask him what the hell was actually going on there. Oddly, he still seemed to want to continue, though, or maybe that was a deflection in itself. She didn't want it to be a deflection. She didn't want it used like that. "Tell me that's what you still want, and you're not just trying to get out of dealing with whatever it is in your head." she said at last.

"Take them off or I'll do it for you," Brett told her, his voice dropping to be almost menacing. "And it's got nothing to do with anything except you don't need to put on a show for me. You look like her when you do that. I don't want her - I want you."

That actually made sense to her. She supposed in a way he was right. It was something she'd done more than once back before. Not necessarily often? Or, not as often as other things, but still. It was part of her skill set, she supposed. Still, in the middle of it all, she liked his tone. So, without letting her eyes stray from his, she reached behind herself to unhook her bra, and she tugged it down, letting it drop. Which left the last bit of clothing, a little satin and lace. She didn't move to remove those, not just this second, wondering how long it would take him to take action.

His drifted his eyes over her form, taking her in, his hands sliding down over her curves until he could hook his fingers into the band of that satin and lace, his gaze returning to her eyes, an admonishing question there. Not that he gave her the chance to correct that before he pulled. One swift tug was all it took, one pull for the material to snap. he didn't even glance as he discarded it.

There was the hint of approval there in the curve of her lips, in her eyes as he did that. She slid her hands behind her back, clasping her hands there in what might have been demure if she wasn't standing there without a stitch on. What she didn't do was make any kind of attempt to cover herself. After all, that was the whole point, wasn't it? He'd said he wanted to see her. Well, he could see her now. She tilted her head to the side, letting her hair fall in that direction, over that shoulder, clearly waiting for him to make some move, give her some form of instruction.

He ran his hands back up her body, until both palms rested against her neck, his thumbs pushing at her jawline to lift her head, the scar red against her skin and he looked at it, then on down over her form. "Even with this," he told her, running finger along the scar. "Even with this, we're going to get kicked out of a lot of parties. I'm gonna get us kicked out of a lot of parties."

She let him do what he was going to, and when she heard him say that, the hint of approval was more than just a hint. There was a dark smile that slid over her features. She could appreciate that. Hell, she was looking forward to getting kicked out of parties, for his behavior in reaction to people's attention on her. "You'd better." she told him. so that it wasn't just her expression he had to go off of. She let her tone reflect her feelings on the matter. How hell yes, that was what she wanted. even thinking about things in that light made her feel oddly better about the endeavor in general. Knowing he was not only anticipating behaving irrationally, but banking on it? That set some of her worries at ease.

"You wanna see me knocking heads together over you?" he asked her, raising an eyebrow at that. He wondered if that would do it for her, if she'd get more that a little kick out of it. he knew that, once upon a time, he'd not been a particularly violent man, but the last few years had taken their toll on him. His way of viewing the world had changed, irrevocably. And his reactions along with them.

"I may appreciate that view, yes." She answered him. "I'm also aware there's going to be a lot of vultures circling. I like knowing they're not going to get too close." she added. Since yes, that meant something to her. Even beyond what it might do for her in an emotional, or sexual manner. Even if it'd do something there too. "And you think they will be?" she asked, going towards what was likely the point of the statement to start with.

"I know they will be - and not just because of who you used to be. You look good, Julia. Though, a little cold," he allowed, stressing very slightly on her name. he used it so very rarely. he'd told her earlier on that he wouldn't compliment her simply because he knew she wanted to hear it, but he'd waited long enough now that it wasn't simply because of her. There had been that time he needed to elapse so he could give her what she wanted without it seeming that he was responding directly to her say-so.

As usual, use of her name put more weight into his words than they otherwise might have had. He usually only used it when he wanted something, or wanted her to stop something. So, this was a little different than usual. This was more just...using her name. But if his goal was to put more into the statement than the words alone would have provided, it worked. There were slight cues in her expression, her posture, little things that said he'd hit the mark there. "Thank you." she said, tone a little softer than it had been. "I had been planning to rely on you to keep me warm." she added, since he'd mentioned the cold thing. Which, was true. She hadn't broken out in goosebumps yet but it wouldn't be that far off.

He didn't know where he was going with this now. they seemed to be at a place that was almost softer than they were used to - conversations about physical violence notwithstanding - and Brett didn't know how to move forward from here. His desire for her was still there, but the need for something to make him forget his inhibitions was lacking. But yet he couldn't walk away and, after a moment, he bent his head to kiss her once again, though, again, it was softer than normal.

She kissed him back, noting the fact immediately that it had a different tone than the kisses he usually gave her had. There was that softer line to it, it lacked the sort of imminent threat that some other part of her was going to be feeling a conflicting sort of sensation at any given moment. Her arms slid up around his neck and she pushed up on her toes, much like she had earlier, though the feel was different there too. For one, she was bare, he wasn't. And while she pressed against him, it was a lighter push than she'd done earlier. No less there, and there wasn't anything that could be considered hesitant about it, but different nonetheless.

He picked her up without breaking the kiss and carried her over to the love seat, that being nearer than the bed. He broke back from her as he laid her down, kneeling on the floor by her side as he did so. And it was only then that he came to a stop, that hesitation, that uncertainty that he'd known would hit eventually finally arriving. It had been the same that first time, when he'd first tried for gentle. It left him far too aware of himself, or the ruin that he was. It was almost overwhelming.

She laid there with her eyes on him, and she said nothing for a few moments, seeing the hesitation there. She could very well imagine what it was. The same thing that tripped them up the first time. Eris was nothing if not a woman who understood the intricacies of intimacy. And, she knew what issues Brett had with himself. She could even draw the conclusion that when they went for consuming passion, that it probably left no room in his head for him to hamstring himself. Reaching out, she slid her hand over his shoulder, in towards his neck, sliding beneath the material of his shirt so she could drift her fingers over where the scar traced up onto his neck. Giving a light little big of pressure, she encouraged him to get closer, to kiss her.

He went with it, but the kiss he gave her was tentative, unsure, though not lacking in want. he closed his eyes as she touched his scar, aware that that was only the beginning, feeling the way it lapped across most of his body, mentally tracing the lines of it - all covered up with an expensive suit. A fake front covering who he really was.

Kissing him until she needed to draw a breath, she tilted his head to the side so she could kiss his cheek, then speak into his ear. Her voice was soft, a whisper just for him. "Stop thinking." she told him. "I want you, Brett. Kiss me like you mean it." she told him, the words lacking force, not wanting to necessarily trigger this into something else, but wanting to give him a way to work around it. Or to try to, at the very least. And if it didn't work, and he needed that hard shove into something else, she'd take that track, but she wanted to give him the opportunity for something else first.

Like it's just that easy, Brett thought to himself, but he tried it, kissing her more deeply, trying to concentrate solely on that, to put his all into that, one hand steadying him leaning against the edge of the loveseat, the other exploring her body once again, trying to forget about himself, to lose himself in her.

She kissed him back, pulled him closer, shifted when he leaned against the loveseat. She let him explore, doing what he wanted, and she kept herself from doing anything that would shift the tone of things--even if it might have been a little bit hard. Nipping at his lower lip, that she really wanted to do, though she refrained, even if she did scrape her teeth against it just a moment. The other things she stopped herself from doing was trying to unbutton his shirt just yet, even if she really wanted to do that. Though, he was likely wearing an undershirt as well, She could possibly attempt it. Instead of going straight for it she just slid her hand towards the buttons, to see if it was going to trip him up.

He stopped as her hands moved to his buttons and he reached to put his own over them, leaning back and looking at her, shaking his head slightly, his heart suddenly racing for a completely different reason. He knew what she wanted to do, knew she'd say she wouldn't care. And possibly he believed her a little more than he once had done in that assertion, but there was still that fear there, so long held, that crippled him. Him who was usually so certain about everything.

It was thirteen years of issues that she was dealing with. She understood that. Keeping her eyes on his for a long moment, she then glanced around the room. "Blow out the candles." she said. They'd been together in the pitch black of Gray's basement, he'd actually disrobed for that. She'd most certainly felt him already. Funny how he'd been so upset earlier that she hadn't been looking at him, and now he couldn't stand the thought of her seeing him.

He closed his eyes for a moment, then moved to do as she said, blowing the candles out one by one, until the room was only lit by the glow of the streetlight down below, and badly at that. It wasn't total darkness. She'd still be able to make out some of him. but it was slightly better as he went back to her side again.

She watched him as he moved to kill all the little points of light in the room, leaving it with that light scent of smoke. When he came back over, she reached out, touching the back of his hand lightly, his wrist. Pushing herself to her feet, she stood before him, and reached up again to start unbuttoning his shirt, not rushing it, not taking it too slow, just doing so at a normal pace. She tugged it out of his pants, and got the last few buttons, before she moved, stepping behind him so she could draw it down off of his shoulders. Then she tossed it onto the chair nearby, and slid her hands up his back, over the material of the undershirt he wore. She stepped in closer, close enough so he'd be able to feel her there, at his back, just remaining there for a few heartbeats, before she tugged that shirt out of his pants as well, and started to draw it up, via her hands sliding up the flesh of his back beneath it.

Brett swallowed and closed his eyes, knowing he was tense right now, hating that he was. This wasn't how things were meant to go, this wasn't how they were meant to be at all. She was just humouring him, he could feel that certainty rising. That, really, if he was going to be like this, she'd get sick of it, eventually. That he needed to get ahold of himself, stop acting this way, stop having issues. Only he didn't know how to do that. It wasn't that simple, and he didn't want to lose the feeling of her hands on his body.

Eris pushed his shirt up then over his head, moving around the side of him as she did so she could pull it off, still at that average pace. She tossed that over to the same chair she'd done the first. Letting her fingertips trail along his skin, following his ribs on the unscarred side, she let them drift lower. Then she dropped down, untying his shoes, and she got rid of them, as well as his socks while she was at it, pushing them beneath the loveseat. Then she tilted her head back, to gaze up at him, even if he was at best a very vague figure in the dark. Reaching up, she started to loosen his belt, still sort of half waiting for him to stop her at some point, even if she was hoping he wouldn't.

He didn't stop her, though he didn't make any move to help her either. He wanted to, but he couldn't - that looming and consuming depression about himself meant that he could hardly move right now. He still wanted her, and yet the longer it went on, the more he was certain that she wouldn't want him. It was contrary to all they'd said tonight, but there was nothing he could do except wait to see if she would stop - or crash and burn it before she could, and he'd so far managed to stop himself from doing that.

She got his belt undone, then took the time to slide it out of the loops, setting it down under the loveseat with his shoes. Then she reached up to undo the button of his pants, and ease the zipper down. She did all of that while still crouched down, but once she was finished with the zipper, she stood straight. Not hesitating, but not rushing, she pushed the remains of his clothes down past his hips, til they were loose enough to drop. Then she sort of directed him to move a little, so she could pick those up and toss them where his other clothes were. That she did fast. Then she was back in front of him, looking up at where she knew he was, and she stepped in close. She stayed there for a few long moments, before she reached out, letting her fingertips slide down his abdomen, one hand on the good side, the other over scars, trailing downwards til she could touch him. At least part of her was expecting he'd have lost interest.

He had some, but her touch on his skin alone was enough to mean that that wasn't entirely. He knew, though, that he couldn't just stay standing here, passively. They were going nowhere if he didn't get with it here, but he just couldn't get his mind in the right place and his body wasn't entirely picking up the slack.

"What do you need from me?" she asked. She pressed against him lightly, still touching him, enough to make an effort at getting everything back up to par, anyways. She pushed up on her toes, and kissed his collarbone, then his neck. Light, little kisses. She really wasn't at all sure this was going to work, or if he'd be able to even go through with things unless there was that element of darkness to it. That urgency where he could just not ignore it anymore.

He didn't answer at first. He didn't know the answer. he didn't know how to actually explain this - not without going into things he wasn't willing to discuss, because they'd make him sound like a yellow fool who couldn't deal with his age-old issues. "I need... to stop thinking," he said, eventually, echoing what she'd told him earlier. That was the only vaguely acceptable concept he could approach.

Eris took him by the wrist and pulled him over towards the loveseat, and pushed at his chest, so he'd sit down. Or, he'd at least know that was what she was going for. "I'm here, with you, and waiting for you to do whatever it is you want to me. Just dying, for you to make your move. What do you want to do with me? To me?" she asked him. It was better than asking him what he was afraid of. That she thought would go over extremely unwell.

He went down as if she'd really pushed him, sitting down hard, his legs slightly spread as he leaned back. He reminded himself that it was dark, and even if she could see some of him by the light coming in through the window there wouldn't be enough to show the extent of the damage. Anyway, he reminded himself - or tried to anyhow - she'd felt the extent of the scarring. She'd touched it. It was there in her mind, she just hadn't seen it.

That thought, however, didn't help the way it was intended to, as it started him wondering if she thought that it was worse than it actually was. Like that was possible. God - he was a fucking mess. He reached up, pulling her down on top of him, hoping that would help, trying to at least pretend that everything was fine. "I want you," he mumbled, telling her the truth - he did want her, pretty badly actually, he just didn't want to be aware of himself doing it - but hating the fact he'd mumbled. He never mumbled. He spoke confidently, he gave orders, he said how it was going to be, or he shouted. He didn't fucking mumble.

He didn't. And as she positioned herself on his lap, straddling him though not pushing against him for the moment, she put her arms around his neck. "You can do better than that." she told him. She leaned closer, letting her chest brush against his, letting her fingers drift in his hair. "Anything you want." she continued. "You mentioned earlier that I had a tendency to walk around in front of you in only a towel." she added. "I'm sure you've had fantasies." she said, directing his thoughts, or giving him options for directions, at any rate.

He had done, god had he done. Only in his fantasies, he wasn't him. He wasn't stuck in this body and he didn't have any of the problems that real life brought. He didn't have worries about lights, or being seen, or what she'd think. He could do all the things that he wanted to do, to her, with her, and never have to worry about what might happen. He couldn't do this - it was just all fucked. He pushed her off him. Not hard, but enough to send her sideways. "I can't do this," he told her, wishing that it wasn't like that, hating himself for it.

"I don't accept that." Eris said, reaching out to latch onto his arm, hold tight so he didn't attempt to do anything like walk away. "I know you can do this, we did before. You gave me something no one else has. And I don't accept that you're this weak. You aren't. And you're not some scared little boy, who's going to back off of some bitch who drives you crazy to begin with. And I know you have issues with this--" she said, reaching across to his other arm, sliding her hand over his shoulder and down his chest. "But you can't let it ruin things for yourself. You know I know it's there. I've felt it. Seen bits and pieces. I still want you. There's still that desire there, that drive. And there's certain things one can't fake, and if you need your proof, feel for it."

Brett made an effort to shake her off his arm. "I thought you said you could fake anything," he spat at her, masochistically, wondering just how much he was intending to crash and burn things right now. And if she'd let him. It wouldn't be the first time he'd used her as a punching bag, after all.

"Not a physical reaction." Eris said. "You have yours, I have mine. What I could fake was people thinking they had my undivided attention. That I actually enjoyed the sorts of things they wanted to do." She also didn't actually let go of his arm, just because he was trying to get her off of it. "But this isn't a set up, is it. Anything here? Is bare bones, just it is what it is. I don't have the benefit of preparing for someone I know does nothing for me, and let's be honest here, that was everyone." she continued. "Only now there's you. Even if you are being a chicken shit."

"So, what? I get a physical reaction but I don't get your undivided?" Brett asked without really thinking. Right now, he didn't much care if he was making sense or not. He glanced down at her arm, noting that she hadn't let him go. "And do you really think you can keep me here?" he asked, wondering if she'd try, actually hoping she would.

"I think it'd be one hell of a lot harder to get rid of me than you think it would." she told him. "And you do have my undivided attention. I would have thought that were obvious, but if you're reverting back to being a five year old, then perhaps not." she continued. She still didn't let go of his arm, either. "You often have my undivided. You take up a whole lot of space in my world. Now, would you like to get back to my point here?"

"Often - on your terms," Brett pointed out, arguing back at her and feeling that resurgence of feeling once again, biting through his crippling depression. He embraced it. "When you want to give me it. And your point? What - that I'm a chicken shit? Fuck you - if I was that, you'd've let me go by now."

"The point before that. About not being able to fake certain things." Eris said. "And on my terms? Who was it who was fully avoiding, and only showing up when he broke in and only saw me by accident?" she asked. "Not me. And what is it you think I do here all day? Or when I go out, or when I sing, or when I set up things to take down people in your way, and try to correct bullshit in your past?" she continued. "Besides, up until quite recently? You've more or less made me feel like I could drop off the face of the planet and you wouldn't bat an eye. So don't throw me 'on your terms'. That's bullshit, and you know that. You're deflecting."

"So what? Your whole life revolves around me now? Princess - you really do need to get out more." He didn't try and put together a coherent argument. Right now, he wasn't trying for that at all. He was reacting, purely riding the wave of reaction over his depression. he didn't care if it made sense, it was his way out and he was taking it. "Or is that it? Do you just wait here, for me? To make you feel like this?" he asked, finally touching her like she wanted him to.

Since they happened to be arguing, she wasn't actually prepared for him to touch her. So, she drew in a surprised, unsteady breath, jumping just a little. But hey, at least he'd know now that she wasn't lying about that or anything of the sort. That he'd had her there, kicked up desire, everything. She'd wanted him. "I go out, it'll get me killed." she told him, tone a little more strained than it had been a moment ago. "You know that. I do wait for you. I look for you, downstairs but you're never there." Which wasn't an admission she'd have given if she'd let herself take another few moments of considering before she spoke.

He smiled at that, at how unsteady she sounded. He liked that and it urged him on, pressing on with what he'd started. "You look for me?" he asked her, shifting their positions so she was more lying down now and he was over her, though not pressing her down at all. She still had hold of him, as though he would actually go someplace. Right now, he had no intentions of doing that, though he knew he had a new awareness of the fact that he wouldn't mind it if she did one day try and stop him. It was the fight he liked, and he supposed that was just another side of it. Interesting though. "Guess you don't look hard enough, Princess."

She let him move her--though she didn't let go of his arm. It was also possible she'd dug her nails in a little. Part of her realized she didn't know if he'd start something like he had then walk away when she was vulnerable. That thought, however, was a little sidetracked when he said that last bit. Biting at her lower lip, she knew her breathing remained unsteady as she frowned a little, wondering if that meant what she thought it did. "You've been there?" she asked.

"I found you there," he confirmed for her, challengingly, knowing she hadn't seen him. She wouldn't have been so surprised when she found him in her place that night if she'd seen him earlier on. He thought of the times when he'd caught her singing and she'd stopped, wondering still whether he was meant to never have heard her, if that was something she'd wanted to keep from him, but he wouldn't be apologetic. Right now, he couldn't be.

It was a little difficult, having a conversation while he was doing things to her, though she kept her mind threading along that line, scratching a little down his arm, though it wasn't as intentional as she would have liked. "What did you think?" she asked, making her voice come out steady that time, even if she had to sacrifice a little volume to do it. She'd just always thought he hadn't given a damn or something. Never had the desire to see her perform. And maybe he didn't, and he'd just found her and then that was it and he never thought about it again.

He moved more over her then, kissing over her breast and then biting down, keeping up those feelings, aware of what would happen if he didn't. "I think you're too good for that fucking dive," he told her, his honest opinion.

He earned a little unsteady cry, nothing that could be considered a bad thing, and her nails dug in deeper into his arm. Hearing him say that felt good. That he had an opinion at all, and it was a good one. "I wanted you to see me." she told him, finally unlatching her nails from his arm with one hand, to pull at his hair a little. Just enough that it would hurt, but she didn't pull any out or anything. "I wanted you to see me in a different light." she managed again between breaths, which were still massively unsteady. "Was it just the once?"

"Just the once," he confirmed, moving over her more, taking his hand away as he slipped between her legs. "I can't be seen there - and I didn't think you wanted me to," he said, not waiting for her to react to that as he pushed up, starting to move.

She made another sound, both arms going up around his neck, as she moved with him. "I did." she said, after a few long moments, and it was in an exhale, just before another soft gasp. And she wished she'd known he was there. Wished she'd been able to pick him out in the crowd, but he'd obviously stayed pretty well hidden. And he was right, he'd have to. She dragged her nails lightly up the back of his shoulder towards his neck, biting at his neck, just not hard enough to leave a mark. Still, she wasn't giving that up entirely, much like he hadn't.

"You'd always stop when I came in," Brett pointed out, slipping a hand underneath her and raising her hips up to a better angle. "Or, sometimes you would carry on if you didn't know I was listening."

She resisted, just a little, just enough that he'd have to push the point with her, move her a little more firmly. "You knew where I was." she said. "You knew when I performed. I never saw you there." she continued, pulling a little at his hair again, trying to pull his head to the side, to expose his throat better. "I imagined you didn't care or want to hear."

It took him a moment or two to get his reply out - talking wasn't top of his agenda at the moment - and when he did, his tone was laboured. "Princess. If I. Go into. That bar. There needs. To be a. Pressing reason. New Years - it was crowded. People weren't. Looking at me. Most times. It's my neck. And you're good. Not that good." He paused and flexed again, changing angle slightly. "...Maybe not that good," he amended, all things considered.

Eris smiled at that, and she didn't get a reply out for a little bit either, concentrating more on everything else than their whole talking thing. Though she did start to push things a little faster, so much as she could from her position. And she pushed at his shoulder, up, to change the angle of things even more than he had. "Maybe?" she eventually got out, that sparking her imagination a little.

Oh yeah, he could definitely go with that change. "Possibly maybe," he clarified, figuring that, right now, she could have whatever she wanted. Nothing else mattered any more, all of his insecurities and fears had melted away in the face of pure feeling. Very specific, very focused feeling.

She didn't say anything for another few moments, giving little moans instead, before she pushed hard at his shoulder with one hand, and pushed at his back with her heel, wanting him to sit back up, or something. Basically, so long as she wound up on top she wasn't actually caring where they ended up. Could be the floor for all she minded. "If you were there," she started. "You'd have to deal...with all the guys staring at me." she said. "Wanting to get closer."

It took Brett a minute, but he finally clued into what she wanted, and turned, bringing her with him so they ended up with him in a sitting position with her astride him. "You probably. Don't want. Me there. Then," he told her, breathing hard at the position change, almost seeing stars.

That was better. She grabbed onto the back of the loveseat, and she took the lead on things, going for something hard, though not necessarily fast at the moment. She bit at his earlobe, and exhaled into it. "Maybe I want...to see you jealous." she told him. They'd been talking about it earlier. About getting deliberately thrown out of parties. And those were people who were higher society. She was curious what he'd do in a situation like the one downstairs. Where half the time some guys tried to follow her off stage. She had a feeling it would go badly.

"Maybe. You want. To see. Me dead," Brett suggested, though he didn't sound like he meant that. "Because downstairs. With those guys. Me? I start something. I would be," he pointed out, under no illusions about that. No matter how good she was. He'd been an O'Malley. He'd been a cop. No part of his existence at all would enamoured him to the patrons of the place she worked. She was as off limits there as she could get.

"So don't start." she said, sort of half finishing the sentiment, but not getting the last word on there. 'something' was a longer word than she had the breath for at the moment. She started to move a little faster, using her grip on the back of the loveseat to steady herself so she could. And she kind of wanted to see if she how cracked his speech patterns got if she did.

Brett moaned as she did that, rolling his head back to rest against the loveseat. "But you said..." he managed, before words failed him for the moment.

"Shut up." she said, kissing him, hard if brief, before she dropped the rest of the conversation entirely. She put her full, undivided attention into getting the most out of him as she could, moans, hitches in breath, bucking beneath her, everything. She wanted to drive him crazy then, wanted to give him a night he was going to think back on often. That he'd want to think about, recall the sensations of.

His response to that was purely physical. To being told what to do. He fisted his hand into her hair, yanking her head back as he drove into her, leaning forward to bite at her neck, breaking his own rule about marking. He'd have to be careful of that, he knew, once they got going. She might be able to wear a scar in public, but a bite mark was something else. But, right now, with the way she'd been talking, she could wear it for now, and she could like it. She was a twisted bitch, she would like it.

She cried out when he pulled her head back, bit her neck. Yeah, that was going to leave a mark. She could feel it in the stink, the heat that rushed to the spot, how she felt his teeth sink in. After the cry though, it was a satisfied sort of sound she made, a pleased one, unmistakeable. She also didn't in any way stop, even if she did use her nails to rake down the back of his shoulder. If he was marking, she was too.

he didn't try and stop her from marking him. His specification had been visible. She wasn't allowed to mark him where people could see it - anything else was fair game. And she seemed to be sticking with that, though he couldn't hold back that gasp of pain as she dug into him. Didn't try to, in fact. It wasn't a bad pain, after all.

She tried to lean in close to him again, though with his hold in her hair, she wasn't sure if he was going to let her, but she tried. The end was fast approaching, and she wanted to be in close with him, pushing things that last bit. Sure she was more using him for leverage now, nails dug into his skin and staying there, but still. The acoustics in the place echoed a little, something she hadn't noticed til nowish, since she was starting to make sounds that were chasing one another instead of isolated.

He wasn't in control as he sometimes was right now, and as she moved, he let her, shifting his grip so that he still had hold of her, just facilitating her new position. Position changes had really worked for him tonight, after all. And now was no exception. He knew he was almost there, having given up on words, his breath coming in what could only be described as grunts now, concentrating purely on sensation and feeling, nothing else in the darkness.

She could hear the both of them, his lower sounds, her sharper ones. They sounded good together with the acoustics. Or, that's what she thought, as she kept getting closer, pushing things at the end there that little bit more, a little harder, a little faster, nothing that would be sustainable for very long but since it was just at the end, she could ride it out. When she hit it was hard, something that seemed to send shockwaves through her and was punctuated by a rather loud if shakey cry.

He was there with her as he clutched her to him, riding it out, once again going for her neck, adding to the mark he'd already left there, his blunt nails biting into her hips as he pulled her down on him.

Her hand found it's way to the back of his neck, into his hair, grabbing a handful of it. But it wasn't to pull him away, it was to keep him there, holding tight. In the back of her mind she was now pretty sure that she wasn't actually going to be able to hide a bruise that was going to be as dark as the one he was leaving on her with makeup. And she didn't care, either.

He finally lifted his mouth from her, bringing her with him as he relaxed back against the love seat, pleasantly exhausted right now, a smile actually playing across his face in the darkness. He'd thought for a while there that this wasn't going to happen. And he'd been wrong - he was pretty glad to be wrong, all things considered right about now.

Eris smiled as well, fine with going wherever he was taking her, and she shifted just a little to be comfortable, catching her breath. She reached up to touch tenderly at the side of her neck, the smile not fading at all on that. Yeah that hurt. Good thing it wasn't a bad sort of pain for her.

"Scrap what I said about red," Brett told her, when he finally found his voice again - and that in itself took a few minutes. He wasn't rushing things though, that was for sure.

"Hmm?" she murmured, not quite fully up to making real words and such yet, but humming a question was okay. She didn't quite get the leap. He'd told her he thought she looked good in red. That was all she could recall for what he'd said there. Had he changed his mind? Shifting a tiny bit so she could rest her head against his chest and look up at him, she did so, waiting for an answer.

"You look better like this," he told her - though the compliment lost some of its impact, given that it was dark and all, he supposed. Still, in a way, that made it easier to say, since it wasn't pointed.

She smiled at that, giving a light little amused laugh. "Something tells me I couldn't really go out in public like this." she told him. There was a lazy sort of affectionate tone to her voice, even if it was still a little fuzzy around the edges as well. "Guess it'll be a look that only you get to see." she added, still sort of gazing at him, even if it was too dark to make out that much.

"Too damn right about that," Brett told her, a little gruffly, though nowhere near as much as he normally would do. His tone had that lazy edge to it as well. He brought a hand up to stroke over where he'd bitten her. "And I ruined your perfection," he pointed out, not sounding sorry about that at al, knowing he'd done it very much on purpose and to that end.

"I noticed that." she said, tilting her head a little so he could have as much access to the bruising area as he wanted. It hurt just a little when he touched it. "I seem to recall there being rules about that." she added, also not really sounding like she so much minded that he'd gone and broken them. "Some reason you threw that out the window?" she asked, curious what he'd say.

"And here was I thinking it was just my rule," he mused, still running his fingers over it. "You didn't say you wanted it to be mutual. And maybe next time you'll pay more attention to me, instead of your looks," he suggested to her.

Eris gave a little gasp at that, like she was shocked at his words, even if she wasn't. "I would assume you'd realize that having to explain why I'm being bitten on a regular basis in highly visible areas wouldn't be something I could do effectively." she said. "And was that a punishment for doing my nails earlier?" she asked. "I think you just like the idea of marking me." Which she thought might appeal to some really deep down dark place in him. "Nothing quite says 'this one's taken' like a bruise of that nature."

"You don't need to worry, Princess - I know that soon I'm gonna have to stop doing it." Soon, just not yet. And she was right that it appealed to him. Another thing that he'd discovered, that aspect of violence, controlled yet possessive. One that she didn't mind. He knew that much, was sure of it - she wasn't upset by his actions.

"That said, I like that much more than the scar line on my neck." she told him, drawing in a breath and settling again. She let her mind drift a little, before she spoke again. "And you wouldn't necessarily have to stop." she said. "Just...not quite so visible places." She propped her chin up a little on his chest, thinking more. "You could always put them places where people might just occasionally catch the slightest glimpse." she mused. "Letting people fill in their own blanks is always amusing."

Oh yeah, she didn't mind that at all. He had known she didn't. He relaxed back against the love seat, lolling his head back, not looking at her now. "I could - course, that would all depend on what you're wearing," he pointed out, knowing she had some really quite revealing dresses. He'd seen them on her.

"It would." Eris agreed. "But I have quite a few dresses for all sorts of different occasions, different cuts, varying stages of revealing." she continued. "So, either I could just dress accordingly, or you could always pick something out, then you behave accordingly." she mused, absently tracing her fingertips along his collarbone. "Since I'm right, aren't I?" she asked. "That you like doing that? You like having me marked?"

"Maybe," he allowed. "I don't think you have a problem with that. Would you prefer it? If it was slightly visible? If people could catch a glimpse, not be sure that they were seeing what they were seeing? What about your claims that you had to be perfect - wouldn't that mar that?" he asked her.

"You were the one who said I should wear my most glaring imperfection as a badge." she pointed out, reaching up to trace along her own scar. "The hint of a bruise somewhere would just make people whisper. Now if I was hiding the scar, or trying to, and there was a bruise, then it would be an issue. But together, it's just something for people to gossip about, try to figure out. What about you?" she asked, wanting his opinion on the matter.

"I think it's a fine line," he said, raising his head to look at her. "It'd have to be clear that it was a claim - and not an injury. If it could at all be read that I knocked you around, that would take away from what you are. That would hurt what we're doing. Might be best to not come too close to that."

"Bruises from punches and bruises from bites tend to look different." she said. Or, they did to her. "But I see your point. I suppose we'll just have to play it by ear." she added. "Find some middle ground, or just gauge how people are reacting in the first place. Whenever we do go out...especially the first night I'm going to need you with me the entire time." she told him. And there wasn't sentiment in that, she really would be requiring his presence. "People are going to move in, and they're going to move in very, very fast. We're going to need code, too." she added, going back to tracing her nails along his collarbone. "Phrases or gestures, touches, that'll tell you things or me without us having to be so blatant about it."

"That first night, nothing could get me away from you," he reassured her, knowing that to be the truth and not because she'd requested it. He was going to be very much on guard for that first night, for both of them. They'd need to watch each other's backs. "If we're doing phrases, or touches - they need to be things you can remember, so I think it's best they come from you. I can work with whatever you give me. You're going to be more familiar with the environment anyhow - which brings me to the question of whether anyone's going to have a problem with me going armed."

"Depends on where we're going." Eris said. "Some places like to check weaponry with coats, but a few people are usually allowed a pass. Assume that at every party, there's at least half a dozen people in the room that are armed. Granted, that doesn't always mean those people actually know how to use said weaponry, I know there's a guy out of city hall that loves to carry, but I don't think he could hit the floor if he fell." she told him. "I think nonverbal cues might work best with my memory. I'll think about it. It'll need to be simple, but clear. For instance, if you do sense a threat, you're going to need to be able to let me know that without being obvious. And if I'm stuck in a situation I need to not be in, I'm going to need a way to tell you without, say, crying for help." She hummed a little as she thought. "You're an ex cop, and my bodyguard. You might be able to keep yourself armed, particularly with everyone getting to know my...colorful recent history."

"Guess that's another thing we'll be playing by ear." There were a whole lot of holes in their plan, and they both knew it. But all they could do was to go along with things, and roll with the punches. "When are you gonna be able to talk to your girls?" he asked, figuring that was the next step, wondering if she'd already started in on that.

"I already have. Granted, I'll need to talk to them again, but they know the basic idea. For the most part, from what I understand, most of them are sticking together, and waiting for me to put the word out that there's someplace to meet up. Which'll be our new place, apparently. We can get them all 'registered' as our employees, map out wages, try and work things out within the area. They're going to want to stay close, and they're going to want to stay together. But they're on board." she told him. Then she was silent for a few long moments. "We're actually starting this, aren't we."

"Yes Princess," he confirmed, stroking a hand up her thigh and resting it on her hip. "We're actually starting this. You'll need to come see the place, get familiar with the layout. And you'll need to be there for getting the girls organised. Then there's opening up, getting the word out - I know we discussed wanting to do that first of all without letting people know exactly that we were behind it..."

She nodded, thinking about it all, and she couldn't help but feel a little bit of a nervous slide in her stomach. That idea that she couldn't actually do this was creeping back in, slowly but surely. There was going to be too much to remember. She was going to be forgetting things, and she didn't do so well in public, she didn't do so well in general sometimes. She tensed a little in reaction to her thoughts, and she set her cheek back down on his chest, staring off into the darkness without seeing it. Shit. Shit, shit, shit, what the hell am I doing?

It didn't take a mindreader to figure out her reaction to that, and Brett tightened his grip on her hip for a moment in a reassuring type way. "I'll be right there with you," he told her, his voice low and quiet, strong. "Every step of the way." He had confidence that they could do this, because what other option was there? Except to hide under a rock until someone found them and took them out. He'd prefer to go down fighting.

"I still don't know if I can do this." she said, tone quiet. "There's going to be so much to remember. And I know a lot of it I already do, because it happened before, but...I don't know. It's everything new." That was where she'd get into trouble. And she knew he'd be there to listen to all the inane conversation, but still. Would he pick out what was important? So much of what was said sounded like nothing, but they were the angles that meant everything. Okay, so she was panicking a little. "I want you here." she said. Then realized that she'd done that 'make a jump without explaining it' thing again. "The last night I'm on stage? I want you here. Be low profile, find a dark shadow, do whatever. Just...be here."

"I'll be there," he told her again - and in reference to both parts of what she said. "You might not see me, but I'll be there." Definitely in the One More Round, that was for sure. But for all he could be an imposing figure, he could keep a low profile when it was called for. He was pretty damn good at alienating the rest of the world, telegraphing very much that people should simply Leave Him Alone. And, mostly, they did.

That made her feel a little better. And, it occurred to her that at any other point she probably wouldn't have been able to say any of that, definitely not tell him she wanted him there. But, well. At the moment they were in the dark, in vulnerable positions in general, so she'd done it. Which led her to the next part. "When're we pulling the trigger on this?" she asked. "So I can let the owner know I'm leaving. If he knew, and advertised that it was going to be my last night performing, I bet I'd draw a crowd. Could make decent money for whatever we need it for." Then she drew in a breath and let it out slowly. "What's the apartment like at the new place?" She wasn't going to be able to stay in the loft once she wasn't singing anymore.

"I want to move on it soon. Maybe not the public face of things, but the business. With Jackson sniffing around, the sooner we can get that started and proven legit, the better, far as I can see. You might want to mention that to your girls as well," he said, not pressing the details there. He knew what they were, what they'd been. And they had an agreement - he wouldn't say shit about anything, as long as whatever they did on the side was exactly that - on the side. Any private arrangements between escorts and clients had nothing to do with their business. Brett wouldn't run a whorehouse. He'd been firm on that and she knew it. "And the apartment's furnished, but basic. better than either of our places though." Which really wasn't hard.

"Wow, a step up." she said, smirking faintly. "Hard to believe, what with the palace here." she added. "And your place...I missed the luxury." Well at least she was getting some of her humor back. "And the girls know what's what, but I'll be sure to re-explain when we get to them." She was quiet again as her mind ticked along things. "Who's going to be living in the apartment?" she asked. Because she actually wasn't sure on that. And while she could just let it go, and not ask and see where the chips fell, she felt like there was a whole hell of a lot she was already doing that with.

And there, that was the question. "People are going to know where you are," Brett said, knowing he was putting a very specific angle on things. "And where I am. It would be more sensible for that to be the same place. After all, you'll need that bodyguard close at hand," he recommended.

She nodded, also thinking it was most sensible. But she couldn't help but remember staring at Clayton's room when they'd been in Babylon. He'd been right there too. He'd been right next door and she'd still wound up where she was now. Her tower hadn't saved her and neither had her guard. "You should get rid of your place." she said. "But there should be someplace we can go, too, someplace no one knows about. Just in case." Some little bolt hole, really. Somewhere under a false name where they didn't keep anything of import, but if things went to hell, there'd be a place to meet up at.

"I'll put that on the list of things to get when we have the cash. Until then, we've got Gray's," he reminded her, not pushing it too much because he could understand why she wouldn't like that place. He didn't lose a moment at the thought of getting rid of his place. He'd never had a particular attachment to it, though he knew it would be odd, not seeing Ginger so much. She'd probably be glad to see the back of him though, one less person to try and mother over.

"Middle class neighborhood, if you can find one." she said. "Someplace nondescript at best. We go too low, there'll be more than enough people who'll want to break in, knowing there's a place standing empty. Too high class, which'll probably be the first place they look anyways, if anyone's looking, will be too obvious. We'll just need someplace to blend into the background. Where people aren't shady enough to rat people out or ask too many questions." Drawing in a deep breath, she let it out slowly. "You'll need to write down addresses for me." she added quietly. "So I can even get where I'm going." It wasn't like she'd remember.

Brett let her talk it through, listening to everything she said, but not saying anything himself. He knew she was nervous about what they were doing - more so than he was. He was just plain scared, but he wasn't nervous with it. He'd committed to the track for various reasons and he wouldn't turn off it, or let her turn off it. They would go forward and do what needed to be done, and if this all helped her get her mind on doing that, then fine.

"Where are the O'Malley's at?" she asked. "I've heard whispers downstairs, but...they pretty much drowned out?" They sure as hell better be. The last thing she wanted was for some stragglers to band together enough to screw them over. That just wouldn't work out for anyone. But they also hadn't talked about it. Part of her recognized that she was just sort of going through everything right now because she was nervous, but she couldn't help it. Details. Everything was in the details.

"Last thing I heard, Joey O'Malley's booked himself on a boat back to the old country and the rest of them are scattering as well. There've been some arrests, a few shootings. It's just a case of picking up the pieces," he told her. He'd been waiting for someone from one of the other Syndicate groups to 'approach' him, offer him a new position. That was the other reason he wanted to move fast on this - he needed to get himself set up in something new to stop the heavy hitters coming down on him and giving him an offer that they'd say he couldn't refuse.

Eris' mind was going to the same places. "Let's get this done as fast as we can." she said. "Take this week, get all our shit done, be in the new place by this weekend. Friday, if we can make it. I can set up the last performance for Saturday, probably. But let's move before anything can happen with the Syndicate, and before anyone else tries to rise up in the O'Malley's wake. Not only that but we need to be on the scene when everyone's recalling the bloodshed and ruin the O'Malleys went down in since we're going to be claiming that responsibility."

"Agreed," Brett said, very much on board with that. It would be a rush to get everything done, but now wasn't the time for waiting around. They'd have to throw it together and hope that it stuck. "Can you get your best girls ready to go by then at the latest? Don't have to be many of them, but I'd like to get them out to some of the bigger hitters in town, give them a vested interest in what we're doing."

"I can do that." Eris said. Really, she was willing to bet the girls would be jumping at anything by now. They were waiting, and it wasn't like they could wait forever. So, yeah, they'd be ready and pretty fast. "How well do you think you'd do if you took a bunch of girls shopping?" she asked, smirking very faintly. She could actually picture that, and wow would he ever be miserable.

Brett blinked and sat up a little more. "Me?" he asked, as if there was no way that she could possibly be referring to him. "...You're kidding, right?" She had to be. Him. Shopping. With a load of probably giggling girls. Most of whom had tried it on with him at one time or another. Half of whom probably still held it against them that he'd been immune to their charms. And she wanted him to take them shopping.

She sat up properly when he did, and looked at him. "Well, if we want me out in public, not quite sure where I'm headed, and seen, I could always do it." she told him. "If that's the case though, only give me the amount of money we can afford to spend, and that's it. Otherwise they might be able to slip something past me. But what we'll need is girls who're going to be looking the part. So they're each going to need one nice dress to start with, and a little bit of costume jewelry to go with. Shoes, probably hair cuts...do you see what I'm getting at here? We're going for high priced...and while I know some of them are going to be able to put money into it as well, I want them thinking we've got more going for us than we do. They're going to need to think we can take care of them. Just...in order to do that we need a little leeway first, but if they catch wind of it, it'll affect their states of mind."

"...You can't just send them out shopping by themselves?" Brett asked, figuring that he was going to get a 'no' back. But ...shopping? He'd do a lot of things, but carrying bags and standing around a group of butterflies wasn't high on his wishlist.

"Baby," Eris said patiently. "What do you think a group of girls of ill repute are going to do with money handed to them? They're going to take some, stash some, probably buy things they say they 'need' that they don't, and come back with shit that isn't actually going to pass inspection." she told him. "They're good girls, and they'll be good for what we need, but at the end of the day, we're still talking about a bunch of girls who've spent their lives selling themselves. It's not that easy to pick yourself out of the gutter, trust me. I had to on my own. It took a while. We need them to evolve a bit faster. They just won't this quick."

Brett could get that - he just didn't like it. But they only had so much money to go round. "...Don't expect me to be nice to them," he said, reluctantly, his tone almost sounding like a pissed off pout.

She laughed, a soft little sound. "I won't." she told him. "You could always tell them that I won the bet, and pretend you don't know what that means." she added, reaching up and drifting her fingers across his cheek, missing the stubble there. Yeah, she just liked him better with it. It went with who he was. He just looked off without it, like it was a vital piece of him. In her eyes, she supposed it was.

"I don't know what it means," he pointed out to her. "But - fine, whatever. You can tell them to meet me, but it's gonna be all business and no fucking around. I'm not giving fucking days to shopping," he warned, reverting back to gruff and annoyed.

Eris was still smiling, and she reached up to drift her fingers through his hair experimentally, just once. "I told you before that the girls had been laying down money to see who could crack you first." she said. "Guess that's me. Only I'm laying claim along with that." she told him. "And don't give them any more than a few hours. Nothing like days. If they dally too long, they're probably just trying to either case the place, or get more out of you. So don't. Tell them from the start when the time is up, so they won't pull anything on you."

She'd told him that before, but he hadn't actually taken her seriously on it. not really. After all, he didn't see why in the hell a group of whores would be betting on sleeping with him. But clearly they had nothing better to be doing, and it wasn't like they ever looked to get emotionally involved or anything. He'd just been another job - just clearly they didn't like the break in their schedule he represented. "That's no reason for me taking them shopping. You won - I didn't lose," he pointed out. "Can you get them there tomorrow?" he asked her.

"No but it's a reason they won't try to hit on you the entire day." Eris pointed out. "Which something tells me would make the entire thing into a new shade of hell for you." She could very much imagine that would add insult to injury. He'd not only be annoyed but he'd be annoyed, then pissed, then twitchy on top of it all. That wouldn't go well. "Yes, I can arrange that." she told him. "Afternoon. I can get to them in the morning."

"Afternoon. I'll be waiting," he told her. He knew that the arrangement had taken some of his glow off, given him stress back. but she was right and it needed to be done, so he'd just have to do it. He had long experience now in doing things simply because they had to be done - at least this didn't involve hurting people.

"Good. C'mon." she said, starting to slide off of his lap. "I hear the bed is comfortable for sleeping and the like." she told him. Technically, her bed wasn't that great. But it was functional, and at the very least, more comfortable than the love seat. Especially considering Brett was really far too tall to lay out on it properly. Hell, she had to curl up.

Brett let her get up, then stood himself, feeling around for his shirt in the darkness and slipping it on. At least that way he could sleep until he woke and wouldn't be gearing himself to wake up before her so he could get dressed before she saw him in the light.

She stopped and looked at him over her shoulder as he did that. Watching him, in the dark, the shirt standing out lighter against the inky blackness. She wondered when he'd stop that. When he might be more comfortable with her in general, where he wasn't hiding. But then again, she was pretty sure Brett was still busy hiding from himself, let alone her. In the end she didn't say anything about it, she just walked over to the bed, climbed on and slid beneath the covers, throwing them back on the other side so he could lie down. She'd need sleep. Tomorrow, things were getting very, very real. It was all going to happen fast. Hopefully she was even half as capable as he seemed to think she was. If not? They were both fucked.