Page 43 of Hercules

His attention telescoped, closing in on the inescapable tenderness of her touch. The care with which she gave it.

The slow solemnity in how she pulled it away.

A twist of her wrist, with that stained thumb held high, like her appendage had become a garden wind spinner in an early morning breeze.

Like you actually know a morning breeze from a Styx storm gale?

Like he actually knew anything about her realm besides how to find and tame its assholes? Honestly?

“Lois—”

“I know, I know,” she muttered, her lips suddenly tight. “You’re okay. Fine, fine. We’ll go with that, but just know this. Your little fibble means I’m permanently off the hook for mine.”

“Huh?” He hitched up straighter. “Yours? What?”

She nudged her head at the living room coffee table, where she’d tossed her long wig and the leather half-jacket that went with her dress. Herc almost reacted with a full laugh but wrangled it into a mild smirk at the last minute.

“Ahhh. Yeah. Your fibble.”

A haughty, and pretty damn lovely, sniff from her. “In which, to be Windex commercial clear, I participated under duress.”

“Noted, though that’s not important.” He hoped his smile was warmer than his tone. He hadn’t logged a lot of practice with the expression recently—or even not so recently—and he’d forgotten all the tricky nuances of it. But fuck if he was going to let nuances chop him even lower, especially with the dense fog bank of meaning he’d just thrown at the poor woman. “What I mean is, your reasons don’t have to be justified because the stunt itself is no longer on my radar. Well, except for—”

Her grimace was sharp and sudden. “Figuring out whether to report me to LAPD or the FBI? Or both?”

With greedy speed, he took advantage of the chance to form his hand to her cheek. “Figuring out how to say that I’m grateful you’re not really Natasha.”

The furrows in her forehead vanished as fast as they’d reappeared. More like they’d taken on weight and dropped—into the heaviness that turned her eyelids into dreamy hoods.

In a matching tone, sweet but satiny, she replied, “But you’re not exactly the expert on that subject, sir.”

As her gaze grew heavier, his thumb slid higher. With its tip, he circled the area beneath her left eye. Goddamn, her skin was so soft. He wanted to talk about that right now, not Natasha Korra’s odd antics by way of her fascinating proxy girl.

“You’re not lying,” he finally murmured. “But that’s hardly the point right now.”

So soft…

And as her breaths quickened during his continuing caresses, so spellbinding.

Holy fuck. A billion descriptors in the world, and his brain had to pluck out that one. But taking it back was an equally disgusting idea. The word…just fit. Perfect alignment, like the curve of her face beneath his fingers and the welcome warmth of her reply in his ears.

“That point being…what?”

“That we’re done talking about your doppelgänger.” At least that part was effortless to produce, despite her tick-tocking head as a fast reply.

“Technically, you know, I’m hers, but—”

“I don’t care about her technicalities.” He barely refrained it from a growl, though his fingers didn’t get the note in time. He pushed against her skin in emphasis. Nearly into it. Shit, was he leaving marks? And why did that idea course him with a mild thrill? “Because not so technically, she doesn’t exist anymore. Not for me.”

His qualifier didn’t change her stunned stare. “I—I’m sorry?”

“Why?” he countered. “Don’t be sorry for being yourself, Lois. It’s that exact self that justifies every word I’m telling you.” He pressed his thumb harder into her temple. Would he leave behind a mark this time? Because maybe that thrill wasn’t such a mild one. “If you donned all that paraphernalia again, complete with the cutesy smile and the funny hair flip, I wouldn’t suddenly be calling you Natasha again. I’d know the difference…and be glad for it.”

This time, he ended with an unintentional rasp that fast earned itself a place on the win board. He mentally ticked it off in ink as soon as Lois’s hitchy breaths bounced on the air.

How could he make her do that again? And again and again?

And what kind of karmic hell was he inviting by simply merely thinking that?