[mature] Any.

[Xiah]

His hands are around her waist before there's time for her to reconsider, and the closing of his apartment door behind them only solidifies her place there: chest pressed flush to his, their mouths both open and accepting of one another, exchanging wet secrets that stopped being secrets a long time ago. He feels firm beneath her slender hands, but as his whiskey-tainted lips leave her gasping, she questions their tangibility. Feels her nails digging into his skin, burrowing, looking for that break through that would finally ground her, would finally bring her back to life.

Perhaps it's the loneliness that drives her to do these things.

(What things, you ask? As if you cannot tell by the emptiness behind her eyes; by the way she swings her hips to the thrum of the music; by the way she smiles at you, but it isn't a happy expression. As if you cannot tell that her heart aches and mind begs for release - release from reality, a chance to slip into that nook just behind your shoulder where nothing feels real - but fuck, then you're falling away again, forgetting the questions you had in the first place, forgetting your own fucking name.)

"I'm sorry," she breathes heavily, breaking away from his lips, shuddering as the nerves inside of her respond to his touch without her mind having to engage at all. "What's your name again?"

[Brynmor]

He had been really, really, lonely, until a familiar face from the past had come along. It would be a lie to deny that there hadn’t been something between them before. Not that he ever cheated on his ex-wife, Brynmor was as loyal as could be. Until this point he had been loyal, though she was not his anymore. Nobody had been able to lighten up his world like Xiah right here and now. In his apartment.

With a kick the door sways closed behind them, but Brynmor has no eye for it. Instead his attention is fully focussed on the girl in his arms. Unconsciously he tightens his hold on her for a short moment, as if he is somewhere deep down afraid she would slip away again. His lips are pressed against hers, tongue in her mouth and as their lips move in sync, his tongue roams through her entire mouth.

Very unlike the gentlemen he is, he does not allow her any time to catch her breath. His lips pull back from Xiah’s, but move to ghost across her jawline instead. Her earlobe is caught between his lips, and he gently bites down on it, before sucking to erase the possible sting.

It is then and there that she gently pushes him back, and her empty eyes – and they hurt Bryn as much as her empty smile – find his. He can only blink at her, then pull back further, his hands on her hips to keep her close, yet not too close. ”Brynmor. My name is Brynmor.” Don’t you remember?

Truly, he is somewhat intoxicated too. He had been drinking away his sorrow at the bar, but he hadn’t gotten further than two, or perhaps three, glasses of whiskey. Not enough to get him drunk. And clearly not enough for him to forget her name, or her completely. After all, he’d known Xiah ever since he had first started as Ice Inc.

[Xiah]

Three whiskies left her counterpart with only some lowered inhibitions (for it's been months - years - since his divorce, and only today had he found her, grabbed her, finally claimed her as his own), but the same amount in her small frame left her reeling. Not blacked out, per-say, but gone enough that her mind had slipped out from beneath her like a rug, leaving her flat on her back in a room where she once could have told you if any object weren't in its perfect position.

The prescription anti-depressants she took that morning might have something to do with her altered state, too, but she can't remember that now; can only feel his tongue tracing her mouth, his hands on her hips, pulling her closer until they grind together with a delirious need. (After all these years. After all the stares at Ice, the little brushes of a hand on her lower back as he excused himself past her, the way she'd smile at him from across the office. And... After she'd been let go. Not that she'd been an employee in the first place, though her own father owned the damn company. As she looks at him now, she remembers his words, swath in regret, but also in an unintended condescension. You know I cannot give you that, Xiah.)

"Brynmor," She moans, flinching as his teeth send shiver down her spines from where they bite her ear. "Brynmor..." Eyes half-closed, she turns around, grabbing his hands and placing them on her hips as she presses her rounded bum into the man's crotch, tilting her head back so that her curly black hair falls on his broad shoulder. "Is this where you had me, every time you looked at me from across the room?" Gently, she brings his hands up to her chest, pressing them there, circling her hips against him as her words come both scathingly and seductively. "Pressed against you with no one else around? No wife, no work... Just me." Her fingers close around his, forcing him to grab her, knowing that he barely needs the encouragement. "I can't have a job, but this, here, us, is the kind of fucked I don't mind being."

She wonders if he can tell how angry he is, through her slurred flirtations and delirious hip movements. She wonders if he can taste the bitterness on the back of her neck, the bitterness at having been chose second, at barely having been chosen at all: just a coincidence, just a one night stand, just someone to fill the void in his bed as he mourned the loss of a wife who he'd chosen first.

[Brynmor]

It had not been his place to offer her a position, and for that she’d turned her back on him. She’d allowed another man to guide her away. All he could do was watch her leave. And Brynmor had everything but liked it. She belonged at Ice, and yet her ambitions – and perhaps jealousy – had driven her away.

He hums softly, enjoying the sound of his name coming from her lips. So she does remember him. Enough to make him shudder and pull her closer again. Xiah, however, has something else in mind.

There is no way for him to deny how good she feels, pressed against him and automatically he pulls her closer. Brynmor’s lips find her neck, gently kissing, sucking and occasionally biting down on tender skin. His erection grinds against her round bum; the action makes him grunt softly. ”Xiah?” he asks, voice low and husky, but confused. There is something in the way she says it, venom hidden in the words. And it is not hard to imagine that Bryn does not like it. Not at all. As she continues, her words becoming even more venomous, he stills. His hands slide down to her hips, then to her shoulders to both push her away from him and spin her around, all gently of course. ”No.”

His jaw tightens and teeth grind together. As he looks down at her he shakes his head, fingers almost digging into her shoulders to keep her a bay. Brynmor wants nothing more than pull her close, to hold and cherish her, but not like this. ”No,” he repeats. Not once had he imagined cheating on Roan. ”It was never like that. And you know it.” He almost growls as he speak, only remembering on time how intoxicated it is. He can only hope that it’s the alcohol talking.

She was never second. But she could be a new chapter in his life. Not a coincidence, more like one of fate’s multiple paths in life.

His right hand slides down her arm, gently, to grab her hand with his. They had to talk. Either that or he would bring her back home. There was no way he would let her out on the street in this state, but neither would he continue the original plans. Unless they talked.

He offers her a barstool in the kitchen, up to her if she takes the seat or not. He does not talk, what was there to say? It is not like they can have an actual conversation like this. Brynmor busies himself with getting ready to make his special sobriety recipe. He glances at the attractive noirette – black haired girl – in his kitchen every so often, but never does Brynmor stop working. ”This will help clear your mind,” he offers her, placing the glass on the counter. He knows better than to say ’drink this’, and thus he does not. To give her it is okay, he downs his own glass in one go. The taste is not all that great, but he damn well needs to sober up for this.