#maybe it was the 17£ per litre vodka

[pia-nor481]

So hey guys quick one.

I’ve just discovered that as much as I like writing men being submissive, even if I do it rarely, I don’t like that in real life.

Thanks for coming

[worryinglyinnocent]

Fic: Cloaked in Night Time

Starting as I mean to go on with the first Worry’sOutstandingPrompts!Weekend!

I had an anonymous prompt for the escort!Belle and professor!Gold verse, in which Gold makes another appointment with ‘Lacey’. A lot of people have since expressed an interest in seeing what happened after the original fic.

The original Escort!Belle fic is here and a follow-up is here. Sorry it’s taken me so long to get round to this one!

Rated: NC-17, natch.

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Cloaked in Night Time

Rory looks up at the pink house and gulps. She’s very new, very nervous, and at twenty-one years and three weeks old, she’s the youngest escort on the agency’s books at the moment. She hopes that she’ll please this client. She really needs to start getting some regulars.

Rum, they told her his name was. Apparently he’d had Belle last time and now he wanted a different brunette.

“What’s he like?” Rory had asked the older woman. Belle had just shrugged, remaining silent for a little too long.

“He likes brunettes.” That was all that she had said.

Rory takes a deep breath and rings the bell.

“Hello.”

He’s in his early fifties, hair greying a bit and face slightly lined, but still pretty handsome. Rory tends to prefer girls but she’s had boyfriends as well and she can see that women who prefer men (and men who prefer men, for that matter) would find him attractive.

“You must be Dawn.”

Rory nods. Aurora. Dawn. It seemed a logical enough leap when she was choosing a professional alias.

“Please come in.”

The door closes and Rory hears Dove drive away as she takes in her surroundings. It’s a very big house for one man and for a moment she’s afraid that he’s married with a family and he’s entertaining escorts whilst they’re out, but there’s no sign of anyone else living in the place. She doesn’t know why she’s so worried; it’s not any of her business if her clients have wives.

“Come through. Would you like a drink?”

Rory would happily kill for a treble vodka and coke or a litre of cream soda to lay her out in an alcohol or sugar coma for a week in order to get over her butterflies, but she doesn’t mention that and just follows her client through to the living room. She’d really rather just get down to business but it’s his time and his money and his wine and his decision.

She accepts the glass of wine he offers her and takes a sip to fortify her. The alcohol burns the back of her throat and loosens her tongue. She’s going to be all right. Nothing to be nervous about. It’s not the first time she’s done this and it sure as heck won’t be the last.

For a while they just stay in the living room, drinking. Well, he’s drinking; Rory just swirls her wine around in her glass. She’s almost convinced herself that he’s just incredibly lonely and wants the presence of another human being in his home to keep him company. But then he drains his glass and stands, gesturing for her to follow him through the house and up the stairs to the master bedroom. Rory turns to him.

“How would you like me, Rum?” she asks.

“Please undress completely and kneel on the bed,” he says. His voice is… sad, Rory thinks. He doesn’t sound like a typical client with an hour on the clock. He’s so quiet and melancholy. “You can go on all fours or grab the headboard, whatever’s more comfortable for you.”

Rory does as she’s told, quickly stripping off all her clothes and getting onto the bed, gripping the ornate wooden headboard.

“Please don’t look over your shoulder. I assure you I’m not going to do anything strange.”

Rory thinks she gets it as she kneels there, naked and a little bit chilly, waiting for something to happen. He had a wife, a brunette, and he misses her, and now he’s trying to recreate his intimate moments with her with various girls from the agency. He wants to see her brown hair, but not the face that doesn’t belong to the woman he loves.

She listens to him undressing and eventually she feels him get on the bed behind her. His warm hands come around her and cup her breasts, massaging gently, and Rory can’t help but press herself into the soft touch. She feels him kiss her neck and shoulder tenderly, but then nothing else happens. They just stay like that, his hands on her boobs and his forehead resting against her shoulder blade.

“I’m sorry,” he says eventually, and he moves away. A moment later he speaks again. “You can put your clothes back on.”

Rory knows better than to question it and waits until she’s fully dressed again before turning to face Rum. He’s sitting in the chair across from the bed, wearing a bathrobe and staring into space, his mind a million miles away.

“I’m sorry,” Rory says. “Did I do something wrong?”

He shakes his head with a soft chuckle. “No, Dawn, don’t worry. At the risk of sounding incredibly clichéd, it’s not you, it’s me.”

“Oh.” Rory glances down at his lap. He doesn’t appear to have an erection. “I could maybe help with that?”

Rum shakes his head again.

“It’s… complicated,” he says. “Very complicated.”

“Ok.” Rory sits down on the edge of the bed. Maybe there is a wife and a family after all. “Do you want me to leave?”

“No.” His voice is soft and almost pleading. “Please stay. This thing… I can’t talk about it to anyone, but maybe someone I don’t know… I might be able to make sense of it all.”

Rory nods warily. She’s an escort and a medical student, she’s not a therapist, but he’s paid for an hour of her time and if he wants to use it to spill his guts to her then that’s his choice. The other escorts told her when she first started that whether she wanted to or not, she’d learn the deepest and darkest secrets of her clients’ lives. There’s something about the intimacy of such a transaction that brings with it a sense of safety and secrecy, despite the fact that the two people involved are unlikely ever to have met before. Given the clandestine nature of the exchange, there’s almost an unwritten rule that nothing that gets said within the bedroom walls will ever be repeated by either party. So far Rory has never been privy to any such revelations, but now she thinks this might be her first.

It’s a little while before Rum begins to speak again, but eventually he does.

“I made a very foolish mistake,” he says. “There was a woman I loved from afar and through a series of coincidences we ended up sleeping together. That should have been the end of it, but I can’t let go.”

“She was brunette,” Rory mumbles, and Rum nods.

“I think by now you have realised why I originally engaged your services. But ultimately, I just want her.”

They fall into silence and Rory has no idea what to say, but Rum does seem happier – or at least more at ease – for having got it all off his chest.

“Surely,” Rory begins, “if you slept together then the feelings are returned, at least in part? Maybe all hope is not lost.”

Rum shakes his head once more.

“As I said before, it’s a very complicated arrangement. I am sure that any interest she has in me is of a purely professional nature.”

She’s an escort. Rory has not been in this business very long, but she’s been here long enough to pick up on certain things. Rum is in love with an escort and he hired her for a night, but that single bite of the cherry was not enough and now he wants another taste. Rory knows better than simply to present him with these facts that she has surmised, but she’s ninety-nine per cent sure that this is what has happened. So, she just nods and plays dumb.

“Perhaps you could talk to her again and explain the way you feel?” she suggests. She can’t quite believe that she’s giving relationship advice to a client twice her age, but then again, Rum isn’t exactly an ordinary client. Rory remembers Belle’s odd reaction when she had asked about him. Has she had this same experience, rejected because she wasn’t the right brunette?

Or maybe, just maybe, Belle’s the one.

She’ll never know. The escorts rarely talk about clients amongst themselves like that, only enough to pass on snippets of advice. All the same, Rory’s dying to find out the mystery going on here. It’s worthy of a romantic novel.

“I don’t know if that would be a good idea,” Rum replies sadly. “I fear that would just complicate matters further.”

Rory doesn’t really know what to say to that, if she even ought to say anything, but she’s saved by the timer on her phone going off: their hour is over.

“Thank you,” Rum says, as he sees her back down the stairs through the darkened house to the front door, where Rory can hear Dove idling the car outside. “For listening and for the advice.”

Rory shrugs. “You’re welcome. And if you ever want me again, to talk or… anything else, you know where to find me.”

Rum nods, and then the door is closed and the barriers are back in place. Rory doesn’t say anything as she gets into the car, lost in thought as she is, and it takes Dove a couple of goes to get through to her.

“Are you all right?”

She nods.

“I’m fine,” she says eventually, looking over her shoulder at the pink house as they pull away from the curb. She doesn’t voice her next thought.

I’m not sure he is, though.

X

“Are you sure that you’re going to be all right?”

Belle finishes putting the final touches to her lip gloss in the sun visor mirror and turns to Dove, giving him an encouraging smile.

“I’ll be fine,” she says with a brightness that she doesn’t feel. “Honestly.”

Dove looks entirely unconvinced.

“I’ve done overnight stays before,” she presses.

Dove’s mouth remains set in a thin line, then finally he sighs, flexing his stiff fingers on the steering wheel.

“I know you have, and I always worry when you do,” he admits. Belle leans across and kisses his cheek.

“You’re very sweet, Dove,” she says, “but there’s honestly no need to worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

“Worrying about all of you is my job,” Dove replies firmly. “Besides, this one gave you a funny reaction last time,” he adds, nodding up at the pink house that they’re parked outside. “I just don’t want you to get hurt; that’s all I’m interested in.”

“I know, Dove, but I’m going to be fine. I’ll call you if I need you, you know that.”

The huge man gives a melancholy nod and the green glowing numbers on the dashboard clock flick over to show nine pm. Belle straightens her skirt and gets out of the car.

“I’ll see you at nine o’clock tomorrow morning,” Dove says. Belle doesn’t reply save for a nod of understanding, and she makes her way up the steps to her supervising professor’s front door.

She would admit if pressed that she was extremely surprised that Rum Gold had booked an overnight appointment with Lacey, especially not after she knows that Rory had an appointment with him three weeks ago. After the shock of discovering each other’s identities that first night, she would have forgiven him for not wanting to see her outside of their laboratory at all, let alone in a sexual context. Belle is not and has never been ashamed of her profession, but she can forgive Gold a degree of awkwardness on finding out that his PhD student moonlights as an escort. As it is, he has asked to see her again in this capacity – not only asking for her specifically but paying for her overnight, for twelve hours of her company. She doesn’t waste any more time in overthinking it and knocks sharply on the door.

Gold is in his shirtsleeves and no tie when he answers and steps back to let her in over the threshold, and his entire demeanour is so much more relaxed than the first time she visited him.

“Good evening, Lacey,” he says by way of greeting, and with that the boundaries are set. They are not Miss French and Professor Gold, they are Lacey and Rum, and those are the roles that they will remain in.

“Good evening, Rum.”

“Please, make yourself at home,” Gold says, indicating the way through to the living room. “Can I get you a drink? Alcoholic or otherwise, I know you passed up on wine last time… I have coffee, tea, fruit juice…”

It’s a somewhat cold autumn night and Belle’s not exactly dressed for warmth; she gives an involuntary shiver as she takes her coat off and folds it over the back of the sofa.

“Tea would be lovely, thank you.”

Gold disappears off into the kitchen and Belle looks down at her outfit. She chose something a bit different to usual today, going against one of her own rules and assuming her client’s preferences. Professor Rum Gold is a classy, expensive man, and somehow one of her usual skin-tight glitzy mini-dresses doesn’t seem appropriate for the occasion, so she’s chosen a more tailored, lacy little black dress, almost sheer, letting through a peep of the corset and French knickers beneath if she moves in the right way. She’s kept the stockings and suspender belt though – he liked those last time.

“You’re looking wonderful tonight.”

Gold has returned with a tray of tea things; a proper pot and china cups, and he’s gazing at her with an expression of slight wonder.

“Thank you.” A small part of her preens, glad that her hypothesising has paid off, and she smooths down her skirt over her stocking tops as Gold pours the tea and hands her a cup. Belle doesn’t think that she’s ever had a cup of tea during an appointment before. If liquid refreshment is offered at all then it’s usually of the alcoholic variety. Somehow, their beverage of choice tonight makes the entire scenario seem more intimate. It’s less like a transaction and more like any other normal couple enjoying a quiet and cosy evening in, and Belle allows herself to relax a little more, leaning back against the sofa cushions and curling her hands around the delicate cup. It’s not like she’s going to be going anywhere in a hurry.

Belle quite likes overnight stays, in contrast to some of the other escorts who find them stilted and awkward; with two strangers thrown together on such intimate terms for such a long period of time, naturally there are going to be long silences. Topics of conversation can run dry. But Belle likes the pace, or rather, the lack of it. She enjoys the break from the usual routine of arrive-fuck-leave that her shorter appointments follow. There is more time to get to know her clients as people, rather than just a pay check. There’s time for talking and kissing and foreplay; there’s time enough just to take their time. Hour-long appointments like to get their money’s worth, Belle’s found. When there are twelve hours in which to get the deed done, there’s less urgency and as a result more pleasure for both parties. Belle’s been doing this job long enough to know that it is not always mutually satisfying, but she’ll not complain when it is. She wonders what will happen later into the night, but she puts the thought to the back of her mind, choosing to focus on the present instead, on Gold’s slim form on the sofa beside her, his unfathomable dark eyes watching her with a look of almost longing as she sips her tea.

“It’s very good tea,” she says appreciatively. She’s no great connoisseur of teas, but she can tell one she likes from one she doesn’t, and she can tell that this is a very nice tea. Loose leaves in a proper pot; tea done right.

“Thank you, I blend it myself,” Gold says. “Part Earl Grey, part Goddess of Mercy. I’m glad you like it.”

The fact that it’s his own unique blend doesn’t surprise Belle at all. He’s a scientist after all, and mixing and measuring and creating is woven into every aspect of his life. The taste reflects him perfectly – refined and elegant but with a kick to it, an aftertaste that lingers and leaves her wanting more. Just like him, his quiet demeanour hiding something strong and dark beneath the surface, something that she wants to get to know a little more intimately. She watches his long fingers trace around the rim of his own cup, and not for the first time, she wonders what it would be like to feel those same fingers drawing circles on her skin.

The silence between them is not uncomfortable and in a way it’s ironic. There are so many things that Belle could say to kill this all-encompassing quiet, because she knows Gold’s subject, his pet projects; she knows his academic field so well, but she’s not his PhD student tonight and so these topics must be kept locked away. They’re two different people tonight, and science does not come into this room. At the same time, it is their pre-existing familiarity with each other that makes the lack of conversation between them easy.

So they just sit and drink their tea for a while, enjoying each other’s company. She could learn so much about him in this time together but she doesn’t know where to begin. Her usual small talk questions are all off the menu because she already knows the answers to them. She doesn’t want to resort to the usual cliché of talking about the weather, so she remains silent, and so does Gold. He’s far less nervous this time, but there is still a tension there: she can see it in his posture and the set of his shoulders. Belle wonders if she could offer to massage that tension away. Tea drunk, Gold moves a little closer on the sofa, and now that he’s not holding his cup, she can see that his hands are twitchy, as if he doesn’t know what to do with them. Belle decides that it’s time to take matters into her own hands. This is his time and they’ll move at his pace, but if he’s having trouble articulating what he wants, then she’s more than happy to give him a little help. So she puts down her own empty teacup, reaches across, and takes his hands gently in hers, and she gives him an encouraging smile.

“Would you like me to kiss you?” she asks. They had kissed before, during their previous appointment, but that was when the lines were blurred and they were not acting the parts they are now, and she knows that some people are not so enamoured by the idea of kissing an escort. There’s something about kissing that makes any kind of sexual act more intimate, and some people are not looking for that intimacy but simply wanting the gratification of the coupling itself. She doesn’t think that Gold is one of those though. She remembers the way he held her last time, as if he couldn’t get her close enough.

Sure enough, he gives a slow nod.

“I’d very much like to kiss you,” he says, and there’s a low, throaty rasp in his voice that, against her better judgement, sends a shiver down Belle’s spine. She moves a little closer to him and their mouths meet by mutual agreement, neither of them really initiating the kiss or having any control over it. The first brushing of his lips is soft, dry and chaste, and as Belle pulls back she can see the unbridled desire in Gold’s dark and sultry eyes. He takes the initiative this time and Belle is pleasantly surprised by the firm confidence of his mouth against hers. When his tongue tentatively laps at her lips, she opens for him readily. His mouth tastes of smoky bergamot and the faint burn of whiskey, and Belle wonders how much Dutch courage he’s had in anticipation of tonight. His hands come to up cup her face and Belle slips her arms around his neck, relaxing into the kiss as by degrees he does the same. For a long time they just kiss, exploring every inch of each other’s mouths, and then Belle lets her hands begin to wander, running her fingers up and down his back, feeling the outline of wiry muscle beneath the thin silk of his shirt. His skin is so warm through the fabric and she wants to feel it properly, to slip her hands inside his shirt and touch him all over; make him melt under her fingertips and let go of that nervous tension that she still senses in him.

Gold’s hands move too. She doesn’t have to tell him that he can touch this time, he does it of his own accord, coming down to take her waist and not startling when he skims the side of her breast on the way past. Belle chances to take things a little further and moves one hand to squeeze his thigh where her own leg is almost resting on it.

“Remember this is your time,” she mumbles against his mouth. “We’ll do this however you want to do it.”

Gold’s hand closes over her own on his leg.

“I like it like this,” he says softly. “I like you. I trust you.”

Belle smiles and presses in closer so that their upper bodies are almost flush, pushing her breasts up against his chest and draping one leg over his lap. He’s already getting hard, she can feel it, and for a while she just stays there feeling him growing hotter and stiffer against her thigh whilst she peppers butterfly kisses to his lips and over his chin, where the beginnings of stubble are coming through. She wonders what the rough scrape of his grey shadow would feel like against the inside of her thighs, and she can’t help but give a little moan of arousal at the imagined sensation. She’s always had a vivid imagination. She finds it helps in her line of work. The more genuine she seems, the better the experience is for both her and her clients, and if she can pretend and think up erotic scenarios that turn her insides to jelly and leave her dripping wet in her panties then so much the better.

Gold’s breathing is coming in hard pants now, and Belle pulls away to take in his dishevelled hair, kiss-swollen lips and blown pupils.

“Shall we go upstairs?” she suggests. Gold nods and she slides off him, letting him take her by the hand and lead her up to his bedroom. It hasn’t changed since she was last here, although she’s not quite sure why she thinks it might have. Once inside he pauses, making no move to go over to the bed, and Belle stays motionless beside him. She took the lead last time, but in the very act of asking for her company again, he has taken control tonight, and she will wait for him to make the next move and set the tone for the next few hours. They’re still hand in hand and Gold brings her fingers up to his lips, pressing a chaste kiss to her knuckles. It’s such an absurdly old-fashioned and yet sweet notion that she can’t help but smile.

“Thank you,” she says softly.

Gold doesn’t reply, he simply runs his thumb over her knuckles before letting go of her hand. For a moment she lets it linger in the air between them and then it drops back down to her side.

“What would you like to do now?” she asks, and although his eyes flicker over to the bed, he makes no move towards it, instead taking half a step towards her and tentatively cupping her cheeks again, leaning in for another kiss.

Snaking her arms around his middle and pressing in closer, Belle wonders if this is deliberate on his part; if he wants to make this as much like a romantic encounter as possible and pretend that the woman in his arms is his every night, not just for twelve short hours, and that no money has been exchanged. She already knows that he is a desperately lonely man. She’s known that since their first appointment, and she thinks that she probably knew it even before then, when it was just the two of them in their chemistry lab making small talk about nothing in particular.

What she still doesn’t understand is why he would ask for her again, knowing her true identity as he does. Is it simply because out of all the agency’s girls whom he may have sampled, she is the one who gives him the best value for money? She knows it’s a somewhat cynical position to take, but she can’t think of any other reason.

Except…

Gold’s not heartless. Not like that. He wouldn’t attach so little meaning to the act as to have it come down to that. Now when she knows that it is the company and togetherness and intimacy that he pays for as well as the inevitable orgasms. Belle is beginning to think that he’s chosen her because she’s Belle, because he knows her and feels comfortable around her. And obviously she feels comfortable in her role because otherwise she wouldn’t be in this position. In theory, it should be a win-win situation. He gets female company – of a person he knows, likes, and trusts – and Belle gets money in the bank. What have either of them got to lose? She really shouldn’t attach any more meaning to it than that, but knowing that she shouldn’t doesn’t stop her from wondering what it would be like to kiss this shy and lonely man, a beast whose bark is worse than his bite, without him having paid for the privilege.

Finally, after what feels like a blissful eternity, Gold breaks away from her. When he loses his inhibitions he really is a very good kisser; thorough and enthusiastic, and she wonders what other sides of him she can coax out of hiding tonight.

“May I undress you, please?” he asks, and Belle nods, turning her back and moving her hair so that he can get at her zip. He drags it down her spine slowly and reverently, and she hears his breath catch as her corset is revealed beneath it.

“Oh my.”

His hands are paused at her hips and she can feel the slight shake of nerves in his fingers, so Belle takes it upon herself to push the sleeves from her shoulders and let the dress fall into a lacy puddle on the floor.

“Oh Belle…” He skims one palm lightly across her satin-clad bottom and it takes all of Belle’s skill and experience not to freeze on hearing her real name. He’s broken that boundary now and even though she knows it’s just a slip of the tongue on his part because he knows that she is Belle and he’s called her Belle in other circumstances so often before, it still makes it so much harder for her to play pretend and act like it doesn’t matter. She’s glad she’s facing away from him and he seems more preoccupied with running his fingertips over her corset lacing and the new skin that has been revealed to him; it gives her a moment to regain her composure. But oh, how deeply she wants it to be real, for him to want Belle as she is, Belle his PhD student, Belle his friend and co-worker, rather than Belle the escort, just another warm, willing body with brunette hair.

By the time he comes around to the front to admire her from another angle, she is calm and composed and her usual professional self again, and she gives him another encouraging smile.

“Would you like to take the corset off now?” she asks, guiding his hands to her breasts. He cups them gently, rubbing his thumbs over her nipples where they’ve pebbled in her desire and are showing through the silk. Gold nods, and he works the first hook and eye nestled in her cleavage. His fingers fumble a little with each of the fastenings, evidently not something he’s at all practised in, but Belle says nothing, just holding the corset up until he’s finished and she separates the two halves, letting it drop to the floor.

“You’re so lovely,” he mumbles. “You’re so beautiful. I mean, you are with your clothes on as well. I… I’ll stop talking.”

Belle smiles. “No, you can keep talking. I’m enjoying the compliments.” She brings his hands back to her bare breasts. “You can touch, Rum. It’s all for you, touch whatever you want.”

His hands run over her skin reverently, as if she’s made of porcelain and he’s afraid that the slightest false move on his part will make her shatter into a thousand pieces. In a way, Belle feels that she is really that fragile tonight. If he makes another call to the agency asking for her, then she will have to refuse. She doesn’t think that she would be able to take another night of this tension screaming through the air around her, this uneven attraction and this terrible sense of not knowing exactly what it is that he wants. She should never have come back, knowing how she feels about him.

“Let me worship you?” he says, eyes almost pleading as his hands come to rest on her hips. “Please?”

“Whatever you want, honey.” Maybe if she doesn’t use his name it will put some distance between them, and it will encourage him to stop using her real name.

His fingers slip into the waistband of her panties and he eases them down her legs; he makes to kneel a little awkwardly and Belle holds out a hand to stop him.

“Wouldn’t you be more comfortable on the bed, Rum?”

He nods, and it’s almost a surrender, for both of them, as they move to the bed and Belle lies back against the pillows, letting her legs fall open and welcoming Gold between them. He’s nervous and fumbling as he kisses his way down her body to the apex of her thighs, but even with his lack of finesse, Belle still can’t help but wriggle her hips in anticipation as he reaches her centre and touches the wetness pooling at her entrance. He’s almost transfixed by it, as if he can’t believe this undeniable proof of her arousal, her desire for him. Belle has to guide his hands, shifting a little to get him where she wants and needs him. It’s not something that she often thinks about; when she comes to these encounters it’s not her own pleasure that she’s pursuing. Of course, if she does get an orgasm out of it then that’s all for the better, but her focus is on her client and what he wants.

But what Gold wants is to pleasure her, and she doesn’t mind giving him a little helping hand to get to that goal. As she responds to his touches with moans and shivers that can’t be faked, that she would never want to fake for him, she can feel his confidence growing, and when she finally tumbles over that peak, her fingers tangle into his silky, salt and pepper hair. It is by far and away the closest and most intimate she has ever felt with a client.

As she comes back to herself, Belle lets out a long, satisfied sigh, and sees Gold smiling at her from between her legs – a shy, nervous smile. She sits up and beckons him closer.

“I think it’s your turn now,” she says. “Would you like me to show you just how good you made me feel?”

Gold nods eagerly and comes up the bed to lay beside her. She undresses him slowly and languidly, covering the skin she exposes with soft kisses like he did to her. Once he’s naked, she pauses, taking in his entirety.

“What would you like now, Rum?” she asks.

“Come on top, please.” He pulls her over on top of him and Belle acquiesces readily, straddling him and reaching into her bag for a condom, no need for lube with the juices of her own orgasm still warm and wet and ready. “Like we were before.”

Belle nods and sinks down onto him, and there are no more words. They have the entire night in which to do this, and she takes her time, setting a slow pace, agonisingly slow as she rocks her hips around in a gentle circle, squeezing her inner muscles and feeling his fingers dig into her back as he pulls her in close, burying his face in her shoulder, craving that ultimate, intimate closeness, just as he did the first time around.

He comes quietly, no shouting or swearing, just a stilling of his rutting hips and a long-held breath shakily released into her hair. The silence in the room is heavy, sleepy almost, sated, and Belle takes her time getting rid of the condom and using the bathroom. Plenty of time still to come, after all.

“Now what would you like to do?” she asks once she returns to the bed, and she sheds the stockings and suspenders that she’s kept on throughout their encounter.

“Nothing yet,” Gold murmurs. He rolls onto his side and pulls her in close. “Just let me hold you for a while. Please?”

Belle nods. “Of course. Whatever you want.”

She doesn’t know if he falls into a doze then or not, but he’s still, and quiet, and his breathing is steady as she pets his hair.

But then it happens, just one word that changes everything.

“Oh, Belle,” he mumbles, and Belle cannot take it any longer, shaking her head and rolling over out of his arms to hide the fact that tears are welling in her eyes. The movement rouses him and she feels his weight shift on the bed as he pushes himself up onto his forearms. “Belle, are you all right?”

“Please,” she says, horribly aware of how choked her voice is sounding. “Please don’t call me that. Because I’m not Belle, not tonight, not any night that someone’s paying me. I’m Lacey, and Lacey is someone completely different to Belle. The two don’t meet. That’s what I said, the first time I came here. I’m not Belle, not tonight, and it’s not Belle you want. It’s Lacey that you booked, so please, unless it’s Belle that you want, the real Belle, please don’t call me that.”

There’s silence for a long time, and if it wasn’t for the fact that Belle hasn’t felt his weight shift, she would think that he’d fallen asleep. But then a hand comes to rest lightly on her upper arm.

“I do want Belle,” he says, his voice barely a whisper. “That’s the entire reason why I asked for Lacey to come here tonight.”

Belle swallows painfully, but she does not allow herself to turn over and she screws her eyes closed. If this is the conversation that she thinks it’s going to turn into, then it could not really have come at a worse time, when they’re both naked and vulnerable and when they’re in the middle of a sexual business transaction.

“What?” she asks shakily.

“It’s Belle that I want,” Gold repeats, his voice firmer. “It was Belle that I wanted the first time, when I booked Lacey. I wanted Belle, but I knew I could never have her. So I booked a brunette. It didn’t matter that she didn’t look like Belle, because she would have the same hair and I wouldn’t have to see her face. I’ve got a good enough imagination. Just one night where I could pretend I was with Belle. You can imagine my shock when Belle arrived on my doorstep.”

Belle still does not open her eyes.

“You wanted me all along,” she says.

“Belle – because it’s Belle I need to make this confession to, not Lacey – I think I’ve been half in love with you from the moment I met you.”

Finally, Belle turns over, shaking off Gold’s hand on her arm and looking him in the eyes. The dark chocolate depths are sorrowful but they speak the truth, and Belle wipes her eyes on the back of her hand.

“So after that night, why did you book Lacey again? If it was Belle that you wanted?”

“Because I could have Lacey, but I couldn’t have Belle. Lacey – you – this… whatever this is. It was the nearest thing I could get.”

“This isn’t real, Rum,” Belle says softly. “This isn’t a real relationship; you can’t pay for something like that.”

“I know that. And this would have been the end of it. The last time, I swear.”

“Why didn’t you say anything?” Belle asks. “Outside, in the real world. On campus, in the lab… If you were half in love with me from the moment we met, why didn’t you say something?”

“Would anything have come of it if I had taken a chance and asked you out?” Gold asks.

“No,” Belle replies honestly. “No, it wouldn’t.”

“And in that you have your answer.”

“It’s not like that, Rum.” Belle scrubs a hand over her face, aware that she hasn’t taken off her make-up and her foundation and mascara is smearing everywhere. “Do you know why I couldn’t take you calling me Belle? Not because I didn’t want my personal and professional lives confused, but because I couldn’t bear the thought of knowing that this wasn’t real, that you didn’t really want Belle, because if you were hiring an escort then it obviously wasn’t Belle you wanted, it was an escort. And I couldn’t bear being here knowing that I was with you but it wasn’t me, the real me, the real Belle, that you wanted. Because I’m half in love with you too.”

They lie in silence for a long time, the truth hanging heavy in the air between them, but with their deep, dark confessions made and their souls laid bare, the atmosphere seems less fraught somehow.

“So, since I’m half in love with you and you’re half in love with me, as we’ve established, may I ask why nothing would have come of it if we’d pursued this relationship in a conventional manner?” Gold asks at last.

“Rum, look at me, look at us, look at where we are and what we’re doing. This is my livelihood and it’s not one that I’m prepared to give up just yet. It’s not one that I’m in a position to give up just yet. It’s not a question of me not wanting you. It’s a question of me not wanting to date someone then go out and fuck someone else for money. It wouldn’t be right. It wouldn’t be fair on either of us.” It’s a line she’s remembered so often and applied to herself with fresh heartbreak every time she hears it in her mind.

We’re creatures of the underworld. We can’t afford to love.

The silence reigns supreme once more, but it is no longer an uncomfortable one. It’s just sad, so terribly, heartbreakingly sad.

“So what happens now?” Gold asks.

“I don’t know.” It’s the most honest answer that she can give. They love each other, they want each other, and they are already good friends and have a good mentor-student relationship – even if it has been a little strained in during these past few weeks as the memory of their first night together is still fresh in both of their minds. But they cannot be together, not in the way that they both want.

“I guess, for now, we can just continue as we were before,” Gold says. “Please, will you stay? Not as Lacey. Just as Belle. Stay the night, and let me wake up with you tomorrow morning. Please.”

Belle nods, and she moves a little closer, allowing herself to slip back into his arms.

Their circumstances have not changed and nothing will magically resolve itself overnight through the power of love. All they can do is keep going in their lives as they’ve always done, and hope that somehow, somewhere, fortune will smile kindly on them.