Take a chance on me / That's all I ask of you honey (NC-17)
He’d noticed the advert lying on the kitchen table the week prior, with little red circles round small blocks of text. Percy didn’t know what had prompted Lavender to start looking for other places to live, places that weren’t in their home.
That wasn’t the confusing part, however. What was confusing him was the tightness in his chest when he thought about Lavender no longer being down the hall, singing slightly off key to herself in the morning as she got ready for work. Toast crumbs next to the toaster, her hairs in the oddest places.
What was confusing was the odd feeling in his stomach, like he wanted to vomit his breakfast from three days prior.
He had been thinking, holing up in the library at the top of the stairs, more often than not staring into the slowly emptying glass of scotch. It was obvious, of course, the obvious answer was right in front of him.
Lavender was simply not allowed to leave.
Molly had been by hours ago to take Jack for the night, his backpack full of books and his toad firmly in hand. Lavender had never liked the greenish-brown thing, but, then again, she’d never really liked anything slimy. So a toad fit nicely into her list of ‘things Lavender does not like,’ along with fish, slugs and snails.
She’d spent the last hour pouring over several stories for the next issue of the Hogsmeade Herald. More reporters had been hired to help fill their ever increasing number of pages. As circulation continue to rise each month, so did her staff. At current count she was at eight full-time reporters and seven part-time. Not to mention the publishing department and the delivery boys.
It’d become quite the endeavor since she’d agreed to become editor; It had been hard work, and time consuming, but it was the most rewarding job she’d ever had.
Despite the wireless droning in the background, Lavender had found her mind wandering. In need of a change of scenery and a recharge before she dove back in, she looked for the only other person left in the house. Percy had been quiet since Jack had left - not that he was ever particularly loud - and she sought him out.
When he wasn’t in the kitchen, living room or his bedroom, she climbed the stairs to the library. It was the only other place he could be and, really, she should have checked there first anyway.
“Perce?”
He stirred himself from his thoughts as Lavender’s voice floated up the stairs. The house was oddly quiet without Jack tearing through it, demanding pirating or trying to avoid taking his bath.
“Up here, dove,” he called back, marking his place in his book, and setting it aside. Percy hadn’t really been reading Developing and Applying Practical Classification Solutions, Volume II with any great attention. One side of his mouth lifted up as Lavender came through the door, her hair sticking out slightly on one side, and ink splattered on her right fingertips.
“How is the editing going?” he asked, gesturing for her to curl up in her favorite chair, just caddy corner to his.
Folding her legs under her, Lavender gave his question a large sigh before answering.
"It's a slow time for stories right now, but they're quality. I'm getting to learn the new reporter's styles and what they enjoy writing about. Hopefully some of them loosen up a bit. Everything sounds a little too formal and forced."
Shrugging her shoulders, she put her chin in her hand, leaning against it as she peered at him, noticing for the first time the tumbler of scotch sitting on his side table. Condensation had formed a small ring of liquid around the bottom of the glass and was pooling on the wood.
"Rough day in the archives?"
“Full of paper cuts and roving hordes of dust bunnies. I actually found a boggart in the Muggle Architecture section,” he replied, a smile playing about his lips. “I’m glad Susan wasn’t the one to find it. I have no doubt that she would have handled it, but I do wish to spare her any of the nastier things lurking about.”
He quieted, trying to figure out how to broach the subject of her not leaving, continuing the play of words in his head.
“Speaking of papers, I’ve noticed ones with little red circles lying about,” he finally said, though no more than a few moments must have passed. His eyes were dark with worry, feathery eyebrows coming together in the middle. “Without sounding presumptuous, what’s wrong here that you want to leave?”
Lavender blinked at the question. She hadn't exactly been stealthy about the search for a flat that would work for her, mostly because she hadn't thought it anything out of the ordinary. She'd originally moved in because her home had been destroyed in a fire and she was recovering from her injuries.
Why she continued to stay after she'd healed, she'd explained to herself, was that she didn't have the funds to survive living on her own. Now, however, the Herald was doing well and her salary had been substantially increased. She could finally afford to be on her own again. The fact that he'd let her stay as long as she had without paying anything for rent (other than the occasional bottle of wine) was something of a sore spot in her pride.
"I figured it was time," she answered, shifting in her seat. "There's nothing wrong here. But Jack's getting older and I figured you'd want space for your family to grow. I know you don't have anyone right now, but when someone does pop up you're not going to want to explain why you have some random younger woman staying in your home."
She shrugged her shoulders in an attempt to make it seem like her moving out wasn't a big deal, despite not really enjoying the idea of actually leaving. "Besides, I think I've taken advantage of you long enough."
It hadn’t occurred to him that she thought he was letting her stay. Percy thought that he was more than clear that this was her home. He was appalled that she thought she was taking advantage of him. She was … Lavender. He couldn’t imagine his days without her, the sounds she made when she was going to bed too late and trying not to wake Jack. Her hair in the drain, and toast crumbs on the counter.
“But... I... you...No.” Percy sputtered, sitting up from his slouch and moving forward in his chair, turning towards Lavender.
“No,” he said again, voice dropping from the previous sharpness. “This is your home. With me, with Jack. Even with the damn cat who steals your knickers when you leave them on the floor. You can’t leave.”
The tone of his voice made Lavender's pulse race. Part of her thought he sounded a bit panicked, but the larger, louder, part of her knew that was silly. There was nothing for him to panic about.
"Percy, you'll be fine. I know it's hard now, with Penelope gone, and yeah, Jack can be a handful at times, but you're his dad. You'll both be fine without me here. It's not like I'll leave and never come back. I'll still attack your wine cabinet on a regular basis, just like I did before I lived here."
Lavender wasn't sure why the look on his face was making her arms erupt in goosebumps, but it was. There was a ... determination ... in his eyes that gave her pause.
He shook his head. He was normally so good with words, with making them come out in the precise order that gave exact meanings, with subtle nuances, with blunt intensity. What was it about the woman sitting next to him that made that virtually impossible, at this precise moment?
Percy reached across the small space separating them, taking her smaller hand into his.
“This isn’t about Penelope. This is about you. I need you here. Not because you take care of Jack, and read to him in French, and make sure the paper is brought in and the jam jar is always empty. Just because you’re you. I love you, Lavender.”
The last bit he hadn’t meant to slip out. It just came out all in a long exhale, and he could almost see the words leaving and he couldn’t catch them fast enough.
When he'd grabbed her hand, the world had narrowed down to the man in front of her and nothing else. They'd touched in the past - a hand in hers while he flailed around the dance floor, a tug at her hair when she cut in front of him for the shower in the morning, a palm to her cheek when they'd had too much to drink and he was condescendingly sweet as he pointed out the flaw in her argument - but this was different.
And while his touch had narrowed her world to the ginger-headed man, his words and sudden admission of love shattered it into a million tiny pieces.
"What?!" She hadn't meant the single-word question to come out so shrilly, but the sound had been ripped from her lungs in surprise.
This was Percy. Quiet Percy, who surprisingly had a pair of golden leather trousers. Thoughtful Percy, who could spend an entire evening in complete silence with her and not have it be awkward. Caring Percy, who didn't mind that he did all the grocery shopping because she was horrible about remembering they needed more raspberries.
Percy, her best friend, who had just confessed he was in love with her. He was her best friend. Best friends didn't just suddenly realize that they'd had feelings for each other for years and confess it out of nowhere. At least, not in reality. That type of thing only happened in horribly sappy romance novels written by Aphrodite Jones.
Her hazel eyes, widened in disbelief, shifted to the almost-empty tumbler of scotch on the table beside him. She lowered her chin and gave him an amused look. "I think one of your brothers might have dabbled with your libations, Mr. Weasley, because you've obviously been confunded."
“Hardly, dove. You know I never have more than two fingers, and you know that the wards don’t let them in unless one of us does,” he replied, voice wry and a little rough. He’d expected as much of a response, when he’d run the thoughts over and over in his head. It had been on repeat for months, quietly running in the background behind all the other noise. The realization had surprised him as well.
“You’re my best friend Lavender. You snuck into my life, and I can’t imagine it without you in it,” he said, quietly, searching out her eyes with his, holding her hand just that much more tightly. She wasn’t running, and hadn’t hexed him.
That had to be something, he thought.
"You're my best friend too, Perce, but this..." She struggled to find words that accurately described the roar and tumble of her thoughts. "Have I... done something? Said something?"
Susan had joked, a while ago, about the two do them having something between them, but Lavender had scoffed at the idea. There'd never been any sort of tension - sexual or otherwise - between them.
She wasn't blind, though, and had readily admitted she found Percy attractive. But that admittance had always been followed by a summary of her friends and which one of them she could set him up with. Percy wasn't for her.
He shook his head, chuckling. This was utterly ridiculous. Of course she was surprised, of course she didn’t have an instant and like reply.
“Left your hair all over the place, your shoes by the front door. Jack’s head in your lap at story time, the smudges on the ends of your fingers when you’re editing a piece for the paper. Your towels on the floor, dancing to horrible music, singing off key when you think no one can hear.”
He thought about pulling back, but couldn’t seem to make himself do it. He brought her hand to his lips, careful not to let the stubble scratch.
“I might have panicked a bit.”
Despite the many times they'd touched over the years, Lavender was suddenly very aware of how his skin felt beneath her fingers and how warm his breath was. "Panicked? I wasn't sure you came in that flavor," she mused, using humor as a shield.
When the swirl of thoughts, feelings and physical sensation became too much for her mind to comprehend, she relied on the tactics she used when running down a story: what were the facts, and how did they make her feel?
Percy had told her he loved her. He didn't want her to leave the house. He wanted her to stay there with him and Jack. The skin where he touched tingled with warmth and her eyes were having a hard time focusing on much other than his lips.
She had never really wanted to leave him and Jack, but had figured it was time for her to do so so that they could move on with their lives. Now that he'd made it clear he didn't want that, she wasn't sure what was next. He loved her, and she didn’t want to go anywhere. Which meant she’d be staying with the man who had had confessed to being in love with her.
"So I won't be leaving then." she said after several long moments where she'd been oblivious to anything outside of the library they currently sat in. "Other than my not leaving... What do we do now?"
He hadn’t thought that far ahead. Thoughts and images flashed through his head, each emotion flickering across his face as he just looked at Lavender. Disbelief. Relief. Want. Fondness. Exasperation.
She wasn’t leaving. Thank Merlin.
The hand that wasn’t holding her moved to cup the soft curve of her cheek, and before he could fully process the thought, Percy had tipped Lavender’s face up to his own, and brushed his lips against hers. She tasted like the wine she’d been sipping and honey. Just the slightest hint of lips and skin. He pulled back slightly, resting his forehead on hers.
“Are you staying because you want to stay, or because I’ve told you I love you?”
Even if she’d never consciously thought about Percy kissing her, her body reacted as if it’d been tensed and waiting for the touch of his lips to hers for years. She felt the thrill of it from the tips of her toes all the way to her scalp. Every hair on her body seemed to stand up with electricity and her stomach felt like it was trying to claw its way from her body.
Though it was one of the more chaste kisses she’d ever had, Lavender still found herself breathing heavy as she leaned her forehead against his, mouth open and eyes closed as her thoughts attempted to catch up with what her body was screaming at her.
“I never wanted to leave,” she managed to say, though the sound of her own voice sounded foreign to her ears. It was too low, too breathy, too affected. “You and Jack are as good as family. It’s just...” Again, she tried to give words to the conflicted feelings warring in her jumbled mind and body. “I never considered you as mine, not in this way, and I don’t... I don’t want to say I love you, even though you know I do, because even though I love you, I’ve never considered loving you. Does that make any sense?”
She was rambling and as a reporter who was very careful about her words it made her frustratingly insane that she couldn’t string together the right ones to make him understand that this was so sudden, and while she knew she loved him and didn’t want to leave or make him feel rejected, she didn’t want to say she loved him because she wasn’t sure it’d be honest. As he was her best friend, the last thing she wanted to do was hurt him by saying something that she wasn’t sure about. But even as those thoughts bounced against her skull, another one followed saying that of course she loved him. She’d been living with the man and his son for years now and they were a family in everything but a physical sense.
At the thought of a physical relationship with Percy entered her mind, her body thrummed with energy once more, electricity shooting through every cell of her person. Her fingers flexed in his with the intensity of the desire to climb into his lap, but the sheer and utter newness of the feeling made her stop.
“I feel like I know everything about you but suddenly know absolutely nothing at the same time,” Lavender tried to explain, certain she was making positively no sense.
Percy’s pulse lept at Lavender’ reaction to the barest brush of lip, a small part of him pleased with her reaction to such a small touch. His knee brushing hers, her hand wrapped in his, her cheek soft against the calluses of his palm - each part was on fire.
“Ask me anything, and I’ll give you an answer. Ask me why, and I’ll show you,” he replied, his voice low and a bit more unsteady than he’d expected. His thoughts registered the smell of the soap on her skin, the slight flush creeping up her collarbone, that Lavender hadn’t run screaming. He couldn’t quite catch a coherent thought, but everything was tinted with Lavender.
Anytime she tried to think of something to ask, her brain refused to form a coherent thought outside of Skin. Warm. Percy. Close.
A thrill went up her spine, almost making her shudder with the intensity. How had she ever been oblivious to the way her body reacted to him?
Lavender leaned forward to press her lips to his again, because she wanted to and, on another level, because she could. Before he could react to the kiss, she pulled back to take a deep breath.
"So, this is happening," she said, still a hint of disbelief in her voice. "You. And me. And Jack. Jack!" For the first time since he'd revealed his feelings and turned her world upside down, someone other than Percy entered her consciousness. "Do you think... He'll be alright? With this? Us, I mean. Together. Me and you. And him. All together."
He had thought about it, in depth, when the paper had shown up. Jack loved her, sought Lavender out for all number of things, including conspiring against his father.
“Yes, of course. He loves you,” Percy replied. He brushed his lips against Lavender’s again. Meeting her eyes, he nodded, once, then tugged Lavender to him. He had the need to feel her soft curves against him, and settled his lips firmly against hers, cradling the back of her head with his hand, humming low at the small noise that escaped her.
Part of her brain still screamed ‘This is Percy!’ but the other part marveled at how easily she fit into his lap and how right it felt to be pressed against him and fully aware of everything about him. The stubble on his chin scratching against the palm of her hand, the taste of him against her lips, the smell of his skin; it was overwhelming but she couldn’t seem to get enough of it at the same time.
Other than her dreadul one-off that had ended rather embarrassingly several months before, she’d been starved for human contact and touch. This, combined with the new awareness of Percy, had her moving in his arms until her legs straddled his waist and put her slightly above him in the chair. Her pajama shorts pushed high on her thighs as her mouth slanted over his with a sense of urgency she couldn’t quite understand.
He hadn’t let himself think that he wanted, especially not this, with Lavender, but now that she was there, it fit. The hand not mussing her hair moved to trace the line from knee to thigh, calloused fingers dancing across silky soft skin. Percy could feel the bumps rise along her skin, and suddenly an image of her above him, skin flushed and dewy, made his breath catch and he pulled Lavender against him.
Percy’s hand was on her leg and she reacted accordingly when their bodies were pressed together, something low and tight in her stomach contracting. Lavender’s brain had stopped questioning this, for now, and was instead just giving into the feelings he was eliciting in her. Her breathing was heavy, full of sighs and small sounds that couldn’t be stopped, as her fingers pulled at the tie holding his hair back from his head.
Percy shuddered as Lavender ran her fingers through his hair, blood warming. As he traced the curve of her spine, he ran his lips across the sweet sweep of jaw before nipping on her ear.
“I want to hear you make those noises when I’m buried in you. I want to love you until neither of us can walk and all you can think of is me. But tell me to stop, and I will.”
His words and the images they invoked, as well as the way his hands felt on her and the way his breath fanned against her ear made Lavender’s whole being feel like it was on fire. How had she known him for as long and as well as she did and not realize that there was an entirely foreign part to him? A part that her body seemed very eager to discover in its entirety.
She couldn’t think of anything she wanted less than for him to stop what he was currently doing, but part of her couldn’t help but wonder if this was all too sudden. The last thing she wanted was to rush into this - but, oh gods, did she want to rip away the clothes separating them - and ruin the best thing she’d ever found.
“Fuck,” she whispered against his lips before pressing her face into the crook of his neck. A litany of curse words flowed steadily from her mouth as she warred internally with what she was about to say. “I don’t want you to stop,” Lavender said as she pulled back to look at him, her hazel eyes conflicted, “but I want you to stop.”
Blue eyes darkened with passion met hazel. He brushed his hand from her temple, tucking stray, mussed hair behind her ear. He agreed with the flow of swearing, with the heat of her core pressed against him, and her fingers still twined in his hair. He didn’t want to stop, didn’t want to hurt her, didn’t want to do the wrong thing and make this, whatever this was with Lavender go away, fall apart.
“I’m afraid that made no sense.” He struggled to clear the fog of need from his brain, skin oversensitized where it brushed Lavender’s, his body screaming at him to take and ease both of them. “Could you try again? I may need small words, dove.” He brushed his nose against her. “You’re a bit distracting on the mental processing.”
“I’m not the only one,” she replied, a small laugh escaping her throat. Everything was jumbled and she had to take a deep breath before she could voice her feelings again. “This is a lot. A lot of stuff in a short space of time. And you and your hands are making me feel like I’m drunk.”
He had done that to her.
He swallowed, reacting to the movements of her body as she laughed, and roughness in her voice. Groaning, his head fell to the back of the chair, and he closed his eyes as he tried to get his breathing back to something normal.
Percy’s hand tightened on Lavender’s hip. “If you’re sure that’s what you want,” he started, the rest of the words falling away as he tried to stop the distraction of her body and her scent; she was going to drive him crazy. Just her existing was going to drive him completely starkers, and keep him from making a coherent sentence again.
“It’s absolutely the opposite of what I want,” Lavender whined, running a hand through her hair. Having Percy below her, between her legs and pressed against her, made everything she was saying aloud sound partly like a lie. A truth, yes, but still a complete and utter lie as well.
Only Percy Weasley could come back from the dead, become her best friend, confess love to her, and then make her question the actual truth of something she knew was the truth. She made her living in facts and here he was, confusing what she knew was right and what she wanted to do.
“It’s your face.” Her hand gestured in the direction of his lips and eyes. “And these,” she said, pulling his hands from her hips before pressing her lips to the back of them. “And...” she trailed off, pulling her lower lip between her teeth before biting on it.
“And what, Lav,” Percy prompted, eyes following the movement of her full mouth, before meeting her eyes with his own.
For the first time since she’d entered the library, something other than confusion, surprise or lust entered her eyes. They narrowed in his direction as her head cocked slightly to the right. “Shut up,” she managed, though the corner of her mouth turned up as she continued to glare at him. After she let out something that sounded like the beginning of a kettle beginning to boil, she looked at him with an almost pleading expression.
“Are you saying that you could throw me down on that ottoman over there and not worry about what it would be like for us tomorrow morning?”
He chuckled, and brushed his lips against her hands.
“I’m saying that I could be in you in less than thirty seconds, and I’d have you again in my bed. In the morning, I was thinking you’d ride me slow, because we’re both tired and sore, and then I’d make you breakfast and lick the jam off your breasts before making you come again in the shower. Then I’d planned on dragging you to the market with me.”
“I-” A look crossed her face. Those words. In that string. Those words had just come out of Percy’s mouth. And she was featured greatly in that vibrantly described scenario and suddenly was having trouble remembering why what he’d just described wasn’t happening. Right. Now.
Though it pained her, physically pained her, she extracted herself from his lap. She could have done it quicker, but she had trouble leaving the warmth of his body.
Lavender stood in front of him, hands gripping her hips because they still ached to be touching him, and tried to vocalize why it was so wrong that he’d just said and done that. “I... That wouldn’t...”
She continued to struggle for a few more moments before gesturing in his direction. “You say you’d take me to the market but if we did all that I wouldn’t be able to walk, let alone buy groceries.”
Percy carefully adjusted himself before standing as well. He wasn’t touching Lavender, his body the merest brush away from full contact. The difference in height meant he had to look down into her face, her lovely face, cheeks flushed, eyes flashing with exasperation.
He smiled then, one side of his mouth going up, eyes crinkling in the corners. “Supplies, dove. Not groceries.”
“Supplies,” she repeated, suddenly uncertain that she understood what the word meant anymore. Or meant in this context, at least. “Then... what? We’re having sex and there’s jam and we’re an ‘us’ in a different sense than we’ve been an ‘us’ in the past.”
Her eyes strayed to his mouth, where it was turned up in a smirk, and she leaned forward slightly before catching herself. Being an ‘us’ sounded pretty good (amazing and perfect and right) but she still felt light headed from when they’d been kissing and he was still close enough that the scent that she’d always just known as ‘Percy’ filled her lungs.
“You want this?” she asked, looking up at him.
He closed the space between them, cupping her face in his hands.
“I want this. I want you. I want to love you with more than laundry and groceries and words. I want to love you with my body. I want to love you with all of me, if you’ll have me.”
Looking up at him, knowing that he didn’t do things rashly and thought things through to a degree that she still marveled at, she didn’t doubt what he was saying. Had she ever imagined that she’d be looking up at Percy while he told her he loved her? No. Even after Susan had joked about it, it hadn’t seemed like something that would happen. He was Percy. Her Percy. And she didn’t think about things like that because he was her best friend and knew her better than anyone else and having that level of intimacy with someone was terrifying but it had been okay because it was Percy and he was her best friend.
And now he was Percy, the person who knew her better than anyone else and she had that level of intimacy with, and she couldn’t understand why she hadn’t considered this before. The thought of losing what they had between them made her ache in ways she couldn’t explain and didn’t that decide everything already? Wasn’t that the answer she was struggling with?
Looking up at him, she wanted to tell him that he was an idiot for wanting to do this, that she was messy and destructive and would drive him starking mad all the time, but he knew that already. He knew everything about her already. What else could she tell him that he didn’t already know?
“Okay.” Lavender said it softly at first, but then nodded slightly, finding her voice again. “Okay.”
He had stopped breathing, watching Lavender think, watching emotions flicker across her face. At her nod, and second affirmation, he let go of the breath, and silently thanked the Fates.
Before he could fully process the thought, he picked Lavender up and wrapped her legs around his waist before depositing her on the ottoman she had helpfully pointed out. He hovered over her, hands stroking down the dip of waist and flare of hip, pulling up the hem of her shirt (wait, wasn’t that his shirt?) as his hands made their way back up. His lips had trailed from her mouth to the juncture of shoulder and neck, and he worried the spot with a slight nip of teeth.
Lavender had a brief instant of being self-conscious, as she always did when she was with a man like she was now, but it evaporated when she remembered that this was Percy. No, he’d not seen her completely naked before, but he’d seen her in little enough that any nervousness she had seemed pretty ridiculous when she thought about it.
Once it had passed, all she could think about was how amazing it felt to wrap her legs around his waist and have him pressed against her. The stubble on his chin and cheeks pressed into her skin and while it might have been annoying on anyone else, on him it sent a thrill up her spine until she was arching against him, hands pulling at the shirt on his back.
The little noises she was making made Percy impatient. He was normally patient, to the point of annoyance, but something about Lavender made him want to hurry. There wasn’t enough of her against him. A wordless spell had the clothing that separated their bodies disappear, and he growled at the feel of Lavender arching against him, no barriers between them.
“Keep making those noises, love. They let me know I’m doing right by you,” he murmured in her ear before cupping the heavy weight of her breast in his hand and laving the rosy bud with his tongue.
Making noises wasn’t going to be a problem, she thought, because the places their bodies connected felt on fire and she couldn’t seem to stop the low keening sound that fell from her lips. Her fingernails found purchase in his back, pulling him closer even though there was practically no way it was possible.
An hour ago she’d been reading articles and correcting grammar. Now her best friend was pressed against her body, hot and ready and Percy and they were an ‘us’. It had changed so quickly and suddenly, but all she could think was that he wasn’t in her yet and it was driving her crazy.
“Percy,” she moaned, crooking her calf around his arse as she tangled a hand in his hair to pull his mouth back to hers. As she bit at his lips, she managed to growl “you said you’d only take thirty seconds.”
Gods, he was going to come like a fifth year just from the way she was wrapping herself around him. Demanding witch.
He couldn’t help bit of a shout as he slid into her slick heat, seating himself in one stroke. He slid one hand to cup the curve of Lavender’s bum, holding her in place as he slid slowly back out of her and slowly, achingly slowly, back in.
“Lavender. Fuck.”
The way her body felt - like a taut string that had just been strummed and was vibrating - and the sensation of being completely connected to Percy made her breath catch in her throat and her eyes roll into the back of her head. When they fluttered open, she looked up at him and forgot to breathe for a different reason.
For all the years she’d known Percy, Lavender had thought she’d seen him completely consumed by something. It was usually a text or an ancient doctrine of some kind, but the look on his face had always been focused and intent on what was in front of him. This look, the look on his face as he was poised above her, moving within her body with the utter concentration he currently had. That was consummation.
Her breathing finally began again, gasps of air as she reacted to feel of skin sliding against skin, and she clutched at his arms as she arched into him.
She was stunning in her passion. Gasping, clutching, moving against him, with him, her walls fluttering with each stroke. His name tumbling off her lips, the smell of her on his skin. He hissed at her nails marking him, felt the tingling at the base of his spine.
“Let go, love. Come for me,” he managed to get out, as he pulled Lavender up to almost sitting and moved in her, holding her down against him with each thrust.
She’d never really been able to say ‘no’ to him to begin with, and she wasn’t in any position to start doing so now. Lavender cried out his name as she began to fell apart, her teeth biting into his shoulder as she continued to cry out as every movement of him sent another wave through her body.
He couldn’t stop the way he was moving in her. Percy knew his hands had to be leaving bruises on her hips, his stubble leaving burn marks on her skin. He loved her, and he could finally show her. Percy growled Lavender’s name as he came, hips thrusting harder with each responding clench from her, each noise of pleasure.
“You’re going to kill me, Lav.” He kissed her soundly, sloppily. “And I’ll die a happy man.”
“No,” she said, her body still thrumming with adrenaline as she tried to remember how to breathe, “that wasn’t part of the plan. Ottoman. Bed. Breakfast. Jam. Shower. Market. There was no death in those plans.”
Her body was covered in a fine sheen and everything smelled and tasted like him. She was sticking a bit to the leather of the ottoman but had absolutely no desire to move just yet. Wasn’t rightly sure if she could, were she to try.
“Bed,” Percy panted. “Right. Hold on, love.” He used his not inconsiderable will to hold Lavender against him, still joined, and stood, her legs wrapped around his middle, arms about his neck. He chuckled at her squeak of protest and managed to maneuver around the ottoman and to the stairs leading out of the library. I will make it to my bed. I will make it to my bed, he thought, licking the sweat off of Lavender’s neck. He had to have her again. And again. They made the landing, and Percy paused, holding Lavender against the wall and kissing her, nipping the full lower lip until she opened her mouth to him.
The fact that they could have died, coming down the stairs like they had, fluttered out of her mind when he pressed her against the wall and began kissing her again. It was dangerous, this new power he had to make her forget things by simply touching her. Or looking at her. Or doing what he currently was with his tongue.
“Bed,” she mumbled against his lips, the thought surfacing despite his considerable distraction. “Yours? Mine?”
“Mine,” he growled, moving against her. “I’ll have you in my bed. Our bed.”
Good Merlin, he had to make it down the hall. Thankful for the first time for the tiny rowhouse, Percy managed to not trip over Jack’s toys in the hall, but paused outside of his room to light the candles and make sure that Boris hadn’t taken residence up in the middle of the bed. The cat was probably cleaning his bollocks at the moment on Lavender’s bed.
He sat on the bed, Lavender above him, hands releasing their grip on her arse moving to palm her breasts. He wanted to hear his name on her lips again.
Lavender had always found it funny that a grown man had kept candles in his bedroom, but when the light reflected off the walls and cast his face in shadows, she silently apologized for her previous doubts.
They were an ‘us’ that had things that were ‘ours’ and a room that would be ‘theirs’. Any time she would have spent marveling at the change that this was where she’d be sleeping from now invested instead on the body below her.
The feel of his hands on her made her head loll backward, her face toward the ceiling as she let out a sound from low in her throat.
“Gods, you’re lovely, dove,” he said, pulling back a bit and looking at Lavender. He’d seen her in various stages of undress, either from her own choosing of dress or from sharing the one full loo in the house. She was all curves, lovely dips and planes of womanliness. Soft, soft skin, slick with passion - he could already see the faint bruises forming on her skin, and felt a passing bit of guilt.
“Tell me what you want. What you want me to do to you.”
His voice brought her heated gaze, and she closed the space between them, pressing her lips to his. She pulled his lower lip between both of her teeth, enjoying the sound he made when she used her tongue to swipe over the spot she’d been rough with.
“Maybe I want to do something to you,” she said, reaching between their bodies to take him in her hand. Lavender had never been shy in bed, and after getting over the shock that this was happening - and, oh yes, it was happening - she found herself growing more bold.
He jerked as Lavender wrapped her hand around him. He craved touch, her touch. He hadn’t let himself imagine this happening. Percy had put the thoughts firmly out of his head, after many a cold shower. He leaned back on his arms and watched Lavender’s hand on him, eyes rolling back in his head when she did something with her thumb.
“Fuck, me,” Percy ground out through clenched teeth.
She would have never in a million years guessed that Percy Weasley had such a dirty mouth in bed, but with every word he surprised her and made things low in her stomach clench in delicious ways.
Lavender kept one hand wrapped around him, slowly moving up and down, while she pressed her lips to his chest and explored his skin with her tongue. She used it to flick at one of his nipples before her eyes rolled up to gauge his reaction.
Percy’s hands were clenched in the quilt on his bed, drawing it up into twists. It was all he could do not to toss her on her back and pound into her. He wanted her to have her way with him, delighted in the pleased sounds she made as she made her way across his skin. Percy swore he could feel his blood screaming through his body.
The knowledge that it had been so long since he’d done this with anyone only urged Lavender on, encouraging her to make this amazing for him. She kissed, nipped and licked at his hip bones, relishing his quick intakes of breath and expletives that became the soundtrack of the moment.
One hand wrapped around the base of him, she steadied the other on his stomach, fingers flexing into his skin as she slowly and deliberately slid her lips down his length. The scent and taste of him, both of them, had her humming as her tongue circled.
His head was spinning with the feel of Lavender’s lips and tongue on him. Percy’s hips moved without his permission as he watched Lavender’s head dip to taste him. Mother of Merlin, she was magnificent. He didn’t know how much longer he’d be able to hold out. He wanted her writhing and clawing under him, and soon.
She used her hand on his stomach in an attempt to keep him still, though she reveled in the fact that she could cause him to thrust and buck with only her mouth. She knew it was a silly thing to be proud of, but if she was able to make Percy Weasley come completely undone, she would see it as a badge of honor.
Lavender sped up her rhythm, hand moving in tandem with her mouth, eyes glancing up the line of his body to watch his face as she took as much of him as she could.
Percy could feel his balls tightening, and he wanted to be in Lavender when he came. His eyes rolled back in his head as he caught the wicked gleam in her eyes.
“You. Up here. Now,” he demanded, tugging on the hand resting on his stomach. “Please.”
The order in his words, coupled with the insistent plea, had Lavender moving up his body. She went slowly though, lips and tongue making the journey north along his skin. She laid beside him on the bed, one leg thrown over his body as she kissed and licked at his jawline.
Percy rolled them so that Lavender was on the bottom, her wrists caught in his hands just above her head, her heat pressed against his erection. His kissed his way from her forehead, to the tip of her nose, each cheekbone, to the fullness of her mouth. He loved the way she tasted. His mouth worked down her jawline to her neck, and he paused there, marking her. The breathy moans Lavender was making made his blood boil, and his hips dug into hers.
Releasing her hands he breathed into her ear, “Have me. Put me in you.”
Eyes fluttering from the thrill of his words, she reached between them and wrapped her hand around him again, directing him to her entrance. She paused there, sitting up to capture his mouth with her own as her thighs spread so his hips could fit against hers. Lavender’s hips pressed upward, a sigh passing her lips as she slid around him, tight and wet and hot.
A shudder ran up the length of her body as she fell back against the bed, biting her lip but still unable to stop the whispered ’fuck’ as they connected fully.
Percy had to close his eyes and start mentally reciting the Dewey Decimal system. He wanted to be gentle, to go slowly, to have Lavender incoherent and wild, but he couldn’t stop his hips from thrusting into her, or pulling one of her legs higher so he could hit the spot that made her eyes roll back and her nails dig into his hips.
Any kind of intelligent and articulate words had ceased to form for her, replaced with consistent moans and sighs as his hips moved against her in long, snapping waves. She moved her knee until it was hooked over his shoulder, allowing him to thrust deeper and harder. Lavender was sure his upper arms, back, hips and arse would be covered in little blood-filled half-moon marks, but when he hit right there, over and over, she couldn’t be held responsible for how her body reacted.
She only had a second of warning before her vision swam in colors and she shouted his name, convulsing around him as she tried to remember to breathe.
He was able to think that Lavender was enthralling when she orgasmed, before he came himself, body tight against hers, her name shouted against her skin, hips pumping his release.
Percy breathed, or tried, and managed not to completely collapse against Lavender. He nuzzled against her neck, breathing deep the smell of sex and her. “I love you.”
The ecstasy of everything, coupled with the physical exertion, made her feel like every bone in her body had been hexed away and she was simply a bag of exhausted nerve-endings, each one of them oversensitized and stinging in the best possible ways. The weight of Percy on top of her was welcome, felt right, and kept her grounded and anchored.
His words, another declaration of love, brought a little more gravity to her consciousness. He’d said those three words so many times before, but they held a different meaning now. Something heavier. Weightier. She’d never been the kind of person that threw those words around lightly (at least, not since Hogwarts) and she couldn’t remember, after all the times he’d said it that night, if she’d responded the same.
Not quite sure why, Lavender was overwhelmed with the need to make sure he understood that she felt the same way. Lifting herself onto her elbows, she disturbed him from where he’d been laying on top of her, interrupting him when he opened his mouth to ask what had brought such a serious expression on to her face.
“I love you, too. And not because of what we just did, though it was... not just because of that. Because of everything else. You and Jack... you’re my family. And I don’t want to go anywhere else and I want to stay with you and annoy you and have you screaming at me about leaving the ice cream out overnight and wake up next to you so we can do it all again.”
“I never scream at you, dove. I merely express my opinion loudly and precisely,” he responded, earning a swat on the arse. He was surprised he had the energy for any kind of teasing or wit. He was drained, in the pleasant, floating way.
“I know you do.” He pressed his lips against hers before pulling her against him, her bum snuggled into the cradle of his hips.They’d fallen asleep next to each other before, listening to the old radio shows, or reading late into the night, or from simple drunken conversations. This felt right, his arms wrapped around her, her cooling feet tucked into his shins.
“Thank you,” he whispered into her hair.
She rubbed her cheek along the inside of his arm where her head was pillowed, snorting softly. “Thank you? For what? Not running screaming from the house? That thing I did with my tongue? You might have to be more specific.”
“Brat,” he replied sleepily into her hair. “Smart arses only get toast with butter for breakfast. No jam.”
“There’s always jam,” she murmured, settling further into his arms as sleep began to pull at her.
Summary: Percy decides that Lavender can’t leave and changes their relationship in a monumental way. NC-17
That wasn’t the confusing part, however. What was confusing him was the tightness in his chest when he thought about Lavender no longer being down the hall, singing slightly off key to herself in the morning as she got ready for work. Toast crumbs next to the toaster, her hairs in the oddest places.
What was confusing was the odd feeling in his stomach, like he wanted to vomit his breakfast from three days prior.
He had been thinking, holing up in the library at the top of the stairs, more often than not staring into the slowly emptying glass of scotch. It was obvious, of course, the obvious answer was right in front of him.
Lavender was simply not allowed to leave.
Molly had been by hours ago to take Jack for the night, his backpack full of books and his toad firmly in hand. Lavender had never liked the greenish-brown thing, but, then again, she’d never really liked anything slimy. So a toad fit nicely into her list of ‘things Lavender does not like,’ along with fish, slugs and snails.
She’d spent the last hour pouring over several stories for the next issue of the Hogsmeade Herald. More reporters had been hired to help fill their ever increasing number of pages. As circulation continue to rise each month, so did her staff. At current count she was at eight full-time reporters and seven part-time. Not to mention the publishing department and the delivery boys.
It’d become quite the endeavor since she’d agreed to become editor; It had been hard work, and time consuming, but it was the most rewarding job she’d ever had.
Despite the wireless droning in the background, Lavender had found her mind wandering. In need of a change of scenery and a recharge before she dove back in, she looked for the only other person left in the house. Percy had been quiet since Jack had left - not that he was ever particularly loud - and she sought him out.
When he wasn’t in the kitchen, living room or his bedroom, she climbed the stairs to the library. It was the only other place he could be and, really, she should have checked there first anyway.
“Perce?”
He stirred himself from his thoughts as Lavender’s voice floated up the stairs. The house was oddly quiet without Jack tearing through it, demanding pirating or trying to avoid taking his bath.
“Up here, dove,” he called back, marking his place in his book, and setting it aside. Percy hadn’t really been reading Developing and Applying Practical Classification Solutions, Volume II with any great attention. One side of his mouth lifted up as Lavender came through the door, her hair sticking out slightly on one side, and ink splattered on her right fingertips.
“How is the editing going?” he asked, gesturing for her to curl up in her favorite chair, just caddy corner to his.
Folding her legs under her, Lavender gave his question a large sigh before answering.
"It's a slow time for stories right now, but they're quality. I'm getting to learn the new reporter's styles and what they enjoy writing about. Hopefully some of them loosen up a bit. Everything sounds a little too formal and forced."
Shrugging her shoulders, she put her chin in her hand, leaning against it as she peered at him, noticing for the first time the tumbler of scotch sitting on his side table. Condensation had formed a small ring of liquid around the bottom of the glass and was pooling on the wood.
"Rough day in the archives?"
“Full of paper cuts and roving hordes of dust bunnies. I actually found a boggart in the Muggle Architecture section,” he replied, a smile playing about his lips. “I’m glad Susan wasn’t the one to find it. I have no doubt that she would have handled it, but I do wish to spare her any of the nastier things lurking about.”
He quieted, trying to figure out how to broach the subject of her not leaving, continuing the play of words in his head.
“Speaking of papers, I’ve noticed ones with little red circles lying about,” he finally said, though no more than a few moments must have passed. His eyes were dark with worry, feathery eyebrows coming together in the middle. “Without sounding presumptuous, what’s wrong here that you want to leave?”
Lavender blinked at the question. She hadn't exactly been stealthy about the search for a flat that would work for her, mostly because she hadn't thought it anything out of the ordinary. She'd originally moved in because her home had been destroyed in a fire and she was recovering from her injuries.
Why she continued to stay after she'd healed, she'd explained to herself, was that she didn't have the funds to survive living on her own. Now, however, the Herald was doing well and her salary had been substantially increased. She could finally afford to be on her own again. The fact that he'd let her stay as long as she had without paying anything for rent (other than the occasional bottle of wine) was something of a sore spot in her pride.
"I figured it was time," she answered, shifting in her seat. "There's nothing wrong here. But Jack's getting older and I figured you'd want space for your family to grow. I know you don't have anyone right now, but when someone does pop up you're not going to want to explain why you have some random younger woman staying in your home."
She shrugged her shoulders in an attempt to make it seem like her moving out wasn't a big deal, despite not really enjoying the idea of actually leaving. "Besides, I think I've taken advantage of you long enough."
It hadn’t occurred to him that she thought he was letting her stay. Percy thought that he was more than clear that this was her home. He was appalled that she thought she was taking advantage of him. She was … Lavender. He couldn’t imagine his days without her, the sounds she made when she was going to bed too late and trying not to wake Jack. Her hair in the drain, and toast crumbs on the counter.
“But... I... you...No.” Percy sputtered, sitting up from his slouch and moving forward in his chair, turning towards Lavender.
“No,” he said again, voice dropping from the previous sharpness. “This is your home. With me, with Jack. Even with the damn cat who steals your knickers when you leave them on the floor. You can’t leave.”
The tone of his voice made Lavender's pulse race. Part of her thought he sounded a bit panicked, but the larger, louder, part of her knew that was silly. There was nothing for him to panic about.
"Percy, you'll be fine. I know it's hard now, with Penelope gone, and yeah, Jack can be a handful at times, but you're his dad. You'll both be fine without me here. It's not like I'll leave and never come back. I'll still attack your wine cabinet on a regular basis, just like I did before I lived here."
Lavender wasn't sure why the look on his face was making her arms erupt in goosebumps, but it was. There was a ... determination ... in his eyes that gave her pause.
He shook his head. He was normally so good with words, with making them come out in the precise order that gave exact meanings, with subtle nuances, with blunt intensity. What was it about the woman sitting next to him that made that virtually impossible, at this precise moment?
Percy reached across the small space separating them, taking her smaller hand into his.
“This isn’t about Penelope. This is about you. I need you here. Not because you take care of Jack, and read to him in French, and make sure the paper is brought in and the jam jar is always empty. Just because you’re you. I love you, Lavender.”
The last bit he hadn’t meant to slip out. It just came out all in a long exhale, and he could almost see the words leaving and he couldn’t catch them fast enough.
When he'd grabbed her hand, the world had narrowed down to the man in front of her and nothing else. They'd touched in the past - a hand in hers while he flailed around the dance floor, a tug at her hair when she cut in front of him for the shower in the morning, a palm to her cheek when they'd had too much to drink and he was condescendingly sweet as he pointed out the flaw in her argument - but this was different.
And while his touch had narrowed her world to the ginger-headed man, his words and sudden admission of love shattered it into a million tiny pieces.
"What?!" She hadn't meant the single-word question to come out so shrilly, but the sound had been ripped from her lungs in surprise.
This was Percy. Quiet Percy, who surprisingly had a pair of golden leather trousers. Thoughtful Percy, who could spend an entire evening in complete silence with her and not have it be awkward. Caring Percy, who didn't mind that he did all the grocery shopping because she was horrible about remembering they needed more raspberries.
Percy, her best friend, who had just confessed he was in love with her. He was her best friend. Best friends didn't just suddenly realize that they'd had feelings for each other for years and confess it out of nowhere. At least, not in reality. That type of thing only happened in horribly sappy romance novels written by Aphrodite Jones.
Her hazel eyes, widened in disbelief, shifted to the almost-empty tumbler of scotch on the table beside him. She lowered her chin and gave him an amused look. "I think one of your brothers might have dabbled with your libations, Mr. Weasley, because you've obviously been confunded."
“Hardly, dove. You know I never have more than two fingers, and you know that the wards don’t let them in unless one of us does,” he replied, voice wry and a little rough. He’d expected as much of a response, when he’d run the thoughts over and over in his head. It had been on repeat for months, quietly running in the background behind all the other noise. The realization had surprised him as well.
“You’re my best friend Lavender. You snuck into my life, and I can’t imagine it without you in it,” he said, quietly, searching out her eyes with his, holding her hand just that much more tightly. She wasn’t running, and hadn’t hexed him.
That had to be something, he thought.
"You're my best friend too, Perce, but this..." She struggled to find words that accurately described the roar and tumble of her thoughts. "Have I... done something? Said something?"
Susan had joked, a while ago, about the two do them having something between them, but Lavender had scoffed at the idea. There'd never been any sort of tension - sexual or otherwise - between them.
She wasn't blind, though, and had readily admitted she found Percy attractive. But that admittance had always been followed by a summary of her friends and which one of them she could set him up with. Percy wasn't for her.
He shook his head, chuckling. This was utterly ridiculous. Of course she was surprised, of course she didn’t have an instant and like reply.
“Left your hair all over the place, your shoes by the front door. Jack’s head in your lap at story time, the smudges on the ends of your fingers when you’re editing a piece for the paper. Your towels on the floor, dancing to horrible music, singing off key when you think no one can hear.”
He thought about pulling back, but couldn’t seem to make himself do it. He brought her hand to his lips, careful not to let the stubble scratch.
“I might have panicked a bit.”
Despite the many times they'd touched over the years, Lavender was suddenly very aware of how his skin felt beneath her fingers and how warm his breath was. "Panicked? I wasn't sure you came in that flavor," she mused, using humor as a shield.
When the swirl of thoughts, feelings and physical sensation became too much for her mind to comprehend, she relied on the tactics she used when running down a story: what were the facts, and how did they make her feel?
Percy had told her he loved her. He didn't want her to leave the house. He wanted her to stay there with him and Jack. The skin where he touched tingled with warmth and her eyes were having a hard time focusing on much other than his lips.
She had never really wanted to leave him and Jack, but had figured it was time for her to do so so that they could move on with their lives. Now that he'd made it clear he didn't want that, she wasn't sure what was next. He loved her, and she didn’t want to go anywhere. Which meant she’d be staying with the man who had had confessed to being in love with her.
"So I won't be leaving then." she said after several long moments where she'd been oblivious to anything outside of the library they currently sat in. "Other than my not leaving... What do we do now?"
He hadn’t thought that far ahead. Thoughts and images flashed through his head, each emotion flickering across his face as he just looked at Lavender. Disbelief. Relief. Want. Fondness. Exasperation.
She wasn’t leaving. Thank Merlin.
The hand that wasn’t holding her moved to cup the soft curve of her cheek, and before he could fully process the thought, Percy had tipped Lavender’s face up to his own, and brushed his lips against hers. She tasted like the wine she’d been sipping and honey. Just the slightest hint of lips and skin. He pulled back slightly, resting his forehead on hers.
“Are you staying because you want to stay, or because I’ve told you I love you?”
Even if she’d never consciously thought about Percy kissing her, her body reacted as if it’d been tensed and waiting for the touch of his lips to hers for years. She felt the thrill of it from the tips of her toes all the way to her scalp. Every hair on her body seemed to stand up with electricity and her stomach felt like it was trying to claw its way from her body.
Though it was one of the more chaste kisses she’d ever had, Lavender still found herself breathing heavy as she leaned her forehead against his, mouth open and eyes closed as her thoughts attempted to catch up with what her body was screaming at her.
“I never wanted to leave,” she managed to say, though the sound of her own voice sounded foreign to her ears. It was too low, too breathy, too affected. “You and Jack are as good as family. It’s just...” Again, she tried to give words to the conflicted feelings warring in her jumbled mind and body. “I never considered you as mine, not in this way, and I don’t... I don’t want to say I love you, even though you know I do, because even though I love you, I’ve never considered loving you. Does that make any sense?”
She was rambling and as a reporter who was very careful about her words it made her frustratingly insane that she couldn’t string together the right ones to make him understand that this was so sudden, and while she knew she loved him and didn’t want to leave or make him feel rejected, she didn’t want to say she loved him because she wasn’t sure it’d be honest. As he was her best friend, the last thing she wanted to do was hurt him by saying something that she wasn’t sure about. But even as those thoughts bounced against her skull, another one followed saying that of course she loved him. She’d been living with the man and his son for years now and they were a family in everything but a physical sense.
At the thought of a physical relationship with Percy entered her mind, her body thrummed with energy once more, electricity shooting through every cell of her person. Her fingers flexed in his with the intensity of the desire to climb into his lap, but the sheer and utter newness of the feeling made her stop.
“I feel like I know everything about you but suddenly know absolutely nothing at the same time,” Lavender tried to explain, certain she was making positively no sense.
Percy’s pulse lept at Lavender’ reaction to the barest brush of lip, a small part of him pleased with her reaction to such a small touch. His knee brushing hers, her hand wrapped in his, her cheek soft against the calluses of his palm - each part was on fire.
“Ask me anything, and I’ll give you an answer. Ask me why, and I’ll show you,” he replied, his voice low and a bit more unsteady than he’d expected. His thoughts registered the smell of the soap on her skin, the slight flush creeping up her collarbone, that Lavender hadn’t run screaming. He couldn’t quite catch a coherent thought, but everything was tinted with Lavender.
Anytime she tried to think of something to ask, her brain refused to form a coherent thought outside of Skin. Warm. Percy. Close.
A thrill went up her spine, almost making her shudder with the intensity. How had she ever been oblivious to the way her body reacted to him?
Lavender leaned forward to press her lips to his again, because she wanted to and, on another level, because she could. Before he could react to the kiss, she pulled back to take a deep breath.
"So, this is happening," she said, still a hint of disbelief in her voice. "You. And me. And Jack. Jack!" For the first time since he'd revealed his feelings and turned her world upside down, someone other than Percy entered her consciousness. "Do you think... He'll be alright? With this? Us, I mean. Together. Me and you. And him. All together."
He had thought about it, in depth, when the paper had shown up. Jack loved her, sought Lavender out for all number of things, including conspiring against his father.
“Yes, of course. He loves you,” Percy replied. He brushed his lips against Lavender’s again. Meeting her eyes, he nodded, once, then tugged Lavender to him. He had the need to feel her soft curves against him, and settled his lips firmly against hers, cradling the back of her head with his hand, humming low at the small noise that escaped her.
Part of her brain still screamed ‘This is Percy!’ but the other part marveled at how easily she fit into his lap and how right it felt to be pressed against him and fully aware of everything about him. The stubble on his chin scratching against the palm of her hand, the taste of him against her lips, the smell of his skin; it was overwhelming but she couldn’t seem to get enough of it at the same time.
Other than her dreadul one-off that had ended rather embarrassingly several months before, she’d been starved for human contact and touch. This, combined with the new awareness of Percy, had her moving in his arms until her legs straddled his waist and put her slightly above him in the chair. Her pajama shorts pushed high on her thighs as her mouth slanted over his with a sense of urgency she couldn’t quite understand.
He hadn’t let himself think that he wanted, especially not this, with Lavender, but now that she was there, it fit. The hand not mussing her hair moved to trace the line from knee to thigh, calloused fingers dancing across silky soft skin. Percy could feel the bumps rise along her skin, and suddenly an image of her above him, skin flushed and dewy, made his breath catch and he pulled Lavender against him.
Percy’s hand was on her leg and she reacted accordingly when their bodies were pressed together, something low and tight in her stomach contracting. Lavender’s brain had stopped questioning this, for now, and was instead just giving into the feelings he was eliciting in her. Her breathing was heavy, full of sighs and small sounds that couldn’t be stopped, as her fingers pulled at the tie holding his hair back from his head.
Percy shuddered as Lavender ran her fingers through his hair, blood warming. As he traced the curve of her spine, he ran his lips across the sweet sweep of jaw before nipping on her ear.
“I want to hear you make those noises when I’m buried in you. I want to love you until neither of us can walk and all you can think of is me. But tell me to stop, and I will.”
His words and the images they invoked, as well as the way his hands felt on her and the way his breath fanned against her ear made Lavender’s whole being feel like it was on fire. How had she known him for as long and as well as she did and not realize that there was an entirely foreign part to him? A part that her body seemed very eager to discover in its entirety.
She couldn’t think of anything she wanted less than for him to stop what he was currently doing, but part of her couldn’t help but wonder if this was all too sudden. The last thing she wanted was to rush into this - but, oh gods, did she want to rip away the clothes separating them - and ruin the best thing she’d ever found.
“Fuck,” she whispered against his lips before pressing her face into the crook of his neck. A litany of curse words flowed steadily from her mouth as she warred internally with what she was about to say. “I don’t want you to stop,” Lavender said as she pulled back to look at him, her hazel eyes conflicted, “but I want you to stop.”
Blue eyes darkened with passion met hazel. He brushed his hand from her temple, tucking stray, mussed hair behind her ear. He agreed with the flow of swearing, with the heat of her core pressed against him, and her fingers still twined in his hair. He didn’t want to stop, didn’t want to hurt her, didn’t want to do the wrong thing and make this, whatever this was with Lavender go away, fall apart.
“I’m afraid that made no sense.” He struggled to clear the fog of need from his brain, skin oversensitized where it brushed Lavender’s, his body screaming at him to take and ease both of them. “Could you try again? I may need small words, dove.” He brushed his nose against her. “You’re a bit distracting on the mental processing.”
“I’m not the only one,” she replied, a small laugh escaping her throat. Everything was jumbled and she had to take a deep breath before she could voice her feelings again. “This is a lot. A lot of stuff in a short space of time. And you and your hands are making me feel like I’m drunk.”
He had done that to her.
He swallowed, reacting to the movements of her body as she laughed, and roughness in her voice. Groaning, his head fell to the back of the chair, and he closed his eyes as he tried to get his breathing back to something normal.
Percy’s hand tightened on Lavender’s hip. “If you’re sure that’s what you want,” he started, the rest of the words falling away as he tried to stop the distraction of her body and her scent; she was going to drive him crazy. Just her existing was going to drive him completely starkers, and keep him from making a coherent sentence again.
“It’s absolutely the opposite of what I want,” Lavender whined, running a hand through her hair. Having Percy below her, between her legs and pressed against her, made everything she was saying aloud sound partly like a lie. A truth, yes, but still a complete and utter lie as well.
Only Percy Weasley could come back from the dead, become her best friend, confess love to her, and then make her question the actual truth of something she knew was the truth. She made her living in facts and here he was, confusing what she knew was right and what she wanted to do.
“It’s your face.” Her hand gestured in the direction of his lips and eyes. “And these,” she said, pulling his hands from her hips before pressing her lips to the back of them. “And...” she trailed off, pulling her lower lip between her teeth before biting on it.
“And what, Lav,” Percy prompted, eyes following the movement of her full mouth, before meeting her eyes with his own.
For the first time since she’d entered the library, something other than confusion, surprise or lust entered her eyes. They narrowed in his direction as her head cocked slightly to the right. “Shut up,” she managed, though the corner of her mouth turned up as she continued to glare at him. After she let out something that sounded like the beginning of a kettle beginning to boil, she looked at him with an almost pleading expression.
“Are you saying that you could throw me down on that ottoman over there and not worry about what it would be like for us tomorrow morning?”
He chuckled, and brushed his lips against her hands.
“I’m saying that I could be in you in less than thirty seconds, and I’d have you again in my bed. In the morning, I was thinking you’d ride me slow, because we’re both tired and sore, and then I’d make you breakfast and lick the jam off your breasts before making you come again in the shower. Then I’d planned on dragging you to the market with me.”
“I-” A look crossed her face. Those words. In that string. Those words had just come out of Percy’s mouth. And she was featured greatly in that vibrantly described scenario and suddenly was having trouble remembering why what he’d just described wasn’t happening. Right. Now.
Though it pained her, physically pained her, she extracted herself from his lap. She could have done it quicker, but she had trouble leaving the warmth of his body.
Lavender stood in front of him, hands gripping her hips because they still ached to be touching him, and tried to vocalize why it was so wrong that he’d just said and done that. “I... That wouldn’t...”
She continued to struggle for a few more moments before gesturing in his direction. “You say you’d take me to the market but if we did all that I wouldn’t be able to walk, let alone buy groceries.”
Percy carefully adjusted himself before standing as well. He wasn’t touching Lavender, his body the merest brush away from full contact. The difference in height meant he had to look down into her face, her lovely face, cheeks flushed, eyes flashing with exasperation.
He smiled then, one side of his mouth going up, eyes crinkling in the corners. “Supplies, dove. Not groceries.”
“Supplies,” she repeated, suddenly uncertain that she understood what the word meant anymore. Or meant in this context, at least. “Then... what? We’re having sex and there’s jam and we’re an ‘us’ in a different sense than we’ve been an ‘us’ in the past.”
Her eyes strayed to his mouth, where it was turned up in a smirk, and she leaned forward slightly before catching herself. Being an ‘us’ sounded pretty good (amazing and perfect and right) but she still felt light headed from when they’d been kissing and he was still close enough that the scent that she’d always just known as ‘Percy’ filled her lungs.
“You want this?” she asked, looking up at him.
He closed the space between them, cupping her face in his hands.
“I want this. I want you. I want to love you with more than laundry and groceries and words. I want to love you with my body. I want to love you with all of me, if you’ll have me.”
Looking up at him, knowing that he didn’t do things rashly and thought things through to a degree that she still marveled at, she didn’t doubt what he was saying. Had she ever imagined that she’d be looking up at Percy while he told her he loved her? No. Even after Susan had joked about it, it hadn’t seemed like something that would happen. He was Percy. Her Percy. And she didn’t think about things like that because he was her best friend and knew her better than anyone else and having that level of intimacy with someone was terrifying but it had been okay because it was Percy and he was her best friend.
And now he was Percy, the person who knew her better than anyone else and she had that level of intimacy with, and she couldn’t understand why she hadn’t considered this before. The thought of losing what they had between them made her ache in ways she couldn’t explain and didn’t that decide everything already? Wasn’t that the answer she was struggling with?
Looking up at him, she wanted to tell him that he was an idiot for wanting to do this, that she was messy and destructive and would drive him starking mad all the time, but he knew that already. He knew everything about her already. What else could she tell him that he didn’t already know?
“Okay.” Lavender said it softly at first, but then nodded slightly, finding her voice again. “Okay.”
He had stopped breathing, watching Lavender think, watching emotions flicker across her face. At her nod, and second affirmation, he let go of the breath, and silently thanked the Fates.
Before he could fully process the thought, he picked Lavender up and wrapped her legs around his waist before depositing her on the ottoman she had helpfully pointed out. He hovered over her, hands stroking down the dip of waist and flare of hip, pulling up the hem of her shirt (wait, wasn’t that his shirt?) as his hands made their way back up. His lips had trailed from her mouth to the juncture of shoulder and neck, and he worried the spot with a slight nip of teeth.
Lavender had a brief instant of being self-conscious, as she always did when she was with a man like she was now, but it evaporated when she remembered that this was Percy. No, he’d not seen her completely naked before, but he’d seen her in little enough that any nervousness she had seemed pretty ridiculous when she thought about it.
Once it had passed, all she could think about was how amazing it felt to wrap her legs around his waist and have him pressed against her. The stubble on his chin and cheeks pressed into her skin and while it might have been annoying on anyone else, on him it sent a thrill up her spine until she was arching against him, hands pulling at the shirt on his back.
The little noises she was making made Percy impatient. He was normally patient, to the point of annoyance, but something about Lavender made him want to hurry. There wasn’t enough of her against him. A wordless spell had the clothing that separated their bodies disappear, and he growled at the feel of Lavender arching against him, no barriers between them.
“Keep making those noises, love. They let me know I’m doing right by you,” he murmured in her ear before cupping the heavy weight of her breast in his hand and laving the rosy bud with his tongue.
Making noises wasn’t going to be a problem, she thought, because the places their bodies connected felt on fire and she couldn’t seem to stop the low keening sound that fell from her lips. Her fingernails found purchase in his back, pulling him closer even though there was practically no way it was possible.
An hour ago she’d been reading articles and correcting grammar. Now her best friend was pressed against her body, hot and ready and Percy and they were an ‘us’. It had changed so quickly and suddenly, but all she could think was that he wasn’t in her yet and it was driving her crazy.
“Percy,” she moaned, crooking her calf around his arse as she tangled a hand in his hair to pull his mouth back to hers. As she bit at his lips, she managed to growl “you said you’d only take thirty seconds.”
Gods, he was going to come like a fifth year just from the way she was wrapping herself around him. Demanding witch.
He couldn’t help bit of a shout as he slid into her slick heat, seating himself in one stroke. He slid one hand to cup the curve of Lavender’s bum, holding her in place as he slid slowly back out of her and slowly, achingly slowly, back in.
“Lavender. Fuck.”
The way her body felt - like a taut string that had just been strummed and was vibrating - and the sensation of being completely connected to Percy made her breath catch in her throat and her eyes roll into the back of her head. When they fluttered open, she looked up at him and forgot to breathe for a different reason.
For all the years she’d known Percy, Lavender had thought she’d seen him completely consumed by something. It was usually a text or an ancient doctrine of some kind, but the look on his face had always been focused and intent on what was in front of him. This look, the look on his face as he was poised above her, moving within her body with the utter concentration he currently had. That was consummation.
Her breathing finally began again, gasps of air as she reacted to feel of skin sliding against skin, and she clutched at his arms as she arched into him.
She was stunning in her passion. Gasping, clutching, moving against him, with him, her walls fluttering with each stroke. His name tumbling off her lips, the smell of her on his skin. He hissed at her nails marking him, felt the tingling at the base of his spine.
“Let go, love. Come for me,” he managed to get out, as he pulled Lavender up to almost sitting and moved in her, holding her down against him with each thrust.
She’d never really been able to say ‘no’ to him to begin with, and she wasn’t in any position to start doing so now. Lavender cried out his name as she began to fell apart, her teeth biting into his shoulder as she continued to cry out as every movement of him sent another wave through her body.
He couldn’t stop the way he was moving in her. Percy knew his hands had to be leaving bruises on her hips, his stubble leaving burn marks on her skin. He loved her, and he could finally show her. Percy growled Lavender’s name as he came, hips thrusting harder with each responding clench from her, each noise of pleasure.
“You’re going to kill me, Lav.” He kissed her soundly, sloppily. “And I’ll die a happy man.”
“No,” she said, her body still thrumming with adrenaline as she tried to remember how to breathe, “that wasn’t part of the plan. Ottoman. Bed. Breakfast. Jam. Shower. Market. There was no death in those plans.”
Her body was covered in a fine sheen and everything smelled and tasted like him. She was sticking a bit to the leather of the ottoman but had absolutely no desire to move just yet. Wasn’t rightly sure if she could, were she to try.
“Bed,” Percy panted. “Right. Hold on, love.” He used his not inconsiderable will to hold Lavender against him, still joined, and stood, her legs wrapped around his middle, arms about his neck. He chuckled at her squeak of protest and managed to maneuver around the ottoman and to the stairs leading out of the library. I will make it to my bed. I will make it to my bed, he thought, licking the sweat off of Lavender’s neck. He had to have her again. And again. They made the landing, and Percy paused, holding Lavender against the wall and kissing her, nipping the full lower lip until she opened her mouth to him.
The fact that they could have died, coming down the stairs like they had, fluttered out of her mind when he pressed her against the wall and began kissing her again. It was dangerous, this new power he had to make her forget things by simply touching her. Or looking at her. Or doing what he currently was with his tongue.
“Bed,” she mumbled against his lips, the thought surfacing despite his considerable distraction. “Yours? Mine?”
“Mine,” he growled, moving against her. “I’ll have you in my bed. Our bed.”
Good Merlin, he had to make it down the hall. Thankful for the first time for the tiny rowhouse, Percy managed to not trip over Jack’s toys in the hall, but paused outside of his room to light the candles and make sure that Boris hadn’t taken residence up in the middle of the bed. The cat was probably cleaning his bollocks at the moment on Lavender’s bed.
He sat on the bed, Lavender above him, hands releasing their grip on her arse moving to palm her breasts. He wanted to hear his name on her lips again.
Lavender had always found it funny that a grown man had kept candles in his bedroom, but when the light reflected off the walls and cast his face in shadows, she silently apologized for her previous doubts.
They were an ‘us’ that had things that were ‘ours’ and a room that would be ‘theirs’. Any time she would have spent marveling at the change that this was where she’d be sleeping from now invested instead on the body below her.
The feel of his hands on her made her head loll backward, her face toward the ceiling as she let out a sound from low in her throat.
“Gods, you’re lovely, dove,” he said, pulling back a bit and looking at Lavender. He’d seen her in various stages of undress, either from her own choosing of dress or from sharing the one full loo in the house. She was all curves, lovely dips and planes of womanliness. Soft, soft skin, slick with passion - he could already see the faint bruises forming on her skin, and felt a passing bit of guilt.
“Tell me what you want. What you want me to do to you.”
His voice brought her heated gaze, and she closed the space between them, pressing her lips to his. She pulled his lower lip between both of her teeth, enjoying the sound he made when she used her tongue to swipe over the spot she’d been rough with.
“Maybe I want to do something to you,” she said, reaching between their bodies to take him in her hand. Lavender had never been shy in bed, and after getting over the shock that this was happening - and, oh yes, it was happening - she found herself growing more bold.
He jerked as Lavender wrapped her hand around him. He craved touch, her touch. He hadn’t let himself imagine this happening. Percy had put the thoughts firmly out of his head, after many a cold shower. He leaned back on his arms and watched Lavender’s hand on him, eyes rolling back in his head when she did something with her thumb.
“Fuck, me,” Percy ground out through clenched teeth.
She would have never in a million years guessed that Percy Weasley had such a dirty mouth in bed, but with every word he surprised her and made things low in her stomach clench in delicious ways.
Lavender kept one hand wrapped around him, slowly moving up and down, while she pressed her lips to his chest and explored his skin with her tongue. She used it to flick at one of his nipples before her eyes rolled up to gauge his reaction.
Percy’s hands were clenched in the quilt on his bed, drawing it up into twists. It was all he could do not to toss her on her back and pound into her. He wanted her to have her way with him, delighted in the pleased sounds she made as she made her way across his skin. Percy swore he could feel his blood screaming through his body.
The knowledge that it had been so long since he’d done this with anyone only urged Lavender on, encouraging her to make this amazing for him. She kissed, nipped and licked at his hip bones, relishing his quick intakes of breath and expletives that became the soundtrack of the moment.
One hand wrapped around the base of him, she steadied the other on his stomach, fingers flexing into his skin as she slowly and deliberately slid her lips down his length. The scent and taste of him, both of them, had her humming as her tongue circled.
His head was spinning with the feel of Lavender’s lips and tongue on him. Percy’s hips moved without his permission as he watched Lavender’s head dip to taste him. Mother of Merlin, she was magnificent. He didn’t know how much longer he’d be able to hold out. He wanted her writhing and clawing under him, and soon.
She used her hand on his stomach in an attempt to keep him still, though she reveled in the fact that she could cause him to thrust and buck with only her mouth. She knew it was a silly thing to be proud of, but if she was able to make Percy Weasley come completely undone, she would see it as a badge of honor.
Lavender sped up her rhythm, hand moving in tandem with her mouth, eyes glancing up the line of his body to watch his face as she took as much of him as she could.
Percy could feel his balls tightening, and he wanted to be in Lavender when he came. His eyes rolled back in his head as he caught the wicked gleam in her eyes.
“You. Up here. Now,” he demanded, tugging on the hand resting on his stomach. “Please.”
The order in his words, coupled with the insistent plea, had Lavender moving up his body. She went slowly though, lips and tongue making the journey north along his skin. She laid beside him on the bed, one leg thrown over his body as she kissed and licked at his jawline.
Percy rolled them so that Lavender was on the bottom, her wrists caught in his hands just above her head, her heat pressed against his erection. His kissed his way from her forehead, to the tip of her nose, each cheekbone, to the fullness of her mouth. He loved the way she tasted. His mouth worked down her jawline to her neck, and he paused there, marking her. The breathy moans Lavender was making made his blood boil, and his hips dug into hers.
Releasing her hands he breathed into her ear, “Have me. Put me in you.”
Eyes fluttering from the thrill of his words, she reached between them and wrapped her hand around him again, directing him to her entrance. She paused there, sitting up to capture his mouth with her own as her thighs spread so his hips could fit against hers. Lavender’s hips pressed upward, a sigh passing her lips as she slid around him, tight and wet and hot.
A shudder ran up the length of her body as she fell back against the bed, biting her lip but still unable to stop the whispered ’fuck’ as they connected fully.
Percy had to close his eyes and start mentally reciting the Dewey Decimal system. He wanted to be gentle, to go slowly, to have Lavender incoherent and wild, but he couldn’t stop his hips from thrusting into her, or pulling one of her legs higher so he could hit the spot that made her eyes roll back and her nails dig into his hips.
Any kind of intelligent and articulate words had ceased to form for her, replaced with consistent moans and sighs as his hips moved against her in long, snapping waves. She moved her knee until it was hooked over his shoulder, allowing him to thrust deeper and harder. Lavender was sure his upper arms, back, hips and arse would be covered in little blood-filled half-moon marks, but when he hit right there, over and over, she couldn’t be held responsible for how her body reacted.
She only had a second of warning before her vision swam in colors and she shouted his name, convulsing around him as she tried to remember to breathe.
He was able to think that Lavender was enthralling when she orgasmed, before he came himself, body tight against hers, her name shouted against her skin, hips pumping his release.
Percy breathed, or tried, and managed not to completely collapse against Lavender. He nuzzled against her neck, breathing deep the smell of sex and her. “I love you.”
The ecstasy of everything, coupled with the physical exertion, made her feel like every bone in her body had been hexed away and she was simply a bag of exhausted nerve-endings, each one of them oversensitized and stinging in the best possible ways. The weight of Percy on top of her was welcome, felt right, and kept her grounded and anchored.
His words, another declaration of love, brought a little more gravity to her consciousness. He’d said those three words so many times before, but they held a different meaning now. Something heavier. Weightier. She’d never been the kind of person that threw those words around lightly (at least, not since Hogwarts) and she couldn’t remember, after all the times he’d said it that night, if she’d responded the same.
Not quite sure why, Lavender was overwhelmed with the need to make sure he understood that she felt the same way. Lifting herself onto her elbows, she disturbed him from where he’d been laying on top of her, interrupting him when he opened his mouth to ask what had brought such a serious expression on to her face.
“I love you, too. And not because of what we just did, though it was... not just because of that. Because of everything else. You and Jack... you’re my family. And I don’t want to go anywhere else and I want to stay with you and annoy you and have you screaming at me about leaving the ice cream out overnight and wake up next to you so we can do it all again.”
“I never scream at you, dove. I merely express my opinion loudly and precisely,” he responded, earning a swat on the arse. He was surprised he had the energy for any kind of teasing or wit. He was drained, in the pleasant, floating way.
“I know you do.” He pressed his lips against hers before pulling her against him, her bum snuggled into the cradle of his hips.They’d fallen asleep next to each other before, listening to the old radio shows, or reading late into the night, or from simple drunken conversations. This felt right, his arms wrapped around her, her cooling feet tucked into his shins.
“Thank you,” he whispered into her hair.
She rubbed her cheek along the inside of his arm where her head was pillowed, snorting softly. “Thank you? For what? Not running screaming from the house? That thing I did with my tongue? You might have to be more specific.”
“Brat,” he replied sleepily into her hair. “Smart arses only get toast with butter for breakfast. No jam.”
“There’s always jam,” she murmured, settling further into his arms as sleep began to pull at her.
Summary: Percy decides that Lavender can’t leave and changes their relationship in a monumental way. NC-17