(Untitled)

[charlesmacaulay]

The hallway of the hotel was long and boring and fluorescently lit, like every other hotel Charles had been in - and that amounted to quite a few, considering his recent career choices. He sorted through the keys in his pocket and opened the door to his room first, dropping his valise just inside. He looked up and down the hall, making sure nobody

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[c_macaulay]

(( *dies* You just want to use the shower icon. ))

"You're not even going to let me finish my cigarette?" The mock-complaint was delivered with a pretty pout, the words contradicted already: as she spoke, Camilla was already reaching over to his side of the bed, putting out the cigarette in the ashtray there. She neatly avoided leaning across him by the simple expedient of going behind him instead where he sat. That done, she sat up too, bringing the sheet up around her, tucking it under her arms. It was a nod to modesty so ineffectual as to be only tantalising.

"It really is hell, and you're just proposing to trade one vice for another." She meant both offers: the shower, the sobriety. The vice he intended to substitute, well, there was little question what that might be.

Except she had never framed it that way before. It had always been the most natural thing in the world to her. In moral terms, she saw nothing really wrong with it. Nor had Henry, when he found out it was true; his only concern had been to keep Camilla safe from her jealous brother, and to keep Camilla for himself. The fact his romantic rival was also his lover's brother did not seem to factor into Henry's considerations, and he might have been the only person in the world whose opinion could have swayed Camilla.

No, what made her balk was what it meant to Charles, or what she thought it meant: that she belonged to him utterly. She didn't think he was offering to stop drinking as a token of peace, or a real desire to reform. He was offering her a bargain, and she knew the coin with which she would be buying his sobriety.

She didn't trust him to keep the bargain if she accepted it. He always wanted more.

[charlesmacaulay]

((Yes. Yes I do. :D ))

If this was Hell, Henry would be here. This is Heaven. Charles reached to tug on her arm. "I'm not pretending I can deliver perfection, Milly. I'm just saying I'll try. And that's different from before, isn't it?"

He gave up on getting her to her feet, instead padding naked over to the bathroom and turning on the shower, then leaning against the connecting wall, looking at her with those gray eyes. "I'm not promising more than I can give, Camilla, and I'm not asking you to either." He really wasn't - surely he wasn't asking too much, that she bury Henry finally and love him, Charles, as she was meant to do. "But look at us - we're here, we're not fighting, we've loved - and it was bloody good, too, you can't deny that and I wouldn't believe you if you did. Possibility is in the air - can't you taste it? We can have it back, almost the way it was before. Even if it's not perfect, isn't it better than the way things have been?"

He waited a moment to see it the thin end of the wedge would slip in easily of if she would continue to resist his masculine guile. Charles opened his arms. "Come on, Milly. Let's get you wet."

[c_macaulay]

"Of course it was good. It's always good." Not a concession, not a grudging admission, if anything Camilla's reply was dismissive. You can't use that to control me. It's nothing special. Camilla had taken only two lovers: Charles, who knew her better than herself because he was part of her; and scholarly Henry, who worshipped her absolutely, and who had addressed himself to the study of her body with all the passion and dedication he brought to any study. One might say her expectations were therefore rather high.

She let the sheet fall as she rose and crossed the room to him. "I'll let you wash my hair," she said, combing through it with her fingers. "How's that?"

[charlesmacaulay]

He ignored her dismissive tone. She'd been spoiled, that was all; he couldn't blame her, since he'd largely contributed to the spoiling. Charles took her into his arms. "Your hair? Is that all I get to lather?"

[c_macaulay]

She let him take her into his arms, no objection. Camilla liked being spoiled.

"Mmm. We'll see how well you do with that, first. It's been a while," she said.

He used to wash her hair for her, and comb it too, as though she were a doll. It was something that started when they were children, and they never gave it up. It simply took on additional layers of meaning.

"If you're good," she said, "I'll scrub your back." Fingernails ghosting down his back to underscore the point.

[charlesmacaulay]

Charles moved backward, pulling her into the shower, watching with heated appreciation as the spray moistened her skin and hair. "Oh," he said, licking away the water that slid down her throat. "I'll be good. I promise."

[c_macaulay]

The warm steam notwithstanding, Camilla still had to shiver a little when he did that. Charles was not what she would call reliable, but some promises he could be trusted to keep, and that was definitely one of them, that promise just now. "I'll hold you to that." A promise of her own.

She had replaced the hotel's generic toiletries with the things she herself had brought. Camilla's tastes did not run to the generic. It took a deliberate effort to reach for the shampoo and hand it to him.

[charlesmacaulay]

By the time Charles was finished being creative with the shampoo and his twin he was out of breath and cleaner than he'd been in weeks. He leaned against the tiled wall, letting the spray pound against his skin, watching Camilla's sleek wet form with sated appreciation. "There must be some enormous water heaters somewhere," he said with a half-smile. "The shower's still hot."

[c_macaulay]

Water heaters were the last thing on Camilla's mind. What her twin had been doing with shampoo, and soap, and fingers, and water -- well, if a girl could be concerned about water heaters after all that, then Charles wouldn't have been doing his job. Flushed as much from his attentions as from the shower steam, she reached to turn off the tap. "If it had gone colder, I might not have cared," she said, handing him a towel and wrapping another about herself.

[charlesmacaulay]

That earned her a full smile and a quick kiss on the forehead. Taking the towel from her, Charles followed Camilla out of the bathroom. "Not so bad for Hell, then."

He tucked the towel around his hips, letting it ride low. "Seriously, Milly..." He rubbed his forehead. "What is this place?" He held up a hand before she could retort. "Rhetorical. What have you found so far, besides the restaurant?"

[c_macaulay]

Camilla dried herself quickly and wrapped the towel about her hair turban-like before rummaging in her luggage for pajamas, which she put on deftly and quickly, no underwear. They were too big for her, and the cuffs had clearly been rolled up and pinned in place; the silver glint of a safety pin gave it away as she put the little suitcase back into the closet where she'd been storing it. "It's your typical airport," she was saying as she dressed. "It's got lots of chairs, and gates where people occasionally arrive but no one ever departs. A bookshop." She straightened and turned around.

There was a monogram on the breast pocket of those pajamas that explained why they were not Camilla's size.

[charlesmacaulay]

Rethread!