peytonoffun:

Peyton smiled down at him and did a happy wiggle. If he was still up to continue their… whatever it was, then all was well in her eyes. Rolling off him, she kissed his check again. “Thanks for being so awesome about this, you’re the best.” She flashed him a grin and pulled the cover up on top of her again. “I’m glad we can still be friends, if my ex and I even work out.” She paused and decided not to go into details about her fears about dating Miles with Ben. It felt to innapropriate to talk about, especially considering what they just did. 

“IHOP isn’t so bad. It saved me a lot of hungry morning. But who am I to object to your wonderful cooking?” She laughed and rolled over. “Maybe I’ll learn. One day. A girl can dream.” Peyton realized that she’d probably never be a good cook and she was okay with that. That’s what take-out and frozen dinners were for. And if she ever got rich enough, she’d just hire a chef. That was her dream, anyway. “Sleep sounds good. Good night, Ben.” She yawned and snuggled into the pillow, satisfied with the nights events. 

He smiled down at her and pulled her against him. “You know I’ll be here for you.” He murmured as she appeared to start drifting off. It was almost astonishing how fully she was in his control at this point. Trust was such a useful thing. Nuzzling her head against his chest, he softly kissed her hair before lying back, his thoughts cascading. He had picked out someone as a possible concubine, pending success of Peyton’s relationship. They were unconnected and so wouldn’t know about it for a while, and he fully intended to convince both of them that it was normal and acceptable before they met. 

“Good night doll.” He murmured back to her, petting her hair softly to help her drift off. It wasn’t time yet for him. He laid there, staring at the ceiling and thinking. He would sleep in a bit. But for now there were so very many plans to make. Eventually, his eyes closed, his thoughts slowed and redirected, and he allowed himself to drift off to sleep. It had been a good day. He would record his plans tomorrow and set some of them in motion. But for now, he relaxed and let himself feel the skin contact with another human and simply enjoyed it as he slept.

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little-bitch-damien:

Being in the house with the girls all the time could become stressful, or at certain times, even violent. Damien absolutely hated Sundays in the house. The girls had picked up a tradition of late of comparing cuts and tips like emptying out bag of candy on Halloween. The girls would always gloat about this guy or that guy and the tips and who made most that Saturday night. And it was always Damien. She worked the most, she got the biggest tips, all because she was Lexon’s favorite and everyone knew it, but still Tanya and Cecily would bitch at her about how much she made and how it wasn’t fair, even though Damien had nothing to do with her own client schedule.

So on Sunday mornings, she had resorted to going to the public library and hiding out there. Well, it was her hiding place most mornings, and afternoons, and evenings. Damien would usually stay there until the last possible second, only leaving soon enough to make it home 5 minutes before Lex would walk in the door.  There was a small cafe in the front of the library and Damien would always eat something small for lunch, before going and hiding in the stacks, picking a random square of floor space to claim as hers for the day. She gravitated towards the YA section. Most YA novels ranged between 400 and 600 pages, and Damien could easily finish a whole one in a day, although she would never tell anyone. She had finished Delirium by Lauren Oliver on Friday, and now she scanned the shelves for its sequel.

Once she found Pandemonium, she pulled it from the shelf and lowered herself to the floor right beneath its now empty slot in the case. She would put it back exactly where she’d found it when the end of the day came. It took only a few minutes for her to become totally absorbed in the book. Once she got reading, the rest of the world fell away. It was her dirty little secret. So when she heard a man’s voice just over her shoulder, obviously directed at her, she jumped, startled, and dropped the book. She blinked a few times and looked up at the stranger. “What the hell?” She snapped. She was pissed that he had snuck up on her, and honestly afraid that someone had caught her here. Her book smarts were her own little secret. No one knew, and she liked to keep it that way.

Ben held his hands up mock defensively “Sorry I startled you. But relax a little” He flashed a cheerful grin and bent to pick the book up and dusted off the cover, glancing at it in passing and holding it out to her. “I tend to make the acquaintance of all who haunt these parts. Hadn’t met you before, so I was curious. Here you go.” Casting his mind back he found nothing on the book and mentally shrugged. He rarely searched these sections exhaustively, preferring the adult section or sticking with old favorites. The book itself had been of little interest honestly; it was mostly a vessel to him. Much as he loved them, if it was found here and he didn’t know it there was a fairly low likelihood it met his standards.

Her reaction was interesting to note, but not terribly surprising; she was hiding in the corner of the section for reasons yet unknown, completely absorbed in a book and he had startled her. Outright hostility might be a bit much, but it was reasonable enough, given the fact that she was hiding. He dropped down closer to her level,resting on the balls of his feet before settling down cross legged. His mask was already adjusting according to his growing understanding of the person he would have to be to cope with her; the person it represented was still a bit bland, but given some time the attitude would adjust. He had learned by this point that most people reacted best to small variations on what was effectively the ubermensch, if not quite in the sense the term originally was meant. So that was who he was effectively at the moment.

“I’m Ben by the way. Good to meet you, even if you do look like you want to slap me for saying hi.” He grinned as he said it, still exuding an aura of friendliness without seeming to. “I tend to at least introduce myself in the hope of hearing about good books if you know of any.” He held out his hand for a shake, making sure not to intrude in her personal space or be far enough she would have to reach.

nicole—whitman:

Nicole couldn’t help but bite her lip in a smile at the young man, clearly amused by his response. Any and nearly all suspicion from before had been either erased from her mind, or tucked away into a corner, the better to appear later at any given chance. If Nicole had to give her two cents, she doubted the chance to suspect the man of anything would come — there was a slight harmless aura about him, and for a moment, Nicole was more ruled by her emotions than her reason. She trusted him, simply. As much as anyone would trust a stranger, sure, but his easy manner had her very convinced. 

“That’s true,” she agreed with a tilt of her head, becoming more and more comfortable around the other the farther they went. His grin made her smile, though she couldn’t help but look at him thoughtfully. The trace of optimism in his reasoning was just about as interested as it was uplifting, and though she weighed his words and could think of a few good situations in which meeting someone new could be a curse, Nicole kept them to herself, the better not to punctuate — or even try to punctuate — the optimism. She liked it. It suited him, somehow. Her smile grew a little. “Well, I won’t try to get you to dislike me. It sounds like a long and difficult kind of challenge,” she replied, and inclined her head reassuringly, albeit at the same time jokingly. 

A silence settled over them for a moment, as Nicole merely walked at his side, her eyes drifting to her surroundings. Even in the dark of the night, she slowly started to recognize the neighborhood around her. Granted, she’d never actually been there before, but sadly there wasn’t an immensely huge architectural diversity in Annapolis — well, at least not in neighborhoods like these. “So, uh, what else do you do? Besides staying up late to mooch off of open wi-fi’s, I mean?” Nicole asked him in a tentatively joking tone, her smile rather small, taking care not to give him reason to think she’d walked with him all this way and still decided to judge him harshly. You couldn’t quite be sure - no matter how much you found yourself otherwise trusting a stranger.

Her growing ease was displayed in slight, likely unconcious signs; a slight release of tension from her posture, a more open expression, a slightly wider smile. As expected. He noted them and that she responded well to simple measures and more involved schemes would be uneccesary. To be fair, if they had been, she hadn’t come near demonstrating enough use to tilt the risk/reward ratio in favor of doing anything involved. But one more tool was one more tool. He didn’t turn down opportunities when life dropped them in his lap, ripe for the plucking. And she truly was far too trusting, even with him giving off all the signs of trust he could. She should not have believed it this readily, for her own safety in life.

The best part of that line of reasoning was that it was completely true. Albeit not quite in the sense that most took it. “It has been managed. Once there was someone who made me downright prickly. Then I made brownies and all of a sudden he managed to think of reasons to get back on my good side. I wonder why.” He laughed quietly, easily, inviting her to laugh with him. There were more than a few he had at least given a display of dislike for. Mostly because they coule be used more readily at second hand, thinking they were acting against him, then they would be able to be prodded directly into what was necessary. And one or two he simply wished not to meet. So they usually didn’t. His words remaining completely divorced from his thoughts, he mentioned casually “For some reason I find that sweets almost universally make friends.”

He chuckled at the question. “You can tease me. I don’t bite. I work at the Naval Academy actually. Research and stuff.” He shrugged. “It’s pretty cool I guess.” He turned again. “We’re getting fairly close actually. You can be rid of me soon.” He grinned over his shoulder before getting back to the qustion she had actually asked. “Iunno, lots of things. It’d be an injustice to most of them to break it down to one or two.”

Ben wandered the stacks, idly looking for something new for his shifts in the lab. The only major downside, at least in his mind, to working with incredibly sensitive electromagnetic equipment was the complete ban on electronic devices. Even his watch got left outside when he went in to mind the equipment. Granted, that was mostly because the professor he worked for was paranoid, but still. It made books completely vital. The univeresity stacks were good for research, but the public libraries were far, far better for the kind of thing he was looking for now. He thought for a moment before leaving the section he was in and heading for the young adult sections. He’d had enough unpredictability in his life. An old classic, well put together but not shocking to him, would be perfect for now. At this point he was somewhat on autopilot, letting his hand drift over the titles and letting a corner of his mind pay attention to them as most of it drifted over his plans for the night. He had to arrange various meetings between different acquaintances of his, mostly legal, all of whom would then owe him another favor. And he had to make sure he encouraged several suitably anonymous campaign contributions by a few businessmen he’d had long chats with over drinks and dinner at the last fundraiser in the area. And he had to arrange to get a replacement for dogsitting for a collegue of his. And of course grade all the homework sitting on his desk, some of which would be brought with him for his shift. The list streamed seamlessly through his head, each one getting its alotment of time and planning before moving to the next item, and the next. And then he turned the corner and saw Riley.

His mask shattered for just a moment before he slammed it back into place hastily. It wasn’t her. Despite her position reading, absorbed in the little world between the covers, despite the uncannily similar looks that kept his mask wavering and his expression from doing exactly what he told it to as usual, despite the expression on her face that seemed to tell him exactly what was happening in the book, it wasn’t her. He silently took a deep breath, praying she hadn’t noticed him as he stood there, calming his mind to its usual analytic state, reestablishing his logic trees as he ran down them, and concluded that she had to simply be a relative new-comer who he hadn’t seen before. And bore a striking resemblence to Riley. It happened. Frequently, in fact; of course he would find people who looked like her. He was thinking about her often enough that it wasalmost surprising he hadn’t found a lookalike sooner. 

That being done he flicked his gaze down her, noting the ensemble, small bag, artful make-up, small inflections of posture that remained unconciously while reading and made an educated guess as to the general focus of her life and work. There were a variety of ways that she could be selling herself, from prostitution to modeling, but it was extraordinarily probable that one way or another it was what she was doing. He paused his reflection to look at the basic facts he was extrapolating from and noted that it was possible it wasn’t professional, simply how she lived. That was a lower order probability though. Either way he knew he was going to talk to her. On the one hand she could be useful… and on another he simply couldn’t turn down the chance. It was an emotional, stupid, irrational reason to do it; appearance did not necessarily have anything to do with personality, but it remained. He gave himself a quick once over, making sure nothing had mysteriously gone drastically wrong (well, as wrong as jeans and a t-shirt could) before confidently approaching Damien and smiling. “I don’t think I’ve seen you in these parts before. What’re you reading?” He made sure to keep his voice cheerful and welcoming, all hints of the roiling emotions shoved back behind the mask. As fat as she should be able to tell he was just a friendly sort of guy. His body language matched perfectly, subtly radiating honestly and cheer. 

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peytonoffun:

Peyton smiled, glad he was taking it so well. She really didn’t want to lose him as a friend and if the date with Xerxes went sour, she definitely wanted to come back on amicable terms. Kissing him back, she rolled on top of him, laughing. “Like I said, I don’t know how this’ll go, so I might not even need a break. And if it doesn’t work out, I still want this. I’m not completely letting you off the hook.” She grinned as she looked down at him. 

She straddled him, taking some of the sheets to cover herself up as needed. “Breakfast sounds awesome. I was just going to get IHOP or something.” Peyton shrugged and leaned over to grab her orange juice and took another sip. “But I’m definitely up for breakfast. I would offer to help you cook but… you know. I suck at that.” 

“Of course you’re not doll.” He reached up to stroke her cheek affectionately. “I was making far too much progress on my pet to just give it up.” He murmured, his voice much rougher for the sentence, bringing her mind back to what they had been doing by association.  Realistically speaking, he could find someone to replace her. He’d give it a week or two though, long enough to see how her reunion with her flame went, but he’d keep his eyes out for a replacement. 

“I wouldn’t subject anyone to IHOP.” He grinned at her. As much as he ragged on it, the local IHOP really wasn’t that bad. But still, he could cook, so he might as well use it. Every memory of a homecooked meal for her tied her that much tighter to him. “And you’ll learn. Eventually. Or get someone to do it for you.” He smirked lightly as his mind continued to run down possibilities of alternatives. “For now, just get some sleep.”

jakobimiles:

I don’t know how this happened, but somehow I wound up with a pile of files bigger than my dog, sitting in a dark corner of my apartment. I can’t decide whether or not I’m unimpressed with my lack of eventful weekends this year, but I’m sure that more of them have involved files than they’ve involved bars. I should hire a secretary to do the parts of my job I don’t like, or something. That’s probably not any more legitimate than it is unprofessional, is it?

I’m pretty sure that’s pretty much the point of secretaries, isn’t it? Or at least, that’s what I always assumed.

peytonoffun:

She curled back into him, content for the moment. The contact was nice, even if they were just friends. Peyton genuinely enjoyed Ben’s company, both in and out of the bedroom. He was a nice person and easy to talk to. But the moral part of her brain told her it wasn’t fair to Miles to continue this with Ben if they were going out on a date. She wanted him to see she’d changed and would be fully open now. But this, she would definitely miss this.

“Uh Ben?” She began carefully, trying to find the right way to say this. “Remember that guy I told you about, my ex?’ Peyton didn’t doubt he would. Even if she had only mentioned him twice, Ben had excellent memory it seemed. “He asked me out… I think. Anyways, we should probably put this on pause for a while, just so I can see where it goes.”  She didn’t expect him to be upset, but she still looked up at him just in case. “Okay?”

He took a second to process the information and add it to his file. “Okay.” He kissed the top of her head and gave her a wicked grin. “Enjoy yourself with him. I’ve taught you well.” He put his other arm around her, pulling her closer to kiss her. “We had a good run and all.” He leaned back, still holding her against him. As he smiled to her his thoughts raced ahead, thinking of how this affected various options. He would need to either be on guard for the inaccuracies the increased level of hormones and lack of interaction would bring or find someone else to manage them.

His thoughts reached further, noting the low probability of the relationship actually lasting. If they had broken up before it was fairly good evidence they wouldn’t last. That outcome would undoubtedly change her use- still useful but differently. This was to be desired. So it remained to be seen exactly what would happen. Lying there he started revising plans in his head, his mask simply holding her contentedly. “You don’t have to leave right away. Stay over, I’ll make you breakfast in the morning and then we can just be regular friends. Have fun.”

peytonoffun:

Peyton groaned slightly as she felt Ben disengage from under her. She knew he was probably going to go get something to drink for them like he always did, but that didn’t mean she had to enjoy the lack of contact happening now. Especially since she knew she was about to essentially break things off with him. She sat up slightly and looked at the clock. One twenty-four A.m. She’d be here overnight again then, something that happened more often than not. Sitting up slightly, she ran her hand through her bed tossled hair and sighed softly. This type of contact would be hard to give up.

As Ben came back into the room with their respective drinks, she smiled, leaning over to grab her drink and sip it slowly. There really was no better drink than orange juice, especially early in the morning.She sat the cup down once she gulped down nearly half and pulled the covers up around her and crawled over to where Ben stood, still smiling. “Well thank you. You don’t look half bad yourself.” She laughed and leaned up to kiss his cheek. “Come, lay back down.” Peyton rolled back over, trying to think up ways to end this as she did. 

He shucked his shorts off and laid back in bed, sliding under the sheets once again and reaching an arm over to hold her. He relaxed back, his arm pulling her against his chest again and inviting her to curl up. “Thank you for the compliment mein fraulein.” He kissed the top of her head, leaning back, his other hand behind his head, letting the remainder of the afterglow seep into himself and just feel content. She really was quite a useful tool. His hindbrain still insisted on human companionship and she was low enough upkeep for him to be able to use her to satiate his libido and for the contact that was necessary for humans. And of course her use increased as she learned from his advice. Rapidly.

His mind traced back through the frequent if somewhat irregular encounters he had with her. Not all of them were sex of course; he put the work into gaining her as a tool for whatever he needed. Her folder was fairly full; he knew her favorite color and had ferreted out more from her frequently changing lies than she suspected. In return she thought she knew far more than she did; about his coworkers, a few of his hobbies, favorite foods and such. And he had developed the mask for her in quite a bit of depth; she knew this version of Ben fairly well, and he was well accustomed to keeping it up. His mental processes paused for a moment to note the double entendre and moved on.