Chapter Text
As much as Gerri would like nothing more than to come, she still chaffs at being bossed around like this, in her “extracurricular activities”. Perhaps it reminds her just a little of endless boardroom condescension and of being made to feel like she’s stupid and Baird who, god bless him, was always so full of ideas of who she ought to be. There were times when she wondered, lying beside him in bed when he’d already rolled over and gone to sleep after he’d gotten off (his favored position on top of her in missionary) where she felt that Baird might have loved her only as his wife and not as herself.
No one could say Baird was a bad husband. To the contrary. Especially from his background, Baird was a good man, a kind man, a loving man. And he was a good husband, but he wasn’t a good husband to Gerri. There are moments where Gerri finds herself wondering what life might have been like if she’d left Baird back when things had first started getting complicated. This isn’t to say Gerri hadn’t loved him, didn’t love him still even all these years after his death (sometimes loving him was easier to do with him gone). He was something so tender to her, hot to the touch like a feverish forehead, weeping— Baird, an open wound.
There were even moments— usually when Karolina was demonstrating a particularly adept handling of a pernicious problem left to fester to some cataclysmic proportion (while more immediate dumpster fires had taken precedent because that’s always the way it was at Waystar), an exercise in the art of triaging a mass casualty event, a balancing act on a knife blade— that Gerri found herself half wondering how things could have been had she met Karolina in another life, or another time. If perhaps, if maybe, there wouldn’t have been—
Karolina picks this exact moment to pull Gerri out of her thoughts by rolling her hips in an intentional show of how much of a brat she could be, demonstrating just how capable of the precise hip movements necessary to fuck Gerri in the way she likes, but instead choosing to tease her, make a mess in a way she knows Gerri would spank her tight, bratty little ass red and smarting for, as she grinds the still slick strap messily against the vibrator, ensuring it presses into the spot on the underside of the base of her clit which Karolina had been taking full advantage of mercilessly since the day she discovered how it made Gerri whine.
“You're going to pay for this, you fucking brat, you know that?” Gerri pants, still trying to fight off the impending orgasm purely out of spite. She tries to distract herself— mind over matter, after all— by idly wondering if perhaps this isn’t the sort of intensity that drives Karolina to brat so pertinaciously. As much as she puts on a show of complaining about Karolina’s antics, it’s something Gerri really, truly appreciates about her: Karolina has bite. She’s the kind of woman Baird liked to call “spunky” which Gerri knew he meant as some juvenile joke about how he’d like to come on her face (how predictable of him, to choose someone dark haired, sharp featured, and tall to make those infuriating little “locker room talk” wink and nudge comments to his short, round cheeked wife, always just vague enough to grant him plausible deniability that she’d look crazy if she called him for it).
(Gerri would call her spunky too, but for the attitude that put into motion the events for which Karolina had been fired for the first of many times, none lasting longer than a few hours maximum because Karolina knew where every single body was buried, Gerri had made damn certain of that.)
She’d never really had a problem with Baird making these kinds of jokes. Honestly, Baird’s affairs wouldn’t have bothered her so much, either, if he hadn’t been so pathetic about the whole thing, groveling and begging forgiveness. Truthfully, she didn’t even mind the occasional comment on another woman, because, Christ, she had eyes too. It had been different though — the time he’d made those jokes about Karolina because, well, it was her . It was different because it was Karolina, she told herself, because she had never been good at sharing. Call it childish, but possession strung softly looks a hell of a lot like devotion and that was something Gerri could not stomach claiming. It felt like debasement, her husband leering at Karolina like something to hunt, a doe longing for an arrow, something to be killed, claimed, and consumed.
Maybe it’s the sense that she’s just as bad as every other executive who ever leered at a 22-year-old intern, who got off on the power trip inherent in knowing you won’t be hurt by being found out, craving the inherent eroticism of someone wanting her to their own detriment, the sense that Baird’s acquiescence is a more palatable facsimile less imbued with cognitive dissonance. The loose strands of this half formed thought alone is enough to make Gerri nauseous.
(Gerri would never admit that she had more dreams than she could count on one hand about coming on Karolina’s face herself.)
It’s almost been a point of pride, all told, that Karolina chose her. That none of the men on the executive floor who wanted Karolina couldn’t have her. That Gerri was the one who got Karolina demurely on her knees, looking up at Gerri through those dark eyelashes of hers, giving Gerri “fuck me” eyes with such intensity she looked moments from salivating like a dog.
But it wasn’t Karolina whining and drooling, not tonight at least. No, it’s Gerri practically being mounted on all fours by Karolina, and it’s Gerri teetering on the edge of an impending, mind-blowing orgasm that Karolina continues to coax from her with all the single-minded dedication one would expect from the youngest and only woman to ever hold the title of Chief of Communications at one of the largest boys’ clubs in the corporate world.
Gerri feels her legs begin to shake uncontrollably, and an involuntary, almost animalistic groan escapes from somewhere low in her throat. It’s at this moment, between the relentless buzzing of the vibrator heightening every sensation and Karolina’s admittedly expert attentions that Gerri finally admits to herself that there’s simply nothing she can do to prevent tipping over the edge.
Which is when Karolina opts to turn off the vibrator, and cease her grinding movements, egging Gerri on towards orgasm, instead staying pressed against Gerri’s back with her arms wrapped loosely around her, chuckling breathlessly as Gerri lets out an agonized groan.
“You're absolutely insufferable, you know that?” Gerri fights the urge to buck her off and finish the job herself, the fact that she’d bound right now be damned, she’d hump a pillow right now if that meant getting that godforsaken orgasm and being able to think straight again.
Karolina tuts her tongue, teasing Gerri with a languid little roll of those admittedly gorgeous hips of hers, the sharpness of her hip bones digging into Gerri’s flesh in a way that makes her idly daydream about punishing the little brat by tying her up and taking care of herself by rutting against those delicious pelvic bones while Karolina can do nothing but watch and squirm needily as she leaks onto the sheets.
“And yet you choose to suffer me,” Karolina taunts, as she pulls off the blindfold, pointedly turning Gerri’s head to force her to look at her, yet even in these little humiliations, ever careful not to muss Gerri’s no doubt already messy hair, “You choose to suffer me repeatedly, love.”
Gerri deftly maneuvers her fingers, still behind her back in the godforsaken handcuffs, hooks underneath the edge of Karolina’s pretty little bustier, whether to rip it in vengeance or in an attempt to drag Karolina’s pelvis back against her where Gerri can grind against her strap Gerri’s not sure. Just one little thrust of Karolina’s hips would be enough to tip her over the edge, that’s how close Gerri is right now. Ordinarily Gerri would rather eat her left shoe than debase herself in such a way, but she hasn’t come properly in weeks (menopause is a bitch, and she’s been so goddamn busy with the Gojo ordeal and her own Hitachi pales in comparison to a demure Karolina and her tongue fucking into her as she eats Gerri out like her life depends on it).
Karolina be damned, she’ll slap her ass silly, slap her with an NDA if that’s what it takes because no one but Karolina will ever know about this. Fuck Karolina, the little brat— and she intends to, thoroughly and so completely that Karolina cannot walk correctly for at least a week, until she can’t do anything but whine and repeat “please, please, please” over and over again in such a desperate way that Gerri actually appreciates Karolina’s staunch adherence to the notion of safe words because Gerri honestly isn’t sure if she’s pleading for more or for Gerri to stop— Gerri will take matters into her own hands, like always.
But Karolina dodges her clumsy fingers, shifting elegantly from her reach, scolding her attempts. That’s it. Gerri is going to kill her once she’s untied. The die is cast. Gerri is planning every single way she’ll enact her revenge when she feels the mattress shift as Karolina slips away from her, footsteps on the creaking floor of the prewar building. A door opens, then closes, and then silence.
“Oh, no no no. Get back here and finish what you started,” Gerri demands after her, but this is met with further silence. It lingers. Gerri hears only her own breathing.
“Fuck,” Gerri growls under her breath, not loud enough for Karolina to hear, never loud enough for her to hear, Gerri couldn’t bear the shame.
What sound does filter in is that of Karolina tapping away at her laptop (goddamn her). And then the sound of her cell on speaker, ringing as she calls—
“Matsson.” Muffled, on the other end of the line.
That little shit. Gerri is going to have her hide for this.
“Numbers are good, Karolina. Good work.”
“Well, the numbers look promising ,” Karolina clarifies. “But thank you.”
“Ebba says you’ve done well,” Matsson says. “Should I bring her in on the call?”
Oh, Karolina would like that, wouldn’t she? An impromptu threesome seems right up Karolina’s alley, especially with a little Scandinavian slip of a thing. Gerri idly wonders how she’d enjoy shacking up with these two, both of them pretty and on their knees, fighting each other for her.
“I only have a moment just to touch base,” Karolina says. “I just wanted to let you know I spoke with Gerri regarding the press release ahead of the third quarter earnings call.”
Gerri winces at the sound of her own name on Karolina’s lips as they hover over the receiver of her phone, Lukas Matsson on the other end. She shifts and is reminded again that she’s bound. Comparisons to working for the European upstart abound. She squashes them.
“And what does she say, the heartless cunt?”
Karolina looks at Gerri, wondering how she’ll take the insult, but doesn’t even see her body shift. Karolina supposes she’s used to it.
“She signed off on it completely,” Karolina says as Clementine, her tortoiseshell cat, pounces onto the bed and bats at one of Gerri’s loose curls, intrigued. Karolina bites her lip so as not to smile in a way that might be perceived by either Lukas or Gerri just as Gerri opens one eye to see a pair of little orange-and-white paws far too close to her face for comfort. She curses the fucking beast in her head as Karolina scoops her up, planting a kiss on her head, then shoos her from the room without breaking her stride. “Those India numbers are the ones we’ve been provided with. It would be suspicious—irresponsible even—not to disclose them publicly.”
Some days she swears that Karolina has never loved anything the way she loves that goddamn cat— not Gerri, not any other far more age-appropriate and actually-gay woman she might end up with if only the company and her need to execute tasks perfectly didn’t take up all her time and most of her energy.
“Nice work. Good girls.”
Karolina and Gerri both wince at this, though for markedly different reasons. Karolina thanks Matsson and ends the call, relieved to have his voice out of her head and to have Gerri back at the center of her voice.
“See? Look how patient you can be with proper motivation,” Karolina murmurs, pressing a chaste kiss to Gerri’s temple. “Now where were we?”
“I’ve known you to be a brat, sure, but not a fucking tease. Not like that.” Gerri isn’t sure whether to be impressed or alarmed by Karolina’s risky little stunt. Certainly hearing Lukas Matsson’s voice cooled her down enough to start to think clearly again.
Karolina laughs lightly, and hums in that infuriating way that makes Gerri want to do anything in her power to wipe that smug little expression off her face. The thought of this alone starts to raise her heart rate, and her arousal, all over again.
“Has it ever occurred to you, that you hardly know me at all?” Karolina offers nonchalantly. There’s no malice in it, and frankly, it’s taken some getting used to for Gerri, how straightforward Karolina is capable of being when she’s existing in a non-professional capacity. Somehow it feels almost unsettling in its incongruence, and for some time, Gerri tells herself that’s the reason she set these hard boundaries of what this thing they have is and what it isn’t.