Work Text:
He was waiting for her when she arrived at the apparition point outside the Sleekeazy building.
As soon as she saw him, the intensity of Lily’s fury increased from merely disturbing to utterly incandescent. What was it, she raged, that was the most aggravating? Was it the way he was leaning against the wall in that infuriating, deliberately casual manner that he always affected? Maybe the fact that he had somehow (and really - how?) got there before her? Or was it that he had the temerity to look so fucking hot while she was this blisteringly angry with him?
Whatever the cause, she refused to acknowledge him, not breaking stride as she swept past him and up the steps. The security charm on the main entrance recognised her wand and despite the late hour, the doors opened to admit her. Moonlight spilled across the deserted reception area, and it echoed with the clatter of her heels against the marble floor as she marched towards the research wing, determined to put as much distance between the two of them as possible.
Clearly, though, it was far too much to expect James to get the hint and leave her the fuck alone. He’d been refusing to do so for the past fifteen years, so of course he wasn’t going to start tonight, especially since he could just follow her inside and continue pissing her off. She cursed internally that the bane of her very existence was the sole and much adored offspring of her boss and therefore had free access to the building at all hours of the day or night. Shaking her head slightly she allowed her rage to carry her towards her destination, as James trailed behind her.
“Lily!” he shouted, as she stalked down the corridor towards her lab. “For fuck’s sake, Lily, stop! We need to talk about this!”
“No,” she called, without even looking over her shoulder. “No, we do not. I got the message loud and clear, James, and I have absolutely nothing to say to you. So do me a favour and piss off, like a good little boy.”
“Oh, come on, Lily! You’re not being fair!”
That brought Lily up short. She knew she ought to just keep walking, maintain a dignified silence and ignore him, but the red mist descended. Instead, she spun on her heel to face him, raising her finger and jabbing it in his face.
“Not fair! Not fair?” The hot flush of anger crept ever higher up her chest and neck, colouring her cheeks as she laid into him. “I’ll tell you what’s not fair, James Potter! Me, working my arse off for literally years, struggling to fit into a world that has made it perfectly clear that it doesn't want me, and finally, finally carving out a successful career for myself, while you and your dickhead mates think you all deserve to swan into any job you damn well please! That’s what’s not fair, James - not me refusing to put up with you and your pathetic little bunch of teammates insinuating my promotion was down to something other than bloody hard work!”
James shook his head, radiating agitation. Splashes of dark pink blotched the olive skin of his cheeks and tension tightened the muscles in his neck. “Okay, first and foremost, I did not just swan into my job!” he retorted, shoving his right hand through his hair leaving it even more wildly dishevelled.
Exactly the way it looks when he gets out of bed in the morning. The traitorous little thought materialised inconveniently in her brain, and Lily huffed scornfully to cover the way that it flustered her. “Oh, I’ll just bet you didn’t”
“Professional Quidditch doesn’t work like that!” James barked. “I had to trial just like everyone else, and I have to work my arse off every single day to keep my place or I’d get booted back to the bench faster than a snidget on fire! It's just about the only job I could have where who I am doesn't make the blindest bit of difference! And secondly, you overheard literally two sentences of that conversation with absolutely no context, so you have zero idea what I did or did not say, or what point I was actually making, about you or anything else!”
He raised his hands in a gesture of exasperation, palms facing her so that she could see the rough calluses on his fingers, the ones that came from constant friction between tender skin and unyielding broomstick. Lily was suddenly acutely aware that she knew exactly how those calluses felt as they dragged delicately yet possessively against her naked skin. She took in his striking hazel eyes, broad shoulders and the graze of stubble that coated his square jawline, and to her annoyance, felt a familiar heat begin to pool in her abdomen. She shook her head, trying to exorcise the memories; she’d sworn that last time definitely was the last time. She wasn’t going there, not ever again, not even in her head, but Merlin’s beard, he had absolutely no right being so ridiculously attractive. The fact that she even noticed it when she was so fucking angry with him only aggravated her more.
“I know what I heard, James,” she countered, “and I don’t want to hear any more of your poor-me-pampered-little-rich-boy whining. Now leave me alone, please. I have work to do.” Out of patience, she whipped around and continued briskly on her way towards the lab.
He, of course, followed, long legs easily keeping pace with her. “At ten o’clock at night?” he scoffed. “No, you do not.”
“Potions don’t run on a nine- to- five schedule, James,” Lily snapped, as she tapped her wand on the bronze security panel next to the research lab door. “Which you would know if you pulled your head out of your arse long enough to pay the slightest bit of notice to your father’s life’s work.”
She knew that was a low blow, but surprisingly, James ignored it. “Oh really? Well, enlighten me then,” he asked, sarcastically. As soon as they were both through the door, he twisted his shoulders and stepped quickly and neatly in front of her so that they were face to face. “What exactly is so important that you have to be here rather than resolving whatever this is.” He gestured expansively between the two of them and glared at her pointedly.
Lily laughed, loudly and bitterly, silently wondering why he couldn’t have normal eyes, like a normal person, just one, sensible colour, instead of that chaotic riot of browns, greens and golds. “Like you actually care. On either count.”
“Try me,” he insisted, his expression flinty, eyes burning into her.
Lily kept her own expression carefully neutral, but internally, she swore creatively and at length, because unfortunately, he was right; there was absolutely no professional reason for her to be at the lab so late into the evening. She was only there because it was where she always went whenever she was wound up or upset and needed to relax. Focusing on brewing something, even something as simple as a basic calming potion or invigoration draft was always the best way to settle her mind. Then, the lab became her sanctuary, her secret place, and she guarded it fiercely. But James Fucking Potter obviously had to call her bluff, didn’t he? Well, Lily wasn’t to be bested so easily.
“Okay, I’ll bite,” she told him, confidently, as her racing mind quickly settled on a plausible excuse. “For your information, I’m running a set of experiments on whether different brewing times affect effectiveness, so I need to be here at fixed intervals to validate the results set.”
James’s beautiful face split into a broad grin, that intensely irritating, lop-sided grin that she utterly detested, no matter how much it made her heart skip. He leaned back against the doorframe and folded his arms across his chest, something that Lily was certain that he only did because of the way it made his biceps pop. “No, you’re not,” he contradicted her, “and no you don’t.”
Lily scowled at him. “Excuse me?” she asked, as imperiously as possible.
“It’s true that brewing time is an active research topic at the moment, but it isn’t your project,” James told her, nonchalantly. “Josiah Perkins is the one leading those experiments. You’re leading the team that’s working on the effects of brewing temperature on potion shelf life, and there’s nothing in that research brief that would require you to be here out of hours.” He raised an inquisitive eyebrow. “Is there?”
“How… How the hell do you know that?” stuttered Lily.
He pushed away from the wall and advanced towards her, placing his hands on the workbench behind her, either side of her hips, so that she was trapped in between them. He was so close to her that she was forced to look up at him. A memory flashed involuntarily through her mind, of the last time she’d looked up at that unfairly handsome face as it hovered above her, his eyes boring into hers as he nailed her into his mattress. She blinked hard, trying to bury it, trying to ignore the way the air between them seemed as charged as it had done then - as charged as it always did, every time this happened.
“Maybe my head isn’t quite as much up my arse as you seem to think, Evans,” he told her, his voice dangerously low. The way he’d switched to using her surname set off a depth charge in her groin. “ Maybe I actually pay quite a lot of attention to exactly what you’re doing on a daily basis. And maybe you might have realised that if you weren’t so preoccupied with trying to balance that massive fucking chip on your shoulder!”
“How dare you!” Lily’s voice dripped with venom. He always did this, knew exactly what buttons to push to ignite both her rage and her desire. Blood pounded through her veins and the wet heat flooded between her thighs; she hated how thin the line between anger and arousal seemed to be when it came to him.
James’s eyes widened, incredulously. “How dare I? How dare I what, exactly? How dare I point out that you’re so blinded by how hard your life’s been - which I don't deny, by the way, it’s been shit and you deserve so much better - that you can’t even see what’s right in front of you?”
“Go to hell, Potter,” she told him, as coldly as she could manage, leaning away in a last-ditch attempt to create some distance between them that she wasn’t at all sure that she actually wanted. “And get out of my lab, or I’ll get someone to throw you out.”
“I’d like to see you try,” he mocked her, standing upright at last and leaving her feeling oddly bereft. “No one’s going to throw me out of a Sleekeazy building, are they? But even if there was someone who would, there’s no one else here, Evans. It’s just you and me. All alone.”
Lily shook her head again, trying hard to ignore how desperately she wanted to feel that hard body pressed close to her, those long fingers exploring every inch of her, that talented mouth hot against her skin. “Merlin’s nuts, you really are an insufferable, arrogant arsehole, aren’t you?” she spat.
“And you’re a stubborn, self-righteous bitch!”
They stood there like that for a moment that seemed to stretch into eternity. Lily’s breathing was hard and ragged as though she’d just run a lap of the lake, as she saw a familiar hunger flash through James’s eyes. The air between them seemed to crackle with a heady combination of fury and barely controlled desire.
They’d been playing this game for years - ever since their final months at Hogwarts. Their mutual animosity had been legendary, their bickering wearisome for all their friends, but at some point Lily had become aware of the sexual tension that underpinned it all. Every so often it built to a point where there seemed to be only one way to release it, and it quickly became the dirty little secret that they admitted to no-one.
After they’d graduated, Lily assumed that having some distance between them would mean it all simply petered out, but then she’d won her training contract on the Sleekeazy research team. At first, Lily had assumed that she wouldn’t see James all that much, given he didn’t actually work for his father, but she’d been surprised to discover he was still a regular fixture in the offices, at the factory, and even in the labs. As a result, the alarming frequency with which they seemed to be thrown together was matched only by the equally alarming frequency with which they seemed to end up tumbling into bed together.
It was a nasty habit, and one Lily had tried so, so hard to break, especially recently. She’d deliberately kept her distance over the past few months, and she’d truly thought she’d been able to build some sort of resistance to him. Now, she found herself wondering quite why she’d bothered, almost as much as she wondered whether those incredible gold flecks in his eyes had always glowed in the lamplight? And had his lips always been so perfectly full and enticingly clay-pink? Certainly, his hair had always been that unruly, black as coal, curling softly around his ears in a way that made her want to sink her fingers into it every single time she saw him.
Lily closed her eyes for a long moment, willing those thoughts out of her mind, clawing desperately for some semblance of self control, but when she opened them again he was still right there, his fixed eyes on her lips, his own mouth slightly parted, his breathing unusually deep. How, she wondered, could he be so beautiful, and so deeply infuriating at the same time?
Suddenly what came next seemed every bit as inevitable as it always did when it came to them. Ah, fuck it, she thought, no longer either willing or able to fight it. Instead, she propelled herself forward, crashing her lips against his. He responded immediately, wrapping his arms around her, pulling her closer as she arched her back to press as much of herself against as much of him as humanly possible.
She allowed her lips to open at the insistent probing of his tongue, revelling in the vibration of him groaning into her mouth. Her own tongue tangled with his, tasting him, savouring him, as her hands skated up the lean muscles of his upper arms to the defined angle of his shoulders and on, up into his hair. It was unfairly thick and silky, and she coiled it around her fingers, sharply tugging him closer and crushing his face against hers.
He grunted in response, a guttural, primitive sound that resonated deep from his chest, as he shoved her against the oak-topped lab bench, pinning her there with the solid weight of his athlete’s body. Desperate to feel him even closer, Lily shifted to allow his knee to part her own, feeling the familiar press of him like granite against her thigh.
Smiling triumphantly against his lips at this evidence of his arousal, Lily loosened her grip on his hair and slid her hands down his back, cupping that impossibly firm backside with her left hand and then slipping her right in between them. Understanding her purpose, James relaxed away from her just enough to allow her to run her hand slowly and firmly along the hard length of him over his trousers, rotating her palm over the head and eliciting another grunt as he finally broke their kiss.
“You’re going to be the death of me, Evans,” he muttered, his voice thick and gravelly.
“Good,” she spat. “Now are you going to stop pissing around and take me home?”
He held her gaze for a heartbeat, his pupils so dilated that his eyes appeared almost black. “No.”
Before she could react, he swung her to the side with one arm and simultaneously swept the other across the surface of the lab bench, sending everything - notebooks, flasks, quills, scales, jars containing Merlin knew how many galleons-worth of ingredients - crashing to the floor.
“What the fuck, Potter!” she exclaimed.
In response, he lifted her onto the now empty bench, as though she weighed no more than one of the feather quills that now littered the lab floor. Then he roughly pushed her knees apart and came to stand in between them, capturing her lips in another deep and demanding kiss before trailing his open mouth down her throat. Wanton vandalism immediately forgotten, Lily allowed her head to drop back, giving him easier access, and producing a breathy moan as he sucked hard on the point where her neck met her collarbone in a way that she knew would leave a mark.
Lily locked her ankles around his waist, grinding against him, as James continued his odyssey south on her body, grunting with displeasure when he reached the neckline of her blouse. He fumbled for a moment with the buttons, swearing against her skin before reaching for his wand. He didn’t say the incantation out loud, and Lily recognised the wand movement a split second too late to stop him slicing her blouse open.
“That was new, you arsehole!” she snarled.
“I’ll buy you a new one,” he rumbled, shoving the ruined shirt off her shoulders. “Fuck it, I’ll buy you ten. And a new bra.”
Lily’s eyes widened as she caught his intention. “No, wait!” she protested.
He didn’t listen - of course he fucking didn’t. Lily’s bra met the same fate as her blouse, but before she could unleash her fury on him, he attacked her left breast with his lips, taking her nipple into his mouth and rolling it around with his tongue, and suddenly Lily couldn’t quite remember what she’d been so angry about in the first place. She closed her eyes and lost herself to the sensation, as he brought his other hand to her right breast, mimicking the movement of his tongue with his fingers and extracting a needy whimper from her. Moments later, he paused and then sucked . Lily hissed at the unexpected pressure, and her eyes flew open.
The ceiling above her came into focus - the circular metal lamps, the smooth white painted plaster, intimately familiar from so many hours spent pouring her heart into her work in this room. She gasped again, this time with the realisation of what they were about to do and where they were about to do it.
“James,” she remonstrated. “Not here! I work here. We can’t—”
“We can,” he interrupted, lips trailing across her sternum as he transferred his attention to her right breast instead. “Of course we can. But the question is - do you want to?”
Lily didn’t reply, partly because her brain didn’t seem to be able to focus on anything other than what he was doing with his lips and his hands, and partly because it was true - she did want to, and she absolutely didn’t want to admit it.
“I… I told myself I wouldn’t do this again,” she protested, more feebly this time.
“That wasn’t what I asked, Evans.” His words vibrated against her nipple, as he rocked the hard length of his erection against her centre. “But if it helps, I can tell you what I want. Then you can tell me if you want that too.”
“And what exactly is it that you want, Potter?” she whispered, knowing how dangerous the answer to that question could be.
He kissed his way back up to her ear, murmuring in a low voice that sent a shiver down her spine. “I want to take you right here, Evans. I want to taste you. All of you. I want to feel you come apart under my tongue. I want to bury myself inside you, over and over again, absolutely nail you to this bench. And I want to hear you screaming my name while I do it.”
And that was when Lily admitted to herself that she was sunk. His words short-circuited something in her brain, and all her objections evaporated in an instant, along with her sense of propriety and the last shreds of her self-control. “I want that too,” she murmured. “All of it.”
She lifted her face expectantly, but instead of bending to capture her mouth and make good on his promises, he raised an eyebrow and shot her a cocky grin. “Sure?”
She made herself look straight into his eyes. Fucking hell, he really was an arrogant shit, and there was no way she was going to let him get away with it. Taking hold of the front of his shirt, Lily yanked him closer, her nimble fingers making short work of the buttons without resorting to brute force. “Yeah, I’m sure, Potter. First you’re going to make me come so hard I can’t remember my own name,” she purred, curving herself against him so that her naked breasts moulded to the sculpted musculature of his chest. “And then I’ll do the same for you.”
“Fuck,” he muttered. He carefully set his glasses to one side, then pushed her backwards so that she sprawled across the oak benchtop. The smooth wooden surface felt cool against her hot skin as he shoved her skirt up to her waist and gripped her ankles, positioning her feet against the edge of the bench so that she was gloriously exposed to him but for the delicate lace of her underwear.
Torturously slowly, with a reverence that was at odds with the roughness of his earlier touch, he kissed his way along the inside of her right thigh, starting at her knee. A bolt of desire lanced through her when he reached the line of her knickers, igniting her nerve endings and fizzing across her skin. Lily keened as he pulled the lace away and ran his tongue just underneath, anticipating where his next touch would take him. Instead, he pulled back a little, and examined her, lips turned up in an insolent smile.
“James, please,” she pleaded, reaching to grab his hair again, but he was too quick for her, twisting his head away.
“No, no - patience, Evans,” he admonished her, his voice deeper and rougher than before. “Not quite yet.”
To her frustration, he moved his lips to her left knee, repeating his unhurried pilgrimage up her inner thigh, his tongue leaving a trail of electricity in its wake as he journeyed again to the apex of her legs. Involuntarily, she whimpered and tried to squirm closer to his lips, but that only seemed to amuse him, little puffs of silent laughter skimming over her delicate skin and making her shiver.
This time, when he reached the fabric of her knickers, he moved his fingers up to the waistband. Lily expected him to pull them down and expose her to him, and she lifted her hips to assist, but instead he put his palm flat on her lower belly and pushed her back down.
“I thought I told you to be patient?” he asked. “Aren’t you going to be a good girl, Evans? You’re always such a good girl for me.”
A tiny part of Lily’s brain wanted to tell him to fuck off and stop patronising her, but it was swiftly overruled by the rest of her that just didn’t care anymore, and she could only release a needy whine in response.
“I don’t think you’re quite ready for me yet though. Let’s see.” James smirked at her, then dropped his face between her legs and put his mouth over the crotch of her knickers, pushing the flat of his tongue hard against the fabric over her clit, moving it firmly back and forward.
The friction provided Lily with a frustrating glimpse of the contact that she really wanted, and she whined again, desperate to feel his mouth against her. To her relief, he seemed to get the message, hooking his fingers around the waistband and easing the lace down.
“Ah! That’s better,” he praised her, running a single finger between her soft folds, making her instantly tighten. “Look at you, so wet for me. But I think you can do better.”
And then his mouth was on her, exactly where she needed him to be, flicking his tongue back and forth with a constant even pressure and rhythm, all the while suckling at her in a way that sent her soaring. Merlin, how dare he be so good at this? He knew her body so well, and it was almost too good, almost too much. She bucked and writhed against him, but he held her firm, fingers digging into her hips, refusing her any relief.
“You taste so good,” he murmured against her, bringing two fingers up to slip inside her. “Come on, Lily. Come for me.” His fingertips curled against the exact spot that she needed, and she could only comply, breaking apart against his tongue. He continued to lick and suck her through her climax until she could bear it no more, pushing his head away and forcing him to release her.
“Good girl, Lily. Now, look at me,” he rasped. Her limbs felt almost boneless in the wake of her orgasm, but she somehow managed to push herself up on her elbows so that she could obey him. “Tell me again, Lily. Tell me again that you want this. Tell me that you want me.”
He’d lifted his head a little, his chin glossy with her wetness in the lamplight, tilted up so that he could still look at her. He was leaning against the edge of the bench, hands wide so that he was still bent low, and something about his stance reminded her of a bird of prey. The expression on his face was no less predatory - no, she realised, no less hungry - but he stayed absolutely still, waiting for her command.
There was something a little desperate in his tone, and her lip curled as she felt the balance of power between them shift in her favour. Part of Lily wanted to deny him, to press this tiny advantage in whatever never-ending game they were playing, but ultimately her need to feel him inside proved far more compelling.
“I want you, James. I want your cock inside me,” she breathed. “Like you promised.”
At her word, something she thought was relief flashed across his face. He straightened and immediately his fingers went to his belt. “Wait!” she told him, and he looked back at her, clearly surprised. Lily pushed herself up to a sitting position and batted his hands away, seeing now how she could give him a taste of his own medicine. “My turn.”
She made short work of the heavy belt buckle and the zip of his fly, before tucking her thumbs into the waist of both his trousers and his underwear, pushing them both towards his knees. His glorious cock sprang free, thick and twitching as her fingers brushed the velvety skin.
Now it was her turn to smirk. “The question is, James - are you ready for me?”
Never taking her eyes from his face, she reached between her legs and made her fingers slick with her own juices, before smearing them up his length and pumping him with her fist. Her palm curled around the head. His knuckles whitened where he gripped the benchtop as he watched her do it.
“Evans, I swear, if you keep doing that I’m going to come in your hand,” he warned her, his voice barely more than a growl.
“Well that simply won’t do,” she admonished, giving him one more swift stroke before allowing her hand to still around him. His gaze was still fixed on her hand around his cock, and he didn’t seem to be breathing as he fought for control. “Potter?”
“Hmm?” was all he could manage.
“Are you going to fuck me or not?”
This time his response definitely was a growl, as he pushed her hand away, gripped her thighs hard enough to bruise, and pulled her to the very edge of the bench. Stepping forward, he took himself in hand, took a moment to align them, and then pushed straight into her in one rough movement, right up to the hilt, impaling her where she sat. Lily gasped at the sensation; in all the times they’d done this, she wasn’t sure she’d ever felt him quite this deep, quite this hard for her.
She looked back at his face, and his eyes were wide open, glazed with desire, and that sinfully talented mouth was hanging open. He fumbled for his glasses, grabbing them from where they lay discarded on the bench and shoving them up his nose. Lily followed his gaze to where they were joined, watching in fascination as he slid smoothly out of her before slamming back into her again.
“Like what you see, Potter?” she teased, the words disjointed by the force with which he railed into her.
“Fucking hell, Lily,” he murmured. “I didn’t want to miss this. Look how well you take me. No one else ever takes me half as well. You’re so good, Lily. This is so good.”
Irritatingly, he was right. It was always good with them, addictively so, in fact - why else would she keep coming back for more? Tonight though, it felt different - exceptional somehow. Maybe it was the heat of their argument? Or perhaps the thrill of their location? Whatever it was, as James met her, over and over, in just the right place, she felt the tightness in her belly begin to build again, the swell of another climax beckoning her on. She was so, so close, if only he would—
“Touch me, James,” she sobbed. “I… I need to feel you inside me when I come again.”
James groaned, but obediently reached between them, finding her nub with his thumb and drawing tight circles there in time with this deep and steady rhythm.
Lily clung to his shoulders, her fingers digging into the smooth plane of muscle there. His eyes met hers, his gaze utterly compelling and Lily found that she couldn’t look away. The absolute concentration on his face made it clear that he was fighting to hang on, waiting for her climax before he let go. Something fundamental seemed to pass between them, something profound and startlingly beautiful, and in that moment, her universe shifted on its axis as she understood what it was. Every bit of pretence and self-delusion dropped away, every defence she had built against him crumbled, all of it swept aside by the simple, undeniable, breathtaking truth that presented itself to her.
James’s eyes widened and words spilled from his lips, words that Lily never expected to hear him say to her, words that ought to have horrified her but instead held up a mirror to her own epiphany, and it was the final thing that she needed to send her over the edge. This time, she absolutely burst. Wave after wave of the most intense, pulsing orgasm she ever remembered swept over her. James, and the feel of him inside her, was the only real thing in the world, and she clung to him as her climax ripped through her body. The strength of it dragged James over with her, because only seconds later his rhythm stuttered and he let out a roar of satisfaction. As the sound faded away, Lily heard another voice, saying his name over and over again, chanting it almost reverentially. With a start, she realised it was her.
They stayed like that, not moving, for several long moments, or it might have been half an hour, or possibly the rest of the night, Lily honestly didn’t know. Her hands were on his shoulders, their eyes locked together, skin flushed, chests heaving, hearts pounding. Lily felt him gradually soften inside her, and then with a soft sigh, he withdrew and muttered a spell to clean them both up before retrieving his trousers from the floor.
It was that normality that broke her. Honestly, she thought she might - might - have let it go, but the way he just carried on, as though he hadn’t just shredded her entire reality, pushed her into action.
“What did you just say?” she blurted, her throat suddenly dry.
“What?” he frowned. “Cleaning spell. Obviously.”
“Not then,” she gestured wildly, urgently. “Just before we finished. What did you say then?”
“I… erm… I don’t…” stammered James, apparently lost for words for what Lily assumed was probably the first time in his life.
“You do!” she insisted. “I heard you. And I need you to say it again.”
He shot her a look of such resentment that she actually flinched. Those eyes, those riotous, patchwork eyes, suddenly seemed duller, defeated. His shoulders slumped. “Why? What’s the point? Apparently you heard me the first time. So why don’t you just go ahead and humiliate me?”
Lily nodded, very slowly, considering her next move. She couldn’t blame him. After all, he had no idea of the lightning bolt that had just struck her. She could, she knew, still walk away with her dignity just about intact, but damn it, she didn’t want to. Now that she knew, there was no other choice for her, not really. Physically, she was sitting on a lab bench, naked apart from the skirt that was bunched around her waist, but in her mind, she was standing at the edge of a precipice, wondering if she was brave enough to jump, and if she was, whether the man in front of her would catch her.
Well, there’s only one way to find out. Carefully, she hopped down off the bench, tugging her skirt down over her hips and shrugging the shredded remains of her blouse over her shoulders. James watched her, silently. Moving closer, she channelled all of her Gryffindor bravery and placed her palm against his stubbled cheek. “That isn’t what I want, Potter,” she whispered. “But if it helps, I can tell you what I do want. Then you can tell me if you want that too.”
“Okay.” His expression was wary, but was there a tiny flicker of something else that flashed across his face? Interest? Hope?
“It’s a funny thing,” she began. “For years, I thought you were just my hate fuck. And I thought that was all I was to you too. An itch that just had to be scratched whenever it got too irritating to deal with any other way.”
James snorted with humourless laughter. “Sounds about right.”
“It wasn’t though.” She shook her head, exasperated. “Look, when we were fighting before, you told me that I had no right to be angry, because I hadn’t heard enough of your conversation to know what you were actually saying. I didn’t realise it at the time, but actually, I think you were right.”
“There really is a first time for everything, isn’t there?” he muttered, darkly.
Lily ignored him. “We’re not just scratching an itch, are we? It’s more complicated than that.”
“You think so?” he asked, voice dripping with sarcasm. “Well don’t hold back, Evans. Dazzle me with your brilliant new theory.”
“Actually, I think you’ll like it because it makes me look a bit stupid,” she confessed. “I certainly feel stupid that I didn’t see it before. James, I… I think I’ve been picking fights with you deliberately, pushing us into situations like tonight, because I didn’t know how else to get you to look at me like that.”
James frowned, his dark brows drawn together behind the square rims of his glasses. “Like what?
She swallowed hard. Come on Lily. Time to Jump. “Like the way you did just now when you told me you loved me. Because actually, I think that’s how I want you to look at me all the time.”
Lily held her breath, as James froze. Then his head snapped up as he looked at her for the first time in several minutes, the gold flecks in those riotous eyes suddenly sparking bright again. Slowly, he covered her hand with her own, so that it was sandwiched between his cheek and his palm.
“Before, when we were arguing, you asked me how I knew what you were working on,” he began, tentatively. “It was a good question. I thought you might also wonder how I know what lab hours you keep? Or how I knew you’d come here when you were upset and not just go home? It’s because I make it my business to know your business, Lily Evans. I make it my business to know everything I possibly can about you.”
“And why might that be?” she asked, quietly. “Tell me, James. Please.”
“Because I love you,” he told her, simply, never looking away from her. “I - Love - You. I have loved you. I do love you. There have been times, lots of times in fact, where I really and truly wished that I didn’t, but I do. And I think I always will.” Lily wasn’t entirely sure exactly what sound it was that escaped from her throat at that moment, something between a gasp and a sob. “You’ve never been my hate fuck, Lily,” he told continued, his voice low and hypnotic. “Just the opposite in fact. You… bewitch me. You always have.”
“Always?” she managed.
“Always. You haunt my dreams and all of my fantasies. Ever since I can remember, I’ve wanted this. Wanted you.”
“Even at school?”
His mouth curved with barely suppressed laughter. “Absolutely at school. Lily, I’ve been in love with you since I was fourteen years old.”
She hadn’t been expecting that. “That long?”
“Yeah.”
“Why didn’t you say anything?”
“Because you weren’t ready to hear it,” he shrugged. “You would have laughed at me and walked away for real. I decided I could make do with being your hate fuck, if that’s what you want to call it, even though it nearly killed me. I took whatever crumbs you’d throw me and be bloody grateful. Right up until tonight, when I completely blew it.”
“Did you though?” she wondered. “Because that was the moment that I realised.”
“Realised what?”
Lily smiled softly. “How I really feel about you.”
There was a long pause. James opened his mouth to reply, and for a moment, Lily thought he was going to ask her the obvious question, but he clearly decided against it. “Then I’m glad.”
“So what do we do now?” she asked, suddenly feeling uncharacteristically shy.
“Well, how about we start with a date. A proper one. What are you doing tomorrow night?” Clearly feeling that he was on safer ground, he gave her one of those lop-sided grins that somehow didn’t seem quite so irritating anymore, but still made her pulse quicken. “And don’t tell me you’ve got potions to babysit, Evans, because as we’ve already established, that’s bullshit.”
Lily felt her cheeks colour as he reminded her of the lie that he’d caught her in, but instead of trying to hide her embarrassment behind a shield of anger, she returned his smile with one of her own. “And you’d know all about bullshit, Potter, the amount of it that comes out of your mouth,” she told him, sweetly, “but yes, tomorrow night works for me. You can pick me up at eight o’clock.”
“Where from?”
“My flat. Given you’ve just admitted to practically stalking me for years, I don’t expect you need me to give you the address, do you?”
Now it was James’s turn to colour. “Ah. No. Touché.”
“Well,” she smiled. “I expect I should probably head home.”
“Yes. Probably.”
“Walk me out?”
“It would be my pleasure.” He offered her his arm, and she slipped her own through it, enjoying the strangeness of this new and affectionate contact.
He led her back down the corridors and out to the apparition point, where she dropped his arm. But before she could make her turn for home, he caught her wrist and spun her back against his chest, capturing her lips in an electric kiss that left her breathless.
“What was that for?” she yelped, when he released her.
“That was a promise,” he explained, in a tone that sent a fresh jolt lancing down her spine. “The next time I take you to bed, you’ll be in no doubt about how I feel about you.”
“Confident, Potter?” she challenged him, old habits not yet entirely broken.
He winked at her. “Always, Evans. I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow,” she confirmed. “Oh, and Potter?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you too.” And with a smile on her face, she was gone.