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Post by mabs on Jan 21, 2011 21:26:59 GMT -5
Reed felt a little settled by her taking his hand and shaking it, even with the combative words she spoke as well. Reed heard her voice an he sighed, wondering that himself. He gave a shrug, his eyes still trained on her.
"You see, it all started with this infuriating little woman who posted a nasty little piece in a column about me," he began as though he were telling an epic story. "And then I tried to woo said woman, and just kept mucking things up. She ended up taking another date instead of me, and I took another date instead of her to this special showing of Rocky Horror, which I had once thought she would enjoy, and then she bolted." Reed sighed and shrugged. "And here I am, hoping that she'll forgive me. Otherwise, I'll be forced to continue sending embarrassing displays of flowers to her until she seeks me out herself."
Reed gave her an impish look, raising a brow in an arrogant fashion. "Would you be able to help me with finding her?"
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Post by rocky on Jan 21, 2011 21:57:49 GMT -5
"I didn't bolt, I left Kurtis at the theatre," Adrienne said, raising an eyebrow at him. "And not for a want of trying to get him to come with me, either."
She ran her hand through her hair, uncertain why she was choosing such a brutally honest tack with him, but nevertheless felt it necessary to point out in no uncertain terms had she left entirely because of him.
"He was angry with me, so I gave him the ticket to --" the elevator, hanging between floor two and three, began to grind. The noise was slow, but it set Ade's teeth on edge. "Shit! SHIT -- NO --"
Adrienne panicked, and shot forward to the door -- but she was powerless to change it. The elevator banged, then shook -- then lurched as though it was falling, and for a moment she didn't know what was up and what was down -- eventually it became all too clear, as she landed in a heap on the floor.
The elevator stopped and hissed like an old steam engine, and she sat up gingerly, and then gasped, as the door ground itself open to reveal the filthy wall of the elevator shaft.
Stuck. AGAIN. With him.
She could have cried.
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Post by mabs on Jan 21, 2011 22:05:28 GMT -5
Reed had opened his mouth to counter Adrienne's combative words when he himself heard the lurching of the elevator. The archaic thing seemed to not be able to handle going up the few measly floors to Adrienne's hall, and he stifled a gasp at the view of the grimy elevator shaft. His hand darted to the 'Close Door' button before he could think of it, and the door screeched such with a ding.
He hated heights. And there was no reason to compound the situation further. Granted, his office was on the highest floor of the building he owned, and his apartment was the penthouse, but that was more for status than anything. He never really went out to enjoy the view. He much rathered views that involved his feet firmly on the ground.
"Right, well..." Reed was unsure of what to say or do. He had hardly ever been stuck in such an uncomfortable situation before. He frowned and sank to the floor beside her. God, they might die there. It was entirely possible. Oh, he couldn't think of that though. Reed turned to her. "You never said if you'd forgive me, darling." Reed was tensed though. It was clear he was hardly comfortable in the predicament that they had discovered themselves in together.
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Post by rocky on Jan 21, 2011 22:26:59 GMT -5
"Son of a --"
Adrienne was in no mood to be comforting for him. In fact, she hardly registered that he had dropped to the floor of his own accord; she was on her feet an instant later and hammering on the wall and door of the elevator, her hands curled into desperate fists.
"HELLO? CAN YOU HEAR ME? THIS FUCKING THING IS STUCK -- AGAIN. MR KRAUT?"
She hollered and banged the wall for as long as she could stand to do it, and then paused. Someone was banging back. For a moment she frowned, cocking her head to listen, and then she realised.
Bang bang bang bang bang.
Mr Kraut was banging his floor... because the noise was disturbing him. Adrienne tilted her head back and screamed at the ceiling, a primal, shrieking cry of disbelief and dismay -- that old bastard. He would report the broken elevator to the super in the morning, when he wanted to use it, and not before!
"My neighbour is an asshole," Adrienne mumbled in defeat, then shook her head. "We'll be in here till he wants his morning paper."
She pressed her hand to her temple, and closed her eyes to draw a slow, measured breath. God.
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Post by mabs on Jan 21, 2011 22:34:40 GMT -5
Reed was startled by he shouts and sighed as he looked up at her, a decidedly arrogant and unamused look about his face. How it was possible for him to look arrogant while stuck in an elevator would have been beyond anyone's wildest guess. However, he simply folded his arms, stretching out his legs.
"Then by God, stop screaming," he called to her frustratedly. They would be stuck together until morning it seemed. And if she ever stopped shouting and cursing, it wouldn't have been that bad. Reed's plan for charming had gone all to pot now, and he was slightly amused by their predicament, on an entirely masochistic level.
Reed looked up at her, catching a glimpse of her underclothes under the skirt of the dress she wore. He saw the lacy garters she'd attached to the fishnets, and Reed leaned to peek a little more boldly, his suspicions resolved. She was either wearing string for underwear, or not wearing any at all, by the view of her smooth buttocks peaking out under the crinkle skirts of the dress.
"Do you often go commando, Heart?" he teased at her, trying to distract them both as it were. If he was to die there with her (which he was completely convinced would happen) he'd at least have fun with it.
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Post by rocky on Jan 22, 2011 7:02:27 GMT -5
"Only for Kurtis."
Adrienne turned and pressed her back to the elevator door, her legs pressed tightly together. She was wearing underwear, it had just ridden up a little, and she was in no mood for him to be trying to see up her skirt, especially when there was no way to get away from him. She still had no sense at all that he might be scared.
Adrienne hardly reacted as the elevator began to vibrate and shudder -- it would do so intermittently, as it was still trying to grind its way upwards, for the rest of the evening. She braced herself and gritted her teeth at the sound, rolling her eyes irritably.
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Post by mabs on Jan 22, 2011 12:59:45 GMT -5
Reed had opened his mouth to retort something snide and snarky to Adrienne when the elevator began to rattle and shake and he sort of caved in his shoulders and closed his eyes. Though when Reed became frightened, he hardly ever shrank into himself, not emotionally at least. He grew angry, perpetuating an irritated and annoyed persona in order to cover up the fear he actually felt. He did it often in the courtroom, though with more finesse and vigor, making his case sound passionate. Now however, he was frightened for his life, and not his reputation, making his anger at the situation and consequently Adrienne, raw and ragged.
"You know Adrienne if you don't have anything kind to say, then do us both a favor and shutup," he remarked as he opened his furious eyes. They mirrored the look of a frightened, cornered animal, something that would lash out when threatened, not shrink into itself.
The elevator gave another sickening shudder and Reed's insides flipped upside down it seemed, and he bolted up slightly before forcing himself to settle. He. Was. Not. Weak.
"If I'm to spend my last hours on Earth in an elevator shaft with you, I'd like it to be quiet so I might fantasize over an agreeable leggy blonde," he added in a snappish fashion. Though he was hardly imagining a leggy blonde. It was the curvy, tartly Adrienne Heart plaguing his mind now. Regardless of what he said.
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Post by rocky on Jan 22, 2011 13:56:07 GMT -5
Adrienne was surprised at first by the ferocity of his reaction, and then she realised he was scared -- she could see the tension in his shoulders, his eyes flitting around the tiny room, and he flinched at every noise the rickety old elevator made. It was perhaps a little cruel, but her first instinct was to laugh -- they had two floors to fall, she didn't imagine it would be fatal. She managed to contain herself to a smirk and an eye-roll, however.
A leggy blonde. Ass.
"And to think you left a leggy blonde to come here -- for this," she pointed out, one hand on her hip. She glanced around the dingy elevator, and felt mildly guilty for being so unabashedly callous.
Adrienne's lack of fear on the subject was experience based, not borne of any serious wisdom on the laws of physics with regard to elevator accidents; she had been stuck in there before. She was careful with her skirt as she moved, stepping across the elevator as though it were a minefield -- he wasn't getting another view of her arse if she could help it -- and then slid down the back wall to sit beside him, sighing. As much as it was easier to keep pushing and flustering him, she was not so lacking in heart that she couldn't take pity on him, a little.
She licked her lips and considered what to tell him, stretching her legs out, and crossing one ankle over the other before she spoke.
"It's not going to fall. I've been stuck in here before. It's loud, and it grinds a little, but it's not going to move until Mr Turner restarts the motor."
She glanced sidelong at him, then said wryly: "So. If these are your last moments, it's because I'm going to strangle you."
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Post by mabs on Jan 22, 2011 14:06:43 GMT -5
"Oh you've caught me. I truly have a tender spot for irritating--what is it? Red now? It was nearly orange the other day," Reed snapped back, but he was grateful for the distraction. It was hard to worry about falling twenty some feet in an elevator shaft when distracted by witty and amusing banter. Reed's first instinct was to stiffen when she sat near him, and he rose his brow high when she spoke. Of course, he responded in a snide way.
"Didn't I say stop talking?" Reed retorted, his face turned to her. And then she spoke with that wry, sultry manner of voice and he couldn't help himself. He relaxed a little. Reed could combat her snarky manner more than he could thoughts of the elevator shaft, and it was a glad distraction for the moment.
"Strangle me? I'm generally not into the bondage stuff, but I'm always up for experimenting," he responded with a smirk of a grin, and he shot a sidelong glance back at her. Reed rummaged through his jacket pocket for his Blackberry, tugging it out and cursing when he did. It struck him to perhaps call someone, anyone to get them out, though the phone bore the miserable message of "NO SERVICE" across the top. Damn archaic elevator.
"The cellphone won't work, the neighbor is an ass, and it's not even midnight," Reed mused aloud. "I believe we in the legal world call this a clusterfuck." And many other crude things, if he were being honest.
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Post by rocky on Jan 22, 2011 14:35:18 GMT -5
"Oh you've caught me. I truly have a tender spot for irritating--what is it? Red now? It was nearly orange the other day."
"If you find me so irritating, why are you following me? And since I didn't change it for you you can keep your opinions to yourself."
Adrienne folded her arms. Really, she had changed it for him, though not on any level that was conscious, she had changed it for the sake of confidence, facing him. He was only re-enforcing her opinion that he was toying with her deliberately, to obtain some twisted personal satisfaction in humiliating her.
It bothered her that even though she knew that was what he was doing, she was tempted. Oh, not when he was unexpectedly smothering her with sloppy kisses, or being entirely too crass in what was supposed to be a tentative, teasing written correspondence -- but when he'd walked up behind her, and the air was taut with anticipation, or when he'd been firing double entendres back to her with gusto -- then she had been tempted.
"The cellphone won't work, the neighbor is an ass, and it's not even midnight. I believe we in the legal world call this a clusterfuck."
Ade snickered in spite of herself. She enjoyed the word clusterfuck. Her own phone was in the theatre, in her coat pocket, so there was no way for her to confirm what she had already known: that it didn't work in the damn elevator.
She shivered, just the tiniest bit, and shifted slightly, on the cold metal floor. The heat of marching herself from Time Square home had kept her warm, as had her fury at him and at the situation, but now that she had given up her energetic display the cold was nipping at her.
She sighed. It was going to be a long night.
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Post by mabs on Jan 22, 2011 14:47:52 GMT -5
"I didn't give my opinion, woman," Reed countered immediately. "And if it's any of your business, you're the only woman I know who can look entirely too sexual in fire-truck red hair. Most would come off looking like Ronald McDonald's long lost sister." The compliment was tainted still by his bitterness at their situation, but it was there regardless.
Reed himself was warm and almost sweating at the fact that they were enclosed, suspended in air. It didn't show, except for maybe a gleam of it on his forehead, but regardless he leaned up and shed his jacket when he noticed her shiver. She was in less clothes than he after all. And in all seriousness, Reed was generally a charming fellow and chivalrous. Perhaps to get what he wanted, as the ladies loved that sort of thing, but it was just second nature to him now.
"Here," he offered in a less combative tone, urging her to sit up as he wrapped the suit jacket around her bare shoulders. "No sense in you freezing to death. Though they say that skin to skin contact is better at retaining heat." The suggestion in his words were nearly empty now though. His nerves were fried and he was tired of putting up the pretenses of playing the charming man. Though he did get a whiff of her womanly scent when he leaned over to pull the jacket around her shoulders, and it was heady and intoxicating, like a good glass of scotch.
Reed noticed things he hadn't on his first survey of the woman, as the first survey nearly always contained focusing on the T and A. But now he spotted enchanting eyes, and a vividly pouty and sensual mouth. Her skin looked soft, and as he leaned away he brushed his fingers down her arm, more in a subconscious effort to sate his curiosity. Well. It was soft.
Reed leaned away, back against the metal of the elevator now, and he sighed heavily, closing his eyes. Maybe he could fall asleep. That would certainly pass the time.
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Post by rocky on Jan 22, 2011 15:12:57 GMT -5
"Thank you, but... do you ever do anything without making it into something dirty?" Adrienne asked him quizzically, but didn't say no to the chance to cover herself a little, and shrugged willingly into his suit jacket.
It dwarfed her at the shoulders, and the sleeves were much too long -- only the very tips of her fingers poked out of the ends of them. She felt a weight on one side, and prodded through his pockets until she found his wallet. She felt she was owed the opportunity to rifle through his things. He had dug right to the very bottom of her desk.
She opened it and glanced inside. He had plenty of cash, but she wasn't interested in that. She began to pluck through his credit cards, amused to find his ID card, with a much younger picture of him on it. He hadn't always been so well-filled out and slick, he looked young in the picture, and sort of skinny and awkward.
"So cute," she said, openly mocking him, glancing in his direction. "Whatever happened?"
It was strange to see, though. It made him seem less like an action figure. Veritable proof that he was flesh and blood and actually human. The same cocky green eyes looked directly out of the picture at her, though, and she knew perfectly well that he had been an absolute shit, even ten years ago.
She put it back and began to slide her index finger into the little compartments, rolling her eyes as she discovered two ribbed for her pleasure Trojans inside.
"And a boy scout, I see. Do you even need to carry these? You're a terrible kisser." She twirled the condom between her fingers, holding it up so that he could see it. Her expression was playful, but she was dead serious in her assertion. Maybe leggy blondes liked it better.
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Post by mabs on Jan 22, 2011 15:22:26 GMT -5
"Nope. Never," he answered quickly. And it was true. Reed enjoyed making things as unserious as possible in his social life, perhaps from the restraints of his legal responsibility and his job. He watched a she prodded through the pockets, and he couldn't help but laugh at the I.D. card she tugged out to look at. He really needed to get a new one, if he were being honest, and he glanced at the card and smiled fondly.
"I was fresh out of college there, you know," he qualified. "And much less respectable than I am now." He grinned crookedly at the picture as she tucked it away. He had been so green then, and hardly knew what he knew now. And it was before his nasty marriage and divorce tainted his carefree looks. As much as he was loathe to admit it, Franny had left a mile wide stretch of hurt along him. Nothing directly, but hurt at the purely cruel things she had done in the last years of their marriage. Reed may have been a total ass and bastard to her, but he never exploited her, not purposefully. Franny had.
Reed raised a brow high at her next assertion and looked at her, wondering whether she was truly serious. "And how would you know that? I haven't gotten close enough to really kiss you, dollface." Reed leaned a little closer, quirking a brow at her. "In any case, since you're the expert on these things, perhaps you should teach me what I'm doing wrong." Though he wasn't doing anything wrong. Impudent twit. If he had really gotten a hold of her and kissed her, instead of that purposefully sloppy teenage-esque kiss, then she would hardly been clothed right then. He was sure of it.
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Post by rocky on Jan 22, 2011 16:32:49 GMT -5
"Predictable, Mr Armstrong," Adrienne chastised him readily, and, finding nothing else amusing or incriminating in his distinctly lacking wallet, she folded it back up and tucked it back into the pocket she'd taken it from.
"In any case, your technique is... passable, it's your approach that's flawed. Women don't like grabby little boys, Reed. Just because your mother spoiled you doesn't mean that I will."
Adrienne was amused with his defensiveness, much as she had been amused with his desperate assertions regarding his size. It was almost endearingly clueless. It was more obvious than ever that nobody had ever told him no. She would have bet her life savings that nobody had ever criticised him outside the courtroom, either.
She stood up and began to pace around, taking small steps to ensure the view up her skirt never became available to him. She had to think about what she was going to say to him. She had to think about what she wanted, instead of what she'd gotten.
"Contrary to popular belief, I don't want to be mauled in the mouth, Mr Armstrong," she said, mentally composing an article on the same subject, "I want to be kissed slowly. I want you to make me meet you half way. It's not a race to reach my tonsils."
She pressed her finger tips to her lips, just briefly, as she thought about it. He had been too hard and fast, straight out of the gate. She wanted build up. She wanted to be coaxed. She wanted him to leave her wanting more. Her fingers trailed the line of her neck, and traced thoughtfully along the exposed edge of her collarbone as she moved.
"I want tension. You just take what you want, you skip the best part in favour of your own instant gratification. I want you to -- torment me. A kiss should be tantalising. If you want me to go weak at the knees you'll have to learn to be a tease."
She stopped. She had started talking in rather more plain terms than she'd meant to, and she flushed slightly, as she realised she'd been narrating it aloud as she would have written it. 'You' and 'I' didn't necessarily mean she and Reed, but she didn't doubt for a moment it was how he would take it.
She leaned against the elevator door, a little flustered.
"Not that it matters," she said, and cleared her throat. "You'd rather have a -- what was it? A leggy blonde?"
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Post by mabs on Jan 22, 2011 16:44:47 GMT -5
Reed was watching her pace slowly, and he looked at the long legs of the woman before him. Oh, she knew what she wanted and how she wanted it, and Reed wanted to rise to that challenge. No woman had ever given him a run for his money, and he'd always been chased, not the other way around. He'd kissed many a women, but none with such a delectably specific need and high standards. Reed stood slowly as she continued to talk, the racy language of her making Adrienne flush a little it seemed.
Reed watched her and hung back, looking at her with a raised brow as she uttered the last words. He didn't speak, not for a long moment before he sauntered towards her. He made no sudden move, and he knew that she would see his intent.
Reed reached for her in a slo manner, his hand settling against her hip and pulling her hips flush to his slightly, sandwiching her between him and the cold metal. He looked at her face for a moment before leaning in close to her face. The warmth between them was noticeable, and Reed's lips trailed hers for a moment before he ran his fingers along her shoulder and then along the outside of his jacket on her arm, urging her to place her arms around his neck.
Reed spoke against her lips when he spoke, their bodies meshed together without so much as a hair's breadth between them. "The leggy blondes are boring," he crooned against her lips, nipping at the soft skin of her pout. "I find irritating columnists much more satisfying." Reed still didn't kiss her, though he darted his tongue out and ran it along her bottom lip, breathing on the wet skin there. He could taunt, and he could tease if he wanted to. And really it was thrilling to him as well. The tension building up to the moment that they kissed. He was even breathing a little quicker and his heart was pounding a little faster at the prospect, with his hands around her waist and his lips brushing hers in a tantalizing motion.
Reed almost couldn't bear it.
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