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“Oh wow, you’re actually doing it.”
Half-naked in the stage lights, her back turned to Piper and the nasty, oozing corpse lying on the floor between them, Blue was making it clear she wasn’t very experienced at dressing in drag.
She heard the comment, of course, be she didn’t say anything back. She just pulled those ill-fitting men’s trousers a little higher, and when that didn’t stop them from trailing past her feet, she bent over and rolled them up. There was no way they’d stay rolled for long, though. The material just wasn’t good for it. Piper would have laughed at the sight if the glowing feral hadn’t made the room stink bad enough to choke her. It was a mystery how Blue could stand it long enough to take the bandana off her face, much less take the time to get changed.
It stunk so bad that even the sight of Blue’s lingerie—a relic of her era, definitely more trouble than it was worth to take care of these days, but still sexy as hell—wasn’t enough to make Piper all flustered like it had the few other times she’d seen it. It disappeared beneath the shirt soon enough, anyway. It was a shirt that hugged her hips and breasts all wrong and ballooned everywhere else, the sleeves falling well past her fingertips before she rolled them up too.
The black trench coat came next, far too big like the rest of the costume, but at least with more of a gender-neutral cut that didn’t look quite as uncomfortable. Then came the black gloves, a good half-inch of empty space left at the tip of each finger as she pulled them on. Did she really think she’d be able to pull a trigger like that?
Then she watched Blue pick up a pair of scuffed black shoes that would have definitely been a death sentence out in the streets, but before the “Seriously, Blue?” was even out of Piper’s mouth, Blue dropped them and reached instead for the costume’s final piece: the hat. It was too big for her head. “Oh good,” Piper grumbled, fingers already twitching for her gun, “not crazy enough to trip over her own feet in a firefight, but definitely crazy enough to run in blind.” No response. “Blue.”
“Do you need an optometrist, my dear Mistress of Mystery?” Her thumb and forefinger holding the brim of her hat, Blue spun on her heel, voice suddenly all theatrical and way too damn loud. “For it is not blue you see, but silver! I am…” She struck the classic superhero pose, feet wide apart, head high, fists on her hips. “The Silver Shroud!”
Seriously, if it didn’t stink so bad, she would have burst out laughing. Laughter was definitely still in her voice, muffled as it was behind the bandana and her hand: “No way you’re getting me into that bodysuit, you lug.”
Blue—or the Silver Shroud, rather—hefted a flimsy silver prop gun in both her hands. “The Mistress of Mystery, cleverly disguised as a Diamond City journalist? Oh Mistress, is there no ruse you cannot play?”
Piper sighed. “This is the rest of our day then, is it?” She stepped over the putrid corpse, took the prop gun from Blue’s hands, and then pulled off the oversized gloves. “Christ, at least make sure you get a grip.”
“The Silver Shroud is amused by your play on words!”
“Uh huh.” She was smiling. She was blushing a little, even in a place as nasty as this. She even liked Blue enough to ignore the fact that she’d pretty much just shouted in Piper’s ear.
The Silver Shroud stuffed the useless gloves in one of her coat pockets and marched back toward the stairs, her equally useless prop gun held high. “Come, Mistress of Mystery! Crime is afoot!”
Piper reloaded her gun and kept close to Blue’s back. God, she hoped they’d managed to kill all the ferals on their way up.
“There she is, pretty as the posters! The Silver Shroud costume herself! And memorabilia, too? You’re really something else.” Kent took the prop gun from Blue’s hands so gently that it may as well have been a newborn baby.
“Not the costume, but the man himself!” Blue tipped up her hat. “The Silver Shroud!”
Piper groaned.
“Hey, that’s actually pretty good! Haven’t heard too many people who can do the voice right. Definitely not too many ladies.” Kent leaned back in his seat, a big smile on his face. “You know what? I like it. A lady Shroud. It fits in a way, you know? I think maybe I should let you in on a little scheme I’m hatching.”
“A scheme of justice?”
“Damn right, Shroud! Way too much crime in this city, and there’s only one hero who can clean it up—”
Piper wasn’t sure which one of them was bad and which one was worse—
“—Just listen to the radio station. I’ll tell you everything you’ll need to know. You’ll be doing the city a world of good and those bastards’ll get what they deserve. Here, I made this.” Kent pulled open the big bottom drawer of his desk, revealing another silver machine gun. Piper didn’t need to ask whether or not this one was real, though. “Definitely not a toy, this thing. It’ll be everything the Shroud oughta have.”
“The Silver Shroud accepts this mission in the name of justice!” Blue held the gun at the ready. At least she hadn’t tried to put the damn gloves back on. “Come, my Mistress! The hour of retribution is at hand!” And with that, Blue practically leapt through the doorway.
Piper didn’t need to look at Kent to hear his excitement: “Oh great, you’re playing the Mistress of Mystery?” Then, a pause. “Where’s your costume?”
Wait, was she actually a little embarrassed? Blue was running around like her brain had been replaced with a bad radio play, and Piper suddenly felt like the odd one out? “I’m, uh… I’m…” She stalked toward the open door and her ridiculous costumed companion. “I’m… undercover.” The words came out in such a grumble that she doubted Kent actually heard them.
“Oh no! The Silver Shroud, in the flesh! Death is coming for me!” The Neighborhood Watchman laughed at her, but she kept right on walking, totally unfazed. Piper had to give her credit for that, at least. Blue may have finally gone nuts, but damn if she didn’t totally own it.
They turned down their first shifty alley, on the trail of some lowlife named Wayne Something-or-Other. Piper didn’t hear the broadcast quite right. Blue did, though, and Blue was on a mission. She kept checking the half-assed little map in her hand and she kept turning toward the seedier and seedier parts of town—which, it being Goodneighbor and all, meant they were pretty much screaming ‘Mug me!’ with every step they took, damn her—and Piper really, definitely, actually started to worry when Blue tripped on the oversized pants a second time, causing her to stumble forward. She caught herself in time, but a three-pack of drifters noticed and started coming near her. Not hard to mistake her for a drunk.
“Hey, sugar. Must’ve been quite a party. You and your friend need a walk home?” The lead man stepped way too far into Blue’s personal space. “Big gun for such a little girl. Lemme just carry that for you—”
“You incur the wrath of the Silver Shroud!” Blue crushed the butt of the gun on his nose, sending him sprawling.
“What the fuck! Wayne!”
“Plug her!”
For the thousandth time in this week alone, Piper thanked her fingers for being so twitchy. She capped one guy before he could even draw, then the other one before he could do much worse to Blue than shove that oversized fucking hat down over her eyes, take her gun, and push her down. Had Piper been a second too late, that guy would have turned Blue’s own gun against her. It dropped to the crumbly old asphalt street from the guy’s lifeless hands right before his body followed.
Still sitting on the ground, Blue tipped her hat up to look at Piper, her expression a little sheepish. Piper crossed her arms. She knew she was pissed, but not as pissed as she should have been. If Blue had been anyone else, Piper swore, seriously anyone other than frigging Blue…
She heard a groan, but it didn’t come from either of them. No, it was the first guy, the asshole with the broken nose. He was still alive.
Blue gave Piper a little smile before jumping to her feet and right back into character, moving to stand over the man. “Tell me your last name, Wayne!”
He spat blood at her. “Delancy. What’s it to a whacked out broad like you?”
Blue raised her gun. Piper suddenly had a hard time swallowing. This was the part where the Silver Shroud made a holey ghost out of him, no matter what, even though he couldn’t fight back. Sure he was a murderer, but he was still the one lying prone and helpless on the ground and looking down the barrel of a gun. “Blue…” she whispered. Please.
Two long seconds passed. “Death is coming for you.”
Piper squeezed her eyes shut. Blue…
No shots came. Instead, there was the sound of scraping metal. Piper looked back up again, just in time to see Blue step back after kicking someone’s dropped handgun into Wayne’s hand. Blood still gushing out his nose and down his face, he made a desperate scramble to his feet, his shaking hand and his shaking gun trained up at both of them.
There were no words to describe what Piper felt just then, in that moment. She never thought she’d want to kiss and kill someone at the same time, yet here she was.
“For I am… the Silver Shroud!”
The alleyway lit up with gunfire. He got two missed shots in before the machine gun totally mowed him down, leaving him more of a mushy puddle than a man.
Blue was sprawled on her butt again, the gun limp in her lap. “The Silver Gun of… of Justice… has far more recoil…” she coughed, “than the Shroud remembers!”
She started fiddling with her Pip Boy, and soon enough, Piper heard the jingle of Kent’s little radio station. “Aw, hell no.” She holstered her gun, grabbed Blue’s wrist, and shut the damn thing right back off. “No. You’re done for the day. You almost just got yourself killed.”
“But the Shroud must—!”
“The Shroud can’t even fit in her own costume! If you’re not gonna drop the act, then at least let the Mistress of Mystery hem your pants—I… I mean…” It was out of her mouth before she could think about it.
The Silver Shroud gave the biggest, most shit-eating grin the Mistress of Mystery had ever seen.
Piper wished she were brave enough to kiss it right off her god damned face. This would have been a perfect moment, just like in a bad radio play. She’d slap the handsome protagonist and then kiss her and call her the bravest, noblest idiot she’s ever met. Then she’d tell her she’s loved her for a really long time, like an almost embarrassingly long time, and that her big, stupid, noble, stupid, righteous decision to give that criminal a chance to kill them too has made her fall in love all over again, because that never happened, never ever did the Wasteland honor real justice for its own sake.
But this was Blue: tough, beautiful, impossible, ridiculous Blue, larger than life like some kind of campfire legend, real enough to hug… or strangle… whatever came first. Piper pulled her to her feet.
She was still fucking grinning. She knew she’d won Piper over, and she was loving it. “Ever the Mystery, my dear Mistress! Who knew the Mistress was also a Seamstress?”
Piper knew she could always slap the grin away. It’d probably be just as satisfying. But no. Instead, she just started walking in the direction of Goodneighbor central. “Shouldn’t bite the hand that feeds you, Blue.”
Footsteps followed her. “It is the Silver Shroud who recalls cooking more often than the Mistress of Mystery!”
“Then don’t taunt the hand that can fix your pants!”
“The Silver Shroud never taunts the service of justice, pants… or no pants!”
Piper walked faster.
“The Silver Shroud is curious as to how the Mistress of Mystery acquired this skill.”
Piper sighed, but didn’t stop working. She knew that these few minutes of Blue holding still were precious. The woman never held still for long, always running from one task to the next, always saying yes to cries for help. There was plenty for her to run away from, after all. Piper could certainly relate. “It has been ten hours since we were in the comic shop. Ten hours with the Silver Shroud. I’ve been counting.”
“Does the Mistress of Mystery not approve of her stalwart hero?”
Piper tied off the thread. One leg done, one leg a little safer. “I’ll approve much more when the costume is a little less lethal to you. And…” she started on the other pant leg, determined not to look up at Blue, “okay, so maybe I wish I’d grabbed a costume, after all. You know I love giving out a good karmic beating. Why not do it in style?”
“The Silver Shroud must serve justice!”
“Yeah, yeah.” She wished she had some proper pins for this.
“And justice demands that the Silver Shroud tell the Mistress of Mystery that she doesn’t need a costume to be the… uh, the beautiful, intelligent, cunning heroine she is! The Silver Shroud is thrilled to have her companionship, and would have fallen long ago without her… literally.”
There it was: the part where her heart starts beating too fast because Blue was just being Blue and Piper wanted it to be just a little bit more than that. But Piper taught herself a long time ago that she wasn’t right for that kind of stuff. She always messed it up somehow. She was too stuck in her ways and no one was ever patient enough to stay, and she couldn’t blame them. Couldn’t blame somebody for wanting to keep all their limbs and live peacefully rather than get up on Piper’s soapbox or follow her out into warzones. Couldn’t blame anyone who’d figured out she was too much for them. Yeah, Blue was different in every way, but old habits die hard.
Still, she laughed because she didn’t want Blue to think her joke had fallen flat, though it sounded just like how she felt: way too nervous and fluttery. Way too obvious. Yeah, real Mistress of Mystery right here.
When she spoke next, it was honestly more to herself than to Blue: “Yeah, guess only the Shroud could stand to hang around the nosy reporter.”
A pause. She probably shouldn’t have said that, either.
“Yeah, but you’re my kind of nosy,” said Blue, and not the Silver Shroud.
Piper almost pricked her finger. Jesus Christ, get a hold of yourself. “She speaks. I was starting to think I’d be second fiddle to the Silver Shroud for the rest of my life.”
“The Mistress of Mystery was definitely no man’s second fiddle. She was a badass in every conceivable way.”
“I know that, you nerd.”
Blue snickered. “Pot. Kettle. Black.”
“True enough.”
They grew quiet for a little while. It was a comfortable, familiar silence.
So of course it was Blue who had to break it.
“S-so you… uh…” She started moving too much for Piper to get anything done, forcing her to look up and meet Blue’s eyes. She watched Blue swallow, watched the way her throat moved. “You were planning on… following me around for the rest of your life?”
So, Piper thought, this is how I’m gonna die. Crouched at the feet of the Silver Shroud in drag, for whom she was also bearing one hell of a torch, and halfway through hemming her pants, she was going to die like this. “Wha… Well, I… It isn’t like I… Jesus, you must think I’m a total creep now—”
“No!” came the way-too-fast reply. “No, I—I mean, not to sound like a creep either, but, uh… it made me kind of really… happy?” Blue huffed, then, as if she were steeling herself. “No, not happy.”
Piper froze. “What?”
Mortification took over Blue’s expression, and she threw her hands up in defense. “I mean, yes, happy! Yes, of course, happy! It came out wrong!” Another long breath. “No, I mean, I just mean… there’s happiness, and there’s other stuff. Just… other stuff.”
Piper took a moment to extract her sewing needle and put it down and out of the way. Something in her gut said it would be a good idea, and she always trusted her gut. “Other stuff?”
“Yeah.”
She was nervous. God, she was nervous. Blue had stepped around all her social shortcomings, and she’d done it in style, but there had to be a limit somewhere. There had to be a point at which, just like everyone else, Blue would decide she was more trouble than she was worth. She didn’t want to hand her heart over, again, just to have it handed back to her after a little while. At least if they stayed friends, it wouldn’t hurt as badly.
But it was funny because, well, shit, she’d basically already done it. She did it a long time ago, not too long after their first real big talk, when Blue had become much less of a stranger, when Blue had told her, a little nervously, that Blue felt like a much more comfortable name than Nora, and that she liked having Piper close. Piper had thought she was going to die then, too.
And Blue was still around, still here. Blue didn’t give up. She was decisive and damn near exhausting to be around in her own right. Perfect for Piper. Horribly, frighteningly perfect. Everything she’d ever wanted, everything she’d learned to be too afraid to ask for.
“It’s just, well… there’ve only been a few bright spots in what’s honestly just been a living hell for me, and you’ve been the brightest. Listening to all your stories about facing down mountain after frigging mountain of bullshit, going on afterward. You’re just… so… badass. You light a fire under me whenever I’m too low. I bet you don’t even know you do it. So just hearing you say you’d stick with me, even when you’re feeling conflicted about your sister, even with how dark it can get up,” she tapped one of her temples, “up here, it… just means a lot. More than you know.”
“Blue…” Piper was never big on friendly physical contact, never one much for hugs, but Blue was an exception to that, too. Of course she was. No one had ever talked to Piper the way Blue did, said the things Blue said. So she held Blue tight, silly Silver Shroud costume and all, because it felt too good not to do. When Blue’s nose pressed against her hair, she let that feel good, too. She couldn’t deny it. “Other than Nat, you know more about me than anyone else in the world. You haven’t exactly seen me at my best, either, but you stick around. No one else ever has.” Please don’t let that jinx it.
“Don’t, uh… don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m sorta glad they did. Left room for me. They’d have never left if they knew what they were leaving.”
Careful, you can make a girl fall in love with that kind of talk. It was such a smooth line. Perfect for a bad radio play. So Mistress of Mystery. She urged herself to say it. Take the leap one last time. Test the waters, stupid. She’ll be different! “C-careful, you can… can…” Her tongue felt like it was made of lead.
Blue pulled away a little. “Careful, what?”
God damn it. Moment over. Smooth line wrecked. “O-oh, um…” Then she realized how close they were, still in their embrace. Blue had pulled back to look at her, but she hadn’t loosened her arms or let go. She was so flipping beautiful.
And Piper was caught in one of those held-breath do-or-die kind of moments, both of them staring at each other, close enough to kiss, knowing what this is suddenly all about. For once, she didn’t think that they needed to talk about it. She could see it in Blue’s face: they were both thinking about it, and they were both scared.
Say! It! “Careful… you could… make a girl fall in love… with that kind of talk.” Thus spake the Mistress of Motherfucking Mystery.
Blue’s eyebrows rose just a little and her eyes widened, just for a fraction of a second, before she took another deep, trembling breath. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“H-how much more of that kind of talk?”
“Not much more.”
“Well then, uh…” Her chin dipped a little. She looked like she was concentrating. “Damn it, now I can’t come up with anything—”
Piper grinned. Was this cloud nine?
“—Not, I mean, not like it’s an act or I don’t actually feel anything. I feel a lot. It’s just now I’m actually trying to think of something clever and on the mark and I’m coming up empty—Not that there isn’t anything else to say—!”
“Blue—” She’s different. She’ll be different.
“—Because you’re really badass and amazing and, uh, gonna be honest and say really hot and I know romance has been kind of a touchy subject for you but I think we’d work out if we tried it—I mean, not that I’m asking for anything you don’t wanna give—”
“Blue.” Piper silenced her with a firmer tone and a gentle hand on her collar. “You’re good.”
“Oh… Oh, well, good.” Blue inched just a little closer. Piper could practically feel the heat radiating off her skin. “Can I…?”
“You sure you want someone loud and pushy like me?” She asked the question before she lost her nerve. She was insecure, and she knew it, and she had to know. “Someone constantly getting in over her head? I’ll probably never stop doing that, you know. I chase stories, most of them under a hail of gunfire. I mean, how many of those kinds of relationships actually work out?”
Blue frowned. “Is it really so hard to believe that someone could fall for you?”
That caught her off-guard. “Well, n-no, it’s just, I don’t think…” Actually, she didn’t know what she thought. She didn’t know why she was even still talking at this point. Blue knew all this already, and she was still here. So she let it go, as best she could, anyway, and pressed her face against Blue’s neck and shoulder. “Aw, forget it. It’s just me being nervous. I gotta learn to trust a little easier.”
“I think you’re perfect just the way you are.”
She smiled a little, lips still close to Blue’s skin. “Don’t overdo it. But I…” she nuzzled a little bit more, “I think you’re perfect, too.”
Blue angled her face down, then, and Piper angled up. It was a single, easy, smooth motion, mundane except for the part where their lips touched and Piper swore she was gonna die all over again just from feeling way too damn alive.
But she didn’t. She stayed up and moving and breathing right where she was, and when Blue kissed her harder, she gave it right back and then some. It just felt too good not to do.
Blue didn’t let Piper get anywhere near her wounds until well after they’d left Hancock’s office and gotten back to their hotel room. She may have been hiding it pretty well, but Piper could tell she was in pain.
“I just didn’t want Kent to see,” Blue whispered while Piper pulled off the makeshift bandages she had applied on the road. “He was already so shaken up. I felt bad.”
Yeah. Shaken up. Definitely couldn’t do worse than let Kent see a bullet wound in her after she had just taunted the area’s nastiest criminal into trying to kill her first. Piper tried not to think about it too much: how her stomach flew to her throat when Sinjin fired on Blue, no pause, no hesitation. How she’d watched Blue drop like a ragdoll.
The woman was insane. Piper had almost pissed herself thinking that Blue was dead, but no, she had allowed herself to be shot just so Sinjinmaybe might ignore Kent and drop his guard long enough for her to draw her 10mm and sharpshoot him right between the eyes. Piper had barely had enough time to duck behind something before Sinjin’s men caught on and the whole basement became a bloodbath. How in the hell Kent had scrambled away without a scratch would be an eternal mystery.
And Blue, well, she had a bullet in her shoulder. “An inch lower, and you’d have been on ice.”
Blue chuckled, though it was quick to make her wince. “Not the smoothest start to a relationship.” She grew stiff and quiet, then, as Piper actually went about extracting it.
“I’d hoped you’d at least buy me dinner before your alter-ego got you killed.” Piper was trying to keep the humor in her tone. No use getting mad at Blue for being the upstanding vigilante of her wildest dreams, no matter how afraid she’d become of losing her. “Guess we oughta make it a little sooner rather than later, eh?” The bloodied bullet clunked on the floor.
A cold sweat on her brow, yet somehow still chipper, Blue gave a mock gasp. “Mistress of Mystery, do you not have faith in the resilience of justice?”
Piper sighed. “Was wondering when that was coming back. Hold still.” She injected a stimpak near the wound, quick, clean, and efficient. She’d done this one too many times before. The flesh began mending within seconds. “How’s it feel?”
“The Silver Shroud feels fit as an ox!” And with that, her hero leapt up from the rickety chair, the only one in their tumbledown room.
Piper just gave her a smile. She had no idea what an ox was.
Soon enough, Blue was rotating her arm, testing Piper’s work. It was just about flawless, of course: Piper never did anything half-assed. “But… with his arch nemesis defeated and his radio guidance systems temporarily offline, the Shroud is at a loss! Tell me, clever Mistress of Mystery, what is our next step?”
Oh, what the hell. “Well, my stalwart hero, the Mistress of Mystery has one final secret to reveal!” She drew close and, with a flourish, she snatched the hat right off of Blue’s head and put it on her own. It was meant to be funny and playful, but she got caught up in being so close to her again.
Two days ago, they’d kissed for the first time. Piper had kissed her best friend. Girlfriend? She wasn’t entirely sure, though she did have a good feeling. It was just that neither of them had actually mentioned the label. Between Blue’s blood-soaked showboating and Kent getting kidnapped, there hadn’t been much time to ask. They’d barely had enough time to catch some real sleep under all the gunfire.
Blue looked as tired as Piper felt, even though she was still smiling, still looking at Piper with hooded eyes and a demeanor that said she was thinking of pulling Piper closer. “You wound me, dear Mistress. In all our travels, it was not the Shroud you wanted, but the Shroud’s hat!” She tilted her chin upward, the back of her hand draped against her brow. “It is clear to me now! Take it, then, and my heart with it!”
“I… oh wait, what?” Piper started snickering. She had meant to say something else entirely, but Blue’s mock drama threw off her train of thought. So much for playing up the heat of the moment. Warm arms came to wrap around her anyway, even though she was still laughing. “Yes! The Shroud has finally uncovered my deep-laid plans!” she half-shouted against Blue’s shoulder, “By winning his trust, the Mistress of Mystery would surely gain unrestricted access to his coveted hat! And now I have it. Victory is mine!” She threw her head back and made the best-worst approximation of a villain’s laugh that she could manage.
The hat dropped right off her head and hit the floor with a soft, muted fwop.
Now it was Blue’s turn to laugh. “Aha!” The hug grew a little tighter. “The Mistress is not so resolute in her plot after all! The Shroud knew she was a woman of justice at heart.”
As much as she could manage in Blue’s arms, Piper struck a dramatic pose. “Oh, Shroud! I can never keep anything from you. Yes, my love, your strength and honor have infected me through and through! Turn me from my evil ways, stalwart Shroud! Turn—!”
Her eyes flew open. What did she just say?
They were pressed close enough that Piper could feel the increase in Blue’s breathing rate. She watched Blue make a subtle lick of her lips just before replying. “Careful… you could make a Shroud declare his love with that kind of talk.”
It was the perfect bad radio romance moment. Piper knew she was supposed to reply with something poignant and sappy, and she honestly did try to think of something, but when she came up short, she made a small shake of her head and leant up for a kiss instead, hoping it would do all the talking for her. Yeah, she loved Blue—pretty, ridiculous Blue—but love was still such a big, scary word, and for once in her life, Piper wasn’t in much of a mood for words.
She’d almost lost Blue today. She almost lost Blue just about every day, somehow, some way. The more the thought bubbled up in her guts, the more it simmered in her heart and in her head as Blue pulled her in tighter and splayed her fingers over Piper’s hips and lower back, the more she realized how good those hands felt. She’d probably been kissed this way before, but never once did it feel quite like this, like she was buzzing with breath and heat, and every little movement was a pleasure.
Kissing her way down Blue’s jaw, down her neck, felt natural, thoughtless, where before it had been just a means to an end. She wanted to listen for the little sounds Blue made, the jagged breaths, and take pleasure in those, too.
So when Blue angled a thigh between her legs and held her there, nice and firm, Piper pressed her lips against Blue’s ear and let her know just how good it felt.
Blue shuddered. “Bed?”
“Yes.” She gave Blue’s ear a little kiss before turning around, but before she could take even two steps, hands found her stomach and lips found her neck, warm, eager. Her head fell back against Blue’s shoulder when those hands crept lower, when those fingers pressed down below her navel and made everything inside go tight. God, she wanted them even lower.
Piper could feel the smile against her skin. “I thought we were going to bed?” Blue’s voice was soft and sultry in a way Piper had never heard before.
“Trying to!” Another caress, another press, lower this time. Piper gasped. “But someone’s decided to be a pain in the ass about it.”
“Yeah, yeah, what’s new.” Blue moved them both forward, a little closer to the bed.
Piper grabbed her by the collar and tugged her along. “You don’t speed this up, I swear to God I’ll be nothing but a pillow queen.”
“You make that sound like a bad th—” Her retort was cut off when her back hit the mattress. Piper moved atop her, laid her body flush against Blue’s, thighs interlocked, and kissed her again. “Seriously, I—” Blue breathed, breaking the kiss, “I could just watch you go—oh—” Piper ground her hips down, her thigh rubbing between Blue’s legs. “Oh damn, you’re just… you’re beautiful.” It was more of a gasp than a sentence.
You make me feel that way. But that was too complicated. Too much thinking for right now. She guided one of Blue’s hands under her shirt. “Don’t even have my clothes off yet.”
The shirt went flying. Blue pulled her down, her lips quick to find Piper’s bared collarbones, the hollow of her throat, the dip between her breasts. “Doesn’t matter,” kiss, “but I’ll say it again when,” kiss, “when you do.”
“Could say the same to you, doll,” Piper whispered, pulling back to undo Blue’s buttons. The ugly gray shirt fell open to reveal the breathtaking body beneath it, and when Blue sat up to accommodate her, she slipped it over her shoulders and tossed it somewhere. Piper nudged her back down with a kiss.
“Nah, not like this.” Blue guided Piper’s fingers over her stretch marks, the physical evidence, the scars, of all that Blue had lost. They met eyes.
There was a lot more to this than what was being said, Piper knew. “It’s just you.” She leaned down and kissed one of them. “And I wouldn’t change you for the world.” She unbuckled Blue’s belt and loosened her pants, laying kisses below her navel.
A gasp. “Piper…”
“I’m serious here, Blue.” She kissed her way up to Blue’s bra, which she reached a hand around to unbuckle when Blue shifted to give her room. “Beautiful just isn’t a big enough word for you.” The bra went on the floor, then Blue reciprocated, tugging Piper’s loose and tossing it. She sat up, her mouth quick to find one of Piper’s nipples. “Mm.” Piper’s arms circled around Blue’s shoulders.
Blue moved to her other nipple. Piper’s hips started rocking. Blue’s thumbs pressed in, down, just beside her hipbones. “You look so good like this,” she whispered.
Piper smirked, her head lolling back when Blue’s thumbs dipped lower. “Save it, ladykiller.” She pushed her hands away and kissed her back down to the bed, reaching, once more, for her oversized pants. She rested her forehead against Blue’s. “Can I keep going?”
She could feel the arch and shift in Blue’s spine. “You’ve got no restrictions, trust me.”
Piper started kissing her way down. “Tell me what you like.”
“I like the direction you’re going in if you catch my—oh God—” she moaned when Piper kissed below her navel, “catch my… drift.”
“Yeah, I think I do,” she whispered against Blue’s skin as she hooked a few fingers in her waistband and gave a gentle tug. The woman under her breathed a little faster. The pants were easy to pull off and toss away, and then there was Blue, totally bare and flushed down to her chest, looking at Piper in a way that said she felt naked, too, but hopefully in a good way. Piper went back to nuzzling her lower belly. “Gorgeous.”
Blue didn’t say anything back—or couldn’t say anything back—as Piper kept kissing lower. She just threaded her fingers into Piper’s hair, and those fingers tightened when Piper’s tongue made its first pass over her clit, and she moaned, high and breathy, into the dim, dusty air. Piper dipped even lower, tasting her, how wet she was, and wrapped an arm around one of Blue’s legs when she wouldn’t hold steady. She dragged her tongue back up, swirled it around her clit, and then again, and had to smile when Blue’s breasts thrust upward and her heels dug into the small of Piper’s back. Eager hands pulled harder at her hair, almost enough to hurt. Eager hips fought against Piper’s grip, fought to move, to grind against her face.
She thought about taking her time, about ‘savoring the moment’ and all that romance-novel jazz. She really did think about it.
“Oh God, Piper—” She sucked Blue’s stiff clit between her lips and brushed her tongue over it, up and down, back and forth, faster, groaning deep in her throat and through her nose when Blue’s thighs started to tremble. No restrictions, she’d said, and she was already getting close, and Piper just wasn’t patient enough to wait on taking her there. She moved her free hand near the soaked spot just beneath her chin. “Ah, ah, oh God—oh shi—” Piper pushed inside, two fingers angling up to stroke against Blue’s upper wall.
Blue’s head threw back. She got louder. She rocked harder, thrashing in Piper’s hold, tightening around her fingers, releasing Piper’s head so she could grip the mattress and push deeper. She was throbbing, fluttering. Piper could feel it. She was close, shaking, gone—
She cried out, stiffened, came loose, releasing and constricting around Piper’s fingers, riding it out against her lips, back arched, neck craned, her arms thrust above her head, legs tight around Piper’s shoulders. Piper kept rubbing her until the throbbing slowed down, kept sucking her until a gentle, trembling hand came to rest on the crown of her head. “Mm, I can’t—” a harsh breath, “Christ, I can’t take any…” another breath as Piper released her, “I… can’t feel my legs.”
Laughing, Piper gave her clit one last little kiss—eliciting a twitch—before moving up and into Blue’s arms. “And here I was worried I’d be rusty.”
Blue gave a smiling, breathy scoff. “You call that rusty?”
“Mm, guess not.” Piper snuggled closer, pressing her lips to Blue’s neck, unable to resist. She was doing her best to ignore the throbbing between her own legs and let Blue catch her second wind, but after all that, it was proving to be a challenge.
She was late in realizing that she was already rocking against Blue’s thigh.
The woman under her groaned, her hands rising to capture Piper’s hips and help her along. “Damn. Damn you’re so…” She trailed off so they could kiss, Piper moaning against Blue’s lips as she ground harder.
She hadn’t even taken her own damn pants off.
Blue kissed her way down Piper’s jaw. “Restrictions?”
“Fuck no,” she breathed, just before Blue’s hand cupped her. She moved against it, moaning when Blue’s fingers started to stroke her over the fabric. “C’mon, Blue,” she husked, reaching for her zipper, “don’t tease.”
“Maybe I like to watch.” Still, Blue paused long enough for Piper to shimmy her pants down, taking her underwear too. Then one of Blue’s hands took hold of Piper’s waist. The other trailed a few fingers up her inner thigh. Piper shivered. “Actually, do you like it on top?”
“Yeah.” Piper braced her hands on either side of Blue’s head. “B-but I won’t last long like this. And I’m sorry if I start—Blue!”
Blue’s breathing deepened, changed, as she brushed a finger through slick folds, and then stroked it against Piper’s clit.
Inside, Piper was pulsing. Tightening. She ground against Blue’s hand, trying to angle her lower, anything to take her in, have more. “Blue…”
A kiss on her chin. “Tell me what to do.”
“Inside.” The fingers moved down, rubbed at her entrance, lined up. She sank down on them. “Oh God.” Blue’s thumb stretched out and up, pressing right against her clit. Piper clutched at the mattress, her hips rocking. “Blue,” she moaned, spine arching as those fingers lit her up inside, thrust deep as they could go, stroked her.
“C’mon, Piper,” came the gentle order. With her free hand, Blue grasped Piper’s hip and encouraged her to move. “I wanna see it. Don’t hold back.”
She ground down, back and forth, slowly at first, her clit rubbing against the ridge of Blue’s thumb, making her throb, making her twitch, tighten, and gasp. She was quick to find her stride, though, so damn quick, holding the mattress in a white-knuckled grip and bouncing and riding on Blue’s hand with everything she had, feeling it build, furious, hot, feeling it flutter deep inside her as she screwed her eyes shut and arched her back and thrust her face upward to let it take her over, mouth wide open, Blue’s name sharp and loud with every breath.
“Blue, Blue, Blue!” She heard herself. Distant. Each call felt good. Each bounce and stroke tingled up her spine and down her legs and coiled tighter and hotter around Blue’s fingers—“I’m—” until she was close, until she was right there—“I’m—Blue, I’m—!” There. She clenched. Her toes curled. Her spine went stiff and she angled down and rode each pulse, head back, moaning Blue, Blue, throbbing with every breath she took, throbbing with Blue’s every upward thrust.
It was a gradual collapse. She rode it until it became too much. Only then did she slow down, stop, and let her head fall onto Blue’s shoulder, exhausted, but still on her knees because Blue was still inside her.
Blue’s free arm wrapped around her waist and she spoke in a whisper: “You okay?”
Piper nodded, breathing hard through her nose.
“Gonna pull out. You ready?”
Piper nodded again, then whimpered at the feeling of fingers brushing against her oversensitive flesh. It only lasted a second, though, and then she was empty, and she wasn’t sure if she liked that very much, either.
But it did feel nice to let her body sink fully down against Blue, languid, loose, and a little sore, but only in the best of ways. So this was afterglow, then. She’d never really felt it before. All her previous encounters had ended with one of them rolling out of bed—usually her, if she was being honest—to get back to work or self-endangerment or whatever. Before Blue, there had never been enough to make her want to keep lying there, curled up in the arms of someone who’d never understand her, who’d eventually figure that part out and decide to leave her.
But this time, oh, this time, she wanted to stretch out like a cat and rub up against Blue like she’d never learned the meaning of the word shame. She wanted to breathe and feel warm and sexy in a way Blue could see, because, for once in her life, it finally felt good to do.
Blue kissed the top of Piper’s head. “Is it crude to say I think you broke my hand?”
Piper sighed. Then again, this was Blue she was musing about. “This your idea of pillow talk?”
Blue chuckled. “I’ll take that as a yes. All right. Uh…” She paused to think, hugging Piper a little tighter. “It’s broken in a good way?”
Piper groaned.
“A worth-it kind of way. Like, what I just witnessed? Wow. That was…” Blue shuddered. “That was really hot.”
“And so subtle, too,” Piper grumbled, nuzzling further against Blue’s neck and shoulder.
“You know you love it.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Mhm. I bet that was the Mistress of Mystery’s big secret all along. You know, the one you were gonna unveil before the Shroud swept you off your feet.” Blue paused to clear her throat. “My dear Mistress, the Silver Shroud knows you find him endearing! Indeed, how could you not? For I am… the Silver—!”
Piper silenced her with a kiss. “Actually, stalwart Shroud, the Mistress of Mystery was going to reveal how she learned to hem a pair of pants. But, y’know, if it helps you sleep at night…”
Blue gave her a perplexed look. “Seriously?”
Piper laid back down. “Yup. Learned it from some old lady.”
A few silent seconds passed. Then, she heard Blue whisper: “… Seriously?”
Piper kissed Blue’s naked shoulder. “Aw, simmer down, doll, you know I’m more than a little crazy about you.”
“Crazy, my dear Mistress?”
She smiled. “Batshit, my stalwart Shroud.”
“And for you, my Mistress, I am equally batshit! For I am…” here it comes, “the Silver Shroud!”
Piper just kissed her again, laughing, because why not. She could sigh and roll her eyes all she wanted, but really, she knew they were both batshit crazy and that, yes, she did love every weird, silly little part of her Blue. She knew she’d stay by Blue’s side no matter where it took her, even if it meant she had to fill the shoes—sandles?—of Grognak the Barbarian next, and that Blue would stay by hers, because she was Blue, and that was that.
Blue cleared her throat again. “Their horizontal spar complete, the Silver Shroud and the Mistress of Mystery look to the horizon. Where will the hand of fate guide them next? What new challenges await our heroes? And why the hell does the Mistress of Mystery continue to put up with all this?”
“All in the name, doll. It’s a mystery.”
Blue made a slow, dramatic wave of her hand. “Stay tuned.”
Piper kissed her cheek, sighing. “It’s a goddamned mystery.”