Cammie & Manny: One Free Night

[x-scorpion.livejournal.com]

Manny takes advantage of the free night offered by Callie in not quite the way he said he was going to...

Manny's skin was cool, she thought, as she laid there.

Cammie was warmer than normal, something Dr. Grey had suggested was part of her mutation, so she didn't mind the fact that his skin was cooler than hers. She didn't move for the moment, but considered going back to her room. It wasn't often she got to just enjoy something like this though. She was poison. But once, or twice a week this was okay to indulge in.

Like cheesecake.

When she could taste it. Now that she thought about it, she didn't remember how cheesecake tasted, only that it was good.

This was good too; in small doses.

"So, should I leave now?" she asked, finally opening her mouth.

There was no response at first, only the simplest brush of green hair away from her face as Manuel drifted in a doze. It was very slowly that her abrupt interuption brought him back and he shifted.

"Are you telling me or asking?" he finally asked, amusement lightly playing in his tone.

"Asking," she returned quietly, her face no longer completely obscured, "Normally, I'm gone by now," she added. She wasn't quite sure why she was still staying, or why she even bothered to ask. "So asking."

If Manuel was surprised, he didn't show it. His arm tightened around her and he let his hand smooth down her back, gentle with touch. "Then no," he replied, though had nothing more to add.

Cammie, for some reason was paying attention to every breath she took, for once not skittish at the touch, "Thought you couldn't wait to get rid of me," she said softly, scooting in closer.

"Thought you could not wait to leave," Manuel countered.

"Yeah, well, my legs are rubbery. I don't think I can stand right now," Cammie said, "I blame you, of course."

"Hm," he smiled faintly, "Of course." He was content with this. "Convenient. I blame you for being unable to move too."

"Yeah, you would," she said, shifting enough to be able to look up at his face, not quite sure what she'd see now that she wasn't looking at it in the throes of passion. After all, they didn't exactly like each other. "I think we both had a hand in it."

He opened his eyes and met her gaze, quirking a brow. "I prefer to blame you. It is easier." They didn't exactly hate each other either.

"Yeah," she muttered, "You would," she had to stifle a yawn, "I just think you're crazy. I mean, you're sleeping with me."

"Technically, there is very little sleeping happening, though you're right. I am several degrees of crazy to be here, lying with you."

"Jesus, it's just a turn of phrase," she said, her green eyes almost, but not quite closing, "What gets me is you don't seem to be afraid of getting hurt."

He regarded her with more interest and brushed her hair away from her face again. "And why do you care?" he asked, though it lacked the usual snark that he had at the ready for her.

"Everyone's afraid," Cammie returned, and they should be. Jean-Paul and Kurt didn't show it. Jake and Logan were different, they didn't have a reason to be afraid. "I'm used to that."

"Everyone is afraid when they should be. I have no reason to be, except for your lack of control and it is not currently an issue." They spent very little time together, therefore he felt this was unwarranted.

"So you're not worried you're suddenly going to drop dead?" Cammie asked, "Do you just not have a sense of self preservation?"

"If I worried about that, I would be sick with self preservation. You and my sister are possibly the most normal aspects in my life and if I ever worry about self preservation, it is in the Hellfire club that I apply my worries there. Why does this concern you aside from the obvious?"

"How can you consider me a normal anything?" Cammie said, propping herself up slightly on one arm. She didn't know what the fuck the Hellfire club was so she wasn't going to touch that but the last, she could. "If by obvious you mean the fact that I've accidentally killed people without trying, I don't know... maybe the fact that I don't like doing that. Or making people physically ill."

"We are in very close proximity of people who know your powers, know what they do and how to extend a life if something should go wrong." He didn't bother addressing what was normal because most of his life had not been that.

"So outside of this place, you'd drop me like a bad habit," Cammie said, not bothered by the notion. Well, she was, but she wasn't going to show it, "Which is the right thing to do with me. And I'm still not a normal anything," she said, laying back down.

He knew a pout when he saw one, even if it was another form of a pout and Manuel sat up, forcing her to sit up as well. "Outside of this place, you would not have given me a second glance, nor I to you. Why are you speculating?"

She looked down at her green hand, the one she hated. Other people drew shiny and amazing cards out of the power box. She, on the other hand, smelled, drank heavy chemicals and killed people.

"Fuck if I know. Just nevermind. Consider it post-sex rambling or something."

Something had changed between them, some emotion and he was not inclined to let it drop, if only because she had brought it up. There was something else underlying beneath it. "You do know. You simply will not say it," he said and reached over, grabbing the wolfhead of his cane and unlacing himself from her to stand up, fetching some clothes.

"Then we can just forget about it," Cammie said, still sitting up, not bothering to cover herself with anything. Her chest was sporting a fresh, new scar.

"Denial is quite the familiar trait with you," he said, setting clothes on the bed and a hand closed over her arm, above her elbow, turning her to face him. "Well?"

"Well what?" she asked, not trying to weasel the way out of the touch like she thought she should, "My denial is happy running right through Egypt. But if this is your way of saying 'get dressed and get out of here' I can do that."

He was up and around, after all. Any more from her and he may have to wash his sheets.

His grip tightened and he pulled her to him, if only because nothing seemed to get through to her other than violence and aggression. "You are insufferably stubborn," he stepped back and pushed her back down. "Sit. Stay. Perhaps you only understand dog commands?"

She fell back on the mattress without so much as a sound and then, "Arf. Arf. Arf. Bark," was the retort. "I do get called a bitch often enough, so yeah, whatever. You're getting dressed, I'll just hang out naked then. Since I can't think of a time where we've been alone together now where either of us have stayed clothed for more than five minutes."

He regarded her with a less than patient expression before he shook out the shirt he was using today and drew it around her shoulders so she would have something to put on. "Perhaps we should rethink that, then."

"Which part? The part where I'm a bitch or the part where we're fucking like bunnies after five minutes?" she asked, buttoning the shirt up. It was something to wear, even if it was a bit big. It smelled like him, which she couldn't figure out if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

"Don't be crude," he replied in a curt tone and walked over to the chair,settling into it to pull on his black boxer briefs. There was something about a woman in his shirt that was completely unhinging and disarming that the afterglow of sex still radiated from her. "I am speaking of leaving and I think you know what I am meaning."

"Yeah mean like calling the whole thing quits?" she asked, "I'm not a mind reader, so it's kind of not right to say I know what you mean," Cammie pointed out, finally standing up, the shirt falling to just below her hips.

The idea of calling something quits shouldn't bother her at all.

But it did bother her and he felt it.

"You initiated this. I am going off of what you started." Even as he said it, he knew he wanted to talk of it more and beckoned her to him with a finger. "You should stay because I want you to stay and not because you think you should leave."

Cammie walked in closer at the gesture, her bare feet padding softly. She wasn't tall at all, and if it weren't for her green arm you wouldn't even think she was dangerous. Just a thin girl in a shirt too big for her. "Fine then, I guess you'll have to put up with me. As long as I'm not making you physically ill. Which I could care less about," she said, though the last was a lie.

"I am sure I will make due," came his reply and he took her hand, pulling her into his lap. "You always make me physically ill." Her emotions betrayed her but he knew not to say anything more. The fact that she was here said enough.

"Then maybe we should get back to the being naked part. I'm at least good at that part," she said from her seat on his lap, "Less thinking and more sex."