"No. Now sit down, we need to talk."
"Ask nicely, Dimples." She was pushing it. My patience was beyond thin right now.
She was standing there in her stupid ass pink robe that barely dusted the tops of her thighs, and I wanted to eat her alive.
"Ashton. Sit Down." My blood was still boiling. My hands were twitchy, I wanted to pin her against the nearest wall and make her scream my name until her windows shattered.
It had been so long, so fucking long since the last time I felt her around me, I never wanted to leave her. I forgot how ridiculously addictive she was in bed.
I'd never wanted to kill my best friend until I watched him slide inside her. He was very lucky that she was there to distract me or he wouldn't have made it out of here in one piece.
Was that fair to him? No. Absolutely not. However, I simply did not care at the time. He was inside her and he deserved a broken body part for it.
My ears were still ringing, hearing her call his name. It was cruel, the way my own brain could punish me like this. My mind was nothing but a highlight reel of every time I'd made her cry out my name since we were stupid teenagers, and then "Oh! Ni!" cuts through like searing hot poker.
Did I have any claim over Ashton? No.
Did I have a claim over her in our group of friends? Yes.
They knew. They all knew that Poppet was mine. Well, except for Liam, he was too high back then to know any better. He never knew what the fuck was going on.
I hated her for how much she invaded my mind. Since I was 18 years old that woman had branded herself on my mind and body.
She couldn't know that though.
She was never supposed to be more than my friend's annoying sister.
She was never supposed to be part of the group, she was never supposed to know us like that.
She was never supposed to look at me the way she did.
I was never supposed to touch her the way I did.
I was never supposed to dream of her.
I was never supposed to know the way she tasted.
She was never supposed to leave.
She did though, and I couldn't forget it. Sometimes when I see Liam's name light up my phone I feel my stomach drop, like I'll relive that phone call all over again.
"She's not there, Harry. Fuck, she's not there, what if she's hurt!? What if something happened to her, what if someone took her? Why didn't she make it to L.A. H!? Where is she!?"
Liam was convinced that a client had taken her. He was convinced that a deal went bad and someone was using her for ransom, using her to hurt us.
I never told him how long I kept looking for her.
I never told him when I found her.
I just moved him to New York.
I didn't know where she was exactly, but I knew she was here so that meant we all needed to be here. There just was no other option.
Zayn had to stay in Vegas for the time being, but he was excited to get back here soon. He just had to secure the product and then he could come home.
The day she walked into my studio my first reaction was to hit the floor in tears, but it was instantly squashed by rage. Absolute fucking rage at the woman in front of me.
My body burned with anger toward her that was matched only by desire. I wanted to fuck her and scream at her at the same time.
She stood there and her eyes finally met mine and I could see all of it. All the years we spent sneaking around, all the memories I don't mess with. Drunken giggles and kisses that just melted into sex. We never talked about those times, we never talked about the times she would fall asleep draped across my body or the times she would play with my hair while I finished my assignments in college.
Those memories were off-limits and we never brought them up after they happened. We went back to scowling faces, jabbing insults, and fucking her from behind.
I always fucked her from behind.
Partly because she loved it, but mostly because I never wanted her to be able to read me. The last time I saw her in that airport I fucked her in the mirror and I knew she could see too much.
I didn't know then just how devastating that day would be, but I think a part of me wanted her to see it before she left.
She still hadn't sat down. She was just staring at me now, arms crossed and one eyebrow raised like the brat she is. She was challenging me and I knew it. I also knew her ass was probably sore from my hands on it and that sitting wouldn't feel too good right now, so I wasn't going to push her on it.
I didn't do aftercare. I never have.
I knew that I should, I knew that I should draw her a warm bath and get her clean sheets and brush her hair, massage the soreness out of her scalp and kiss her gently in the places I grabbed her roughly...but I wouldn't do it.
I wouldn't do it because even now I still hold hope that she'll tell me to stay away from her. Even now I hope that she'll realize she shouldn't be treated that way and tell me to fuck off and never touch her again, because unless she tells me to I know I won't stay away from her.
I was awful to her for years and she just kept coming back, kept coming around, kept pressing her body to mine, and letting me have her.
I never took it for granted but I always acted like I did.
"Fine. Stand then, I don't care. I'm sitting." I returned to the chair that she'd tied me to and crossed one leg over the other, making myself comfortable.
The pink rope laid limply on the floor and when I glanced at it I could feel the sting of the rope burn on my wrists. I pulled hard to get that off of me, she had tied it well. I knew my wrists would be fucked for days.
I sat back in the chair and ran my hand over my face. What the fuck was I doing here? When I got the notification that Niall was leaving his post I thought the fucker had been kidnapped or something, but no, he just came here to fuck my girl behind my back!
"My girl," Jesus Christ I needed to get it together. She wasn't "my" anything. We weren't even friends anymore. I always felt like I knew her but the shock of her decision to hide from us showed me that I guess I never did.
That's fair, I suppose. Spreading her open was the only way I ever knew her, but she never really knew me either. If she did know me then she would have known that there was no reason to hide from us, I would have never let anything happen to her. I was already fighting with Liam back then about taking her on drops with us, that's why I made sure she never went with him alone.
I think that's part of why it cut me deeper than the rest of them. Not because I particularly liked her, but because I would have done anything to keep her safe and away from it. I chose this life for myself but I wouldn't wish it for anyone else.
The others loved her dearly, but they always thought she could handle herself in our world, that she would fit right in as part of the team. I hated them for that. Both for loving her so openly and being willing to put her into this life.
I underestimated her. A part of my brain thought that she'd stay with us forever and that even though our relationship was fucked and toxic and full of unsaid things and unresolved issues, I'd have it forever. I never thought she'd hide from us. I never thought I would grieve for her like that.
Grieving for the living is hard. Where most of the steps of grief and in peace and acceptance... mine ended in anger.
Denial and anger were the only steps in my grieving process for Ashton Payne.
Now she was here, standing in front of me after having her fun and playing her little game, and I was still angry. I was angry that she still affected me so much, I was angry that she fucked Niall while I was tied to this fucking chair, I was angry that she called him in the first place, and I was angry that after only being in each other's lives for mere weeks again, we were already back to this game.
I didn't want to play the damn game.
Our previous arrangement was simple, we only fucked each other and that's all we ever did. It was simple and effective. We had incredible sex, we knew the other one was clean so we didn't have to worry, we were comfortable with each other in bed, it was a good system.
"Spit it out Harry, I want to take a shower. I'm not spending all night at your disposal." She snapped at me and shifted her weight to the other hip.
"Why did you call him?" I think my question surprised her, her eyes widened just a fraction before her smug smirk returned to her face.
"Because I wanted to fuck him, Why did you track him here?" Oh, we were gonna play this game. I liked the question game, we were more honest this way.
"Because he was supposed to be working and I was concerned. Did you want to fuck him specifically?" I had leaned back in the chair, legs spread.
"Concerned? For what? If he was just meeting a client why the hell would you be concerned?" She was getting distracted. Her eyes flickered down to my lap and her tongue darted out to wipe her bottom lip.
I scooted down even farther in the chair, letting my pants tighten up in my crotch so she could see the bulge that was starting to form from our tension-filled banter. Her eyes kept bouncing from my eyes to my lap, keeping her distracted from her line of questioning.
"You didn't answer my question, Poppet." I slid my hands down my thighs and then back up toward my hips slowly.
"Why don't you come here so I can hear your answer properly." She was practically drooling as she crossed the room to me and straddled my lap. She clamped her tired thighs around my own and let her weight rest on top of me. Her arms went to the back of the chair on either side of my head.
I looked up at her pouty mouth, swollen and red from the work she put in on Niall, and felt the jealousy flare up again. I lifted my knee to make her body roll toward mine, stimulating her abused clit. She whimpered as she fell into me and I let my hands grip her waist firmly.
"Don't lie to me, Poppet. Was it Niall you wanted to fuck tonight? Was it the thought of our good friend with his hands on you that drove you mad? Was it his name you wanted to scream? Did you want to taste him?" I let my hands run up her back and down to her sore ass cheeks while I spoke in her ear. I rocked her hips forward again and she collapsed into my neck.
I hadn't felt her there in a very long time, leaned into my chest and neck like this. The last time was in college, and she was crying. That night she showed up at our door and I didn't question it, I just let her in and followed her to my room after she waved to Ni. I walked in behind her and pulled my shirt off over my head. I had just gotten home so I sat down to take off my shoes, and I heard her sniffle.
When I looked up she was taking off her clothes while tears ran down her face.
"Hey, Woah. No, no, no, stop. Stop, Ash. What's wrong? Are you okay? What happened?" I pulled her hand toward me and she just crawled into my lap. She turned her legs to the side and slid her hands around my neck and buried her face into my skin. Her warm breath and wet tears coated the exposed skin between the hollow of my throat and my chest. She never told me what it was about, she just cried until I finally coaxed her into laying in bed. I stayed with her and held her all night, I didn't sleep a wink that night, and in the morning we pretended like it never happened.
Now her hot breath was coating my skin again, but she was panting, not crying. "Answer me, Ashton. Who was it that you really wanted this evening?"
"You, you, you, you," she mumbled into my neck while she ground her hips down onto my thigh.
"Louder, Poppet." My head was tilted back, mouth open with heavy breaths at the sensation.
"You! You! I wanted you! Always fucking you."
"Want another reminder?" I let my hand slip between her legs as they rested on my thigh and she instantly moaned for me.
"Good girl, such a mess for me. Let me hear you again." She moaned louder as she started to rub herself over my fingers, soaking them completely.
"We used to have an arrangement back in the day, do you remember?" She whimpered into me and nodded.
"Words, Poppet. Focus or you'll have to find a new seat. Look at me." She brought her head up and her hips worked faster. The shift in position from her sitting up more made my fingers slide farther into her folds, teasing the opening of her slick cunt. She was feral, fulling panting, no memory of the soreness and discomfort she had been previously feeling, the only thing she felt was pleasure mixed with the perfect amount of pain.
She loved to be edged until she couldn't handle it anymore, and she was working herself into a frenzy on my lap. "Do you remember the arrangement, Ashton? Tell me."
"We only fucked each other. Kept us clean and safe and satisfied. Any play partners were mutually agreed upon."
"Is that an arrangement you'd be interested in having again?" I should have been confident in her answer by the way she was riding my thigh at that moment, but she had a habit of surprising me these days so I felt my confidence waiver even as her cunt tried to clench onto my fingertips.
"Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Make me come again and then I'll answer you."
"Oh, you want to play it that way? Fine." I slid my fingers up to her clit and started the pattern I wanted to draw on her.
She collapsed into my chest as soon as my finger pressed against her.
Over and over again I traced the pattern until she caught on.
"Oh, you fucker. You sick fuck, don't you dare stop." She clawed into my shoulders, face still buried.
H- A- R- R- Y
I continued to spell my name on her clit until she unraveled before me. My thigh was completely drenched in her, and my skin was sticky from the humidity of her breath.
"A reminder of what you really wanted tonight. So, what do you say, Poppet? For old times sake?"
She sat up and looked me dead in the eyes before huffing out a breath and standing from my lap.
"Eh, I'll think about it. I'll let you know when I decide. Now, please see yourself out, I need to shower. Good to see you, Dimples."
With that, she stood and walked to her bathroom without even a glance behind her.
Fuck, she was hot.
______________________
hey, hi, hello.
a shorter update but y'all got chrysalis this week too so anytime it's double the chapters are going to be shorter.
i'm so excited for this story. chrysalis is over halfway over and when it ends i will be focusing all my energy on magnetic because it's going to be quite a story. i'm so excited to bring these characters to life for you, pls remember that we're barely scraping the surface.
side note: i've gotten a few questions so i thought i'd answer them here:
current day ashton is 25.
current day harry is 26.
current niall is 26
liam, louis and zayn are all 27-28.
frat boy harry is the highschool era of this fic, so when you see 2013 era pics of the boys, it's a high school memory.
lhh is the college harry so and 2014-2015 pics you see of the boys are college.
there will be a LOT of flashbacks in this fic.
you can find lots more content on my twitter, pinned tweet and also the character accounts which you can find from my account
@/ stachestyles_ on twitter
PLEASE KEEP MAKING TIKTOKS I LOVE THEM they make me smile so hard.
@/ stachestyles on tiktok
i love you all endlessly, thanks for being here. -mo💖