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"Hey, Bette. You okay?" Gar's voice was more quiet than it had been all day as he caught up with Bette outside the showers at the Tower.
The door slipped closed behind her as she stepped out into the hallway, idly toweling at her hair. "I'm fine, Gar," she said, and wondered how long he'd been waiting for her out here.
Gar caught his bottom lip with his teeth, his hand coming up to scrub through his hair once, mussing it, as he fell into step beside Bette. "It's just, you know, with Dick around and all..." When Bette stopped and turned to look at him, arching a brow, Gar trailed off. "I just wanted to make sure that—"
"I'm over him, Gar," Bette said. "You know that."
She began her walk down the hall to the stairs down to the rest of the main Titans team. Gar trailed after her, practically heeling. "Well, I know that. I mean, obviously. It's just that you haven't seen him in a while, and I—"
Bette didn't have to stop to look to know that Gar was biting his lip and indulging himself in some more nervous hair-mussing.
"I told you, Gar. It's not a big deal. I'm over it."
Gar seemed satisfied with that, and Bette bounded down the three flights of stairs with a green puppy at her heels.
***
The club wasn't quite all-ages, but with Gar and Bette and Roy, they'd managed to sweet-talk Toni in, and now Toni and Gar were on the dance floor enjoying themselves, and Bette was sitting at the bar with a gin & tonic. She wasn't unhappy, not really.
Bette wasn't even really jealous, not in a real way, that Nightwing was off somewhere letting Jesse not-cry on him because, well, Jesse was having a rough time, which Bette understood. And she didn't really even want him anymore, it was just— it was like some sort of emotional reflex.
She was jealous in what would be best described as a more general sort of way, and what it really was was showing up here, and babysitting while the "real" heroes took care of business. That nobody else took her any more seriously than Nightwing did, which wasn't seriously at all.
As much fun as their adventure with the kids had been, it still hurt.
Bette has thick skin, and she adapts, even if people don't believe it. These days she studies, and does her thing in LA, keeping the boys mostly under control. It's just that the switch from tennis player to superhero was a lot easier than the transition from groupie to someone people should take seriously. Nobody else seems to be able to accept that she can change, or that she's any good, and she's actually good at a lot of things.
Her plan had been to do what she did back in California, which was fight some crime, and then go out on the town with Gar and Matt and Tara, and have a great time secure in the knowledge they'd done good. It was hard to be sullen when she was dancing with Gar, but something about being out here, out of LA— Bette wasn't sure if it was being on the east coast, or being around the "real" Titans, or just the presence of Nightwing, but her plan wasn't quite working.
"You know, it's weird," said a voice near Bette's ear. She instinctively jumped, spinning to see... Roy. Of course. She should have expected that. His eyes widened, mouth twisting a little. "Feelin' a little jumpy tonight?"
"Wasn't expecting you," she replied, settling back down on her barstool. Roy settled down on the stool next to her, resting his elbows on the bar and signaling the bartender over. "What's weird?" Bette asked before taking a sip of her gin & tonic.
Roy nodded in the direction of the dance-floor where Gar was rather spastically dancing with Toni. "I haven't seen him very much since the last Raven... thing. It's weird seeing him be a normal guy again."
Bette shook her head slightly. "Gar? Gar wouldn't hurt a flea." She paused for a moment because, "well... maybe if it was a giant flea bent on the destruction of the universe or something. But he's a good guy. I've heard about what happened, but I just can't imagine—"
"He wasn't himself; I get that. I'm just sayin'..." Roy shrugged a little, tilting his head toward Bette. "It's weird."
Which was when the bartender finally made his miraculously-timed entrance, breaking up what could only have been the beginning of an uncomfortable dialogue peppered with words like "weird" and "strange" and lots of "I don't knows." Instead, Roy ordered one of those beers that people who are connoisseurs of beer drink, and Bette took another sip of her gin & tonic, and watched Gar and Toni dancing. They looked like they were having a good time, which wasn't difficult when Gar had on his hyper face.
"So," Roy said, leaning in closer to Bette as the bartender walked away, "You and Animal, eh?" He gave her a conspiratorial wink.
Bette felt the laugh bubbling up but didn't bother to try to stop it. "No," she said. "Me and Gar? No."
"Seriously?" Roy asked. He sounded surprised. Bette had known that she and Gar were kind of attached at the hip these days, especially with Vic booking it out to Keystone, but she hadn't thought anyone would seriously get ideas.
"Seriously." Bette dragged her thumb along the edge of her glass. "I'm—" How to phrase this? "I'm not exactly his type," Bette finally said, and it only took a moment for Roy to quirk an eyebrow, the edge of his mouth twitching toward a smile.
"I'm not surprised," Roy said, even though he sounded it. He lifted his cup to his mouth, and Bette made a note to never offer to buy Roy beer because he apparently just ripped through them.
Bette took one last sip of her drink before sliding off the barstool to hit the dance floor. That was why she'd come here after all.
She wasn't at all surprised by the heavily callused hand that caught her arm at the elbow. "So, you always go for the unavailable guys?" Roy asked, and at the abrupt shift of his body, suddenly it seemed half his hair was in his eyes. Bette wasn't sure if the look was sexy or silly.
"I haven't 'gone for' Gar, Roy," Bette said, and she was starting to feel like a broken record trying to explain to everyone who ever put on spandex that she didn't, actually, need to have a waist-deep obsessive crush to function in life.
Roy's mouth twitched again. Bette wondered if he ever smiled for longer than a millisecond. "What about Dick?" he asked. He still hadn't let go of Bette's arm, and the callus on his thumb was scratching across the sensitive skin at the inside of her arm. It didn't quite tickle.
"I got over it," Bette said.
"You got over it."
Roy's hand wasn't quite on her elbow, but just above it, gripping her upper arm, and when his thumb moved, it just barely brushed against the side of her breast. Bette couldn't quite stop the hitch in her breath, and if she didn't have any idea what was going on in Roy's mind, so much the better.
"It wasn't working. I got over it," Bette said again.
"Good."
***
They were supposed to be quiet because it was very late and the DEO kids were asleep, but Bette wasn't doing a very good job of it. This was primarily Roy's fault. His hand was supposed to be on her hip to steady her. He wasn't supposed to pull her in so tightly against him that their feet tangled together a little as they walked down the hall, and Roy most certainly wasn't supposed to let his hand drift from her hip, fingers flattening low on her stomach, just above—
Bette stopped walking halfway down the hall, and Roy's reflexes were clearly better than hers, because he only stumbled a little for his footing. His voice was low in her ear, "You good?" and his breath against her neck made Bette bite her lip. They were supposed to be quiet, and he still wouldn't move his hand.
Except then he did, only not quite how she'd intended, because his hand was sliding up, underneath her shirt, and his callused fingers were brushing lightly across the skin of her stomach. It didn't matter how hard Bette bit her lip at this point because she was making this awful squeaking sound in the back of her throat, and she... really didn't want Roy to stop.
His hand was rucking her shirt up higher, settling his palm flat on Bette's stomach, his fingertips moving slightly against her skin. His thumb shifted, coming close, but not quite close enough to brushing the underside of Bette's breasts. Roy was so warm, and moving, less at her side than behind her.
Roy's mouth on the nape of her neck was just wet enough, a sharp suction, light scrape of teeth, and Bette was absolutely positive that cutting her hair had been a wise decision because, God.
And she wasn't being that loud, not really.
Her hand reached up to bury itself in Roy's hair before she'd even really thought about it, and her fingers curled, tightening at the roots of Roy's hair, holding him in place as he kissed around to the side of her neck, lips fastening just behind her ear. When his arm tightened around her, hand pressing hard at her stomach to pull her back against him, Bette let out a shaky gasp, her eyelids fluttering closed.
Roy was hard, pressed up tight against her, his hand slipping a little higher along her torso, this time, his thumb did just lightly brush against her breast, and Bette had to stop making those little whimpery noises every time Roy's teeth nipped lightly at her neck, because— because...
"Roy," Bette murmured, and Roy made a slight affirmative noise against her skin, and that wasn't what Bette meant, but, "I don't— we shouldn't do this. Here."
The low noise Roy made in his throat, muffled against Bette's neck, made want curl low in Bette's stomach, and she didn't want to stop except,
"We're in the hallway."
"Perceptive." His tongue skated around the rim of Bette's ear, as he shifted against her.
Bette tightened her grip in Roy's hair, and pulled him off. Which both made him stop his assault on her ear, but also made him let out the most amazing open-mouthed noise of need, and Bette was kind of sorry for making him stop but, "Just-"
"No, no. I get it." Roy leaned in again, mouth tracing along her jaw.
"Your place or mine?"
***
The door shut behind them, and the next thing Bette knew, her back was flat against it, and Roy's hands gripped her hips as he pressed his mouth to hers. The kiss was gentle for about a millisecond before Bette was nipping at Roy's mouth, swallowing the quiet noises he made.
Bette wasn't quite sure how they'd managed to make it to the guest room from where they'd been in the corridor. Roy's hands and mouth were far preferable to trying to actually walk anywhere, and now—
Roy was pulling her shirt up and off, and it had barely fallen to the floor before her had her hoisted up, hands on her thighs, her back flat against the door, and Jesus, he was freaking strong.
Duh, Bette. Archer.
She wrapped her legs tight around him, and his hips jerked, and this kiss wasn't so much good as it was all-consuming. There wasn't much to do other than hang on to Roy, one hand clutching at his shoulder (and he still had his shirt on), and her other hand tangling in his hair.
He had her pinned up against the wall, and Bette didn't quite mean to be shifting her hips as much as she was, but the need for more was starting to pool low in her belly and Roy was hard, and strong, and about as eager for it as she felt. When his mouth moved from hers to trail down along her jaw, down to her throat, nothing was muffling the sounds Bette made anymore, and she didn't, actually, care.
Her fingers dug into Roy's shoulder, and he just made another of his unexpected "yes, please" noises. Bette couldn't believe she was doing this because yeah, Roy was hot like a hot thing that was hot, but—
"Do you want to stop?" Roy's voice was muffled against Bette's skin, and she hadn't intended to say any of that out loud.
"If-" Bette's breath hitched with a roll of Roy's hips, and Jesus he didn't play fair. "If you stop I will have you killed," she said. Roy was laughing, and one of his hands moved up to the small of her back.
He was pulling her away from the door, carrying her as he stepped backwards, further into the room, and Bette caught Roy's mouth again, tightening her thighs at his hips, fingers digging into his shoulder.
When her fingers tightened in Roy's hair, his teeth scraped at her bottom lip, which only made her need to do that again.
They turned, and Bette was falling— landing on the bed, and— yep, still drunk because that made her dizzy, and then Roy's weight was above her, all bare-chested and fantastic arms. Bette's hands had a mind of their own about this, tracing over his abs, chest, scrape of fingernails over his nipples, which earned her another of his shuddery groans.
Roy was kissing her all over her neck, down, just below her collar bones, one hand came round behind her to trace along her spine for a moment before deftly unclasping her bra, and then his mouth moved even lower, as Bette let it drop to the floor. Kissing between her breasts, and then there was his tongue, and the light scrape of teeth.
Suction around her nipple, and Roy's lightly teasing tongue, and Bette was gasping, arching, letting her legs fall a little further apart around him, and one of his hands was sliding up along the back of her thigh, fingers digging in just a little.
And then the suction was gone, and Bette made a horribly embarrassing noise in her throat, needy and aching as she felt. Except then she had one of Roy's hands sliding up to cup her breast as he kissed lower, along her stomach, sucking at the skin there.
When he unbuttoned her jeans, sliding down the zip, Bette let her hand drift down to scratch fingernails lightly up his neck, fingertips tracing along his ear. Roy looked up at her, and the look in his eyes was pure sex. And then he turned his head to kiss her fingertips, sucking two fingers into his mouth, and Bette wondered— But Roy's hands were still busy, and as his tongue circled around her fingers, Bette's jeans were slowly being pushed down off her.
She toed off her shoes, and then her jeans were hitting the floor at the foot of the bed. Roy let her fingers slip out of his mouth, and then there was sharp suction at the inside of Bette's thigh.
Bette squeezed her eyes shut, turning her head to the side, one hand covering her face, and "God, please, Roy."
Roy's calluses felt even better on her hipbones when he was pulling her panties down, pulling them off. And then he leaned in to nip at the inside of her other thigh, and Bette's hand was in Roy's hair and pulling. "Oh fuckin' Christ, Bette," he gasped, and his mouth was— his tongue flickering over her clit, and his fingers pushing inside her.
Bette couldn't loosen her grip on Roy's hair if she tried, because it was fast, and brutal, and she'd already been so goddamned turned on. And she really hoped these walls were insulated because she couldn't stop the breathy, needy noises that kept falling out of her mouth.
Bette shifted her hips, trying to find the balance between riding Roy's fingers and pressing up against his mouth, and he was sucking at her clit, light flicks of his tongue here and there. His fingers rough, stretching, filling her, and it was so good.
The curling twist of his fingers inside her and a swipe of his tongue, and she could feel that tenseness in her thighs, her stomach, and on the next thrust of his fingers in she was there, and she knew she was arching too much into it but she couldn't stop herself from— squinching up her eyes, and twisting away from his still insistent mouth because she was just that over-sensitive. "I'm good. I'm good; hang on a second," she managed to grit out.
It took a moment for her to unclench her fist, tight in Roy's hair. He pulled back, kneeling there between her legs, flushed, eyes dark; his fingers dug into his thigh, palm pressing there.
Bette couldn't take her eyes off him as he got his jeans off, fingers hovering a little too long at the zipper, letting them join the pile of clothes on the floor. Bette wasn't precisely suprised that Roy went commando, but that made the knowledge no less pleasant.
He was moving in, hovering over her, his cock brushing her thigh as he kissed along her collarbone.
"I. I didn't expect—" Bette started, and the ache was building all over again with each movement of his cock against her thigh. "I don't have any-"
"It's fine," Roy said, and his mouth was on hers, wet, and warm, and sharp, and she could taste the slight sourness that was her. He wasn't idly moving anymore, the thrusts against her were meaningful, and his hand slid back between her thighs to rub her with his rough, perfect fingers.
Bette thought she was going to be swallowed in sex, felt like she was going to come again already, like her body hadn't even bothered to calm down after the last one.
Roy wasn't kissing her so much as moaning into her mouth, and then he was just pressing his mouth to her shoulder, sucking, biting there as his hips worked against her. Bette's hands came up to his shoulders, hanging on for the ride, apparently, until the perfect scratch of callus rubbed against her, and she knew her fingernails were too sharp down his back, except he was groaning against her shoulder, and coming all over her hip.
Bette whimpered in the back of her throat because she just— she just needed a little more...
Roy kissed along her jaw, up to suck at her ear, and his fingers kept moving, circling, until Bette was clutching at his arm and moaning as she came.
***
Bette woke up with and intense feeling of dread in her stomach: if she opened her eyes, her head would explode. It was that simple. There was also a strong arm wrapped around her waist, and it took her a moment to remember that — yeah, so that was the Arsenal-go-round. She shifted slightly, reaching down to grab the comforter and throw it back over her entire body, including her head. Roy shifted behind her, his arm tightening around her.
Well, that was... Bette wasn't actually sure if that was no good or perfectly okay.
Instead she cracked open an eye under the safety of the dark blue comforter. That wasn't so bad, she thought, and cracked open the other. Her stomach fluttered a little, and she made a note to grab some toast before she and Gar left to head back to LA.
Which she was supposed to be doing right now.
Instead, Roy made a little half-asleep noise, and pulled her in that much closer. His mouth moved against the back of her neck, morning stubble scratching softly just above her shoulders, when he murmured, "Hey."
Bette twisted a little, trying to turn to look at Roy. He loosened his arm around her as she rolled onto her other side. "... Hi."
And then she had one of his really pretty large hands smoothing down her hair, and he was smiling.
"What?" Bette asked.
"Your, uh... your hair was standing up," he said. Bette wasn't sure what sort of facial expression she was making, but it made Roy laugh. "You looked really silly."
Bette almost made some comment about how goofy half-awake Roy looked, but— No, she had places to be. She reached up to grab Roy's wrist, pulling his hand from her hair.
"Hey, you okay?" Roy asked, his smile fading a little.
"Gar and I were supposed to be heading out this morning."
"Oh," Roy said, and he didn't quite look disappointed which was a good thing.
So Bette got up and found her pants, and couldn't shake the feeling that Roy was looking at her as she skipped putting her bra back on and slid on last night's tee-shirt. When she glanced over at him, he was half-sitting on the bed, back pressed against the headboard. He was looking at her.
"What?" she said.
He shrugged.
Bette found one of her shoes kicked underneath the bed, and as she knelt down to grab it (and hopefully find the other one) she said, "Look, I haven't exactly... I'm not sure what the etiquette is..."
Roy laughed even though Bette hadn't meant that to be particularly funny, but when she sat down at the foot of the bed to pull on her sneakers, he said, "Hey. It's okay."
"What is?" she said, picking at the knot that had somehow developed in her shoelaces overnight.
"I just mean that you shouldn't be all tense about it," Roy answered. "It happened, and unless you didn't li-"
The knot in her shoelace came free as Bette cut Roy off. "Okay."
"Okay?" The upturned note in Roy's voice hung in the air for a moment before Bette looked up at him.
"It was fine, this just isn't-" Bette searched for a moment for the right words. "I've never really just." Maybe there weren't actually any right words anymore. "This isn't the sort of thing I do."
"Yeah. I figured as much."
"I should. Be going," Bette said.
"I'll see ya around, yeah?" It wasn't really a question, of course they'd see each other. It was what their little long-underwear clique did.
"Yeah."
You should come to LA sometime, Bette almost said, but the words wouldn't come out. She always figured if you had trouble saying something then maybe you shouldn't say it.
***
Bette threw her bag into the backseat of the car and turned the ignition. Gar immediately leaned forward to fiddle with the radio, even though he'd declared the college station they'd found on the trip in "The station of the gods." Apparently the gods were fickle. Possibly Gar had converted.
"No R&B," Bette said when Gar's attention rested too long on an uninspired ballad.
When the tune didn't change, she glanced over at him, and he was looking at her curiously. "What?"
"You sure you're doing okay?"
"I'm kind of hung over," Bette said, because it was the truth.
Gar's grin was always just a little too pointy, thanks to his fangs. "I could drive."
"You are not. Ever. Driving my baby," Bette shot him down.
For just a moment, Gar's expression sobered, and, "Are you pining?"
"I'm not pining."
"Pining for Dick?" he questioned, and his grin was so Dennis the Menace it hurt.
"I'm over Dick," she said.
It was true.