Chapter Text
After she gifts him his freedom, he runs. He runs so swiftly from Caesar's tent she can barely get a word out. But what words would she even say? She's not so sure that there even are the right ones in her whole vocabulary. Bunch of words jumbled in her head but she can't string them together right.
You shot me in the head, but I'm not too bothered by it.
We fucked and you left, but I don't feel a damn thing.
Statement A and statement B are sure as shit related. That doesn't mean Jill can make sense of how or why.
But now is not the time for Jill to make sense of anything because about eight of the highest ranking members of Caesar's Legion look ready to tear her apart like they're dogs and she's steak, and all she's got is a 9mm pistol that she managed to hide awkwardly against her stomach. How the fuck they didn't notice the distinctly gun-shaped bulge is beyond her. But fuck it. She doesn't have any pride, so she runs.
Better to run and live than to, something something. Fuck it, she figures. She just wants to live. If she lives, she can have all the pretty things the Mojave has to offer. Prettiest of all might be Benny, because fuck if he doesn't shine brighter than all the lights in Vegas when he smiles.
She tells herself not to care about the fact by the time she's managed to lose the Legion tail, darting and dashing, and trying to throw them off the scent, she's got no idea where Benny is. That's alright, doesn't matter. Nothing matters.
--
This is where he would always be, she thinks when she does find him. The Hill Above Goodsprings. How he got here isn't important. In this place where he put the bullet in her brain.
Benny leans against the naked tree. Before the bombs fell, it might have been beautiful. Now it is only dead. What is that word? Petrified. Leaning against it he smokes cigarette after cigarette. He goes through three of them before she even gets close. But he must've seen her, he must've.
Jill takes a cigarette from her own pack but lets Benny light it. The silence between them cuts her to the bone. It's unwelcome, uncomfortable. Normally she’d say she likes silences. Instead of talking they watch the hole in the ground she got dug out of. The hole he put her in months ago.
"Didn't think of you as a woman then," with the topic finally broached, Jill almost wishes they were still silent.
"Yeah?" Her smoke is nearly out. Four left in the pack. She'd have to go down the hill for more. "What was I, a molerat?"
Benny shakes his head, tosses his butt into the grave. It’s not even properly finished. She noticed that about him, well, about his cigarettes. He doesn't really use them all up when he's nervous. That's why there were so many to be found between her grave and the Strip. Maybe he deliberately left a breadcrumb trail for her to follow across the desert. Like he knew they would end up there and back again.
"You weren't anything, Pussycat. Just a piece of meat around that Chip I needed."
"Oh." She makes sure to use up every millimeter of her cigarette. There's nothing left over but the filter by the time she tosses it away.
"You save me back at Caesar's camp just to kill me now? Would be real poetic," his laugh is more relaxed than one would expect from a man anticipating his demise. "Put me in the same grave and everything. Fitting."
Jill scuffs her feet in the dirt until it clouds up. Doesn't reach that high, but she wouldn't mind breathing it in. She might like the sting of it in her lungs. "I should hate you."
"But you don't?"
"Can't be bothered."
So instead of hitting him she raises up on her toes to kiss him just at the corner of his mouth. Benny doesn't say a word, just lets her do it. Neither of them dwell and by the time she's flat footed again, she wonders if it was a mistake.
"Doing any better on hating me, Pussycat?" His voice is real soft, like it might dry up if he uses it too much.
"A little." She shoves against his chest, pushing him back into the tree. The damn thing creaks like it could snap in half if she keeps pushing. So she shoves him again. Creaks, doesn’t break though.
"Anything I could do to help you along?" his smirk is just precious.
The hill is brightly lit from the street lights that don't go out. They seem such a waste in a time of scarcity. Just like Benny feels too. A big fucking waste of a pretty face. That might be what he and Jill have in common.
"Get on your knees," she commands.
Benny smiles on the way down. Like he's got a big fucking secret. Makes a show of running his hands down the front of her dark slacks, skimming his fingers over her boots. The boots are a size too big. They're awful and she hates them but they're the only ones she's found that are remotely right.
"I like the view," Benny says.
She wants to kick him in his fucking mouth. Knock out his teeth maybe, but that would ruin the thing she likes best about him.
"Take out your-" but she doesn't finish because Benny grabs her around the knees, pulling forward until she topples over into the dirt on her back sending a puff up all around them. "Fuck!"
"Should make you work for it a little, Pussycat." His lips are ferocious at her neck, biting just hard enough to make her lash out against him, pounding her fists against his chest. She's not really big enough to fight him proper. But even like this, with her legs wrapping around his waist, she knows he doesn't want to win. Knew the odds before he went all in.
"Why you fucking cheat?" she growls, kicks her legs a little too. But he’s too heavy on top of her. "You haven't worked a day in your life!" Claws her nails down his arms, all the way to where he’s rolled up his sleeves to the elbow.
"And you think you have? Pretty little thing like you?" His mouth is at her ear. "Think you can just show up, make all the men beg for your attention, huh?"
"Yes." She says it because it's about as true as anything else. Jill has never had it easy, but she's never had to work for it either. The two categories aren't mutually exclusive.
"Girl like you, could make a good run of it at Gomorrah," he teases. "Some guys like them small, tight, slutty."
"Yeah? And what about you, Benny?"
Keeping his weight on top of her, he smiles. "Nah, I just go in for crazy."
Jill rolls her eyes. Of course this is a game. At least it's a mildly amusing one. And fuck if he doesn't feel good, warm and hard and all over her. The way his erection presses against her thigh and he's got her pinned down. She likes the idea of all of it. But she's got other realities she like more.
"Good thing I'm normal."
Benny laughs at her joke, kisses her lips before he starts sliding down her body, unfastening her slacks as he goes. When he kneels between her legs, Jill sees her opening, kicking him hard in the center of his chest so he topples backwards.
Ripping at her underwear, she ends up naked from the waist down. She can push Benny onto his back because he wants to be pushed, wants her to win. Sitting on his chest, she slaps him across the face, hard enough to hear the crack, waiting for the smile that follows.
"Yeah, you're totally normal."
Jill lowers her cunt to his mouth, making sure to cover up whatever additional witty reply he thinks he's got conjured up. Using his index and middle finger, he parts her folds to get at her swollen clit. She won't tell him how much she wants this right now. How maybe it matters that it's his face under her, licking her up, and not just anyone with a clever mouth. His arms come up around her body, holding onto her as he works his tongue in tight circles. Jill plants her hands flat in the dirt, making sure she'll keep some sort of composure.
The only problem with this is he can't talk to her, say all those sick words that she likes best of all. But she likes the tight coil of heat between her legs too, likes his arms around her. When she's just on the edge she grinds her hips down, trying to smother him out, show him that she's the one who survived. He's been gifted his life, by her. This is her game now. He's just lucky she likes pretty things. Like Vegas, and nice dresses, lacquered nails, and his smile.
Jill doesn't think she's pretty when she comes. Her face probably contorts as her body shudders. But she feels alight. That much she can feel. Not much else, though. She'd say Benny took that from her when he shot her, but she knows that's not true. The empty feeling is in her chest. The void will make her ribs bend, crack one day. Sucking up everything until she is gone.
She climbs off of him clumsily. Her hands roll down Benny's body, working the buttons to his shirt loose. He looks good like this, her wetness smeared over his smile. She opens his shirt but doesn't bother to take it off. It's only that she likes seeing the dark scratch of tattoos across his chest, down to his waistband. They're good enough to remind her that he wasn't always so pretty. Once he was something rough, so there might be hope for her yet.
His pants do come off, and he hisses when he spreads his legs around her narrow hips. His thighs and calves are muscular enough maybe he could crush her. He won't though. Jill knows men like Benny. If she didn't know them, how to make them shudder and fade, she wouldn't have survived this long on so short a string.
She presses her painted nails to his mouth, his lips parting around them, licking in between each digit. He gets them good and slick, smiling through it. Not until she pulls away does he speak.
"What do you plan on doing, Pussycat?"
"Hmm," she wrinkles her forehead, but she's not really thinking about it. She already knows. "I was thinking about fucking this absolute slut."
"Oh? And who might that be?" He presses one of his thighs against her side, pushing her until she bounces against the other one..
"You're a damn idiot," she grits her teeth.
Sliding one finger into him is easy enough. Benny hisses a little, but she suspects that's just for show. His dark eyelashes press against his cheeks before opening again. She can see the lights reflected back in his eyes.
"Yeah, Pussycat, fuck me good," Benny whines, stroking his cock at a languid pace. Maybe he doesn't want this to be over all that fast, but they're pantsless on top of a fucking hill and the dirt is sticking to her knees as she finger fucks him. It's not the most pristine of locations.
She slides in a second finger to make him gasp. She doesn't want to be gentle about it; she wants him to fucking feel this tomorrow, and the next day, and the next. Spearing her two fingers into him she tries to get him to cry out for her.
"You just gonna spread your legs for anyone?"
Benny bites his lip, shakes his head, "you just get me all worked up. Can't help it. Want your cock bad, Pussycat."
He's ridiculous, but she sort of doesn't care. She almost thinks she likes it. "Nah, I think you're just a cockwhore, Benny."
"Maybe that too."
She presses her hips against her hand, thrusting into his hips to make it more like the real thing. Like she's got a fat cock Benny just can't live without. That he's whining and wet and slick for her, like a good girl.
He tries to reach down her shirt with his free hand, grab hold of her breasts or something. But he doesn't quite make is as she pushes him back down into the dirt. She's got to get herself arranged first. Gets her hips over her hand, her chest over his. Fucking him until he looks like he might come apart at the seams. She's got him, got him good.
"Jill," as soon as the word is out she presses one hand against his neck. Pushes down as he tilts his head back. Brown dust gets into his black hair.
She doesn't have enough weight to really stop his breathing, but fuck if he doesn't look good like that. Like it wouldn’t be great to have one hand at his throat and another buried in his ass. She wishes she had ten more hands to claw at him everywhere.
When he comes between their bodies it gets on just about everything. His shirt, her shirt, his stomach, hers too. It's a mess. They are a mess. Can't deny that.
She pulls her fingers out of him. Benny makes a noise like they hurt more coming out than going in, maybe because he's no longer aroused or too sensitive or something. It's not good enough, but she wipes her hand against the dirt for now. There's a bottle of water in her pack she can grab in a second, but for now she just sits on her heels and watches the rise and fall of Benny's chest, the way the black ink contorts a little when he breathes.
"You'll be the death of me," he covers his face with both his hands.
She snickers, "That's irony, right?"
When he sits up, he's scowling rather than smiling. "You gotta know, I wouldn't take it back. Everything the same, I'd probably shoot you again."
"Is that so?" Now she feels well enough to stand. Rinses off her hand hastily before looking for her slacks.
"But if everything weren't the same. If I knew you'd be this woman, I would've gone about it different."
"I don't need it to be different. I like it how things are."
"No you don't." Benny holds out his lighter for her to use. The one she slipped back in his coat after finding him. In that moment she knew she wasn't about to kill him. That would be the easy way out for both of them.
"You're right, but even if it were different, I still wouldn't like the way things are."
Benny's hand falls around her waist, to the small of her back, pulling her in against his chest. He smells like expensive things she never could get in any legitimate manner. Benny didn't get his nice things legit either. They're just clowns, really. Jokers. Though the Mojave doesn't know that yet. Maybe never will because they've got fancy clothes and lacquered nails and real nice digs on waiting for them on the Strip.
It's all just surfaces.
Under her slacks, dust still clings to her knees. Won't let go.