12-22-2025, 12:21 AM
Something inside her went taut and deliberate, like a blade paused mid-arc. Sasha’s hand on her chest was a mistake. Not because it was crude or presumptuous, but because it was careful. Because he didn’t shove. Didn’t grab. Didn’t try to take anything. He just touched her where he could feel her heartbeat and pushed softly, enough to prove a point rather than make distance.
That he could leave.
It was only a gesture to speak whatever words died in his dry throat, but it shivered a reaction anyway. Heat spiked sharp and immediate, a flare of instinct that had nothing to do with permission and everything to do with being touched where she rarely allowed it. Ori's pulse jumped under his palm – traitorous, furious – and she hated that he might feel how deeply she was breathing then.
Her eyes darkened.
For half a second she looked like she might break his wrist. Or kiss him again. Or do both and call it a lesson.
Instead, she leaned in. Not enough to press him, or close the space, just enough to take it back.
“You really have a gift for saying the wrong thing in exactly the wrong way,” she murmured, her voice threaded with something dangerous and amused. Her gaze flicked to his hand, still resting there, then back to his eyes. “You know that?”
She didn’t remove his hand. She wasn’t giving permission. She was waiting to see if he’d take it anyway.
Because he could add contradictory to his shitty list. Right then Oriena wanted him to cross the line, to take the risk and show her exactly what he did want – not with words or caution, but with intent. If she forced it now, the suspicion of obligation would burn it to cinders. Her ultimatum wasn’t without her own thorny reasons of course, though she wasn’t likely to ever explain the parts of her he branded confusing and complicated. By the same token she was waiting for him to shrink his hand back like it’d come too close to an open flame. Ori was quite used to capitulation. If he pulled away it settled something; a return to equilibrium maybe. And she wanted that too; for him to ruin it before the sparks ever caught another flame.
That he could leave.
It was only a gesture to speak whatever words died in his dry throat, but it shivered a reaction anyway. Heat spiked sharp and immediate, a flare of instinct that had nothing to do with permission and everything to do with being touched where she rarely allowed it. Ori's pulse jumped under his palm – traitorous, furious – and she hated that he might feel how deeply she was breathing then.
Her eyes darkened.
For half a second she looked like she might break his wrist. Or kiss him again. Or do both and call it a lesson.
Instead, she leaned in. Not enough to press him, or close the space, just enough to take it back.
“You really have a gift for saying the wrong thing in exactly the wrong way,” she murmured, her voice threaded with something dangerous and amused. Her gaze flicked to his hand, still resting there, then back to his eyes. “You know that?”
She didn’t remove his hand. She wasn’t giving permission. She was waiting to see if he’d take it anyway.
Because he could add contradictory to his shitty list. Right then Oriena wanted him to cross the line, to take the risk and show her exactly what he did want – not with words or caution, but with intent. If she forced it now, the suspicion of obligation would burn it to cinders. Her ultimatum wasn’t without her own thorny reasons of course, though she wasn’t likely to ever explain the parts of her he branded confusing and complicated. By the same token she was waiting for him to shrink his hand back like it’d come too close to an open flame. Ori was quite used to capitulation. If he pulled away it settled something; a return to equilibrium maybe. And she wanted that too; for him to ruin it before the sparks ever caught another flame.
![[Image: orianderis.jpg]](http://thefirstage.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/orianderis.jpg)