"I just need to stop in," she said, standing in front of the doorway like she was trying to bar my way in.

I peered around the half-open door. "So this is where the famous Celia Silver lives?" I asked. "In a sixth floor studio walkup with no windows?"

"I have a window," she corrected, then grinned ruefully. "In the bathroom, right over the toilet. I can see into the Chinese takeout place next door."

"Glamorous," I observed.

"You have a problem with my apartment, Scottish boy?"

I shrugged. "I just expected the daughter of Ricky Silver to live in something...

I caught myself before I finished that thought, but not before her eyes snapped dark fire at me. "My father doesn't pay for things for me," she said, her voice frosty. "I've been paying my own way, with my own name, since I was eighteen years old."

I looked down at her, reaching out to brush her long hair away from her face. "You know," I said. She watched me balefully, but didn't move away from my touch. "I'd look up to you."

"You would?" she said, some of the ice melting out of her gaze.

"Definitely would," I said. "If you weren't so short."

She laughed, smacking me in the arm and then shoved the door all the way open. "You may as well come in, asshole," she said.

"How could I pass up such a warm and open invitation?" I deadpanned, but followed her into her apartment like a little lost puppy. The sight of her neatly made bed in the corner filled my head with thoughts that would get me arrested in some Southern states, and I snapped my head back to watch her as she breezed through her apartment, gathering things up into her arms. "What are you grabbing?"

"I've been keeping clippings ever since I first watched you guys," she admitted, waving a manila file stuffed with torn magazines and printouts from the internet in faded black ink.

I eyed it warily. "That's impressively full given that we only met officially a few days ago."

She looked down. "I know," she said slowly. "I guess, I guess I was feeling inspired."

Fuck, she was biting her lip. I turned away. "So those are pictures of how you think we should look?

She nodded. "I don't think," she said. "I don't think you're projecting the image you want to be projecting."

"Who the fuck said anything about projecting an image?" I wondered. "This is just what I look like."

A slow smile spread across her face as she regarded me from under half lidded eyes. "Well. What you look like could be a lot better," she said. "For one thing, your hair...."

"The fuck is wrong with my hair?" I demanded, raking my fingers through it to let it fall back behind my shoulders. "It's rock 'n roll."

"It's too long and floppy," she said crisply.

"Long and floppy, aye?" I said. "Well I love my hair."

She lifted her chin. "You're the only one that does." She reached up and touched it. I stiffened, and she seemed surprised. "It hangs in your face," she said, in a voice a little bit softer than I was expecting.

I shook my head. "No one wants to see my face," I reminded her.

She paused, holding the end of my hair in her fingers, and twisting it around, playing with it. I didn't like to admit how good it felt. "Yes," she said softly again. "They do."

Something exploded in the back of my head, and I think it was comprehension. "Ah lass," I said, unable to keep the grin off of my face. "You want to see my face better?"

She didn't say anything, not that I expected her to, but there was a flicker of something across her face. Was it— Yes. It was interest. I licked my lips. "You want me to cut my hair, do you?"

She nodded. "I do."

I reached over, and grabbed the paper shears off her tabletop and handed them to her. "Go for it."

"Me?" she squeaked.

I raised my eyebrows. "You're the one that wants it."

She blinked up at me. "You trust me to cut your hair?"

"Should I not?"

She blinked, and then grinned. Grabbing the scissors in my hand, she deliberately turned and set them down the tabletop. "Well then we'll need better tools than that," she said.

Out of nothing more than curiosity, I followed her into the bathroom with the one window in the place. She rummaged through overstuffed drawers, until she pulled out a small pair of haircutting scissors and brandished them lovingly. "When I was working for Roger, I couldn't afford salon haircuts," she explained. She stabbed in the direction of the toilet. "Sit."

"On the bloody loo?" I demanded.

"The toilet, yes."

Not knowing what else to do, I'd edged my way around her, and sat.

"Now," she exhaled. I could feel her eyes raking up and down me, and goddammit I liked the way she was looking at me right now. Closely, like there was nothing else in her life but me. And yeah, I knew she was just viewing me as some kind of project, but I basked in her attention like cat in a sunbeam. "I think," she said critically. "I think we need to get it wet."

I licked my lips. "I'd like to get you wet."

Her eyes flicked down in utter disdain then she turned to the sink.

"Nothing?" I grinned. "Not even a slap in the face?"

She rolled her eyes, and promptly dumped a cup of water on my head.

"Hey!"

"Somebody needed to cool off," she announced.

"Bloody Christ, woman," I seethed, trickles of water slipping down my back. "I'm fucking soaked."

"Hold still and stop being a baby. I have scissors, and I'm not afraid to use them." She brandished them threateningly.

I laughed. "You'd cut my dick off with no hesitation."

She nodded. "If that's what I thought it would take to make you guys as big as you deserve to be, then yeah," she said in a rush. Then she licked her lips, looking as though she'd reveal too much, and I hid my grin of triumph as she leaned over me to start cutting my hair.

There was no way around it, her tits had to be in my face. I didn't really give a shit what she was doing on top of my head as long as those gorgeous mounds bobbed inches from my mouth. I was busy spinning myself out into a lavish fantasy of taking her nipple into my mouth, licking the peak until it tightened and puckered in my mouth, when I heard it. "Snip!" went the scissors, and she pulled back with a long piece in her hand.

"Jesus Christ!" I complained. "I thought you were cutting my hair, not shaving me bald!"

"You're not bald," she scoffed, then she stepped back, staring at me appraisingly. I wanted to reach out and grab her, to pull her onto my lap and bury my face in between those tantalizing breasts. Her slim waist was right there, begging for me to wrap my hands around. Her T-shirt was sheer enough that I could see her bra straight through it, and my dick strained against my pants. I gripped the toilet seat tightly as she leaned over me again. Her hair brushed my shoulder, raising goosebumps on my skin, and filling my nose with her light, clean scent. She snipped around my head, and I watched with dismay as my trademark locks fell to the tile floor, but I held my tongue.

I held perfectly still as she worked, shuffling around me in a slow circle, groaning softly as she strained for the hard to reach place in the very back of my head. "Can you?" she asked, and finished her sentence by pressing down lightly on the back of my head. I bowed, staring eye level with the zipper of her jeans. The little silver tab glinted, teasing me with how easy it would be to take it in my teeth and unzip her, tooth by tooth. What color would her panties be? And was she wet for me the way I was hard for her? My fingers, and my tongue, ached to find out.

"I just need to," she murmured, reaching behind my head. "Can you? Let me just reach over, Oh!" she yelled as she overbalanced.

Quicker than instinct, I reached out steady her. Only to have her freeze like a statue. For a long, drawn out moment, we both were still, her breathing the only sound other than the racing of my heart. I looked down to where my hand rested on her thigh, steadying her.

She was watching it, lips parted.

I slid it higher.