by Tara Wimble
“Situation?” Bella asks. “What are you talking about?”
“Nothing.” Jacque rubs her eye before pulling her glasses back down from her hairline.
The situation being how close Bella is to her and what she looks like in that dress. She’d thought she’d been tortured on their engagement party, but standing here now is proving how tame that black dress in her memory really was.
Jacque glances to the side and spots Sadie leaning against the bar with Kathryn. Every few seconds their gazes do land on the couple. Curious eyes as always. This is her life now, she figures.
“They’re gonna keep staring.” Bella points out. “So I figured we could end all the whispers.”
“Whispers?” Jacque asks. “No one is whispering.”
“They might be.” Bella’s hand is on her bicep. The wedding ring is cool against her skin, a contrast to how hot Jacque feels and the uncomfortable way her shirt sticks to the tops of her shoulders. “So, you’re gonna kiss me.”
A car crash plays out before her eyes and the sudden implosion of all the music in the room bursts in her ears. “What?” The aftermath is a buzzing white noise.
There’s not a single trace of a joke, only Bella’s alcohol blushed face earnestly staring up at her. “Just so they stop staring.” When Jacque fails to reply she carries on. “You were the one who said we had to sell this. You not-so-subtly flirting with the locals isn’t helping our case.”
Jacque wants to argue that it was subtle until Bella came over but that’s hardly even true and she can’t process anything more than the tight grip Bella has on her arm and her waist.
“Look, it’s weird. I know.” Bella bumps their hips together. “But you’re not an awful kisser and a few painless kisses might save our cover in the long run.”
“Painless?” Jacque blurts out before she can stop herself.
Bella frowns at her. “You didn’t complain the last time.”
That’s not what she meant.
“Look, just-” Bella turns her whole body into her. Facing and closer and Jacque is already muttering ‘oh fuck’ under her breath before Bella even brings her hand up to Jacque’s face. “-follow my lead.”
Bella hasn’t led before. It was Jacque that initiated their wedding kiss. Just as it was Jacque that planned the wedding. Moved them out. Built their cover from the very beginning. Yet here Bella is leaning in and Jacque forgets to breathe.
Over the tones of her mental breakdown Bella kisses her first. Jacque sighs into it. It’s too panicked to be a whimper and too casual to be a gasp so she ends with a soft sound that urges Bella in the right direction. Her lips are wet from the beer she’s been drinking all night and the arousal that already spikes in her from repeated exposure. Bella is the one leaning up, pressing in and deepening the kiss while Jacque struggles to separate the charade from the baseline thudding of her heart against her chest.
Bella leads and Jacque follows. Her hand curls around the back of Bella’s knee and her knuckles brush against the hem of her dress when she pulls Bella closer on the bench. It’s all about making them believe on the outside, but on the inside Jacque is exploding. Her touch has Bella’s fingers tapping at the skin under her ear, as if she’s laughing at Jacque’s improvisation but approving of it all the same.
The promise of a painless kiss isn’t delivered as Jacque finds herself sinking into a burning instinct that Bella doesn’t refute. False hope is the most dangerous of downfalls.
It starts to end when Bella digs her nails under her jaw. The long kiss shatters into several sweet ones. Sweet because they’re chaster with everyone. Sweet because to Bella they don’t mean what Jacque feels that they mean. The repetition of ‘oh fuck’ comes back tenfold and when Bella pulls back, dragging her nails along Jacque’s jaw just to leave a mark, that’s all that’s going through her head.
Then the purpose, the real one and not the one that Jacque feels panting inside of her, begging for more, rears it’s disappointing head.
“Yeah they’re still watching.” Bella sighs out. There’s no trace of that worry Jacque expected, that she pushed it too far, but a small smirk as Bella brings her hand up, under the eyes of her team, to run her thumb over Jacque’s bottom lip. “Down girl.”
Jacque is definitely not down. She is definitely not Jacque. Bella is pressing up against her and pressing those buttons that she’s tried to deny even exist and she’s not even doing it with intent. Jacque pushes her hair back out of her face, feeling the cold sweat form on the back of her neck, while Sadie tries to catch her attention with a mocking thumbs up. “Don’t be cute.”
Bella clings to her still and it does no favours. “You keep saying that. Not gonna change a thing.”
Jacque’s throat feels drier than it was. “I’m gonna get a drink.” Out of politeness she asks. ”Do you want one?”
Bella doesn’t take the bait and stands with her. “I’ll come along. We can carry one back for Kathryn as well.”
From there they don’t spend a second apart. Bella clings to her, solidifying their cover better than she has for their entire performance and while Jacque is grateful, it’s also an unintended torture.
Bella didn’t mean it. Bella never meant any of this. Jacque is just attracted to women. Women like the ones in the bar. The ones on her honeymoon, in the gym, on the soccer field- in her apartment. She hasn’t been blind these last two years, Bella is attractive and trying to deny that is an insult to herself. She just didn’t think it would sneak up on her like this that the attraction was a cover in itself.
It helped that they hadn’t kissed and Jacque hadn’t felt that whimpering light headedness for over a year. It was easier to pass it off as just being attracted to her. Appreciating it from afar. There’s no shameful reason to deny that. She’d say that to Bella’s face.
Telling her that there was something else under that? Out of the question.
Just as her need to bring someone back to her room and fall quickly and roughly into bed with them was made impossible the second Bella came over and talked her into kissing her. Suddenly she’s off-limits to everyone in the room.
God, Jacque downs her drink, Bella. Always the problem, never the solution.
She chokes and coughs enough for Sadie to have to slap her on the back. “Woah-”
Bella knows. She definitely knows from the amused smirk on her face and the way her grip tightens on Jacque’s waist.
Yeah, she needs take care of this sooner rather than later.
*
The room locks but with a key it’s not much protection. Jacque has about fifteen minutes and spending it barricading the door is only going to make everything look worse. She heads to the couch. It implies casual and quick and it’s not as intimate as the bed which is what she’s trying to avoid.
She doesn’t want to think intimate.
The button of her jeans is popped open and her fingers unzip her fly just enough for her to shuffle her skinny jeans down her thighs. She doesn’t take them off entirely, all too aware of the door, and pushes her shirt up just to flatten a hand over her hipbones.
The anticipation doesn’t last long. She’s been pooling and digging her nails into her arms ever since Bella kissed her.
The first touch shudders through her entire body.
Jacque focuses on the girl in the club for as long as she can. The weight on her lap and the smell of her perfume is better to think about. It’s less guilt inducing. It’s less invasive in her mind. The shiver of the marks made on her neck aren’t guilty pleasures they’re deserved ones. She can think about them and not feel herself reel back and wonder if she should be doing this.
But it doesn’t get her off.
She can’t remember what the girl looked like or the exact tone of her voice and it’s visual needs that she can’t spare when her hand is circling her clit under her underwear. Knowing what colour eyes she had, what she was saying she wanted to do to Jacque- those are the details she needs. That’s how it buil
ds, that’s how it edges and starts the spasms behind her knees.
That’s how she starts to think of Bella.
The guilt is outweighed by the need. As much as she hates herself for it, it comes too easy to ignore the relief she feels when what she knows takes over. Jacque can feel how wet she gets after a few minutes. The guilt adds to it. Knowing that she shouldn’t be doing this, that Bella really has no idea how crazy she makes her, or how attracted she is to her.
Her fingers slide over her clit and dip inside of her as she grabs onto the back of the couch. She remembers how Bella’s lips tasted. The mix of fruity cocktails and a sweeter orange. Her bucking hips rise as she licks her lips replaying the kiss in her mind and deep memory. Her back arches because there’s no comparison for that kind of kiss. The kind that knocks the wind out of you in nervous surprise. The kind that you don’t instigate yourself and just let happen. Bella took control of something in their fraud relationship for the first time and it would have to be doing something that makes Jacque lightheaded and weak in the knees.
Her heels dig into the couch, pushing down making her head press harder against the arm of the sofa. A part of her clings to the few moments she knows she has before Sadie comes back. The rush of it all races to her head faster. Jacque rolls two fingers over her clit in a well practiced motion. Every dip, every buck, every bitten back moan, is a familiar symphony to her. These last few months have taught her well how to take care of herself when there’s no other option.
She’s also learnt how to be quiet about it. Sneaking around with someone else is an skill but stealing away for ten minutes, a wall’s width away from the person causing all of this, and coming out looking completely innocent is an art form. Jacque is a painter in that sense.
And Bella is the fucking straight girl muse that’s keeping her inspiration on a dripping tap. A floodgate has been opened tonight. Jacque doesn’t know why she did it, why Bella can do this to her and not think anything of if, and why she continues to subscribe to this secret torture.
It’s everything.
A twisting knot in her stomach whenever Bella comes around. That stupid, bashful looking smile and the accent that she can’t turn off that sends jolting signals to Jacque’s brain and body. It’s just a want that she can’t ignore. So here she is, fucking herself on the couch in her shared room knowing that she’s got nowhere else to hide when Sadie comes back.
She’s resigned herself to that capture and commits to the pleasure. Her jeans feel tighter as she pushes her hand further down to curl her fingers just inside of herself. When she stops there will be an uncomfortable heat that sticks to her hips for the rest of the night and it’s that which keeps her rolling her hips and biting through her panting desire.
Jacque won’t say her name. Saying her name out loud, even to fulfill the deepest and most hidden of her wanton freaking lust, would be too much. Too much temptation especially when they’re going back to Toronto alone for the next few months.
If only she’d gotten away with the girl at the club sooner. She wouldn’t be catching a moan in her throat and spilling over her right hand thinking about how Bella kissed her.
She also wouldn’t be walking towards the bathroom a few seconds later to wash her hands only to have Sadie come in the room and instantly zoom in on her unzipped fly.
Jacque’s new resolution for these situations is to take a long, cold shower.
*
Returning to Toronto after the Cyprus Cup second place finish is like having a bucket of cold water splashed over their lives. In positive news, they both received good feedback from Coach Jayce and it seems as though she’ll be inviting them back to the next camp of the year.
So they take a few days to ride that high because the world of competitive soccer is tenuous at best and if there’s anything Jacque has learned from her experiences, it’s best to savor each moment because the next is never guaranteed.
Buying a case for Bella’s first cap ball sort of just happens. She’d been thinking about doing something special, putting it on display somewhere in the house, hers was only displayed in her old room at her parents’ house but Bella deserved to see hers every day.
And she was still feeling a little bit weird about the club and the shower and she needed some way to wipe the slate clean. To not feel so dirty about living platonically with Bella.
So she goes down to her favorite trophy shop and covertly steals the ball so she can make sure it fits. Then she gets a plaque on the case engraved with the date, score line, and description.
On a whim she stops by Bella’s favorite restaurant downtown and makes them a reservation for two at eight pm.
Jacque texts Bella and let’s her know they’re going out to dinner and laughs when Bella responds with five smiley emoticons.
It’s only around seven when she and Bella are fighting over bathroom space, picking outfits, and getting ready to go does it dawn on Jacque that she’s basically inadvertently planned them out a date.
Bella’s favorite restaurant? Check. Eating after six? Check. Sentimental gift? Double check.
Fuck. She’s not even sure how she keeps stumbling into these types of situations.
“You almost ready?” Jacque yells out to Bella who has barricaded herself in the closet, luckily there’s a light or else it’d be just a little weird.
“Ten minutes.” There’s a crash and a loud ‘shit’ resounds from inside. “Um, fifteen?”
Jacque shakes her head and yells back. “I’ll meet you in the living room! We have to leave in twenty or we’ll miss our reservation.”
She leaves the bedroom and makes sure that the case and everything is still stashed so she can run in quickly when they get back and put it on display for Bella to freak out.
Bella takes all fifteen of her allotted minutes and it has them rushing out the door.
Due to some aggressive parking by Jacque they’re just able to slide into the restaurant at exactly eight, much to the wary looks of the rest of the patrons.
“Two for Liresch.” Jacque breathes out, ignoring the waitresses judging look.
Their table is exactly as Jacque had requested, right by the window so they can do a little people watching as Bella loves to do, but secluded enough that they can talk as well.
And fuck, how did she not realize she was setting up a date?
So stupid.
Despite the fact that it’s an obvious date Bella doesn’t say anything or really seem to notice and they have a fantastic time. The food is delicious, the company fantastic, and it’s a great way to ease back to the real world.
Driving back they don’t speak hardly because they’re so full and it’s only when they’re walking back up to the apartment that Jacque remembers she needs to get in there before Bella.
None too smoothly she tells Bella to wait outside, to an annoyed groan, and goes to set up the case where it’ll be easily viewed upon entrance.
“Come in!” She yells and hears the knob turn and the door pushed open. “Surprise!”
She yells it out and at first Bella just looks at her like she’s some sort of crazy person. And then she looks just above Jacque’s head and sees her first cap ball on display and starts to tear up a little.
“Jacque, you didn’t.” She says softly, moving closer to the case and, as a result, Jacque.
“I sure did.” Jacque answers nervously. “Do you like it?”
Bella runs her fingers over the engraving, reading the words softly under her breath. She turns to Jacque and pulls her into a hug that steals all of the air from her body. “I love it.”
It feels good to do this kind of stuff for Bella and it’s when she realizes this is what she wants to do always that she realizes she’s in a lot more trouble than inappropriate actions in a shower or accidental dates.
*
Jacque wanders into the living room with a take-out menu and stalls as Bella smoothes down the dress she’s wearing. Her jaw locks and Jacque has to recover quickly.
“Who said you could go out like that?”
Bella jumps, not hearing her come in. “Oh man, don’t.”
Jacque tuts jokingly but pulls out her phone to stop herself checking Bella out. Especially when Bella is dressing up for a date. Yeah, that’s a new development. “Is he picking you up from here?”
Since coming back from Cyprus Bella has been going out more. Exploring the city and along with that the city has been taking its own notice. Jacque’s not sure how she feels about it exactly, but Bella seems happier and since she can’t ask for more than that without things getting complicated, she’s...dealing with it.
“Outside.” Bella pushes one of the pins in her hair into place. She’s wearing it up for a change. “He said he’d call when he got here.”
Jacque picks out what she wants on the menu and then scrolls through her apps to check her bank balance. “You know what I love to see?”
Bella does a double take, thinking that Jacque is still looking at her. “What?”
“Money in my bank account.” Jacque grins. “I’m getting pizza.”
Bella groans jealously. “Are you kidding me? He’s taking us to some gourmet sushi place and you know there’s only going to be like-” She makes a tiny circle with her fingers. “-that much of everything.”
Jacque taps in the number for the place. “Do you want me to save you some?” She gets a hopeful praying gesture in response.
Bella’s date calls before Jacque gets the order through and she has to silently wave goodbye to her as Bella rushes out of the apartment. It makes it easier than trying to force some sort of ‘good luck, have fun’ into her voice when she doesn’t really mean it.
Jacque drops her phone onto the couch and readies herself for a long night in. She’s not waiting up for Bella so much as she knows Bella won’t have taken her keys and she can’t lock her out of the apartment when she goes to bed.
The pizza comes and after halving it and promising to run it all off tomorrow, Jacque eats and spends the next few hours watching a Heroes marathon.