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The routine was the same from beginning to end.
While the location could change – an empty flat in Paris, Ana’s home in Egypt, even a Watchpoint once when she dared to risk Gérard’s attention – Amélie knew the steps would be identical.
She arrived in casual clothes to avoid drawing anyone’s eye, her largest purse weighed down with everything that was needful. Ana always ensured there was a place to shower and change, and the washing itself was a ritual before the performance. After months of this, the smell of plain white soap was enough to put a flutter in Amélie’s pulse as she scoured herself from head to toe, breathing in steam. There was barely any scent to it, but the rounded bar was simple and practical, just like Ana.
Back home in studios and on the stage, Amélie preferred to wear softer shades – eggshell white and pastels pinks – but here the only color permitted was black. Dark tights stretched skin-tight up to her hips, layered with a leotard that appeared demure in the front only to leave most of her back exposed, a web of thin straps woven just below the nape. She stole a quick glance in the oval mirror nailed to the wall before putting up her hair, high and tight to prevent it from getting in the way.
The shoes came last once her feet were shrouded in lambswool, ink black ribbons crisscrossing around each ankle to keep them steady. It was a new pair, the fabric holding its untouched sheen while both stiff toes refused to yield to her weight. Amélie took another deep breath and opened the door to the other room, ensuring her steps were no more than a whisper across the floor.
A mix of mint and cane sugar hit her senses, running cool and sweet down Amélie’s nose and throat as she came to stand in front of Ana’s chair. Its source was a silver tray on the table beside the sniper, housed in a clear glass that was full of piping hot tea, steam coiling around its rim. If it was still settling, she hadn’t taken too long to prepare; Ana expected punctuality in all things.
The slender black cane resting against the older woman’s knee had enforced that intolerance for lateness more than once.
There were no words before she began, only the bowing of her head and a long step back into the open space of the room. Ana reached for her tea, cradling its heat between gloved hands, and Amélie swallowed past a knot in her throat as that dark gaze fell upon her, expectant.
This was no violation, yet. The thought always rang in Amélie’s head as she began with a few light steps, making a quick pirouette to ensure her balance wasn’t off-kilter. If asked, if caught now, she needed only to explain that this a private performance for a friend, one who appreciated her dancing more than any audience in Paris.
To be sure, they were alone together and no one else knew it, much less where either of them were, but that wasn’t evidence of an affair in and of itself. It was only the shadow of suspicion, a sliver of impropriety.
Until she began to move. Amélie had every step memorized without direction or music, dancing in time to a rhythm that echoed only in her head. No bend or turn was provocative by its nature, but having Ana’s eyes on her unblinking was a slow feeding of sparks to tinder. That gaze raked over her from head to toe, watching over for any hesitation or slip, the slightest misstep, and no commentary was made beyond silent sips of tea, polished leather cupping glass.
It was when the cup was set aside that Amélie ’s heart leapt in her chest, fighting past a stilted breath to bring her arms out, making a full spin balanced on one toe. Twice, thrice, before she came back down to earth and brought up her opposite knee, hands coming together as if in prayer. When both feet touched ground, Amélie made to roll up onto her toes again, only to stagger when the rounded edge of her shoe slipped against hardwood.
Ana’s arm lashed out in a blur, the tip of the black cane poised like a lance against Amélie’s throat. She gasped as the pressure gave her a second’s grace to recover, the rod held firmly up under her chin until she was balanced once more, a quiver going through her thighs at the sharp reversal. It would have been left at that, simply a warning, had she not hesitated a breath too long.
The first strike was a resounding slap against the outside of one leg, and Amélie had barely begun to move her feet again when the second blow landed on the opposite side. Dull impact soared to a sharp sting in seconds, aching so intensely that she was forced to swallow a hiss of pain behind clenched teeth, only to continue the dance as if there had been no reason to pause at all.
After a moment, the cane returned to Ana’s side, and the older woman indulged in another long sip of tea. Amélie drew on the pain to hone her focus, remembering harder days in her youth when practicing en pointe left blood staining silk, and well-aware of the reward to come if she persevered. Ana valued discipline and endurance, which was something the two of them shared after a fashion; she didn’t have to be a soldier to understand such things.
Turn and step echoed in her mind like a script, keeping Amélie on track as her feet fluttered over the wood like a bird’s wings, not quite touching for the length of a breath. The landing was clean, but her left shoe came out first, and that was a mistake. She wasn’t facing Ana, but she didn’t have to be for the cane to cut a blazing line across the curve of her ass, holding a tight inhale before she switched feet and continued to move.
Arguably it hurt less than the first strokes against her thighs, owing to more surface and muscle to cushion the blow, but every time her shoes touched the floor now, Amélie felt the strike bruise-deep all over again. It was nowhere near the last either; two more landed an inch below the first when she didn’t complete her next pirouette, and the lines crossing over each other brought the start of tears to her eyes, forced out by the pain even as it sizzled under her skin, threatening to ignite.
Amélie’s heart was thunder in her chest, every hard beat rattling against her ribs as she twisted and spun, so distant from her skin yet so desperately present. Agony was grounding in its way, but whipped pliable under Ana’s hand, she felt more like a puppet on strings, drawn this way and that until desire flooded her veins, threads of resistance frayed thin until they snapped.
When Amélie finished the routine, dropping into a low bow, she was gasping for breath, a dozen lashes from the cane hidden under taut black fabric and limbs soaked with sweat. Her head throbbed, so dizzy with pain and adrenaline that she barely registered Ana’s murmur of approval before strong hands pulled her into the older woman’s lap. At the first offer of solace, Amélie’s knees gave out, folding against Ana’s legs, and gloved fingers caught onto her chin to demand attention.
“My captive swan.” The accented words were succor and balm, warm with an affection Amélie never allowed herself to expect. “Such a rare and beautiful thing you are.”
“Je t’implore, Ana–” A solid hold kept her hips in place, but the contact wasn’t enough. She would beg in any language it took if it meant the soldier would take her, provide any measure of relief to this bone-deep ache.
This was where the line was crossed, cast aside, and then obliterated.
Leather scraped across Amélie’s tights, rasping a path upward until a palm cupped firm between her thighs. She choked on her next breath, hips rolling forward as Ana’s fingers pried a path past stretched fabric and slipped underneath, finding her dripping wet. The opposite hand was like an anchor between Amélie’s shoulder blades, keeping her steady as she was explored and spread open, parting slick with the first knuckle-deep thrust.
Silence was beyond her now, gasps and moans muffled into the collar of Ana’s jacket as the cane’s sting inflaming her nerves melted into a sharply tinged pleasure, flickers of pain answering the desperate rhythm each time her hips dropped to take the older woman’s fingers. Again and again until she thrashed and nearly sobbed, arms thrown around Ana’s shoulders as if it would keep her from falling apart completely.
When a gloved thumb found her clit, working in unerring circles, Amélie shattered with a cry, clawing at whatever she could touch. She clenched tight around Ana’s fingers with every pulse of ecstasy until her body simply had nothing more to give, going limp against the woman underneath her. Never mind that her cheek was pressed just above a worn Overwatch patch, that the name stitched below it was certainly not Lacroix.
“Is that better?” Ana whispered.
It was a question she always asked, dropping the stoic mask of the punisher, the indifferent audience that existed only to be pleased. Amélie returned the same answer by rote, willing the repetition to etch it into reality like acid washing over stone.
“Yes.” She breathed out, letting a soft smile curve her lips. “So much better.”
But this performance would not be her last, and they both knew that to be true.
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