*
"They're my fucking lawyers and they didn't see this coming?"
"No, Daddy."
Cordelia smoothes her skirt over her thighs. Plucks off a stray thread and tries not to flinch when her father jerks the car across three lanes of traffic.
She knows his tirade by heart. She could recite it verbatim. Sometimes she overanticipates, starts to say Yes, Daddy and Whatever you say and Sorry, Daddy before he's finished and wheezing in the next breath. Sometimes she has better things to do than play chaste supportive daughter to the raving man of the house.
Not today, though. Not when some sweet little murmurs and gentle squeezes of Daddy's hand get her out of school, away from the freaks and geeks she can't seem to shake, all the way into LA. Not when she just cashed her first paycheck and the money is cuddled up, snug and warm, all her own, in her secret bank account. Pin number: wesley.
*
The prom dress can wait. She'll figure something out; she always does. That blue silk sheath might look pretty in Sunnydale. But from where she's standing right now, here in the sweetest-smelling, quietest, *shiniest* mall ever built, that dress is worse than a potato sack.
The sack she could carry off with a little Betsey Johnson-esque flair.
The dress is a millstone, or an albatross. Something heavy and choking and pulling her places she'd rather not be. One more pathetic obligation she's found herself ensnared in, like Xander Harris's big brown eyes, like stakes that spatter foul-smelling dust all over her, like twitchy little geek witches, like mayors with ridiculously nefarious plans.
Cordy shakes off the obligation.
Cordy *wants*.
Cordy will get.
*
The shoes are classic. Squared-off toe, gently sloping slide upward, caressing the instep, embracing the foot, pouring like champagne into a twisting heel. Close to stiletto height, but never so gauche.
Leather that smells like home, like butter, like extra maple syrup on Sunday-morning waffles. Black and blue and red leather, black at first sight, shining dully like plums until the blue drifts into sight, then the scarlet, then sinks back down.
Shoes you want to pass down to a beloved granddaughter who will also be named Cordelia but will be blonde and speak with a sweet, tony London lisp.
Shoes to elevate you above the madding crowd, carry you through muck and trash and other people's narrow sad little watercolor dreams.
Shoes that will take you places.
*
"Lovely, aren't they?"
The saleslady is *good*. Done up like an East Coast matron, business suit and thick flounce of understated scarf around her neck. Small gold hoops in velvety earlobes, voice as quiet as a deacon's.
You're supposed to trust her, let yourself be gathered under her wing and buy what she tells you.
"Interesting," Cordy allows. "They're pretty."
When she smiles, the saleslady's lips go square, showing no teeth, not reaching all the way across her face. "Imports, of course. A Flemish line."
"I know Bosch," Cordy says. "Just surprised they'd be -" She waves her hand and tightens her eyes. "Here."
Sienna-pencilled brow arches and the saleslady nods to herself. Cordy's not to be messed with, no matter if her heart's pounding like a rabbit down the trail and her palms are a little slick with nervous sweat. She'll be an actress; she already fakes it all so well.
"Size?"
"Eight," Cordy says. "I'll be over there."
*
The store's small as a jewelbox, packed as tightly with glimmering, glittering things. No music, thank god; if she has to hear Enya one more time on repeat to set a "sophisticated" mood, Cordy *will* scream her vocal cords to shreds. No customers, either, of course. This is the sort of place that's yours alone, your box of pretty, yours, all yours.
She sits on the tiny padded bench, tufted raw silk, and tucks her hair behind her ears.
The saleslady emerges from the back. Cordy sits up straighter. The box is large and matte-black, like charcoal. Something that can become a diamond.
"Bosch, eights, on order." Low, rumbly woman's voice as someone approaches and lifts the box away.
It's like a shark just cut in. Like a scalpel sliced through time. Like taking candy from a Cordy.
The woman is tall and starvation-thin. Power suit the color of steel, cut so sharply it could lacerate skin, put your eye out. Smoky stockings, decidedly not sensible pumps with peaked toes and steel piping.
Cordy narrows her eyes and stands. "Mine," she says through the anger sifting sourly down her throat. "Those are my shoes."
When she turns, the woman arches an eyebrow. Eyes the color of an untended lawn, all brown and green. "Sorry, little girl."
"Listen, X-Ray. Maybe Heidi Fleiss sends out her minions to buy shoes, but those are mine." Cordy steps forward and taps her index finger on the lid of the box. God, even the cardboard feels silky and solid. She *wants*. "Hand them over."
"Spunky. But they're still mine."
The saleslady is nowhere in sight. In fact, the shop seems dimmer, somehow, the walls closer. Cordy lifts her chin. "You'll look ridiculous in them."
"Unlike you, I won't be playing be dress-up."
The bitch smells like parsley tastes. Hardly anything, just the squeak of green between your teeth. Garnish. She has Ingrid-Bergman good cheekbones, though, and the powder on her face is enviably smooth and pearlescent. Cordy has a sudden vision of being big-boned and clumsy, stupid Cordelia who gets smacked in the stomach and sent flying during dodgeball by one of those gazelle-thin girls, all smirk and weightless grace.
Her mouth is watering. Shoes, LA ego-battle, strangely twisty femme fatale eyebrows: One of those, all of those.
"Hand. Them. Over."
The bitch smiles and drops the box. Cordy's hand hovers in the air, then over, now on, dew-pale silk shirt. Bitch is so thin she doesn't need a bra. "No," she whispers, and the shop's definitely darker now, or maybe it's just the shadow she's casting over Cordy's eyes. This close, she smells like moss, and feels like moss, springy and lush over granite. "You wouldn't know what to do with them."
Cordy swallows and slips into sweetness. Coats herself with spun sugar and smiles wide and bright. "Whatever you say." Runs her palm over one breast, then slips three fingers between the top two buttons. Presses her mouth to the bitch's taut, tense throat and kisses, wet and fast, along her sharp jawbone as her other arm goes around the impossibly bony waist.
Fingers tipped with short, hard nails in her hair, scratching her scalp, and the bitch pulls back Cordy's head. Digs nails in skin, pushes her knee between Cordy's thighs, and kisses back. Serpent tongue, tastes like rye whiskey and maraschino cherries and -
Cordy *wants*.
She pops buttons and pinches a nipple, twisting it as she rocks against the bitch's leg. Slides her other hand over the pathetically small, nearly flat ass and up the back of the bitch's skirt. Digs her fingers into the crease of thigh there, under elastic, grabs and pinches until the bitch gives up a moan. Throaty and too, too brief, but it's a start.
Cordy can kiss circles around anyone. It's all about fluttering the tongue and sucking when they least expect it, using the scrape of incisor judiciously, then ferally. She's wet and wriggling already, working her skirt up to her hips, as she kisses harder, tasting the whiskey and under that, off-brand toothpaste and mint floss. One palm covers the bitch's entire breast, and she squeezes even as she pulls back, tugs, collapses back on the bench. The bitch straddles her, pushing Cordy's head against the mahogany cabinet, muttering angrily at her.
Cordy smiles. The bitch is even wetter than she is, hotter than coffee and slick, taking two fingers at once, her kisses slackening as Cordy fucks her and watches her face.
"Mine," Cordy says. "All mine."
And it's true again and if the feeling crackling fast and bright through her chest feels as cliched as fireworks, she doesn't really care, because it feels too good, power-suit hoochie trembling over her, thighs shaking, little meows spilling into Cordy's mouth and down her neck. Cordy grabs one of her hands, shoves it under her own skirt and spreads her legs farther.
"Gimme -" And the bitch nods, she's not stupid, just a fake, and her thumb works Cordy's clit like she was born to it. Circling and pressing, plucking and rubbing as her index finger slides inside and Cordy laughs, clenching on it, feeling her hips roll like the sea, kissing short and shallow as she adds another finger and pushes her tongue down the bitch's throat. Bites her lip as she pulls away and fucks faster. "More. Gimme more."
She rides the bitch's bony fingers, hips snapping and teeth grinding as she grins, and she's not thinking about Wesley or Xander or Devon, just about herself, how there are crazy shakes running and ripping through her, warm, then hot, so fast, and how hard and slippery the bitch is inside and outside and how she, Cordy, was born to be here and get and take and have and how good cheap whiskey tastes on sharp tongue and when she comes, she almost jack-knifes at the waist, twisting her neck, seeing the kind of stars, golden and hugely swelling and dripping sparks, that she's only ever seen when she was alone in bed under the covers after yet another stupid makeout session with some dumb boy who'll never get out of Sunnydale left her tense and aching and wanting.
The bitch shakes and grinds against her, and Cordy's not evil. She does have a heart. It's just tapped less than occasionally. Only when she feels large-spirited and magnanimous, and anyone who can make her come like that, she'll smile on. So she closes her mouth around one swelling breast and flutters her tongue and fucks her fingers until the bitch stiffens, goes still, and knocks her forehead against the cabinet.
*
Daddy treats her to lunch, still bitching about lawyers, the government, stealing money from hardworking patriots.
Cordy's not that hungry. She's got new shoes that offset her calves and complement her ankles and she didn't have to dip into her earnings at all. Presents from strangers: She's never seen why it's such a bad thing.
After all, she still wants a lot more.