Chapter Text
A slow, intoxicating tune drifted through the night as Vi approached the tennis court. Only a handful of couples were still swaying in the dim light cast by the thousands of tiny bulbs suspended from the makeshift ceiling.
She spotted Caitlyn sitting at a small table near the edge of the dancefloor and had a sudden, wild urge to pull her out of her seat and onto the dancefloor. Her heart was beating as though she’d actually done it, a voice in her mind chanting bad idea, bad idea, bad idea .
She shouldn’t get distracted—shouldn’t risk the job.
But Caitlyn smiled widely when Vi slid into the seat opposite her, and she couldn’t help wanting to see her do it again.
Vi grinned back and nudged the half-empty glass clasped in Caitlyn’s hands. “Drinking alone?”
“At this time of night, yes.” Caitlyn looked back at the dancefloor with a smile.
“Your friend went to bed, then?”
The flicker in Caitlyn’s expression was fast, sharp, uncertain. She swirled her drink for a moment before replying. “Yes. Yours too, I expect?”
Vi nodded.
“You should join me,” Caitlyn said, lifting her glass, her smile returning. “I’m currently drinking alone, but I need not remain so.”
Vi grinned even wider. “Alright.”
Caitlyn followed her to the bar and leaned against it, stilling Vi with a hand on her shoulder before she could order. “What would you like, Vi? It’s on me, given that you’re so generously offering to join me,” she smiled, indicating her half-full glass.
Vi swallowed. Usually, she was the one who ordered the drinks. And usually, she’d order a nonalcoholic Noxian Screwdriver—basically just honeyfruit juice on ice. Usually. But this time, she asked for the real deal.
Her drink came quickly. She had just turned back to their table when a hand on her shoulder stilled her.
“Let’s sit out on the beach,” Caitlyn said softly. “It’s a lovely night.”
Vi nearly spilled her drink. “Good idea,” she recovered, extending an elbow for Caitlyn to grasp before she could think better of it.
It was, indeed, a beautiful evening. The air was still and warm. Calm waves lapped at the sand just down the slope, the water shimmering in the cool light of the moon. Vi pulled off her shoes and Caitlyn followed suit, pausing to unclasp a pair of high-heeled boots that went much, much higher up her legs than Vi had noticed before.
Tearing her eyes away, Vi offered Caitlyn her arm again and they continued their meandering path down to the water.
“So what do you do, Vi?” Caitlyn asked, hitching up her long gown so she could lift her knees higher in the sinking sand.
Vi slowed. “Imports,” she said. “Cloth, metals, that sort of thing.” Simple, boring, believable. “How about you?”
Caitlyn glanced up. “Oh, I do a little of this and that for the family business.”
“Ah.” Vi looked away. She itched to ask the question that was burning a hole in her mind but seemed impossible to shape into words.
They walked in silence for another minute, approaching the wooden pier that stretched out into the shallow water. When the sand underfoot turned cold and wet, they stopped. A slow song floated out from the tent behind them, louder in the silence between them.
“How about that second dance?” Caitlyn asked.
Vi took a sip of her drink and it burned all the way down. She looked over to see a shy smile on Caitlyn’s lips, all of a sudden very aware of the hand wrapped around her arm that just then gave her a subtle squeeze. A bad idea.
“Dancin’ is a dangerous game,” Vi said slowly, glancing up and catching Caitlyn’s questioning eyes. “In—in the sand, I mean. Could twist your ankle.”
Caitlyn laughed. “I’m happy to take the risk, if you are.”
“Alright,” Vi smiled. She reached out for Caitlyn’s now-empty drink, then nestled both their glasses securely in the sand. When Vi straightened back up, Caitlyn was suddenly closer, her hand catching Vi around the waist. Vi let out a short breath in surprise.
“I’ll lead this time, if that’s alright,” Caitlyn said softly, guiding Vi’s hand up to her shoulder. She could only nod in response.
They swayed to the music more than danced, their feet mired in the soft sand. Vi hoped that Caitlyn couldn’t feel the way her heart was racing, close as they were.
“Isn’t she a bit… old for you?” Caitlyn asked suddenly, breaking the silence.
Vi paused, breath caught in her throat, no easy answer coming on command. “It’s—it’s not like that.” She forced a laugh. “And you’re one to talk.”
Caitlyn pulled back to look at her, the corner of her mouth teasing a smile. “I suppose that’s true." They swayed in silence for a minute, Vi hoping the tight-wound tension in her body wasn’t as obvious to Caitlyn as it was to her.
“It’s not the worst way to earn a living,” Caitlyn whispered, almost inaudibly. Vi struggled to suppress a grin, forcing herself to slow down, to confirm.
“Thought you worked for the family business.”
“Mm, yes.” Caitlyn said softly. “But I didn’t say what the business was, did I?”
And there it was. Vi let a laugh spill out from her lips, let the words wash over her in waves. She pulled back and looked at Caitlyn with new eyes—eyes that peeled back layers of makeup and silk gowns and courtesy to reveal someone so, so familiar: someone with an act, a con, a livelihood.
Someone like me.
“You know, I thought so.”
Caitlyn gave her a small smile, reaching up to tuck a stray strand of hair behind Vi’s ear and leaving a trail of fire in her wake. “And you? Your true… business?”
“I’m a—well, I’m good at what I do,” Vi shrugged. “It’s not so hard to get people to tell you things. Valuable things, you know.” The song ended and they stood there for a moment, looking into each other’s eyes. Eventually, Caitlyn sank down to the sand to lean against the wooden pillar of the pier, beckoning for Vi to follow her.
“Oh really?” Caitlyn smirked. “And how do you do that?”
“Well,” Vi said slowly, settling down so she was facing Caitlyn. “If you really want people to talk to you, you have to let them think you have what they want.”
Caitlyn leaned an elbow against the pier, the hint of a smile on her lips. “And what do you have?”
Vi laughed, finishing her drink and tipping the glass upside down in the sand. “I’m hot.”
“I can see that.” Caitlyn’s smile grew wider, and Vi felt a little warmer than the alcohol should have made her. “But that can’t be your only selling point.”
“Well,” Vi said, moving closer to Caitlyn—too close, close enough that she could feel Caitlyn’s breath across her warm cheeks. “It’s also a good act.”
“Oh? What do you do?” There was the slightest hint of a tremor in Caitlyn’s voice.
Vi placed a tentative hand on Caitlyn’s bare shoulder. “A lot of eye contact, a little touch here and there. Making them laugh. Being interested in what y—what the other person has to say. Remembering all the little details.” She let her hand trail down Caitlyn’s arm. “Did you go out on the beach at night, when you used to come here as a kid?”
Caitlyn gave her a mischievous smile. “No, my mother wouldn’t let me out of our suite after dark. As if Holdrum was a particularly dangerous place.”
“Seems like her heart was in the right place, to protect you like that. Might be sand monsters out here, for all we know, eating all the little rich girls for lunch.” Vi looked around at the dunes in mock concern.
Caitlyn laughed. “You’re right, that explains it.” She glanced down at the small patch of sand between them before looking back up into Vi’s face. “But thank you for the demonstration. Would you like to see how I would do it?”
Vi briefly stopped breathing as Caitlyn rested her hand on Vi’s knee. “Sure.”
“I can tell you’re very attentive,” Caitlyn whispered, letting her thumb pass over the fine wool of Vi’s trousers and sending electric charges through the skin below. “You’ve got responsibilities. You’re not only doing this for yourself, are you?”
“No, I’m not.”
“Who’s it for, then?”
Vi hesitated. “Family.”
Caitlyn hummed. “You care about them a great deal, it seems, to put yourself at risk like this. It’s not an easy job.”
“I’ve done worse,” Vi said, glancing away.
Caitlyn gently cupped her chin, drawing her gaze back. “You have a good heart. I can tell.”
Vi lifted her eyes to Caitlyn’s. Caitlyn’s breathing was shallow, her lips slightly parted, her hand warm on Vi’s skin. She looked earnest, her expression open, unguarded in a way she hadn’t been during the daytime.
Caitlyn kissed her, and Vi froze. It was quick, hesitant, just a brush of lips against her own. And yet, it sent fire coursing through Vi’s body, made her lose all sense of what she should and shouldn’t do.
And then it was over, cool air replacing the feeling of Caitlyn’s soft skin. Caitlyn turned away, her face pink. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t—”
Fuck it. Vi turned Caitlyn’s head and met her lips again. Caitlyn let out a long breath and leaned closer, moving her hand from Vi’s thigh to her waist and sending a fresh wave of electricity through her skin. The kiss deepened and Vi finally let her hands rove across the warm silkiness of Caitlyn’s back, savoring the ease of the kiss—the utter, lightheaded freedom of it.
“So,” Caitlyn said, a little out of breath, when she pulled away. “That’s… that’s how I do it.” Her hand lingered on Vi’s side.
Vi smiled, her eyes flicking back to Caitlyn’s still-parted lips. She thought back to her lithe form stretched out on the pool deck earlier that day. She pictured the older woman enraptured, leaning forward like Vi was now, drinking Caitlyn in like cool water in the desert. The memory gave Vi a hollow feeling.
“She’s a lucky lady.” Vi leaned back, letting Caitlyn’s hand fall to the sand and breaking eye contact. “Who is she, anyway?”
“Her name is Renata Glasc. She’s quite a prominent industrialist in the Undercity.”
“Oh.” The word was a sharp exhale. An industrialist.
“Have you met her?”
Vi stood and walked toward the water, hoping she could hide the fury that seemed to be rising off her skin in waves of rippling heat. An industrialist . So she was one of—so she worked for—
“Silco.” The word spilled out of her mouth like a curse. Her fists shook with the effort of not punching something.
Caitlyn’s hand was on her shoulder. “Silco? The councilor from Zaun?"
It came back to her in a familiar flood, sweeping away the freedom and lightness from moments before. The name rang in her mind over the shouts in the alley behind the bar, the crack of gunfire, the screams.
Vi turned and kicked one of the wooden legs of the pier.
“Vi, what’s this about?”
Caitlyn already knew what she was. So what did it matter if she let it all spill out? She braced herself against the pillar, breathing fast.
“He’s a murderer. He—he’s…” Vi rested her head against the wood, trying to tame the jumble of words in her mind. “She’s gotta be in his pocket.”
“What do you mean?”
Vi looked up into Caitlyn’s wide eyes. The truth felt like stumbling down a steep mountain—every step easier than the last, but more likely to send her tumbling down into the sharp rocks below. Not yet.
“Silco’s just—he’s bad news. You should be careful around her, that's all.”
“I will. Thank you for telling me.” Caitlyn’s voice was quiet. She laid a cool hand on Vi’s burning cheek.
Vi nodded, rising to her feet. As the adrenaline drained from her body, it left behind a heavy-limbed exhaustion at odds with the frantic buzzing in her mind. “Gonna go to bed,” she said, at the confused look on Caitlyn’s face.
“Goodnight, then.” Caitlyn looked like she wanted to say more, but thought better of it.
Vi gave her a small salute and turned back to the resort. A chembaron, here. What was she going to tell Powder? She waded through the sand, each step bringing more and more questions she couldn’t answer.
“Vi!” She whipped around at the sound of Caitlyn’s voice. Caitlyn was hurrying after her, holding her long gown up as she took long strides through the sand. “I forgot to ask,” she said as she came close, a little breathless. “Would you meet me here tomorrow? At the same time?”
Despite everything, Vi’s heart leapt at her tentative words. “Yeah. I’d like that.”
“Good.” Caitlyn smiled in response and reached out to grasp her hand. “Thank you for tonight.”
Vi let out a short laugh. “Dunno what you’re thanking me for.”
“For the dances. And everything else. For being honest with me.”
Vi tried to fight down the feeling of affection that blossomed in her chest. She gave Caitlyn’s hand a squeeze.
“Goodnight, again,” Caitlyn said, letting go of her after a long moment. The cool air she left behind sent goosebumps up Vi’s arm.
“‘Night.” Vi forced herself to turn back to the hotel, a raw tangle of emotion tight in her chest. She wished beyond anything that she could just fast-forward the next twenty-four hours, itching to join Caitlyn under the pier again, alone in a starlit world without chembarons or socialites.