Like Fallen Apples by Dana Woods

Gunn's seen more of Eve today than he has since Angel Investigations took over Wolfram and Hart. She says it's his turn to be shadowed, that it's part of her job description to observe the upper echelon employees. He's not buying it. Well, not the "his turn" part, at least.

Because she's wearing her hair up and she's got this scooped neck shirt on, and Gunn knows damn well it's to show off the purple-blue bruises around her throat. Knows that she just picked today to follow him around so that he'd see that necklace all day long.

Gunn keeps looking at them. Can't help himself, really. Not when Eve's constantly drawing his attention to them with blatant turns of her head accompanied by exaggerated winces. At least, he hopes they're exaggerated.

But even when he's not looking, he's aware of it every time she speaks. He doesn't really believe that her voice is still that raspy, but whether or not he believes doesn't seem to matter.

"The day is over, Eve," he snaps, looking up from a brief and glaring at her. "Time for you to get the hell out my face."

Her lips pull into her usual wide smile, but the rest of her is brittle. "Oh, sweetie," she says, her voice raspier and rougher than he's heard it all day, and he's positive she's faking now. "I think you're confused. The observation period is a week--five business days."

Gunn's jaw sets and his lids slam shut for a moment. "No. There's no damn way. You've got to be pulling my leg."

Her eyes lock on his, and then she reaches up and runs her fingers along the bruises. "What do you think of Thai for lunch tomorrow?"

If the situation wasn't what it was, Gunn might be tempted to strangle Eve. But... you know. He's already done that, and it wasn't pleasant. In fact, he's still a little nauseous.

By order of his momma, Charles Gunn doesn't hit women. Except evil women. And only if they're going after him or his. Not probably evil women. And not just because they're probably evil.

Angel gave him the expected line of bullshit about not being himself. Don't matter, really.

What Gunn did to Eve was... he didn't even just hit Eve. He did something more. Something worse. He wrapped his hand around her throat, lifted her off the floor, and pinned her to a wall. Took a page straight out of his no-good-father's book, and his momma is rolling in her grave and doesn't give a damn about bleeding eyes and two souled vampires endangering reality.

"Pad Thai," Eve chirps, strolling in with two large bags of take-out.

Today she's got on a slinky tank top and her hair's up again. The bruises are yellowing around the edges.

She comes behind his desk, unpacking and distributing his food. She has to lean over him to set it down and it puts Gunn's face only an inch away from his handprints on her skin.

He stands up so suddenly that she stumbles back so that he doesn't knock her over. "Is this fun for you?" he asks tightly. "Is this how you amuse yourself?"

The usual perky-chipper-sweet-ingenue-annoying set of Eve's face changes. Gets slack around the edges and dark in the center.

"And how do you amuse yourself, sweetie? Choking little girls?"

Three-point shot, right there, but Gunn's not going to let her get away with believing her own hype.

"You ain't a little girl, Eve," he counters. "And you're more than a little evil. You're not fooling anyone with your swishy shirts and your 'sweeties'."

She steps a little closer. "You notice my skirts? I wonder what that says about you." She tilts her head to the side. "You hate me, you think I'm evil and you tried to strangle me to death, but you still notice my skirts. I think you might have some issues."

Gunn grits his teeth. "Back off, Eve. I mean it."

Eve gives him that incredulous and condescending smile she's already become infamous for. "Do you honestly think you frighten me? Think about who I work for. A street thug with a brain enhancement doesn't make me shake in my swishy skirt, sweetie."

She shimmies even closer and Gunn stares down at her blandly. "Seemed pretty scared if I remember right. Think there were even tears and a pathetic little breakdown that had Fred feeling sorry for you."

There's a long moment of staring, then Eve takes a deliberate step away from him. "Guess that brain enhancement isn't all it's cracked up to be."

Day three, and Eve's left her act in the dust. At least when they're alone. Around the others, she's still the saccharinely sweet thing that makes everyone's teeth hurt. But when she and Gunn are in his office, he gets what he thinks might be a more real version of Eve.

She's sharp and cutting, and Gunn spends the morning mentally tallying how many three-pointers she's made on him. But there's a flipside to her dropping the facade: it's damn easy to score on her, too. He gives himself bonus points every time he manages to do it with a mention of Lilah Morgan. Someone's got an inferiority complex a mile wide.

Gunn's mental tally has them even after the afternoon staff meeting ends and they head back to his office. He sees Harmony making her way over and pauses, his hand on the door. He doesn't want to be closed in with Eve, but he doesn't think he can take another one of Harmony's heavy-handed attempts at bonding.

It started after they both recovered from the bleeding eyes and there's no end in sight. In her own way, Harm's nice enough. But he staked his own sister. He'll be damned if he'll befriend some vapid, rude soulless vamp. It's a matter of principle.

He closes the door practically in Harm's face and turns around to find Eve sitting on a chair in front of his desk, legs crossed demurely. Today, the shirt is superficially subtler than the previous days' choices: a button down with a collar.

The collar perfectly frames the marks, and they stand out next to the black. It's tight, and there's some kind of gathering of material around her breasts that emphasizes them. Her skirt is swishy, as usual, but a lot shorter.

When he glances at her face again, she's smiling smugly. "So, what's on the agenda this afternoon?"

Gunn rubs the back of his neck and makes his way to his desk, gesturing at his mile-high inbox. "What do you think?"

She lets him work in peace for thirty minutes. He looks up when she sighs heavily. "Don't even start," he warns. "This was your idea, remember? If you're bored, go somewhere else. My job isn't to entertain you."

Eve stands up and starts wandering around. "You could at least make an effort. I've spent three days watching you read."

"That's not all I do," he replies.

"Oh, right. Sometimes you sign things, too. Does the fun ever end?"

Gunn returns his attention to the folder in front of him. "If the thrill's gone out of the relationship, Eve, maybe you should find some greener pastures."

They've settled into some kind of eerie companionable type... thing by the middle of day four. Eve gives him hour increments to work in, then interrupts him for ten minutes, making her digs, wincing at his.

At three, she arranges for Italian for lunch and makes him come out from behind his desk for it. He sits across from her at the small meeting table in the corner of the room. The shirt of the day is a green peasant-style deal that leaves her shoulders bare. The color clashes something fierce with the faded yellow choker of bruises around her neck.

"Almost gone," Eve notes when she sees him staring.

Gunn looks away and swallows a mouthful of linguini. "That's... good. Real good."

"Hm."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Eve shakes her head and reaches for a plastic fork. "Did you ever imagine your life would be like this?"

Gunn shakes his head, a little confused by the serious tone. "Obviously not." She doesn't say anything, just lets an awkward pause fall that Gunn, for some reason, can't just leave be. "What about you? Ever think you'd be the gofer for the heads of an evil law firm?"

Her smile isn't one that Gunn's seen on her before. He's used to knowing, smug or fake smiles. This one is cryptic. He didn't think she could actually do cryptic, but he guesses he was wrong.

"I'm a sucker for good benefits."

All hell cuts loose at four o'clock the next day. Figuratively, not literally. A big deal client needs a contract drawn up immediately and Gunn spends five hours getting it ready, then hands it off to a courier to take across town.

Eve is standing by his desk watching him with narrowed eyes. "What?" he asks.

She shakes her head slightly. "You've ended the observation period on a high note."

Call him crazy, but he doubts that's what was going through her mind. "Whatever," he sighs, dropping onto a chair at the meeting table. "I'm going to not move for a while, then drag my ass home. It's been fun, let's not do this again."

He closes his eyes and hears her moving. He assumes she's leaving, but then there's a clinking noise, so he forces his lids up again. Eve is settled down across from him, a glass of something amber colored in her hand. There's another one on the table for him.

"Proper attorneys celebrate a job well done with brandy."

Gunn arches a brow, then suspiciously picks up the glass. "And how would you know what a proper attorney does?" He's being sarcastic, since there's not really a "proper" attorney to be found in Wolfram and Hart.

Eve just winks at him and lifts her glass. "Cheers, sweetie."

She takes a long sip, and some of the tension seeps away from her shoulders. Gunn sighs and downs half of his drink.

Gunn has rules for his life. Like, before staking a vamp with a stray slat of wood from a broken dresser? Yeah, make sure it's not plastic with a wood finish. Only takes a quick glance to prevent a world of trouble.

Two drinks and two hours after his day ends, he makes a new rule: no drinking with probably evil women. It leads to all sorts of...talking and causes screwy judgment that makes the probably evil woman seem kinda attractive in a fucked up sort of way. He thinks it's a good rule and it probably would have served him better if he'd come up with it a hundred and twenty-five minutes ago..

Eve discarded her shoes an hour ago and scooted her chair closer to his twenty minutes ago. Gunn undid his tie and started leaning closer ten minutes ago. They haven't said a word in five.

Her hand is at her neck, rubbing the faded bruises, and she keeps staring at him. Gunn knows there's a really fine a line between everything he and Eve are and used to be and should be. So fine that he can only see it if he reminds himself that it's there. Because she's in the Senior Partners' pocket, and Gunn knows that agreeing to the knowledge upload gave them a hold on him.

Eve's hand drifts from her throat, and then it's reaching for his. She doesn't say anything, just brings his hand to her neck and sets it there. Then she waits. Gunn isn't sure what's going on, what she's after. Didn't get the impression she got off on being choked.

When he doesn't move away, she stands up, her hand lifting to hold his in place, tugging until he rises as well. His hand is right over her pulse and he can hear it pick up pace as she walks backwards until she hits a wall. She pushes his hand down until it's on her hip.

"You didn't really want to strangle answers out of me, did you, sweetie?" she asks roughly. She takes hold of the waistband of his pants, pulls him closer until he's pressed against her.

Gunn thinks that it's the other way around, that she didn't want him to strangle answers out of her. He's got a good idea of how she would have preferred him to get them, too. She's rubbing against him, and there's a smug grin that comes to her face when he starts getting hard.

He could play this a lot of ways. The truth is, Eve without that sugar coating is more than a little sexy, and she's got that thin, tight little body that he usually typically goes for. There's a line there, though, and it's big enough to make a difference.

The top of her shirt is elastic, and she pulls it down until her breasts are uncovered.

Her name is Eve, and she made a big deal of that fact when Gunn and the others first started at Wolfram and Hart. Tossed apples around like a calling card. Didn't really need the apples, though. Got enough temptation to her without having to offer up some forbidden fruit. Besides, Gunn dropped the apple she lobbed at him and it got bruised. Didn't take long before it rotted, and he almost lost his lunch when he bit into it without realizing that.

Leans down close to Eve's face and whispers, "Get the hell out of my office, sweetie."

.End