Chapter Text
A buzz at his hip signals a security breach. Rufus excuses himself from his current crowd with a polite smile and a cheerful shrug at the empty contents of his glass. He sets it on the tray of a passing waiter as he makes his way up the main staircase, taking them briskly up and down the hallway and then up again to the third floor, all the way into the western wing where his master bedroom resides. And where he finds his newest maid clutching the wrist of the most beautiful woman in all of Midgar. Literally. For the third year running.
“Master Shinra, sir, I caught this woman prowling around,” his maid announces with breathless delight, eager for praise.
“Prowling? You don’t recognize The Tifa Lockhart?” The maid drops her smile and Tifa’s wrist with a furtive glance at her face. “And I was expecting her.”
“Expecting—here? O-oh!” She flushes and babbles apologies all over while Rufus nods and shoos her away, taking Tifa by the same wrist and quickly closing the double doors of his bedroom behind them. Inside, she shakes off his hand and scowls, eyes luminous in the pale moonlight flitting in from the windows. She crosses her arms under her chest and draws his eyes toward the dripping neckline of her shimmery, nearly sheer golden gown that hugs every curve before cascading like a waterfall over her legs. A slit that starts sinfully high against her thigh allows for a peek of a lacy black garter and the long expanse of a toned leg that ends in a pointed gladiator stiletto heel.
“You were expecting me?” She raises an eyebrow and he shrugs, backs away to give her some space.
“I figured some third-rate tabloid article about our supposed illicit affair would blow over easier than a front page story about Midgar’s most beautiful woman getting arrested at the Shinra mansion.” She pokes her tongue adorably against her cheek as she considers this, before finally nodding in agreement.
“Well, I guess thanks for not calling the cops.”
“Thank you for not breaking my new maid’s wrist.” She smiles a little at that, glances up at him through a dark fan of eyelashes while her hand sneaks toward the door handle, but he snakes an arm around her waist before she can make her escape. Matches her smile with a toothy grin.
“So, if I wasn’t expecting you. What are you doing here?”
She untucks his tie from his jacket and toys with the ends. “Can’t a girl enjoy a party?”
“Not when I specifically remember her declining the invite.” She drops his tie and he closes the distance between them, rests his cheek against hers as he slides his hand down towards her ass.
“There he goes again, rich little Rufus Shinra thinking everything and everyone he lays his hand on belongs to him,” she clucks, breathy and sweet but arguably makes no move to stop him.
“Not everything.” He mutters, giving her ass a firm squeeze before letting his hand trail lower. “And not everyone.” Down through the slit of her dress toward the damp warmth between her thighs and—frees a tiny bit of plastic and metal from its gartered prison and holds it up to inspect in the light. “But this? Yes.”
She doesn’t bother feigning innocence, simply grabs his other hand and presses it firmly against her breast.
“You can’t distract me like this every time.”
“Oh, can’t I?” If there’s one thing Tifa Lockhart loves, it’s a challenge, so she yanks him by the tie and crushes his lips to hers, rakes her long nails against his scalp and slips her tongue into his mouth until they’re both desperate for air and then, suddenly somehow, yet again, he’s zip-tied with his hands behind his back. He refuses to blame himself. She’s the sexiest woman on Gaia for five years running, after all.
She pushes against his chest so that he falls backward on his ass and she follows after him, straddles his waist and nips at his jaw and he groans because fuck does he want to touch her. “Lockhart.” He wriggles his hands helplessly against his bindings as she grinds against him, her dress rucked up to her thighs and leaving just the fabric of his slacks between them. “Tifa, please—”
She stops then, staring down at him with disbelief, lipstick smeared over her lips, hair completely disheveled. “You don’t get to use my name.”
“What is this even about?” he grits, still winded and completely baffled. She’d ghosted him for two weeks before suddenly turning up to his house during a party she declined by sending him the shredded remains of the invitation.
“Corneo. Scarlet. Hojo.” Her eyes are hard and shiny with betrayal. “You’ve been sitting on information on them all—and for how long? I thought we were on the same team, I thought you trusted me—”
“I do trust you.”
“Then why—”
“Because you never listen to me!” Rufus growls, drawing his head up as far as possible to look her in the eye. She presses her lips into a firm, angry line, ready to explode in protest. “If you had this information you’d go marching into the police with it just like you went marching into my house for it.”
“So?!”
“So there’s no point in turning this in if the judge, jury, and executioner are all on the same side.”
She stills, stares at him with rounded eyes until it appears that it’s all clicked in her head. “Heidegger.”
“Yeah. I’ve had my men infiltrating his police department for months now, but he’s way too good at covering his tracks.” He rests his head back against the floor. “I was going to tell you about it once I had a solid lead.”
She huffs and slips the USB back into the breast pocket of his jacket with a soft pat—when had she even gotten her sticky fingers on that again?—before standing up and removing a tiny pocket knife from somewhere. She makes quick work of his zip-ties and offers him a hand up once he’s free, and he rubs at his wrists as she makes the pocket knife disappear again.
“You’re gonna leave now, aren’t you?”
She smiles faintly. “If your men haven’t gotten anywhere in months, I’ve got some work cut out for me.” She wipes her mouth clean and straightens out her dress, runs her hands through her hair and she’s instantly presentable and unbearably beautiful.
“I’ll leave the window open.”
She laughs, opening the door and flooding the room with the glow from the hallway lights. “You know your locks wouldn’t be able to keep me out, anyway, right?”
And though he usually enjoys it, their game of cat and bat, he can’t help but admit, “They’re not designed to.”
She smiles wryly, warily. Touched, even though it only shows in her eyes. “See you later, bat boy.”
And in a flutter of gold, she’s gone.