Coming home to Art in her kitchen was not what she wanted or needed. She had thought about changing the locks when she had first kicked him out, but she had never gotten around to it. And he hadn't come around without her permission, so she had decided that there was no reason for it. Apparently, she had been wrong. The fact that he'd come by like this, that he had sent the babysitter home and had put Zemfi to bed -- she just didn't like knowing that he had been here and she hadn't known it. Not that she thought that there was a risk of anything bad happening. Despite everything that he had done, he was still a good father. She just did not like that he had been here. She had kicked him out for a reason. He wasn't allowed to just show back up like this, and she wanted him to leave.

But nothing that she had said had managed to get him to budge. The sass that she'd thrown his way had done nothing except maybe piss him off more -- which had resulted in his determination to stay put. But she thought she had almost gotten him with her earlier comment about what she'd been doing tonight. Bringing up Marcus and them shagging at the theater had definitely brought out a visible reaction. There was one more card left to play. Faking a little gasp, she sat her tea down on the counter she'd been leaning on. "I just realized I'm not wearing any knickers. I wonder where those ended up."

268 ✧ Artunakara Buchanan ✧ outfit

Every exchange with his wife just made him angrier and more possessive. She was his wife. She had promised herself to him! And now, what? She was spreading her legs at the bloody theater or opera or where-ever for some prat Swede! It was bullshit. This was not how things were supposed to be. This was not how they were supposed to be. He had kept his hands to himself so far, but he couldn't anymore.

"You know better than to tease me like that, T," he flirted. He had been moving closer to her with each verbal spare they had exchanged. His drink had long been abandoned. His hands were free to go for her dress. The urge to push the fabric up was just too tempting. The man's eyes were darkened. The expression would be all too familiar to his wife. She had seen him look at her with burning lust many times before.

The time since their last night together would not have banished those memories from her mind. He was sure he still lived in her thoughts just as she lived in his. You could not just forget someone that you had built a life with. Kicking him out of their house was much easier than banishing him from her heart and mind. He knew she had not left his. It was why he needed to touch her now. He needed to remind her who they were--and erase every memory of the man she had been dating. The thought of her dating was one that eternally turned his stomach. They had been together for twenty years...and not three months after he was out of the house, she was out on dates. How could she do that?

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She had kicked Art out of the house in September. It was now June. It had been nine months -- and it had been six months since she had started dating. She knew that that was quick to get back out there. It was not something that she had done intentionally. Titania had not thought that she would be dating anytime soon. She had honestly questioned if she would date ever again, after everything that had happened. It had seemed so pointless -- she had found the man that she had promised to love her entire life. She had not stopped loving him. He was just no tthat same man anymore. The man that she had married could not have done the things that he had, and she couldn't be a part of that. She couldn't even look at him. But that did not mean that she had any plans to be with or date anyone else. It had just been something that had happened.

Still, it was strange to think that it had been nearly a year since she had been with her husband. There had been a time in her life when he was the only one that knew her body, that knew what she liked. There had never been a reason to think that anyone else ever would. Now there was someone else. Her relationship with Marcus was not serious. It had no labels or official titles, and they saw each other a few times a month. But her husband did not need to know that. If bringing him up was enough to piss Art off and get him to leave, then she was going to use it.

"Don't you dare," she warned, shaking her head at him as she lifted a reprimanding finger at him. Being backed against the counter really did not give her too many other options.

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Artunakara Buchanan would never force his wife, or any woman, into a situation they did not want. But sometimes, an objection was not meant to put an end to potential intimacy. Sometimes it was about the chase. It felt like that now. There were hints in the air of playful moments exchanged in the past--minxy little misdeeds meant to bring out the more dominant and strong side of the man. His longing for his wife made him want to believe that was what this was. 

He was nearly sure of it. So, he pressed on. 

"No?" he questioned. Art was radiating his intentions. Determination and desire were so very clear in the man's dark warm chocolate brown gaze. A flicker of a smirk played on his lips. The shift caused that divot in his cheek to show up. The damn thing had worked its magic on Titania many times before. Art really thought it would do the same now. She surely wanted his hands on her again just as much as he did. She could not have forgotten their chemistry. 

"Don't do this?" the wizard asked, reaching for her dress. His tone was taunting and the husky timber of his deep bass embraced the beauty. He needed to remind her what it was like to be with a real man. He needed to remind her what it was like to be with her husband. He knew her. He knew her body better than anyone could. He hadn't been with anyone since she kicked him out. He didn't want to be. He had married her. He was still committed to this marriage even if she wanted out of it. The fact she had not filed for divorce made him think she didn't really want out. If she hated him, truly, the papers would have shown up by now. 

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She had wanted to make him mad enough to leave. She didn't think that it would be all that hard to do, given where she had just been. And who she had just been with. Titania didn't know for sure how he even knew that she was dating. Maybe Vivien or Olivette had brought it up to him, but she was unsure. It didn't matter. She wanted him thinking about Marcus shagging her in a very public place, even if that wasn't exactly what had happened. She wanted him thinking about how she had possibly left her knickers behind. It would make him think about just how recently someone else's hands had been on her. Someone that was definitely not him -- someone that she did let close to her, when she had not wanted him anywhere near her.

The last thing that she wanted was for him to be moving closer to her with very clear intentions. Her eyes flashed in anger as he reached for her anyway. Just as quickly, she smacked his hand away, hard enough for the sound to echo through the kitchen.

Titania didn't know why talking about another man shagging her had the opposite reaction from her husband than she had expected. He had been pissed when she had brought it up, but she had thought that would make him want to leave. Make him want nothing more to do with her tonight. She had expected anger, yes. But she had not expected this. That husky voice, that look in his eyes. Nothing that she was doing was succeeding in making him leave. The smack hadn't stopped him for even a moment, and her eyes narrowed as she batted his hands away again. With not as much force as before, but with enough to get her point across.

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Titania had a vicious temper. Art had seen it countless times before. That ginger fire had always drawn him in. He was like a mouth to her flame. He would keep flying too close until it burned him. Over and over again. Just like it had been for the last twenty years. He was not dissuaded by her strike. Even as his skin stung from the force of the blow, he was reaching for her again. He could accept rejection, if she really wanted him to stop. If she ordered him to leave, he would go. He had done it before. It wasn't going to force himself onto her, but he was going to try really damn hard to make sure that she knew he wanted her--that the lust, attraction, and love he had felt for her all those years was still alive in him. He still looked at her and saw his wife. 

Art was not sure if Titania had actually slept with another man tonight. He did not want to believe it. Part of him could not stomach that. He knew that she had slept with Marcus--he knew even that she had spent the night at the prat's flat. It was bullshit. He hated it. He missed her... She had to miss him, too. She was still objecting, but there was less force to it. He arched his brow up towards his smooth head.  Her name was purred of his tongue:  "Titania."  It was a prayer. It was a request. It was a million messages compressed down into the single moniker. 

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This was not the man that she had married. He was not the same. He had changed. The person that she had fallen in love with could surely not do what he had done. He shouldn't have been capable of it. She knew that nobody was perfect. Titania knew that he wasn't perfect, and that people made mistakes. But she also knew that he did not see the epidemic as a mistake. He did not feel bad about what he had done. There was no way that he could. If he did, then he would understand why she had kicked him out. He would understand that he had ruined lives, and that he didn't even feel bad about it. He had let something happen that had gotten her sick, had gotten Vivien sick. It was his choices, his actions, that had done all of that. And it did not seem like he felt bad about that.

But there was a reason why she hadn't seen him in the recent months. There was a reason why it had been easier to kick him out. Easier to not be around him than to suffer a moment in his presence when it just hurt to see him. She could not just turn off loving him. It wasn't something that was possible. He had been the love of her life for twenty years. Very nearly half of her life. It was easy to miss him and to think about simpler times when he was standing right in front of her. And she had a hard time not turning to jelly just from the look in his eyes.

But she was not going to give into that that easily. Absolutely not. "What?" She snapped, already prepared for him to reach for her dress again.

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So what they had spent nine months apart... It did not matter. It did not change them. Nothing really changed them. Not truly. They were still them. They were still the Buchanans that everybody wished they could be. They had chemistry. They had fire. They fit together. They would always fit together. 

Art could see all the familiar tell-tale signs that he had learned over the decades they had spent together. He could read her. Just like she could read him. She knew what he wanted. She knew he wanted her. She knew and she was letting him get this close, because some part of her still wanted him too. He was sure of it.

The wizard could see that T liked having his attention. There were hints all over that beautiful face of hers. She could control her tongue, but she couldn't suppress the flair of attraction in her pupils. They still swelled at the sight of him, because he was still the one. He swept his tongue over his lips and that I know you want me smirk shifted towards a smile. "You've missed me,"  he said softly. The words were not offered as question. They were a simple statement of the facts as he saw them. Art reach for her again, this time not for the dress, but to put his hand on her hip. His fingers found their hold there. He gave a gentle squeeze--desire was still clearly displayed by the move, but it wasn't as quick or to the point as moving to hike up her dress had been.

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She could not let this happen. Absolutely not. Deciding to separate had been the right thing to do. He had to understand that what he had done had been wrong. It had been so wrong, and he just didn't see that. He didn't understand it, and she could not understand that. Titania could not understand how the man that she had marry could unleash a biological weapon onto the magical world, and then act like he had done nothing wrong. Act as if it had been the right thing to do. She knew what it had stemmed from. It had stemmed from his family, and the way that they had treated Wendy all her life. It stemmed from the way purists treated Muggleborns. And was the registration now over? Yes. Could that partially be credited with the fact that the epidemic had prompted the ICW coming to sort out the United Kingdom? She supposed so. But people had still died. She did not think that the ends necessarily justified the means. Not with how many people he had made suffer.

If she opened this door, if she let herself miss him and let him touch her, she knew that he would take that as an invitation. Not to her -- he would never do anything to her that she didn't want. He was not that man. But she had no doubt that this would not be his last surprise visit to the house, if this went his way. Titania knew that she could expect to see a lot more of him if she gave in the way he wanted her to -- the way that her body wanted her to, just on instinct. She couldn't allow it to happen.

Still, this time, she did not bat his hand away. His hand made it to her hip, this time not making any moves to tug her dress up like he had been before. Her glare only intensified, to make up for allowing the touch. "I have not."

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The Buchanan was exuding confidence. This was his house. This was his wife. This was a step towards getting back his life. The kids deserved both parents under one roof. They needed to be a family again. The way they had spent Christmas could not be the way they spent the rest of their lives. 

Art had taken too long to get back here. He should have come home sooner. He should have forced this confrontation. He should have been here to remind Titania what she was missing--Who she was missing. 

He smirked as his fingers bore down on her hip. "Yes. Yes, you have." Art was absolutely sure. The wizard was so confident in the assertion. The man had always been sure of himself. This had very often manifested in the bedroom between himself and Titania. She would see  the  way that he was looking at her now and know every deviant thought in his mind. He was ready to make them all reality. 

The wizard started bunching the fabric of her white dress up in his fist as he stood over her. Each move of his fingers drew the hem upwards. Her glare did not dissuade him. To be perfectly honest, it spurned him on. He needed to draw her back, back to them. Fuck this Swede. Art hated the prat. Art wanted to make the import into a fleeting memory of a stupid mistake. Nothing more. They could leave all that behind. Marcus could just disappear--and they could be them. She could be angry, but she could take it out on him instead of closing down and shutting him out. 

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