On a Familiar Trail [SnowSage and AlluringEnigma]

[SnowSage]

Alarms cried out in anguish from the core of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, eliciting a panicked stampede among the random assortment of well-dressed young professionals, eccentric old money, and overeager young artists who made up the clientele of the downtown establishment. The confused, raucous attempts to escape the limiting, classical European-style architecture did little except to slow down the procession of building security and cops that were hustling across the grounds to converge on the main exhibit space. A callous, though certainly charming smile spread across the face of Cassian Orlov as he remained calmly in place, his manicured hands stroking the perfectly groomed stubble which spread fully over his jaw as his deep, sea-storm eyes cast their grey-blue hues from one end of the modest permanent display room to the other. The commotion would pass shortly, he was certain. Even factoring for how bumbling the building security and Philly cops were, it shouldn't take them long to find the real Royal Wedding Dress. After all, he had only hidden it in a bathroom stall in the same wing of the elaborate building. It was a local relic of city heritage, after all, not a treasure with any kind of market value. The fake that he had left in its place was never intended to survive inspection, only to draw the guards away from this wing of the facility upon its discovery. A task which it seemed to have performed beautifully.

With a practiced grace that looked so effortless that it may as well have been breathing, the gentleman thief's gloved hand slipped past the sensors around his true target, two fingers pinching the edges of the ancient etching of stained glass, no larger than a dinner plate, which he was truly after. Lifting the piece off its pedestal and tucking it into the inside breast pocket of his long jacket, his meticulously shined shoes flowed across the floor like water, barely making so much as a tap as he walked briskly towards the gathering crowd out in the atrium. It was almost too easy, lining his pockets with what may as well have been unguarded artwork that had survived since the French Renaissance while the locals chased strips of fabric that anyone in the city could see whenever they wanted, and nobody outside the city would care enough to pay for. As if hearing their mark in his script, the local police pulled up to the front entrance, also the only official exit, of the building, shoving their way past UPenn hipsters and Logan Square attorneys alike to rush the staging area where all the alarms were concentrated. Cassian was only feet away from the distracted door guard who he knew wouldn't pat him down properly and about to disappear into the mid-evening crowd when his eyes caught on a figure emerging from the cop cars with a very different uniform. Wearing a blazer marked with the letters FBI and a vest, rather than the local full uniform, the young-for-her-job looking woman also seemed to have the presence of mind to look where the alarms weren't blaring.

In an instant, Cassian calculated his chances of success slipping by the FBI agent as well as the door guard. His decision was, however, made for him when the door guard's shoulders straightened up and his eyes focused in, having clearly noticed the cop coming in his direction who would notice him slacking to watch the show. Cassian's plan A escape route was cut off. Without a moment's hesitation, he spun on his heel, turning fully away from the guard and the approaching FBI woman to prevent either from seeing his face. He began to walk calmly but swiftly back towards the permanent exhibits building, returning the direction he had come from without any apparent concern for the fact that there was not a single other soul moving in this direction. He could hear the falls of the clever cop's feet on the floor behind him, obviously having noticed the man moving away from everyone else. Yet even as the woman was honing in on him, his eyes were dancing with stars, and his smile was as broad as it had ever been. His blood was rushing, and the exhilaration of the moment had him breaking into a jog as he passed through the doors back into the building, his own footsteps barely registering a sound.

When she came in through the door, the FBI woman would hear a sudden, dramatic percussion sound, the clanging of metal plates in very near proximity to her sounding like a brass band tossing all their instruments away at once. The polished, textured Medieval era barded horse armor that stood on display was falling in a crumpled heap to one side of the door. Before she could react to spin around and check the other direction, strong hands grabbed her by her shoulder and drove her roughly into the wall, pinning the young, lone officer up against the firm, unyielding surface. The fingers pressed in harshly to her trapezius, using the muscle as a handhold in a way which both discouraged resistance through pain and gave him the direct leverage he needed to bind her to the wall. It was a familiar anchor point, one that he had always been fond of using when he applied direct force to his conquests. His other hand wrenched her service pistol from her grasp, a practiced motion deploying the clip release with his thumb so that the ammunition dropped harmlessly to the ground as his athletic body held her own pinned against the wall.

"Nice to see there's at least one of you with a brain... More fun that way..." He whispered in her ear, his voice goading and taunting as he pulled his hand off her shoulder to slide the one bullet remaining out of her chamber. Tossing her gun away, he twirled the woman around to face him, so that her ass, rather than her bust, was pressed to the wall of this priceless museum. And as he saw her eyes, his lips spread just a little further into an intense smile. "Well, well, well... All grown up, are we, college girl?" He teased, making no effort to hide the immediate spark of recognition of one of his earliest conquests.

 

[AlluringEnigma]

It was funny how detective work played out. She had spent months analyzing his patterns, looking at long-dead crime scenes and pouring through files, trying to figure out how to be one step ahead of a man who seemed to have made his entire criminal career revolve around being one step ahead of the people chasing him. In some ways, she felt like a distant lover, learning and analyzing and becoming intimate with another human being she couldn't even touch. He was infuriating to track - his targets random and his motivation seemingly too money-driven to allow any weakness of personal motivation into his actions. He was a consummate professional, one worth tracking and one that consumed all her time nowadays.

Danielle Cross had come a long ways in her life. Back in college, she had been instrumental in a theft, having been abused and used and then tossed aside. Years of therapy and plenty of inner monologuing had brought her a career in FBI specifically to stop those same thieves from getting their hands on property that they had no right to. In a way, they were doing the same thing to the possessions of the world that had been done to her the night she had been drugged, fucked and left behind after opening a few key doors for her abusive fling.

Now, she sat there surrounded by the works of a man who had eluded multiple bureaus and departments across the globe, trying to crack the same case that many others were staring at. What makes you so special? What makes you think this man is any less clever than the one who tricked you so well the last time? You'll end up just as outplayed as last time, you know that right? Her inner thoughts raged against her as she spent another hour staring at the inexplicable images in front of her. She shut them out and clenched her fists, taking deep breaths and steadying herself. Then it hit.

Misdirection!

A single word, fired at her brain like the final shot of a six piece. He always used something obvious to cover his tracks and let him get the real prize he was after. This wasn't something new - but the insight it gave her was in his target selection - he would choose his next prize based on his ability to be able to discern a proper distraction in that area.

She pored over the list of museums and galleries, looking for something... though she couldn't pinpoint quite what yet. The Philadelphia Museum of Art had a local dress on display, a treasured relic of no value to the actual market. Bingo!


Her bosses were skeptical, and she had ended up on the mission without support - or even the official consent of the Bureau. How vindicated she felt when the alarms rang and the museum was flooded with cops looking after their precious local relic. Misdirection she thought to herself as she racked her brain for his location. The other wing! No doubt he was pilfering where all the commotion had died down. She turned on her heels and hurried to the exit he was most likely at and felt a rush of adrenaline as her effort bore fruit. A shady man clearly angling to escape into the crowds was making a bee line to the exit.

As he saw her, she gave chase with little thought beyond the adrenaline of his capture. Perhaps it was this excited recklessness that ended up with her being slammed into the wall, his strong hand pushing into her trap and pinning her to the wall, his other hand deftly disarming the eager agent. She didn't try to see his face - if she did, it was a sure death sentence for her, as she had been taught at the Bureau. Better to live and try again than end her days at his hands.

His voice rasped in her ear, the hot air hissing against the goosebumps of her skin.

His voice. Why did it send shivers down her spine? Her training was overcome by instinct as she was spun around and she met his gaze. It was him. It was really him. Cassian... her heart dropped in her chest as a million emotions ran through her: fear, anger, hate, and worst of all lust.

"I should have known it was you, twisted fuck. After what you did to me, I hope they put you somewhere you never see sunlight again." She spat at him, a large glob of spit hitting his face and did her best to use that moment to try and pull her arm free and send a hard elbow into his kidney, though she had little leverage from the position she was in.

 

[SnowSage]

Danielle's weak attempt at an elbow strike earned no attention or response from Cassian, lacking as she was in leverage to build up force. Her momentary statement of defiance by spitting at him had not caused so much as a flinch, as his powerful body continued to block her path away from the wall, holding her in place and leaving her with no room to operate to resist him. His hand that had tossed away her gun swept across her body in a swift, harsh motion. The open palm impacted violently against her perky, modest breasts, the impact of the slap causing a deep, chafing, familiar ache in the warm mound even through the heavy fabric of her FBI jacket.

"Now, now, college girl..." He said, maintaining perfect eye contact, his smug, commanding expression not shaken in the slightest by her outburst. If anything, there was a note of playful, predatory amusement in his smile as his hand which was not currently kneading the bruising breast through her blouse rose to his cheek, thumb wiping the thick wad of spittle from his face. "Is that how I taught you to greet your master?" He teased, as the thumb which was still carrying her spit thrust forward, plunging past her full lips to return her lougie back to her own mouth, his fingers curling possessively around her chin to tilt her head up, reinforcing the position of physical dominance that he had over her. "Don't worry... We'll find a better use for your mouth."

"Don't worry, college girl." A younger, more clean-cut Cassian, not yet 30 and wearing a starched white shirt, un-intrusive blue tie and slacks, said to a then-19-year-old Danielle. His hand was red and her chest was heaving from the impact of the slap he had just delivered to her breasts. They were alone in the conference room of the corporate office building that she had been interning at, and he sat with his legs spread wide in a conference chair, taking up substantial space as she stood in front of him. He had just interrupted her as she was baring her soul, spiraling through emotions as she explained how much shame she felt for having enjoyed what he did to her when she was helpless and alone the previous week. "You don't need to explain. You aren't good at it. We'll find a better use for your mouth." His red hand, fresh from having slapped her through the tight professional blouse she wore, shot up to her hair, fingers curling into a tight fist in the full, dark hair, gripping at the root just above her scalp, at the base of her skull where it met her neck, his wrist gently pressed against the lobe of her ear.

With a firm tug, he drew the young, impressionable victim of his perversion down, so that she was off balance, bent over, and unable to look away from his intense stare as his wolflike eyes gazed into her soul with a predatory hunger. He spoke firmly into the sparse fractions of an inch between their lips. "Consider your offer accepted, college girl. You're all mine, now." His lips hung tauntingly close to her own, letting her hunger for the kiss that was never coming, before his hand in her hair cranked downward, and he guided her under the conference table. With his strong hand guiding her inexperienced motions, from an anchor point on the back of her head, he forced the young girl who had just admitted she got off on being pushed around through sucking him off for the very first time.

After a moment, with her discharge safely back in her mouth, Cassian drew his thumb out of her lips. The thumb slipped down to the dimple of her chin, so that the point of her chin was pinched between it and his fingertips. His other hand's fingers had found her nipple through her kit, and his thumb and index finger were circling, teasing her areola in frustratingly familiar ways. He leaned his weight forward, pushing on her chin to force her to lean her head back into the wall, his bodyweight stifling her and penning her further and further into a rapidly diminishing sphere of space that she could move in. His lips hung fractions of an inch from her own as he looked at her just like he had when she was a young submissive only barely managing to fumble her way through asking to be owned. His breath rolled heavily over her own full lips, cascading over her exposed neck. For a long moment, it seemed the kiss she had been denied as a young woman would come now, but as the distant sounds of footsteps rang out, Cassian chuckled openly. "Bad timing from your friends, college girl... Looks like I'll be seeing you around."

Disengaging from her body, Cassian strode swiftly to the base of the stairs. Glancing back at her, he reached into his pocket and pulled out the stained glass artwork, holding it up. "By the way, you can tell the jackboots that I have a highly fragile work of art that has survived since the twelfth century on my person. If they don't want to see how their department heads feel about a priceless object that would have eventually found its way back to a museum being destroyed, they'll have to leave their guns in the holster." With a flourish, he returned the item to his pocket, and took off up the stairs. Mere moments later, he reached the roof of the wing, paying no heed to the alarms which were blaring off in response to his having shoved his way through the restricted roof access door. Turning to face Danielle, whom he had presumed had pursued him during his flight, he gave a casual wave as he leapt off the side of the building, letting himself fall the two stories to the sloped grassy hill below, where he landed with a tumbling roll, distributing his momentum over the course of cascading down the hill to the waiting waters of the Schuylkill river below. During the entire roll, his hand had been in his jacket, cushioning the glass relic and keeping it safe. Before Danielle and the local cops could even make it out of the museum, Cassian was across the river, casually walking into the bathroom on a coach car of the currently boarding Amtrak to New York. After changing, he left his soaked outfit in a duffel bag in the bathroom, and slipping back out and across the platform to instead take a first class seat on the departing train for Chicago, his prize safely in a briefcase on his lap.