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ratchedspeach · 4 years

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R&R

Prompt written for Falliam Frenzy Week 4 - “Are you flirting with me?” and “…or we could make out.” This isn’t nearly as angsty as my other stuff - thought I would let these two have a little fluffy moment hehe

Femperial was a success — not just profitable, not just breaking even, but a real, bonafide success. By the end of their first year, Fallon had managed to double their profits, bringing in almost fifty new authors to publish and help launch careers for, and she did it mostly single-handed (by and large because she couldn’t loosen her grip on the reigns). It was a somewhat thankless job, not that she minded. Work was the only life Fallon really knew, and the one she felt most comfortable in.

Liam would watch and offer his help when he could, which … wasn’t very often, because he didn’t actually understand the business side of his own industry. It made him feel a little foolish that mostly what he was good for was bringing her too many cups of coffee to count. Fallon never complained, though — never expected him to do anything for her, never mind what he already was. She would just smile, and thank him gently, before turning back to her computer.

There was something almost confounding about watching her focus — eyes squinted, lips parted gently, bent slightly forward towards her computer screen. It wasn’t necessarily when she was her most flattering (at least that’s what she would tell him), but it was certainly when she was least worried about what others thought of her. It was intrinsic, and personal, and passionate.

Today is different.

Usually when Liam came, she would tell him that she was too busy for visitors, not that he would listen. Today, though, she had simply smiled as she accepted the coffee and kiss on the cheek, because she actually was too busy for visitors, let alone the three minutes that their usual useless banter. He noted the change in their routine, as well as the way her jaw clenched as she continued typing away at what he assumed was an email, but he hadn’t looked at long enough to be sure.

“Didn’t your mother ever tell you its not nice to stare?” Fallon teased, eyes maintained on the screen.

He was seated on the couch, legs crossed with a book abandoned against his chest, and his hands placating a now cold and mostly untouched latte. Liam smirked, making the dimple in his left cheek protrude.

“Actually my mother was always upset when I didn’t stare.” He mused.

She rolled her eyes, heaving a sigh, because of course that would be Laura Van Kirk’s prerogative. There was a ping from her computer before she could respond. Fallon tensed, biting the inside of her cheeks and clicking the email open. The further she got into it, the further her face fell, and the more Liam’s concern subsequently rose.

“Fallon?” He murmured, standing from his perch and coming to lean next to her.

She closed the email before he could read beyond Dear Ms. Carrington, tensing as she starts searching through her files for only god knows what. Liam backed off the desk pressing his hands out as if to signal his white flag. She relinquished almost immediately, exhaling heavily and pressing the palms of her hands to her eyes, and for the first time Liam saw her for what she was: exhausted. A pang of guilt settled in his stomach for not having seen it sooner — for not even considering the fact that after launching her own company with all bets against her, she must be …

“You need a break.” Liam murmured, placing a hand on her shoulder and kneading into the spot behind her shoulder blade.

Fallon groaned in protest, but did nothing to stop the contact. “I don’t have time.” She mumbled, and he could feel her back tense again at the omission. “If I don’t secure the Griffin option before one of those little Penguin gremlins gets to her, that’s it for Femperial.”

“It’s one option, Fal.” Liam looked at her like she was speaking another language. “I don’t think it will make or break you.”

It’s the first time all day that she looks at him, and he almost wishes she hadn’t. Fallon’s blue eyes are bloodshot, and unfocused, and maybe a little panicked, and her lips are pursed into a decidedly uneasy grimace. She’d been pulling late nights, Liam knew that, but he’s beginning to think he doesn’t know the full extent. He’s always asleep by the time she gets home, and she refuses to wake him. Liam’s grown used to taking her word for it when she promises that she’s home no later than midnight.

“Jesus, when’s the last time you slept?” Liam breathes, his brow furrowing.

“I’m fine.” She huffs, rolling her shoulder away from his grasp. “At least I will be once Griffin responds to my email instead of getting one of her assistants to do it for her.”

“Well have you called her?”

Fallon quirks an eyebrow. “She hates phone calls ... she’s an author, Liam. I swear you and your kind are going to be the death of me … what ever happened to face-to-face communication?”

He smiles at the hyperbole, but he thinks she might be right judging on how close to the bone she’s working herself. She’s mentioned the Griffin option once or twice — Leila Griffin, a prodigal eighteen year old fiction writer who had just finished her first full-length novel. Liam had pushed her to fight for it because it was, admittedly, an impressive opportunity. He doesn’t realize what pushing for something means in her mind, though, but now here she is - running almost purely on coffee (and some Adderall she stole from her father’s medicine cabinet, not that either Liam or Blake know about that), and going out of her mind over one book option.

“You need a break, Fallon.” Liam repeated, cupping her face softly in the palm of his hand and reveling in the way it made her eyelids flutter. “You know, rest? Respite? Relaxation? Any of these words ringing a bell?”

She rolled her eyes at his alliteration, swallowing down a giggle, and fixing him with the closest thing to annoyance that she could muster. He had grown impressively adept at making her pause, and it was equally comforting and aggravating. Fallon loved her work — more specifically she loved doing her work — because it was only her’s.

She had grown up with the expectation of her future holding marriage — more specifically, marriage as a means of some business merger for Carrington Atlantic, she would come to realize. The first Christmas she can remember is when she was six and her brother as ten. Steven had received a chemistry set, and his first briefcase (amongst other things … they are the Carringtons, after all). Fallon, on the other hand, got clothing, and her first eyeshadow pallet. She would smile, and thank her parents gently, and try to ignore the disappointment she felt settling in her stomach, because truth be told she was too young to really articulate why it was there in the first place.

Femperial is the first time she’s felt like her life has direction, like she has direction outside the confines of expectation and without anyone’s aide. It had started as a passion project — something to occupy her from the crippling devastation that came with Liam’s absence, but …

By the time he was back (and actually remembered being back), it was a career, and one she loved, but one that Liam thought was starting to run her ragged.

“I know what a break is.” Fallon snapped, but he saw the humor glinting behind her gaze.

Liam smiled in return, tilting his chin before leaning forward to kiss the top of her head. “Well then,” He mumbled into her hair, “maybe you should bring it into practice before you go crazy. Or … drive Griffin crazy.”

Fallon felt he way her nerve endings tingled and fizzled as he formed the words against the roots of her hair. Her eyes closed, and he took it as permission to bring his kiss from the top of her head, to her cheek, to the space just below her jawline, and —

“Liam …” Fallon whined softly. “I can’t. Not here.”

“You’re the boss, last time I checked.” Liam whispered, marveling at the soft murmur his lips moving against her bare skin elicited from the woman.

Fallon gigged, grabbing him by the chin and kissing him squarely. “Maybe so, but that actually makes me more culpable … last time I checked.”

Liam groaned when she rolled her chair a few centimeters away from him, but complied, reclaiming his seat on the far side of her desk. She watched as he placed the book he had been largely ignoring back on his lap and quirked an eyebrow upward. Fallon chuckled, shaking her head, before returning back to whatever she had been doing prior to the interruption on her computer. Liam watches her brow furrow as she returns to her work, before heaving a sigh and unfolding the page of his novel.

He’s not sure how long they sit like that — long enough that the next time he looks up from his half finished book, the sun is golden, and Fallon is … she’s asleep? Liam thinks, crooning his eyes to wear her head is placed on the crook of her elbow and her curls are spilling over the edge of her desk. Oh my god she fell asleep.

He has half a mind not to wake her — Fallon’s stillness is something of a relief if he’s being honest — but he knows that if he doesn’t, someone else will eventually barge into the office looking for her, and that would simply mortify her. From his vantage point he can just barely make out the way her ribcage rises and falls to give way to the slowness of her lungs expanding. Liam smiles, closing his book delicately, and coming beside her.

“Hey.” He whispers, pushing a few strands of hair off her cheek with his index finger before tracing the profile of her face.

Fallon stirs, mumbling softly, but otherwise does not change. Liam can only assume that its the equivalent to her rolling over were they in bed, Liam thinks, and has to stifle the laugh that threatens to spill over his lips at the sigh.

“Fallon, babe, wake up.” He practically sings before leaning over to kiss her cheek.

She wakes with a start, then, practically knocking the side of her head into the front of his as she sits upright, placing her hands on the desk like she’s holding on for dear life, and snapping her eyes open.

“Good morning to you too, sunshine.” Liam gripes.

“How long was I out.” Fallon groans, blinking her eyes and checking her phone screen as she once more orients herself with where she is.

“Not sure. A while, I think.” He shrugs. The brunette looks at him, and his smile falls when he sees the panic streaking across them. “What’s wrong?”

“The … the goddamn Griffin option.” She breathes. “It was due at three.”

Liam fumbles with his coat pocket until he finds his phone, clicking the home button, and … shit. His eyes close, breath dropping out of him in as his knuckles close around his phone. “It’s 4:30.”

“Why didn’t you wake me?” It comes as a dangerously low grumble, and he jerks his gaze towards her.

Fallon isn’t just angry, she’s pissed — cheeks red, eyes narrowed, lips drawn into a snarl. Liam looks at her a little incredulously, because … it’s not my fucking fault. He doesn’t say it, because he knows it won’t help, and ultimately he knows that she doesn’t actually think it's about him. Which begs the question …

“Fallon what the hell is wrong?” He asks, and before she can snap back, adds, “Really?”

It was rare for him to come to her dance recitals. As a matter of fact, Fallon can count on one hand the number of times he’s seen her in the audience. When she joins the competitive team at her school, and even earns herself a solo, she had begged Blake to come. He complied less because he was proud, and more because he was curious.

She was a beautiful dancer, admittedly, and were she not born into the family she was, it might have made a viable career option for her. Blake had watched her dance, and feels something akin to pride. It was short lived, though, when awards were announced and she came in second. He left before the ceremony was over, stalking back to the car, and sucking down scotch in the back of Bentley while he waits for her.

She’s thirteen the first time her father tells her that she’s “a Carrington. Loosing is not an option, Fallon.”

“I lost!” She shrieks. “I … fuck, I didn’t even loose, I just wasn’t a contender!”

Liam realizes that what he had mistaken at panic in her wasn’t that at all — it was grief. Grief over a lost option, over something that she would see a million more of during her time as a publisher, that she would lose a million more of.

“Fallon, it’s ok.” He says, and its a little harsher than he means it to sound, but … is she fucking serious?

“No it’s not, Liam.” Fallon rasps, shooting out of her chair and slamming her hands on her desk. “If I can’t even get a goddamn eighteen year old to sign with me, how is anyone going to take me seriously? Leila Griffin was a perfect client for us, and I dropped the ball, because I was —“

“Because you were tired, Fallon.” He cuts her off, ignoring the sharp look it earns him. “Because … Jesus, because you’ve been working nonstop, and you’re not taking care of yourself.”

It hits her like a ton of bricks. “Oh my god, is that what this is about?”

Liam’s brow furrows as he tries to keep up. “What … what? What what is about?”

“The visits.” She seethes, color rising in her cheeks once more. “The coffee, asking me to wake you up when I get home, and your incessant company. Is … is this all because you’re trying to fucking play doctor?”

“I’m trying to help, Fallon.” He shoots back, his voice low in his tenor. “I was trying to take help take some of the pressure off of you! Jesus, what did you think this was all about?”

“I thought you were flirting!” Fallon shrieks, arms jutting out to her sides like she’s presenting tangible evidence. “I thought you were — … ! I … fuck, I don’t know! I thought you were bored, and looking to be preoccupied, or something. That’s all!”

He can’t help but laugh by the time she’s done, because even she sounds uncertain about her reasoning. Liam watches the muscles in her shoulders release as she considers what she’s just said.

“Ok … maybe … maybe, like, deep in my subconscious, I knew why you were here, but that doesn’t change anything.”

He’s full on cackling by the time she’s done, which he thinks she might kill him for, but he doesn’t care. he starts to giggle too, covering her face with her hands to hide her smile. It’s almost off putting, because he’s really expecting her to be angry, or defiant, but she’s just …

“Maybe I am tired.” She mumbles, the sound getting muffled into her palms.

“Are you sure? I think you’re doing great.” Liam teases, silver eyes glinting, and Fallon groans softly, and yeah … she’s sorry. Liam pulls her into his arms, the scent of his shampoo making him heave a contended sigh.

“You’re gonna have a million opportunities thrown at you, Fal.” He levels, weaving his fingers through her curls. “You can’t win ‘em all. Hell, no one expects you too.”

He thinks he might have hit on something when he says it, because she pulls away (not before he can feel her tense in his arms) and looks at him with stormy blue eyes, it takes everything in him not to break her gaze, because she looks so somber. He thinks there’s something particularly unsettling about somberness on her because it requires a certain amount of defeat, and Fallon Carrington does not go down without a fight.

It might be the first time she hasn’t been punished for making a mistake. A sheer B+ was reason enough for Blake or Alexis to come down on their children, going so far as to insult their characters when they were especially upset with them. Fallon has heard how mistakes are her fault so many times that she’s effectively learned how to stop making them - or at least how to project the blame. It makes for a great businesswoman, but a sometimes shitty woman, woman. In a lot of ways, Fallon owes who she is to them, which is as much reason to love them as it is to resent them, she thinks.

“I was off my game.” Fallon inhales when she sees a way out within what he says. “I do need a break.”

She spins, clicking a few buttons on her computer. He hears it whirr and hum for a moment before falling silent, and he realizes with a decent amount of relief that she’s turned it off. Fallon, on the other hand, seems uncertain, her fingers trailing idly on her keyboard as she brings her gaze back to him. Liam smiles softly, reaching for her hand and squeezing it softly.

“This is a good thing.” He says, and he’s only half teasing her.

Fallon bites the inside of her cheek, giving him a knowing glare, before squeezing his hand back. She hadn’t realized how quiet her office was without the humming of her desktop, and she’s not sure yet if she likes it. Her eyes flick to the window pained door that separates where she and Kirby work. The other woman’s desk is covered in papers and empty coffee cups, but there’s no sign of her.

Or anyone else, for that matter.

“Where did everyone go?” She murmurs mostly to herself.

Liam shrugs, the image of everyone finding times to sneak out before she woke up flashing through his mind. He doesn’t say anything, just places his free hand on the small of her back and kisses her delicately. She squeaks at the jolt in movement, before melting into him and bringing her arms around his shoulders. Liam pushes her against the desk, trailing his hand up her back to the spot just below her ribcage.

“Liam…” She protests weakly when his lips find her neck. “This is still where I work.”

“Right, because your moral compass is always pointed due north.” He breathes, kissing her neck again and smiling when her breath hitches in her throat.

“Are you flirting with me, Liam Ridley?” She muses softly, her fingers finding the space between his pants and his shirt trailing up the muscles in his back.

Liam pulls away so that he’s looking at her and god she wants to wipe that smirk straight off his face, because he looks all too pleased with himself, and it makes her heart melt.

“Maybe.” He coos, kissing her again and bringing his own hands to toy with the top button of her deep green Chanel blouse.

Fallon’s breathing goes a little ragged, and before she can really think about what she’s doing, she’s kissing him again, hard and fervent, and mussing his hair between her fingers. Liam pulls away after a few moments, his eyes meeting hers knowingly as he ignores her whines in protest.

“We can go home if you want.” He flirts easily.

“You’re right, we could.” Fallon says cooly back. “Or …”

“Or?”

“… Or we could just make out.”

#falliamfrenzy #nat writes #I hope y'all like this #falliam #Falliam frenzy #ship: falliam #liz gillies #fallon carrington #fallon x liam #this is kinda cute and fluffy and like smutt if you really squint ... its more like pre-smutt HAHA #liam ridley #dynasty #dynastyfic #dynastyedit

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