CHAPTER WARNINGS: degradation/humiliation, public embarrassment.

NOTES: Good morning, Monday sufferers! I decided to get this up now to go along with Elsa's Monday. Not much Anna in this chapter, sorry about that. More coming up in the future, I promise! I'm glad you guys seem to still be digging this!

C A Moore: You bring up some very interesting points. As far as the "war on BO" goes, I think for a lot of people who are somewhat squicked by the whole pit-sniffing part of this fic, they're imagining some rancid man on the bus. What we're talking about here is the natural human scent we all possess, in some fashion or other. Again, not every kink is based on one I have; this time, I put pheromones in this fic because of an article I recently read. Anyway, on we go!

~ CHAPTER EIGHT ~

It took Elsa a solid five minutes after Anna took her leave to stop sobbing and take the implement out of herself, rinse it off as much as it needed rinsing, and lay it on the back of the toilet. Another few to exit the tub, let it drain, and sit on the edge of it with her head in her hands.

Unforgivable. She never should have let that happen, never should have let Anna stay. Even if it would have hurt her sister's feelings, she should have commanded her to leave her in peace. At that point, she didn't know which was worse: getting off when her sister was in the room at all, taking such dark pleasure in her "pheromonal areas", or the moment of climax being during a kiss with her. They were all horrifyingly awful in equal measure.

After towelling off, she stared into the mirror for a long moment. Who am I now? she demanded of herself. What is WRONG with me? Why can't I resist these… these weird things I suddenly want to do? With Anna, without Anna… I used to be such a normal, good person. And now… now I'm guilty of…

There was a word that was beginning to apply more and more to Elsa and her relationship with her sister, but she refused to acknowledge it. She pulled on her underwear with jerky, violent motions as she avoided thinking about that, because it wasn't true. Sure, what happened in the tub was pretty perverted, but not nearly as bad as it could be. They weren't guilty of that. Not yet.

But it has to stop, she told herself as she wrapped her hair in a towel, tucking it into a turban. I think it would hurt her to stop kissing her right away, but nothing like what just happened can happen again. I… I have to dig deep, find some willpower! Or else… I'll be the worst big sister in the world.

With that sobering thought, she left the bathroom.

"Hey," Anna said easily from the dining room table, where she had been writing in a small black notebook. "So I hope you still like cashew chicken and vegetable fried rice; I got tofu stir fry for me, and some spring rolls. Well, I got enough spring rolls for both of us, I just meant that I picked those over egg rolls because they don't have any meat. I've been pretty lax on the whole 'vegan' thing since I got here, but there's no time like the pres-"

"Maybe you should sleep on the couch tonight."

Anna blinked for a moment at the interruption, trying to switch gears. She smirked a little. "Aww, are we fighting? Am I in 'the doghouse' now?"

"Stop that," Elsa breathed, voice shaking. "I… I don't want to do this anymore."

"Don't want to do what? Be my sister?"

"Of course I want to be your sister! But that isn't how we've been acting, is it?" After a few seconds, she repeated more sharply, "Is it?!"

"Elsa… I tried to tell you, I don't really care about labels and categories. I've been hanging out with you. That's it. Whatever happens, happens."

Tugging at her turban, Elsa began to pace back and forth. Then she snapped, "I don't want this anymore. I don't want to smell your armpits, and I don't want you to pretend not to know what was going on before you came into the bathroom."

"Right." Anna had the good grace to look ashamed of herself. "I didn't know before I opened the door, though. Swear to the deity of your choice. I just… wanted to spend more time with you. How was I supposed to know you wanted a moment alone if you don't tell me?"

"We're already spending too much time together. Or… too much of the wrong kind."

"No kind of time with my sister is the 'wrong kind'."

That made Elsa blink several times. How was it that Anna could so easily cut through her heart with a few words? She waited for Anna to say more, for her to elaborate, or yell at her, but she just stared down at her notebook, looking somber and hurt.

"Okay," Elsa sighed wearily. "You're still sleeping on the couch, and I want to stop being so… so intimate with you. But I don't want that to ruin the rest of the night. So can we just… put this all behind us?"

"Can we? I don't know."

She walked over, took one of Anna's hands in hers. "Please? I… I'm sorry for being so upset, but what happened in the bathroom was just way too far. But… I still want to hang out with my sister."

Anna turned to look up at her. Taking the opportunity, even though her eyes were stinging with unshed tears, Elsa smiled down at her. Slowly, the smile was returned.

"Okay. Yeah, I know this whole thing's a little off the beaten path for you. Sorry for not respecting the speed of your enlightenment."

Rolling her eyes, Elsa grunted, "Whatever that means, you're forgiven."

"Good, good. And… I wish you had just told me to leave."

"So do I!" she burst out, and Anna giggled. "Honesty, I don't know what's wrong with me; that would have been a much easier solution than 'oh, I hope she doesn't notice.' I feel so stupid!"

Shrugging, Anna finally closed the notebook and set her pen down on top of it, turning to look at her properly. "It's fine. Like I said, I don't really care, but I didn't mean to make you have regrets later or anything. I just wanna make you happy."

"Not too happy." Then she snorted as she sat down. "Seriously, though… your ear?!"

They both shared a long laugh about that particular development.

~ o ~

The rest of the evening passed in a pleasant enough fashion, though dull. She snuggled up with Anna in front of the TV again with cartons of delivery, passing them to each other and sometimes even feeding each other. It was still a little more "coupley" than Elsa wished, but they didn't kiss, and no pit-hair was shoved into her face. So she decided not to worry overly. If the problem continued, it would become more obvious after a while, and they could argue about it then.

However, she had to admit to herself that her bed felt empty without Anna. After rolling over several times, she had to seriously contemplate calling out and asking Anna if she was awake. But she suppressed the desire. Maybe the next night, after a little time apart, they could try again. See if there would be less boundary-pushing.

Her alarm woke her the next morning, and she reluctantly got up for work. The shorter night balanced with the extremely restful, deep sleep from the night before, and she felt about like her usual self. She snapped on the coffee pot to get it brewing, then tickled the single partially-bronzed foot sticking out from the blankets on the couch as she passed by on her way to the bathroom. Anna only squirmed but did not wake.

Work itself was like any other mundane Monday morning. Spreadsheets and emails and collating and filing. Though she did have the date with Sideburns that evening to look forward to, at least; maybe that would help her shake loose the lingering feelings of desire that should not go in her sister's general direction.

Lunch was still an hour away when she felt herself crashing; maybe she got even less sleep than she originally thought. Distracted by the correspondence she was supposed to be proofreading for her boss, she reached over into her briefcase for one of the fun-sized chocolate bars she kept for just such an eventuality.

But it was stuck. What was it sandwiched between in there? She knew the distinctive feel of the crinkly packaging without even looking, but it was being stubborn. Really, her briefcase was due for a thorough cleaning sometime; most of the things in there weren't even necessary for work, because she always got over ninety percent of her work done in the office. It was a glorified lunchbox.

Finally, the bar came free, but it knocked several other things loose when she did, spilling them onto the floor. Groaning, Elsa tried to bend to get them… and cursed her slight pudge and thick thighs. She knelt down to pick up the two sporks, still in wrapper, lemon-flavouring packets to add to water, club crackers, and receipt, and put them all back where they belonged, actually watching what she was doing this time.

However, when she sat down to open the candy bar, something niggled at the back of her mind. She set it down for a moment, tilting her head and adjusting her glasses. What was it? Something important. Maybe it was about the receipt…

"What is this?!"

A chill crept into her stomach. The receipt had been in the Barnes and Noble bag. Now it wasn't. And though one of the purchases was back at her apartment, safely resting in the very back of her medicine cabinet, the other one was…

"Interesting," Cindy laughed as she leaned against the wall of her cubicle entrance, looking down at the small, square box in her hand. "You know, I really wouldn't have expected you to have something so lewd! Especially not at work!"

She didn't know why. It was stupid, and childish; she knew it was. But the first thing out of her mouth was, "S-something like what?"

"Don't be coy. Oh wow — 'Our most powerful vibrator', it says. With four variable speeds! Had the old model and wanted to step it up, huh?"

"Th-that isn't… I'm n-not…" Her throat was going dry. Hot shame was flooding her face, and she could feel eyes everywhere, even if no one else was looking yet. Cindy's eyes were enough.

"You know, I always kind of wondered if these are actually any good or not," she admitted, still smirking. "But look at you — quiet, stuffy, by-the-book Elsa. Trying things like this under all our noses. Where do you do it? In the bathroom, or right here in your office?"

That snapped Elsa out of her stupor a little more effectively. "Wh- NO! Wh-why would I do something like that at my desk? It's d-depraved! I'm not like that!"

"But you're blushing. A lot." Elsa couldn't deny that. "I thought you were going on a date with that guy from the website. Is this in case he stands you up?"

"H-how did you know about that?!"

"He was on your screen Friday, silly," Cindy laughed. When Elsa bit her lip and looked away, she laughed. "Gosh, it's nothing to be embarrassed about! So you haven't found your Prince Charming yet, like I have. So what? Plenty of people use those sites." Then she looked back at the box. "And probably use these, I guess. Just not in their place of work."

"I told you," she tried again, though her voice was shaking so badly that she knew it was futile, "I d-don't do that here. I never have, and I w-wasn't planning on-"

"What's going on here?"

Already, she was wishing she could disappear from Cindy finding her other little toy. Belle's head poking around the corner was one of the few things that could have made it worse. While she was thankful it wasn't her supervisor, or the big boss, or any of the men in the office, the more people that knew about what she had been picking up on the way home from work, the less she wanted to continue living.

"You'll never believe it," Cindy gushed, grateful for someone to feed the juicy gossip. "Look what I found right outside Miss Ice Queen's office!" She held up the box for Belle to read. "Can you believe it?! I'd never have expected this from her, of all people!"

Belle took in the box, Cindy's overly-hyper demeanor, and the way Elsa looked like she wanted to melt into the carpet. She held out a hand and asked, "Can I see that?"

"Sure," Cindy snorted, handing it over. "Doesn't belong to me. Elsa, do you care? Probably should have asked, my bad." But Elsa didn't reply.

"Hmm. I had wondered where this went."

What? Unable to believe her ears, Elsa looked up sharply, seeing Cindy looking confused. Belle was still just staring down at the box, unconcerned and musing.

"What are you talking about?" Cindy finally asked, with a nervous little laugh. "Did she show it to you before or something?"

"Why would she show me my own bullet? I guess I just lost it in the bottom of my purse. Who knows how it worked its way out, but it must have today at some point. Huh." Then she grimaced slightly. "Elsa, I… I'm sorry it ended up in front of your office. That must have looked pretty incriminating."

"Yeah," Cindy finally breathed, her mind having caught up with the shifting of the "blame". Elsa still had not; she was gaping at Belle, completely flabbergasted. "W-well… I still think it's kinda weird to bring something like that to work, don't you?"

"No," Belle answered smoothly. "Maybe to use it here, but really, sometimes this job gets so tedious. Who wouldn't want to let off a little steam?" When Cindy only blinked in horror, she added with a sigh, "I wasn't using this here. Cross my heart. Just accidentally got dropped in the hallway. Still in the package, right?"

"Well, um… okay, I guess I believe you." Then she turned around and whispered to Elsa, "Sorry I blamed you for it, I can see how that… yeah, you looked really panicked when I thought you were… well, sorry."

But Elsa couldn't even find it within herself to do anything other than nod. That seemed to make Cindy feel even worse; she walked over and patted her arm briefly, then eyed Belle with a lot of suspicion as she backpedaled from the cubicle and set off down the hallway toward her own office.

"You okay?"

"Hmm?" Rousing from her worry, Elsa fidgeted for a second before whispering, "Y-yeah, I think. I just… I don't understand. Why did you tell her…?"

"You were panicking. I didn't know the full story, but I could tell Cindy was making you feel like you really did something unforgivable by owning this. So I covered." Adjusting her glasses, she paced further into the office and added, "I hope that's okay. If you wanted to fight your own battles, I can let you, of course."

Hurriedly shaking her head, Elsa told her, "You really don't have to do that. Fight my battles, I mean. I… but in this case, I'm really grateful. Thank you. I just didn't mean to bring that back to work, it… f-fell out of the bag, I… I'm sorry."

"Hmm." Belle regarded the box for a few seconds, turning it first one way and then the other. When she passed it back, she said, "Pretty funny that I told Cindy it was mine."

"Yeah," Elsa said with a quiet smile, going to put the box away. "I would never expect you'd have anything like this. Then again, I'd never expect it from me, either…"

"Right? All of mine are way bigger."

"Exactly! It's… wait, what did you say?"

Smirking as Elsa sat there, with one hand still stuck in her briefcase, Belle eventually leaned down and pressed her lips right up against Elsa's ear. The words that followed sent more tingles into more areas than she cared to admit, and were ones she knew could never be erased from her memory.

"I know what kind of woman you are. Or I do now that I've seen your little 'friend', anyway. Quiet on the outside, and you tried so hard to be good, to match up your insides with the outside. But look what you are now, huh? A thirsty slut who just wants someone to put her in her place."

She no longer felt calm, nor rescued. Her lip quivered as she tried to come up with an answer, but what could she say? That Belle was wrong? She wasn't — not entirely, at any rate. That was the real problem, not the words she was speaking. Even though she didn't appreciate some of the phrasing.

"You liked Cindy accusing you of this. Craved it, even as you hated it. I've seen your exact brand of shame a thousand times, and from more stubborn women than you."

"Belle… wh-where is all of this coming fro-"

"You wanted her to hand you the box," she went on, pacing around behind her chair to place both hands on Elsa's shoulders, leaning down to the other ear. "And command that you open it. Then you wanted her to ask — no. To order you to open the box and use that newbie vibe on yourself. Right in front of her."

"You- th-that isn't anything like what-"

"In front of both of us." Her voice was growing quieter, but it still cut off Elsa's attempts to reply with great ease. "In front of the entire office."

And that easily, against her will and all sound reasoning, Elsa felt her urges rushing back from where they had been banished to the night before. Perhaps Belle wasn't exactly right… but she also wasn't entirely wrong, either. At the very least, that vivid mental picture was turning her on. Powerfully.

"Look at you," Belle chuckled when she spotted the hot flush creeping up Elsa's neck. "That didn't take much. Already, you're getting the flames fanned. I barely said anything."

"L-listen," Elsa began, trying to find her bravery despite the fingers lightly massaging her neck and shoulders. "You think y… you know about me, but… I'm not like th… like that."

"You are. You just don't know you are yet." When she walked around to look at Elsa's face again, at the complete degradation and self-hatred there, she whispered, "I can make you feel worse. So much worse, in such a good way."

"Wh-what do you mean? What are you doing, are… are you soliciting me?"

With a wolfish grin, she muttered, "Not at all. Making an offer. An offer to grind you into the carpet, my sweet little slut. You won't have any use for that thing you bought if you let me work you over."

Somehow, after all of that, Elsa found her voice. It had been eluding her, but now that she had a better idea of what was going on, she came back into contact with her higher brain functions.

"Listen." Her voice was firmer this time, and she met the woman's beautiful dun-coloured eyes through their two pairs of glasses. "If you s-stop this, right now, I won't report you to HR for harassment. Because of what you did for me with Cindy. But if you don't…"

"You'd rat me out? Just like that, because you're uncomfortable?"

"Yes. Because I'm uncomfortable, and you don't care."

Belle stared for a long moment. Her eyes narrowed, but Elsa only blinked. Her lip curled and she growled softly, "If you ever do consent to an arrangement between us, this is going to cost you. Dearly. I won't forget to punish you; my memory is long and petty. You're going to be in a world of-"

"Stop. Right now. I'm a lot more serious than you seem to believe."

Another moment, even longer than the first. Belle's expression slowly softened from the dark, goading one of before. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, then opened them — and they were sad instead of flinty and cold.

"Alright. I'm stopping. Sorry, Nieves. I still think I'm right about you… about who you could be if you let me twist you into a shape befitting the sole of my high-heeled boots." When Elsa's hand strayed toward the office landline phone, Belle visibly twitched, reaching out to stop the hand. "Okay! Okay, I… wow, I really did upset you, didn't I?"

"Upset me? That's putting it lightly. I don't like you much at this moment, if you really want to know."

This time, she actually looked hurt. "Elsa…" Glancing at the hand still lingering near the phone, she licked her lips briefly and whispered, "Really, I'm so sorry, you're right; I let my perception that you're the right type for my kind of, um, play make me jump the gun. I honestly… I wanted to show you what I could provide. But I didn't mean to push you so far that you hate me. You're right, an office is no place for me to do that." In a whisper, she added, "God, I feel stupid."

The last words sounded so familiar to Elsa, when they had come from her own mouth, that she couldn't help but feel a pang. But her ire remained. "You made me feel worse than Cindy." That caused Belle to look down in regret. It gave Elsa a tiny pinprick of vindictive satisfaction that, for once in the past week, someone else was the one feeling embarrassed and ashamed. "It's just a tiny toy! Why would it mean you have free license to start saying such… such grossly inappropriate things into my ear?!"

"Because of where you got it." There was no answer right away. "From Edna's? I… recognised the price sticker. Any old hausfrau can get one of these from the supermarket, but that's not where you went. You're bolder, you went to an actual sex shop, so I thought…" Sighing, she turned away from Elsa to lean back against the lip of the desk. "I jumped to conclusions. That's my fault, too. I'm sorry."

Nodding, Elsa finally put her briefcase away and pushed her hands into her face. "I've been so confused lately. About myself, my feelings, my needs… I just… probably went in there, looking for answers. And I didn't find any."

"I could give you answers."

"No." Belle only shrugged, so Elsa snapped, "Stop that this instant or I'm never speaking to you again other than in a work capacity. Is that what you want?"

Squirming a little, Belle took a few seconds to digest that before she whispered, "No, Ma'am."

"Good. Now go back to your desk for now. I just… I want to be alone. This whole thing has been horrible, and… and I can't stand you being here."

"Yes, Ma'am." That easily, she stood and began to walk toward the entrance. Elsa knew something felt off about it, but she had been resolved to ignore it… until she saw Belle paused at the entrance.

"What? What do you want now?"

"You're tired of hearing about any of this, I know. But if… you ever want to do things the other way around… I almost think you could," Belle told her with a light flush in her cheeks. It was nothing compared to her own, but it was far more than she'd ever seen in the solitary neighbour. "Somebody who came across as totally spineless a few minutes ago, flipping around and shutting me down so coldly? God… that does things to me…"

In a deadpan, Elsa asked, "You want to borrow my vibrator?"

"Do you want me to?" Belle asked with a wider grin. "I'd give it back without washing it, if that's your thing."

"Just get out!" Elsa hissed in a sheer annoyance. Waggling her fingers merrily, Belle slipped out and into her own cubicle next door, leaving the sole occupant to place her head in her hands. This was pretty much the last thing she needed.

~ To Be Continued ~