[grimli] angel with a shotgun [malachi]

“Ten on Trickett? Sure thing,” she said with a quick grin as she took the gold coins in one hand and slipped the customer a slip of parchment with the other. For Tara Kingsley, it was another night at Grimli. The crowds, the din of chatter and conversation, the hum of adrenaline and anticipation. Everything. All of it. She thrived on all of it. Even with the slightly awkward history that existed between her and the owner of the fight club, Tara couldn’t keep herself away from it. She regularly worked the bet table and tonight was no different.

Leifr was on the board to fight tonight and she was just as eager as ever to see that go down. She knew that he was a tough opponent to go up against and she was never rooting for him to lose per se, but if he did get knocked on his ass, she wouldn’t be terribly upset. Might do him some good. As the first fight drew nearer, more and more witches and wizards came to place their bets and Tara barely had a moment to herself, but she did find a few moments to sneak away just before the first bell went off.

She sidled up to the ring, sliding her way in between little openings to get a better view of the two men squaring off in the ring. Tara found herself peering around a set of broad shoulders that seemed vaguely familiar and she glanced to her right to take another look at the guy. Lancaster. She followed his gaze towards the rink and crossed her arms in front of her. “He’s new,” she offered as she nodded toward the hulking man with a short sweep of blonde hair tied at the nape of his neck. “They call him the Bruiser. Swedish. This is only his second fight. He knocked Bradley out cold in his first fight,” she added, mentioning one of the regular fighters that she saw here often.

Tara glanced at Malachi with a smirk and then cocked her head. “I don’t know if you could take him,” she remarked casually, but there was that glint in her eye that meant she was just teasing.

@Malachi Lancaster

Unwrapping a piece of spearmint stick gum, Malachi shoved it in his mouth as he walked into the seething pit that was Grimli. This was one of those nights where he wondered why he came there. He wasn’t fighting, didn’t have any bets on anyone. He’d been walking, and he’d magically ended here. It wasn’t like he’d better things to do. Outside of the dog, when he wasn’t at work, his best friend had become this club or a 89 year old bottle of whiskey. As lovely as the bottle was, it was nothing compared to being around this seething crowd of people. He could get black out drunk another time, right now, he would distract himself another way.

Clear brown eyes scanned the room, making sure he could see any potential exit. The war had been murder on his paranoia, and every where he’d went, he’d made sure that he was able to she everyone, or get to his weapons as soon as possible. This was the worst and best place for that. One, there would always be some wand twitchy wizard bitchy that he’d lost his fucking galleons over a shit bet. It wasn’t often that Malachi would involve himself in something like that, but the way he was feeling, he’d throw someone across the room no problem.

After nodding at Leifr and at his healer friend, Malachi had went to find a good perch in which to see the match properly. He rolled a coin in his hands, feeling the need for a cig, but knowing that this wasn’t the place. He was rolling his tongue in his mouth as if he was tasting the clove smoke entering his lungs before he heard a voice beside him. He glanced over quickly, his grasp on the wand peeking from his holster loosening. Tara. Of course. He didn’t have an issue with the brunette, but she should know better than to walk up on him without jingling some shit.

He grunted slightly, his shoulders heaving once as he processed her words. His hand slid into his pocket and he pulled out the pack of cigarettes tapping the bottom of the box on the palm of his other hand repetitively. “He looks…pale.” Malachi’s baritone voice rumbled as he eyed up the male in question. Sure he was big. He also moved very slow. He couldn’t be as strong as he wanted to be, but strong couldn’t always beat everything. Malachi knew that first hand. He pulled a black papered cig out of the pack before stashing it, and slid the cig in his lips. With a snort, he met Tara’s eyes directly as he lit the smoke.

“Oh you dont?” Did she think that was the way to bait him?“Why not?”

"Easy there," Tara said with a prolonged look in his direction. She noticed the way he twitched and tensed and part of her wondered why that was, but she simply held up her hands palms forward in a silent gesture. No wand, no harm. She chewed on the gum a few times as she looked at him before sliding her gaze back to the ring, her mind turning with questions. He seemed disinterested in her summation of the Bruiser and a smile played about her lips in reaction to his shrug. Though she did watch him pull out a cigarette from his pocket and she eyed it enviously.

He snorted and Tara's smile turned into a bright grin, her green eyes gleaming, and she moved slowly but held out her hand toward her and wiggled her fingers a bit. She wanted a cig too now that she smelled the smoke wafting towards her, the gray wisps obscuring his face for the briefest of moments. Still she saw his direct gaze on her through the smoke and she met his eyes unflinchingly. This was why she liked Lancaster. "He doesn't look pale," she disagreed. "Aren't all Swedes that pale? No sun and all?" She was merely guessing. Tara wasn't exactly worldly. "You worried about your boy?" she asked with a sly smile, knowing Lancaster and Leifr were friends.

She shrugged a bit and turned back to watch Bruiser bang his knuckles against each other and circle around the ring. He rolled his shoulders and she could see the muscles ripple under his skin. Damn, she could certainly appreciate the male form. "He packs a powerful punch," she explained. "Not sure if you could keep up." But she was almost laughing, teasing. "When are we going to see you in the ring? I might bet on you. A knut or two maybe.."

His brow arched for a moment before he rolled his eyes and went back to the ring. Okay, it wasn’t Tara’s fault that he was jumpy. Maybe it wasn’t right  for him to get agitated when people he knew walked up to him without warning, but it he couldn’t help it. He rolled his shoulders slightly, walking the slight hand to hand sparring taking place between the two other men. He hoped that Leifr beat the hell out of him, if only for the fact that he and Leifr were friends, and he rooted for his friends.

When she held out her hand to him, he blinked for a moment before automatically pulling the cig from his lips and passing it to her. It was habit, ingrained in him fully by conversations with his little sister. He would be smoking on the balcony of his mama’s house and Leah would sneak out to chill with him. Most times, she’d end up wrapping her arms around him and chattering a mile a minute while Malachi just sat there and listened. The action was so familiar to him that he couldn’t help but respond automatically. “Not pale?” Malachi should his head slightly, amused. “He glows. It’s…strange. And no, I’m not worried about him. He’s fought worse and won.”

The white guy was a show hound, a performer. While Malachi knew people like that, he’d never been one. He operated in silence, preferring his actions to show his skill. People like Bruiser sometimes got pumped up on their own hype, letting people talk in their ears and inflate their ego so much so that they lost sight of what they were fighting against. “He can hit.” Malachi shrugged, holding his hand out for the cig. Tara kept on poking at places where he wasn’t insecure in, and all it did was make him give her an honest to goodness grin, one that he didn’t show much.

“Oh a knut or two? I promise you any show that I put on is worth more than a nut or two, Tare.” He licked his lips and chuckled deeply, turning back to the ring. “And I’m out of commission for the next month. Auror shit and all…”

She wondered at his jumpiness, but as he brushed it off, so did she. She could understand it to a point. This place wasn't filled with the most upstanding citizens of Wizarding London. She smirked lightly as he passed the cigarette from between his lips into her waiting fingers. Tara nodded once in thanks and her green eyes became a little brighter as the smell of tobacco hit her tongue. She inhaled slow and deep and held the breath for a moment as she held the cigarette between her fingers. She blew out and the smoke surrounded her for a moment before it wafted away, but she felt comfortable there, surrounded in a haze of smoke and adrenaline.

Tara laughed lowly at his 'glowing' comment and shook her head with an amused roll of her eyes. But then she took another look at Leifr in the ring and nodded in his summation of their mutual friend. "I'm sure that's true," she said, but then grinned as she continued looking forward. "Doesn't mean I don't want to see him fall on his arse once in a while." Merlin knows Leifr's ego needed that every now and again.

"Would you ever go up against Leifr?" she asked, curiosity and a little bit of devil glittering in her green eyes. She took another drag from the cigarette before she passed it back to him. "I could see that being a headliner," she added, thinking that that fight would be something a lot of people (including her!) would want to see. Then again, she didn't really know Lancaster that well and she was eager to figure him out just a little more.

She grinned at his confidence and felt a glimmer of excitement that he wasn't just another blockhead friend of Leifr's. "Oh, alright then. Maybe two or three knuts. Sound about right?" she said, sarcasm and her dry humor imbedded in every word. But then he mentioned his auror obligations and she turned to him with a cursory glance. She never saw the interest in that particular field and was blunt enough to blurt out the first question that came to mind, "why the hell did you become an Auror, Lancaster?" She chuckled as she said it and shook her head as she glanced back to the ring, just in time to see the Bruiser swing out a fist aimed at Leifr's nose.

Malachi tilted his head to the side slightly, keeping his eyes focused on the fight. “Getting knocked out is a reality check. Everyone needs one every so often…” Then he grinned, and shot a look over at Tara. “He needs one. He’s lovesick, and it makes me want to gag.” Every time Leifr mentioned his girlfriend, Kai wanted to beat him with a pillow. It wasn’t because he was bitter and alone, but it was because he was alone and bitter. Two separate things that had nothing to do with each other.

Shrugging, Malachi invaded Tara’s personal space and took back the cigarette. Inhaling deeply, he shrugged again. “I don’t know. Probably. It’d be fun.” It was always hard competing with ones friends, especially since Malachi took everything so seriously. It was rare that he could lose at something and not hold a grudge for a short amount of time. “I’m competitive. Always have been.” Not even a brawl with a friend could stop that part of him.

Tara liked poking fun at him, and Malachi found he didn’t quite mind. However, “I’m still worth a bit more than that. Get me in the triple digit galleon range, and I’m sure to entertain.” His lips twitched with the amusement of the innuendo that was laced int hat phrase. Malachi liked provoking people and seeing how they responded. Had he known Tara better, it’d be as raunchy as it could possibly get, but he wasn’t quite comfortable with her. Didn’t know how she’d react, so he’d keep it simple.


When she mentioned the Auror thing, he snorted. Just that day, his mother had tried to ask him what he did for work. It’d been on the tip of his tongue to mention that he was a wizarding cop, but that would start a whole pot of drama he wasn’t prepared for. So he just mentioned his minor jobs like being a bouncer, and other shit. He rubbed the back of his head, trying to formulate what he was going to say to Tara. “I had a shitty childhood. Being an Auror provides the respectability that I’d never be able to find if I were to go back to the muggle world. I also got stuck there after the war. Personal interest and all.”

"It's about time Leifr was knocked on his ass then," Tara quipped, her grin matching Malachi's. "You see it too?" she asked, her eyes bright as she laughed and shook her head, her hair falling about her shoulder in soft, dark waves. Tara rolled her eyes at the thought of Leifr and Alicia and while she didn't have anything against Alicia personally, the fact that she still had to work beside a Falcon almost felt like betrayal. "At least you don't have to work with them," Tara said.

She watched with steady green eyes as he moved back in and plucked the cig from between her fingers, a smooth and sly smile lifting her lips. Tara found herself side eyeing him even as the fight was under way. There was something about him that intrigued her. Maybe it was just because he was such an unknown and she had always been a curious kind of girl. "Competitive? I know how that goes," she told him with a coy smile. She had been told once or twice that when she lost she was kind of a bitch about it. Maybe that's why she was always determined to win. "How are you on a broom?" she asked casually, though her tone let on to how interested she was in his answer. Competitiveness was something that was inherent to her character and suddenly she could see the two of them racing each other through London's streets. But she didn't want to race if he wasn't even going to be a challenge. She looked over at him speculatively.

"Triple digits?" she whistled lowly under her breath as she narrowed her eyes playfully. "Sounds like a promise that I'm not sure you can keep," she threw back at him, her playfulness evident in her dancing green eyes. She found herself watching him more than she was watching the fight even though the two opponents were in the thick of it. When he opened up about his childhood, she found herself turning back to the ring and watching with eyes that weren't really seeing. "Well," she started after a moment. "Kudos to you. Because I would never be able to do that."

“You’re complaining about working with them? Try going out with them.” He laughed low, the bass sound rumbling from deep in his chest. He licked his lips and ran his hand over his low-shorn hair, amused. “it’s like watching one of those old lifetime comedies. With a Celestina Warbeck soundtrack.” Maybe he was a bit jealous, but that was no reason that the two of them had to be so corny. He lifted his lips up in a grin, and blew smoke out of his nose.

Malachi bumped his shoulder against hers, before inhaling the cig deeply. “I bet you do, Tar.” He quipped. “I’ve got six siblings, and I’m smack in the middle. When we used to eat, it was like fighting a battle.” He let out an amused laugh, shaking his head. “Compared to my older brothers, I’m little. Those two used to knock people out of the way to get food, as if we were starving. We got into it one good time, and they learned not to fuck with me…” His gaze turned back towards her, and he had this arrogant, masculine grin slowly curving his lips. “And i’m fast.” He responded to her broom comment.

There was a loud slam, and he saw Leifr get thrown on the ground. Malachi slammed his hands against the chair, and began to yell encouragement at his friend. Laughing loud, he cheered when Leifr got up and dealt hard body blows to the German, making him stagger and fall on his knees. Malachi swore when the blonde got up. He turned back to Tara, handing back the cigarette, exhilaration pounding through his veins and making his eyes light up with glee. “Fun, yeah…?”

His eyes narrowed at her comment, and he shifted so he was looming before her. His hand grasped her chin, and he looked down at her, eyes narrowed. “Trust me, Tara. I keep all my promises…” He smirked and chuckled darkly, tapping her bottom lip with his forefinger. “Triple digits or more…” And just like that he backed away, turning back to the fight. His dark eyes flicked back and forth, watching the action. His hands opened and closed as they traded blows. Mentally, he was screaming at Leifr to duck and dodge, but he was too drawn in to speak a word. Then Tara's voice broke his concentration.

“Do what? Be an auror?” He let out a bark of a laugh. “Please. It’s easy. My dad would hate it if he knew…He hates cops.” Inhaling on the cigarette, he threw it in a neighboring trash can. “Drink?” Without waiting for an answer, he slid through the crowd towards the bar, not noticing the way people moved to get out of his determined path.

She grinned, the smile getting bigger the more he spoke, as they stood on common ground. Tara shook her head, her hair falling about her shoulders and turned her gaze to the fight, though her attention was on the man beside her instead of the men in the ring. She idly wondered why her and Kai hadn't hung out before now considering he wasn't so bad, smirking as she bumped her shoulder back against his.

'Compared to my brothers, I'm little.' At that, Tara turned and gazed at him with a questioning brow. Doing a noticeable up and down assessment of him, but continued to listen and matched his grin with her own as he boasted. Tara might ordinarily find that arrogant but with him, she found it intriguing. "Little? Not the word I would use," she quipped. "But fast? We'll see about that."

The action in the ring caught both of their attention and Tara turned back to watch Leifr and the Swede duke it out. She found herself yelling just as loudly as Lancaster. She had never been a quiet fan, much to her parents chagrin when she attended Griffins game in the family box. Tara was not exactly the modicum of poise and politeness at any sporting event. She accepted the cigarette back from him with a  nod of thanks and agreed with a grin as his question. "Hell yeah," she said.

One moment he was beside her and the next he was just in front of her, her chin in his grasp. He was fast. Her breath hitched. The instinct to shove his hands away from her chin faded because of the look in his eyes and the sound of his laugh rumbling deep in his chest. He tapped her lip with his finger and she got the urge to slip her tongue out and touch his finger, but he moved away before she gave into the whim. "I guess we'll see then," she said after a moment of getting her breath back.

Tara quirked another questioning brow at him, but he turned away and changed the topic before she could ask. He was already walking away toward the bar in search of a drink, leaving Tara to glance between the reaminder of the fight and Lancaster's back. With choice made, she sidled up next to him at the bar and asked, "What are you drinking? This round's on me."

She slapped some sickles down on the counter and asked for a beer from the bartender as she glanced at Kai.

He let out a deep belly laugh, his hand running over his closely cropped hair slowly. He needed to get a line up soon, maybe tomorrow. When he turned to look over to Tara, she was looking him up and down like he was something to admire, which he was. He smirked openly, shifting in place. “Let’s just say that they are taller than me, but I’m bigger in all the ways that really count…” He winked at her, amused. It was different, flirting again. It wasn’t bad different, just…different.

He’d already been at the bar, waiting for the attention of the bartender when the shorter woman slapped her sickles on the counter. “Wow, you’re bossy. I at least usually get a slow fuck in the shower before I let a woman buy drinks for me, but since you insist…” He rumbled low, licking his lips. He looked at the bartender and shrugged, “Whisky, please.” And turned back to Tara.

“Gimme.” He demanded, snagging the cig from her, and inhaled deeply. “So, you’re never getting in the pit?” He teased, nodding his chin towards the fight which was the last thing on his mind. “I can see you brawling out there. You sure have the temper enough for it.” Hand resting on her lower back, he sipped at his whiskey, passing a bag of coins to the bartender. “Open a tab.” He commanded, turning back to her.

“You want to go back over there, or what?”

Tara let out a smooth, low laugh, her green eyes glittering in the dim light, as he mentioned how big he was in certain departments. This kind of harmless flirting was something she always enjoyed and to find a new partner, a new opponent in Kai was fun. "Oh, I don't doubt it," she said breezily. "I don't know who ever said 'size doesn't matter' because they're fucking idiots." She grinned crookedly at him.

At the bar, she popped her hip against the counter, her breasts brushing his arm as the crowd pulsed around them and they were pushed closer together. Her eyes caught on his lips and his words stuck in his mind, painting a picture she wasn't necessarily all too against. Tara wasn't a loose woman, but she also wasn't one with a whole lot of rules. "Huh, in the shower?" she questioned, gazing at him before sliding her gaze to the bartender, watching as she poured her a glass from the tap. "I was going to suggest the bathroom in the back, but I see you have standards," she teased.

She passed the cigarette back to him and pulled her beer toward her in the next second, sipping from the edge. "Me?" she asked with a disbelieving laugh, quickly followed by a "Hell no. The boxing I do is strictly recreational." Tara had always been a fan of boxing for a work out and she liked the fights, don't get her wrong, but she would never step foot in a ring like that. She was perhaps a little too vain and not sadistic enough to enjoy the pain you received in the ring.

Tara felt every inch of her become aware when he placed his hand on her back and she glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. "But you can see me out there, huh? Think I'd win against Leifr?" she asked, a grin curling one corner of her lips. "Against you?"

At his question, she took another swallow of her beer and glanced behind them at the ring. The fight seemed to be coming to a climax and Tara shrugged as she turned back to Kai. "We can see from here who wins. If it isn't Leifr, we can give him hell after buying him a drink."

“Size matters. Control matters more. The size and the motion of the ocean, yeah?” He grinned broadly, amused. “I’ve never heard of a woman getting off on just a tiny stick alone…” He tugged a piece of Tara’s hair gently, teasing. This was fun. He wondered why they hadn’t done this before.

“It’s not standards, actually…I just like water, especially when it’s dripping off of a woman’s curves. And small spaces and moans? It’s lovely. It’s like a symphony, makes me want to work harder.” His face dropped into something less playful and more serious, before he masked the heat of his words with a smile.

“You box?” He could see it, most definitely. See her slapping someone the fuck out for play. “You want to box me? I’ll make sure I’ll take it easy on you…” His smirk was almost malicious as he challenged her to play with him in his playground. He held his hands up in a boxing formation, playfully tapping her with his knuckles on her upper arm. “Maybe I might let you win?”

“If he loses, I’m buying him a bottle and knocking him on his ass.” He droned, rolling his eyes. He took another sips of his drink, licking the droplets of liquor off of his full bottom lip. “I can depend on you to take out his glass jaw, yeah?”

His voice was smooth and deep and his words were painting pictures that she wasn't against, her green eyes glittering gave her away. She tilted her head and grinned. "Yeah, tiny sticks aren't my thing," she told him as she looked up at him through her lashes, her whole body tuning into him as she tugged on her hair in play.

She nodded seriously as he spoke and kind of wondered if he had a hobby of poetry. He certainly had a way with words. "You seem like a hard worker," she echoed, seeing something in his eyes spark that in turn made something in her own spark back just as brightly. Tara took another drink of her beer, the cool glass in her hand staving off some of the heat she was feeling coming off Kai. Was it just her imagination? Maybe.

Tara nodded with a vicious smile and shook her head. "I don't need you to take it easy on me," she told him with a shake of her dark hair. She tracked his fists as they came up and she set her glass down and squared off against him, bringing up her own fists just in front of her face, settling into the position naturally, eagerly. "Don't want you to let me win. I'll do it all on my own, dancing circles around your ass," she told him with a grin as she feigned to one side as if they were in the boxing ring.

She eyed the real ring again with Leifr and the Swede still battling and nodded. "Yeah I got'im," she told him with a smile that said she would be keeping her word.

“I focus totally on my job when I’m in it. Sometimes too much. I like to be the best, and I like to make sure that everyone is satisfied with my performance. I learn by doing, yeah?” He bit his bottom lip again, moving closer so he loomed over her. If he was being honest with himself, which he was 99.9% of the time, he wanted to bend Tara over and take her against the bar. But that might just be the smoke, and the liquor, and the ambiance. He wasn’t usually so indirect with his interest, but they’d already began this game, and he liked it. His hand reached up to play with her hair, and he refrained from digging his hand in her hair and dragging her against him.

Smirking, he grabbed both of her wrists in one hand, forgoing his former restraint, and pulling her body against his. “I’d love to see you try, Tara.” He said, leaning down to brush his lips along her cheeks. “I’m pretty sure I’d work you over, and leave you with bruises, but I’ll make sure I’ll put them where people can’t see…You might even come back for more…” He leaned back up, looking around, meeting eyes with the man staring at them. His eyes narrowed, and the man flinched turning his attention back to his drink.

Tara’s body still against his, he raised his fingers and summoned the bartenders. “Take a shot with me…” He waited for the drinks to appear, and held them both in one hand, letting her go so he could hand her her drink. “Then maybe we should head back over there, so Leifr doesn’t think we’re abandoning him.” And maybe he would learn some restraint and try not to drag her to a dark corner, just to talk. “And then maybe you can tell me how you’ll dance circles around me.” Throwing back the shot, he set the shot glass down on the table, waiting for her to follow.

“Unless you want to take another one?”

Her brows rose and arched and she knew they were speaking in innuendo which had a whole reel of naughty thoughts going through her mind, but she also got the feeling he was speaking in truths too. And that made her wonder about a whole different side to him than she knew. She was mostly distracted by the teasing, flirty, sexy side though. He moved closer into her space and Tara simply let her head fall back a little further to keep him in her sights. She appreciated his height and the heat she felt coming through his shirt as she placed a hand on his chest. "It's a good way to learn," she echoed as she bit her lip and flicked her eyes to meet his.

Their play boxing soon transformed into something else entirely and Tara's breath hitched as he shackled her wrists together in one of his and pulled her closer. She wasn't protesting really, but she was also naturally a fighter and so being roughed around without fighting back wasn't easy for her. His body was hard and hot and she leaned closer, using his body to keep her balance.

She felt his breath on her cheek and her own breathing went uneven. His words were hypnotic, her reaction automatic like lightning. His words made her hot and a need pulsating through her, something she wanted to explore more, with Kai specifically. She didn't particularly care for the bruises, she was too vain for that. But she didn't mind the roughness or the physicality that his tone promised her. "And what about the bruises I'll leave on you..?" she asked, meeting his gaze.

His call for shots was greeted with a grin and a quick nod. She was a girl who loved shots, but she regretted the distance that fell between them as he released her hands. "Leifr's a big boy, I'm sure he can handle it," she told him as her eyes lit up when the bartender slid the glasses across the counter to them. She took hers and handed him his and held it up to him in a toast. "To hard work and boxing that might cause bruises," she said with a devilish smile before knocking her head back and swallowing the shot in one go.

His call for one more had her nodding again. She couldn't say no. So she called out for the bartender as she leaned against the counter, pushing her arms together so her breasts were more in view, winking a thank you, and then pushing the shot glasses into their hands for one more round. She held up the glass and looked at him expectantly, waiting for his toast.