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Cher has to face Mallory and deal with the fallout of a failed mission. She does get to meet up with a friend afterwards, though.

Shifting Consequences--Chapter 31: Lies to Protect

By Zmeydros (Lucien Quinn) zmeydros.tumblr.com zmeydros (Twitter) Malfedrosti (Mal Twitter)

Cher walks past security barely noticing her well-practiced motions as she shows her badge and passes through the metal detector. She looks at the elevator briefly before taking the stairs. Her coworkers may take the elevator to go up one floor, but she wouldn't be caught dead doing that. It would be incredibly inefficient because the average wait for the elevator is enough time for her to get to the second floor on foot.

When she arrives on the second floor, she sees her teammates gathered in the big conference room. The upper two thirds of the room is made of glass and black-painted steel criss-crossing in a square grid--like a glass and steel cage. Apparently, the architect thought meetings were a form of punishment. Cher sees Mallory flailing her arms a bit as she addresses everyone. Cher tries not to smile about the fact that it looks like Mallory's having a bad day.

The moment Cher walks into the room, everyone goes quiet. "Uh, hello?"

"Now's the time tell everyone what you did to tip off our fugitives so they could set up a trap for the extraction team." Mallory sits down.

Cher's eyes start to go wide as her heart starts to pound and her fists start to ball up. Mallory wants to throw her under the bus? With careful concentration, Cher holds her face still. "So, we didn't get them?"

"No! Did you get a text about a successful mission? Did I call you to congratulate you?" Mallory puts her palms on the glass tabletop. "We were just talking about whether you need a vacation. I told them how you seemed apprehensive about the mission and about your recent questioning of orders."

"You can't pin this on me. Did the team get even one positive ID? I told you--"

"Everyone, OUT!" Mallory stands back up and points at Cher. "Except you."

Cher moves away from the door as her coworkers file out of the room. Don and Marsha are the only two that make eye contact with her. They were probably the only two people she could call friends. Cher catches herself staring at Don's ass. Really? Her heart is pounding and she is about to have a fight with Mallory and she's suddenly noticing that Don has a perfect ass? Maybe it's his new steel grey suit?

As the door shuts, Mallory sits down and says, "Sit," as if Cher is a bad pet.

Cher just looks at Mallory for a few seconds before pulling out one of the fake leather roller chairs. She sits down. Disobeying Mallory right now would just make things more difficult.

"Are you trying to undermine me? I know you don't like me." Mallory leans back as if she has it all figured out.

Cher takes a deep breath before she speaks to avoid yelling. "No, I don't even know what happened. Was the extraction team ambushed?"

"We don't know. Their descriptions of the events that occurred are very unhelpful." Mallory looks into Cher's eyes. "I know you know something you're not letting on. You didn't look genuinely surprised when you heard that we failed. You will either tell me right now whatever it is you're hiding or I will pin the failure of this mission on you."

Cher stares right back. There's no way she's going to let Mallory take her down. "You can try. I'm not hiding anything. I didn't think we had the right people. I expected some sort of failure."

"It's settled then, next Thursday at four o'clock, you and I are going to have another meeting. You're suspended until then. Hand in your badge and your gun." Mallory stands up.

"What? You're really going to suspend me?" Cher stands up on shaky legs.

"Oh yes! You had it coming the moment you became a problem for me." Holding out her hands, Mallory motions for Cher to surrender her badge and gun.

"FUCK YOU!" Cher pulls out her gun and badge before laying them on the table. "You're just a paranoid bitch!"

"I'll put that down as insubordination. Now slide them across the table." Mallory smiles.

"Get them yourself." Cher turns and walks toward the door.

"All you have to do is tell me the truth and I'll give these back." Mallory leans forward and picks Cher's belongings.

Cher barely hears Mallory as she walks out the door. There is no way she'll go down without a fight. She's going to--Cher stops in midstep to avoid running into Don. His dirty blond hair has been combed to the right and frozen in place by plenty of gel.

Cher looks at his thin nose and bright blue eyes as he says, "You okay?"

"I'm suspended." Cher looks away in shame.

"That bitch!" Don looks around to make sure no one heard him before continuing. "When I get off, let's get some drinks."

"Huh?" Cher blinks. Don never seemed interested in seeing her outside of work before.

"Look, I'm shy and only the thought of you being alone tonight was enough to get me to finally say something." A blush was forming on his face as Cher stared at him more.

She looks over Don's perfect stubble and the slight bulge in his pants. She'd never thought about him in a sexual manner... "Okay, sure."

"I'll call you later." Don steps back to let Cher pass.

Cher walks past him. When she gets into the stairwell, she notices a sweet scent. Is that her scent? Wow! She smells good... And her life sucks now. She might lose her job or end up in jail or who knows what. She is hiding something! How is she supposed to win this when Mallory is actually right?

She starts walking down the stairs. No! Mallory is the one that's wrong. Cher may have a secret, but Mallory is using dirty tactics and operating without care for anyone other than herself. It's Mallory that should go down. All she has to do is point out Mallory's self-serving behavior to her own allies. Cher's done good work over the years and her reputation is flawless. Mallory has to know she's on shaky ground. To the right people, her attempt to pin this all on Cher has to look really questionable.

Cher walks out of the doors and toward her car. She'll just have to call up internal affairs in the morning and make her case. She gets in her car and drives toward home. She's on autopilot most of the drive except for a yellow light near her home where she takes a moment to decide that she shouldn't try to roll through it.

When she is back at her apartment, she drops her purse on the couch and plops down in the plush easy chair that's far older than she is. She picks up Jimmy Carter's latest book and starts reading.

She dashes over to her purse when she gets a call and answers.

"Hey, I'm off work. Want to meet me at Pizza Tap? I know it's tacky, but they have good drinks and--"

"Sure, I'll head over there now." She cuts Don off. The nervousness in his voice is making her feel awkward.

"Okay. I'll get us a table and wait. Bye."

"Bye." She hangs up.

Cher grabs her purse and heads out the door. If she had thought of it before now, she might have dressed up a bit... or maybe not. She doesn't really have any clothes for dates. She gave away all her old dresses and such years ago thinking she'd never need them. Don probably didn't have time to dress up anyway.

She walks out of her complex and gets in her car. Her heart starts beating faster. A guy asked her to go drinking with him and she said "yes." A week ago, she would have turned him down. No more embarrassing painful sexual encounters... Wait, wouldn't she turn him into an anthro something if she had sex with him?

As she gets in the car and closes the door, she realizes that Don probably doesn't know that Zack can transform. She and Mallory are probably the only two people that know. And even Mallory doesn't even know the extent to which Zack can change.

Driving toward the bar, she thinks about Zack, Bella, Glenn and that other person. If she transformed Don, she would share a secret with him. He could be an ally or he could turn her in... She doesn't need to worry about this right now. Don isn't the type to have sex on the first date and neither is she.

All she needs to do is enjoy herself and have a few drinks. There's no guarantee they will have any sexual chemistry. It's hard not to get ahead of herself when it's been so long since she dated anyone.

She tries to clear her mind for the last five minutes of the drive. Whatever happens tonight, she'll learn from it and enjoy herself. Her expectations are only going to make it more nerve-racking.

The ugly red and white strip mall that has the bar in it is soon in front of Cher. She focuses on the sign for Pizza Tap to avoid looking at the tacky lit signs for the other places. One is a secondhand music store that looks like an absolute mess from the outside. She went inside once and the people there didn't even know how the music in the store was organized.

After parking and making it inside the door to the bar, she sees a at least ten people waiting to get in. Something moving in the corner of her eye catches her attention. When she turns to look, she sees Don waving from a table near a black-painted square pillar. The Christmas lights draped across the ceiling and the old racing memorabilia lend a sense of fun to the otherwise drab interior.

The tables are round with a mottled grey finish. The chairs are simple black wooden ones with red vinyl cushions. Her face takes on a slight blush as she realizes Don actually dressed up for her. His hair has been re-gelled, he put on a white and bluish-gray pin-striped short-sleeve shirt. The top two buttons are undone, showing a bit of his chest hair. She stares at him as she walks up to the table. His khaki pants look brand new. Is this a date?

The moment she gets to the table, he gets up and pulls the chair next to him out and after she sits down he helps her scoot in. When he sits down, he smiles at her. "I'm, uh, so glad you came."

"Why wouldn't I? I said I would." Cher glances at his shoulders. They're a bit above average.

"Well, I just never, um, got the idea that... that you wanted to see anyone outside of work."

"Well, I would have said no when you asked if I wasn't planning to come."

"Oh, right." He fidgets with his silver-colored watch band.

The waiter says, "What would you like to drink."

Cher hears the waiter, but doesn't see him. He's standing right behind her. The way the tables are arranged leaves little room for him on the other side. She doesn't bother to crane her neck to see him and says, "A strawberry margarita."

"I'll have a Corona." Don said.

"Anything else I can start you off with?" The waiter asks.

Don looks at Cher. "You like Jalapeño poppers?"

"Yeah, actually." Cher smiles. Her heart starts to thump when Don's gaze lingers.

"Okay, I'll be back with your drinks in a jiff." The waiter walks away and Cher catches a glimpse of him from the side.

He's a lanky guy that walks with a wider gait than seems necessary. His hands look overly big on his arms. She turns her attention to Don, who is staring at her hair. No words come to her, so she just ends up staring back at him. She feels a bit light-headed all of a sudden. She's just not used to this sort of attention.

After a few long moments, he turns away and blinks, chuckling nervously. "Sorry."

"It's okay." She looks across the crowded bar. Some tables are well on their way to having far too much alcohol, while others have families where the fathers are trying not to pay entirely too much attention to the hockey game that's taking place on the HDTVs hanging on some of the bar's pillars. "How long has it been since you went on a date?"

"Is it that obvious?" Don laughs nervously.

"The way you're dressed says that you're hoping this is a date and your pants are new, so you haven't had a reason to use them since you bought them, and you are easily as nervous as me." She avoids looking at him. That admission was stressful enough already.

"It doesn't have to be a date." He looks down at the table.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to intimidate you." She grabs his hand.

He looks up at her as his face softens from worry to a look of faint hope. His eyes are more relaxed, making his worry lines disappear for the first time since she got here. "I was a bit terrified to ask you to join me for a drink tonight. I thought you'd spot all my character flaws by the time we got our drinks."

The waiter sets down the drinks in front of them. "I'll be back with your appetizer." He dashes off to a table closer to the front and starts taking their orders.

She lets go of his hand. "Everyone's flawed, including me. I haven't been on a date for four years and I'm probably as nervous as you." Cher takes a sip of her margarita and then takes a swig. It's actually pretty good.

"That beats my two. I assumed you had a life outside work and that's why you didn't seem interested in getting to know us." He grabs his drink the moment it hits the table and squeezes the lime that's been placed on the rim into it.

Cher laughs. "A life outside of work? My life was my work. I'm trying to learn how to fix that."

He gulps down a fourth of his beer while she speaks. "Some of us started speculating that you had a bed in one of the store rooms. Now that I think about it, I guess it's pretty obvious you didn't take much time for yourself."

She's had about a third of her drink now and she feels warm all over. When was the last time she had alcohol? Who knows? A year? More? Either this is a strong drink or her tolerance is non-existent. "A bed in one of the store rooms... Why didn't I think of that?" She giggles.

He laughs. "You're far less serious outside of work."

"No, I am serious outside of work... Well, I was." She gets a cold headache when she sloshes some of the margarita around in her mouth. She'd forgotten just how much she liked these.

He raises an eyebrow. "You were?"

"Recently, I've gained a new perspective on things." She stops herself from saying more.

"Oh?" He trails off as the appetizer is set down.

The waiter says, "What would you like to eat?"

"We haven't even looked at the menu." Don smirks.

"Do you have a spinach artichoke pizza?" Cher asks.

The waiter shrugs behind Cher. "Yeah, we do."

"What do you think? Want to share one?" Cher tilts her head.

"Sounds good to me," Don says.

"What size?" The waiter asks.

"How hungry are you?" Don asks.

"Let's get a large."

"Yeah, you can bring some home if we don't eat it all." Don smiles.

"Okay, you guys set for now?" The waiter says as he writes down the order.

Cher remembers something... She likes tequila and there's other drinks that have it. "I'll have a tequila sunrise."

Don shakes his head. "I'm good."

The waiter walks away.

Cher blushes. "I usually don't have more than one drink."

"Well, you did have a crappy day."

The fact that she's been suspended pops back into her head and she looks down at the table as her shoulders slump. No wonder she's feeling like a second drink. With her head lower, she smells her own scent and feels her crotch warm up. If she could get laid tonight, that would make her day so much better... Too bad she probably shouldn't let things go that far.

"May I touch you?" His lips are in a slight sympathetic pout as he looks at her face.

"No one's ever asked me, they just touch and see if I say 'no.'" Cher feels her nipple harden as she imagines him running his hand up and down her thigh. "I think I'd like that."

He puts his arm over her shoulder. "Sorry for bringing that up."

"It's fine." She reaches for a popper and bites it in half only to start going "Haah! Haah! Hot!" as she breathes out trying to cool the roof of her mouth.

Don makes an obvious effort to not laugh at her. "I think I'll wait on those."

She sets the other half down and carefully blows air out of her mouth while chewing to stop her mouth from getting any more burnt. When she finally swallows, she starts laughing and he can't help but laugh with her.

When they recover, he squeezes her shoulder and then lets go. He sniffs the air and his eyes glaze over for a moment. "I should have warned you about those."

"I've had them before. I just forgot that the cream cheese in the center gets scalding hot." She takes sips of the margarita using the icy slurry to cool the roof of her mouth. It's not a bad burn, but the ice is still very soothing. The warmth of the alcohol goes right to her head and she finds herself feeling slightly dizzy.

He puts his arm around her again and stays silent for a couple minutes. She can't think of anything to say during that time. He feels good... He smells good. She's feeling slightly turned on by the time he says, "They're probably cool enough now." He pulls the plate of poppers closer to them.

She grabs the half she set down and takes a small bite to make sure it's cool enough. Just the right temperature. She eats one after another with his arm draped over her shoulders. He stays silent and no words pop into her mind. Feeling a bit dizzy from the booze and the wonderful scent of their slowly evolving arousals, his embrace is more than welcome.

When she's eaten about half of them, she kisses his cheek. "Thanks."

"For what?" He looks at her.

"This." She moves her seat closer so her side can touch his.

"No problem." He gives her a squeeze.

One of the reasons that Cher spent more time talking to Don than just about anyone else on her team is that she knew he was compassionate person. She would be more likely to hurt others than he would. He probably hates working under Mallory as much or more than she does. "What do you think about the Graff case?"

"I think we're chasing a high school student for reasons so stupid that our superiors are too embarrassed to tell us. Either that or Zack is some kind of criminal mastermind even though his record is spotless." He sighs. "Mallory didn't even tell us why she was spending so much time in our department until this afternoon when she started making a case to pin the mission failure on you."

"She released information just so she could try to bury me?" Anger starts to encroach on Cher's calmness.

"Well, not only to bury you. She's also getting other agents, like me, involved. Someone upstairs decided that secrecy is now less important than catching that young man."

Cher feels a numbness in her chest. Mallory is expanding the man hunt? That's not good at all. "She is everything bad about the FBI rolled into one."

"You can say that again." He nods.

"Do you have a family?"

"My wife divorced me when she got a job at the US embassy in Portugal. I told her I didn't want to move away from my daughter."

"You have a daughter?" Cher looks up at him.

His shoulders slump. "I was sixteen and stupid. I had sex with a cheerleader and nine months later, I had a daughter. One of the best worst decisions I ever made." A smile parts his lips. "My parents helped me raise her and we must have done a good job because she graduated from high school at sixteen and is in the biotechnology program at Purdue."

"Wow! Good for her!" Cher smiles.

He chuckles. "Her friends called her Doogie Howser."

Cher laughs. "I could never quite get through episodes of that show."

"She and I watched a bunch of it together. I think we realized early on that she was something special."

"No wonder you didn't want to move away from her." Cher puts her arm around his back.

"I thought I already told you about all this at work."

Cher sighs. "I was in my own little world. I vaguely remember you saying something about a daughter, but I zoned out on people's personal details."

"Yeah, you took that professional distance thing really far at times."

"I still feel weird about getting this close to you so fast. I think I was craving closeness, but was afraid to pursue it."

"Psychoanalyzing yourself, now? Perhaps you've had too much to drink."

Cher drinks more of her margarita. "Nope, I need to drink more. More alcohol is obviously going to fix more of my personal problems."

"Guess I'm the designated driver."

"Damn right. I'm the one who has the better reason to drink." It was coming back, the charm she used to use to get guys to like her. Don was like a set of training wheels keeping her upright so she could learn how to ride once again. Oh! She wanted to ride him! If she felt this good from this amount of closeness, just imagine how good she'd feel if she had him inside her. She shivers at the thought.

He squeezes her her. "You cold?"

"Nope, I'm fine." She nuzzles his chest. Maybe it's the alcohol, maybe it's something her transformation did to her, but she likes it. Sex doesn't scare her--it excites her. Sex on the first date seems kinky. She whispers in his ear. "You ever had sex on the first date?"

He looks at her with his eyes wide; neither of them notices the pizza and Cher's second drink arriving. The waiter looks at them and leaves without a word. Don's face reddens as he says, "No, actually."

"Neither have I." She grins at him.

"Are you sure?" He looks into her eyes possibly trying to determine if she's joking.

"Yes. We've both been waiting far too long." She rubs his thigh and his leg quivers. "There's a catch, though."

"What's that?" He raises an eyebrow.

"If you have sex with me, you'll have the same secret I do. Something you can't share with Mallory or the FBI."

He sniffs the air. Her scent is so much thicker now. "I have no idea how that fits in... Is it something illegal or harmful?"

She runs her hand along his inner thigh until she is cupping his balls and his half-hard penis. "No, it's something I'd only share with people I want to be close to. I can't see why anyone wouldn't like it."

He raises his hand and looks at the waiter. The waiter starts walking over. "Let's take the pizza home."

"Good idea." Feeling his penis harden under her rubbing, Cher feels a surge of heat and joy. She feels powerful and in control. Being the one that initiates the sex is really fun!

Should she do this? There's so many things that could go wrong! She takes her hand off of him and drinks half of her tequila sunrise. If she has to, she'll drown her doubts with alcohol. She's tired of worrying about everything. Can't she just have one night of careless fun?

The waiter comes over. "Yes?"

"We'd like to take the pizza home. I'll take the check now too."

"You're paying?" Cher asks.

"For a hot date like you? I'll pay multiple bills." He grins.

Cher laughs. His pickup line is adorable. She grabs his hand under the table and leads it to her crotch. The moment he rubs, she has to bite her lip to avoid moaning. When the waiter is on his way back, Don removes his hand and starts blushing deeper.

The waiter sets down the check and then puts the pizza in a box. While the waiter is working on that, Don gets out his credit card and puts it on top of the check. The waiter takes it away.

Cher leans into Don and resists the urge to grab at his crotch. She'll get to play with his equipment soon. Don strokes up and down her back as he waits for the check. The moment it's on the table, he signs it. Cher stands up with him and grabs the pizza box as he gets his card back into his wallet.

On the walk out of the bar, Cher manages to walk pretty straight. She's a bit drunk, but not nauseated or anything. "Lets go to your place."

"Sure. I think it's closer anyway." He leads her to his car and she hops in the moment she hears the doors unlock.