Fic: Repent At Leisure (Bandom, Gabe/Victoria, 10500 words, Explicit)

[rsadelle]

Summary: Gabe and Victoria are drunk when they get married, and they aren't in love, but they make it work anyway.

Notes: In case it's not obvious from context, I wrote this two or three years ago, before Gabe and Bianca broke up and before Victoria started tweeting pictures of her professionally done nails. Consider it to take place within that time period. Thanks to D and S for providing nail polish advice, lakeeffectgirl for reading through this and talking it out with me, and anyone else I may have talked to about this but forgotten now. Any errors and rough patches are due solely to me, not to them.

Story on AO3


Victoria wakes up to a pair of phone alarms buzzing just out of sync. She has a godawful hangover, and she's not wearing any clothes. She doesn't remember what she did last night, but at least she's in a hotel bed and she still has her phone. She apparently hooked up last night, too, because the bed is too warm for just her.

She reaches for her phone. It's buzzing with her last minute, get the hell up now because you have to leave alarm. She usually sets an earlier alarm too, but she either forgot or slept through it.

It's while she's holding the phone that she sees it. There's a very simple gold band on the ring finger of her left hand. Holy fuck.

There's rustling behind her and the other phone shuts off and is replaced with a very familiar voice groaning.

Holy fuck.

She turns to look, and there's a matching ring on the hand Gabe's scrubbing over his face.

"Oh, fuck."

Gabe looks at her, and his eyes widen. "Victoria? What the fuck?"

She holds up her left hand. "Did we get married last night?"

Gabe looks at his finger, then his. "Fuck." He gets out of bed and starts gathering clothes up off the floor. "Fuck, fuck, fuck."

"I really fucking hope not," Gabe says.

Victoria feels like shit.

They appear to be in her room, so she gets clean underwear and clothes more comfortable than last night's out of her bag, stuffing last night's clothes into it while she's there.

"I'm going to get my shit. I'll see you at the bus."

Victoria does a sweep of the room after Gabe leaves to make sure she's not leaving anything behind. There's a used condom on the floor and their marriage certificate on the nightstand. She slides it into her bag next to her laptop where it won't get crumpled.

*

Victoria makes it to the bus with a minute to spare. She hasn't bothered to take off the ring. Alex, Ryland, and Nate are all hanging out in the lounge in varying stages of hangover, and they all watch her walk through so she can throw her bag into her bunk.

"Your wedding's on the internet," Alex calls after her.

Victoria's bag falls from her suddenly nerveless hands. "Fuck," she mutters. She picks it up and tosses it into her bunk.

Gabe comes onto the bus just as Victoria comes back out from the bunks.

"Your wedding's on the internet," Alex tells him too.

"Come watch it," Ryland says, seemingly oblivious to the way that Gabe and Victoria are staring at each other.

There's an ugly, unhappy twist to Gabe's mouth, but he drops his bag on the floor and sits down on the bench on one side of the table.

The bus rumbles as they pull out of the hotel parking lot.

Victoria sits down next to Gabe. Alex puts a laptop in front of them and hits play. They're close enough that Victoria's elbow touches Gabe's as they watch.

They're clearly drunk, stumbling down the aisle clutching each other and giggling. Ryland, Alex, and Nate stand up with them, Ryland in what looks like one of Victoria's skirts on the bride's side, and Alex and Nate leaning against each other on the groom's.

They went all out; the officiant is an Elvis impersonator, and a pretty good one. Victoria looks like she means it when she says, "I do."

And then they're kissing, which means both of Gabe's hands are on her ass and she's wrapping her legs around him. Victoria can see that they're kissing with tongue.

That's where the video ends.

"Fuck," Gabe exhales. "Is it out?"

Nate nods. "I got a bunch of tweets about it."

Gabe's about as pale as he can get. "Fuck." He's starting to sound like a broken record.

"You can get it annulled," Ryland suggests offhandedly.

"No," Victoria says, "we can't." She doesn't turn to look at Gabe.

Even through their hangovers, it only takes a couple of seconds before Ryland, Alex, and Nate get it and start laughing.

"This isn't funny, fuckers," Gabe growls. He pushes at Victoria. "Let me up."

"How is this not funny?" Alex asks.

Victoria moves so Gabe can get up.

"Bianca," Gabe snaps.

Everyone stops laughing pretty quickly. Victoria feels worse than she already did.

Gabe's already dialing his phone as he walks toward the back.

Victoria sits back down and stares at YouTube's share-replay-related videos options overlaying the last image of them kissing. She's starting to remember bits of it, like Gabe's hands on her ass and looking at rings and a really sloppy blowjob.

Her head is killing her. Nate brings her their shared Costco-sized bottle of aspirin and a regular-sized bottle of water. She manages to thank him and takes three aspirin she washes down with the whole bottle of water.

Gabe's probably in the back lounge, on the other side of the bunks, and they can hear his voice in the front lounge. Victoria can tell from the cadence of it that he's arguing, and doing it in Spanish.

Victoria feels a little like she might throw up. She also feels like she could sleep for another twelve hours. If she goes to her bunk, Gabe's voice will only be louder. She lies down on one of the couches and curls herself up into as small a ball as she can. The ring on her finger already feels like it belongs there.

*

A week passes. Gabe continues to have angry phone conversations in English and Spanish. Victoria's tongue sticks to the roof of her mouth when her parents ask, "What now?" When interviewers bring it up, Gabe bullshits them with crap about how they're very close as a band and they like to keep the surprises coming.

Victoria notices the way his jaw tenses and his shoulders hunch in just a little bit, too subtle to see if you weren't looking for it.

She also notices Ryland, Alex, and Nate exchanging worried glances when they think she and Gabe aren't looking.

Victoria already had plans to fly home for their next day off for a friend's birthday party. Now Gabe buys a ticket too, and they wait together in silence in the gate area.

Victoria doesn't see Gabe once they're in the air, and she catches only a glimpse of him in the terminal.

She's used to late nights, so even though she's tired, she's not sleepy. She doesn't really feel like doing anything either, so she just lies on her back on the couch and stares at the ceiling.

She's been doing that for a while when the buzzer sounds. It's Gabe, and she lets him up.

He has his bag slung over his shoulder. "I forgot to take the ring off. She threw me out." He's trying to sound casual, but Victoria can see the tension etched in every line of his body. "I figured my wife might let me in."

Victoria sighs. "Yeah, sure." She lets him in and sits a careful foot away from him on the couch. "Why haven't you taken it off?" She's still wearing hers too.

Gabe laughs completely without humor. "It turns out I actually believe in taking marriage vows seriously no matter how frivolously we made them in the first place."

"I know what you mean." Victoria looks down at her ring. "It looked like we meant them in the moment on the video."

"Maybe. The bitch of it is that if New York had common law marriage I could take my marriage to the woman I actually own property with seriously."

Victoria thinks she might cry.

"What are we going to do about this?"

"Fuck if I know." Gabe leans against the back of the couch, and he looks about as tired as she feels.

Victoria sighs. "We might as well get some sleep. You're going to be miserable on the couch. If you keep some clothes on, you can come sleep with me."

*

Waking up in bed with Gabe when she remembers going to sleep that way is different from waking up next to him last week. There isn't the same sense of panic and confusion. Instead, Victoria's pretty content until she stops letting herself forget all the ways this is fucked up.

Then she gets out of bed, pulls her hair up in a messy ponytail, and makes coffee.

Gabe's been to her place enough that when he stumbles out of the bedroom, he gets himself a mug out of the cupboard and fills it from the pot. He knows where she keeps the sugar, too, and a spoon to stir it with.

"We have lawyers," Victoria says. "We can get a divorce." She doesn't want to be one of those celebrities who gets a quickie divorce to match their quickie marriage, but she also doesn't want to stay married to someone who doesn't want to be married to her.

They're like mirror images of each other, both of them leaning back against the counters on either side of the kitchen, connected by matching mugs held in hands wearing matching rings. Victoria thinks about how she would frame the shot for a movie.

"That feels like cheating."

Victoria knows what he means. Skipping out because it's hard isn't fair to the commitment they made, no matter how unknowingly.

Gabe puts his mug down and wraps his arms around himself. "Bianca's forgiven a lot over the years, but I don't think she's going to forgive me this, even if we do get a divorce."

"Yeah, well, if the guy I was living with married someone else, I probably wouldn't forgive him either."

Gabe hunches over himself. "I'm going to take off the ring and try talking to her again." He smiles at her. It looks painful. "If she'll take me back, we should get a divorce. If not, you want to make this marriage work?"

Victoria does. She apparently believes in marriage just as much as he does. And this would be something that belongs just to them in a way their band doesn't.

"Yeah." Victoria rubs her thumb over the smooth glaze on her mug's handle. "But if we do, no more fucking around. I'm not as forgiving as Bianca."

"Deal." Gabe picks up his coffee again. "Can I use your shower?"

Victoria waves him in the direction of the bathroom. "Go for it."

*

Victoria goes out to visit the friend who has Gizmo and get her hair done. She tosses Gabe her spare keys before she leaves. "Just in case."

When she gets home, he's sitting on her couch with red-rimmed eyes and looking as small as she's ever seen him.

"She wasn't even mad anymore," he says. "She just said that this was it, it's clear I don't want to be with her anymore, and if I wanted to be married to you I should just go be married to you." He looks down at the floor. "She's not going to change her mind."

"I'm sorry," Victoria says. She pushes off of the wall and sits down next to him. After a moment of hesitation, she puts her arm around his shoulders. "We can still get a divorce. See if that changes things."

"It won't." Gabe looks bleak. "She's not going to change her mind." He looks away from her. "I've also been through that, with my parents. I don't want to do that again."

"It would be different," Victoria says, even though she doesn't want to do it either. She knows marriages can work; her parents has.

Gabe shakes his head. "No," he says firmly. "I'm not going through it again."

"Gabe," she tries.

"No." Gabe looks at her. "No. It doesn't matter. We're married, and we'll stay married." There's a set to his jaw that she thinks means he's trying not to cry. "People get married for all kinds of reasons and it works out."

Victoria's a little relieved. This whole thing is crazy and ridiculous, but there's a ring on her finger that says it's real.

"Want to come to a birthday party with me tonight?"

Gabe chokes out a laugh. "What? That's my consolation prize? Your relationship just ended, go to someone else's party?" He sounds a little hysterical by the end.

"I was more thinking you're my husband and you might want to come with me so you can meet my friends. And it might distract you for a while."

"Fuck," Gabe swears. "I did a fucking good job teaching you about being a Cobra." He doesn't actually sound pleased about it.

"It was just an idea." Victoria gets up so she can go to her bedroom to figure out what she's going to wear and repack her bag so she can leave for the airport right after the party. "You don't have to."

Gabe catches her wrist. "I'll go," he says. "Thank you for inviting me."

"I think," Victoria says carefully, "that most invitations will be for both of us now."

Gabe looks up at her. "You're right." He presses his lips across her knuckles, over the ring. "I don't have anything dressy with me."

Victoria shrugs. "You can get away with it. Besides, they're mostly people I know from film school. You won't be the strangest dressed person there."

She's right about that, and about her friends not minding that she brought Gabe along.

"So this is the husband," Kitty all but purrs. It's her birthday; she gets to say whatever she wants. "Nice. Tall. Is he rich?"

"Yes," Gabe answers for her, "but so is Victoria."

"I didn't marry him for the money," Victoria tells Kitty and the rest of the group that's listening in with varying degrees of obviousness.

"Then it must be for his skills in bed," Kitty says. She looks Gabe up and down in a way that makes Victoria want to stand between them. "Because I can't imagine any other reason to tie yourself down like that."

Victoria makes herself look as mysterious as she can. "A lady never tells."

She's saved from any more of Kitty's prying by the hostess letting them know their table is ready.

Gabe fits in surprisingly - or not so surprisingly, once she thinks about it - well with her friends. He can talk pop culture and avant garde film and the business of making art. Somehow Jean-Paul, who's always had a distinct interest in philosophy, winds up on the other side of him, which means Victoria feels comfortable catching up with everyone else without feeling like she has to keep Gabe entertained too.

The table goes through a dozen bottles of wine with dinner, but Gabe and Victoria are both totally sober by the time the party breaks up. They take a cab back to Victoria's place and tell the driver to keep the meter running while they run up to grab their bags. Then they have him take them to the airport.

Gabe applies liberal doses of the words "newlyweds" and "my wife" and charms the gate agent into changing their seats to two together. He drapes his arm over Victoria's shoulders while they wait.

Gabe sleeps about as well on planes as he does on moving buses, so Victoria lets him take the window. He seems serious about the newlyweds thing; he pulls up the armrest between them so Victoria can lean against his shoulder and asks the flight attendant for a blanket so she'll be warm while she sleeps.

It is one of the more comfortable naps she's ever had on a plane.

*

Victoria's reading in her bunk when Nate knocks on the edge.

"I think you should see this." He's holding his laptop in one hand.

Victoria shuffles around so there's enough room for him to join her. They sit shoulder to shoulder, and then he hits play on the video. It's an interview Gabe did, and Nate starts it at the three-minute mark. It's the end of Gabe's answer to some question about the tour. Then the interviewer asks him about the wedding. It's the same kind of bullshit he's been spinning the whole time.

But then she says, "I think what surprised people the most is that you have a girlfriend who isn't Victoria."

"Had. Let me give some advice to your viewers." Gabe looks directly into the camera. "If you're living with someone, don't marry someone else. It'll fuck up your relationship."

The interviewer isn't good enough to keep from looking surprised.

"Yeah," Gabe says. "It was a shitty thing to do. It was a shitty thing to do to Victoria too."

Victoria's mouth drops open.

"Now she's stuck with all that baggage too." Gabe waves it off and turns his charming grin on the interviewer. "But enough of that serious shit. Let's talk about something fun."

Victoria shoves the laptop into Nate's lap and hurls herself out of her bunk. "Gabe!" She knows he's not in the bunks. She has to choose a direction, and she picks the front of the bus. It's the right choice. He's chilling on the couch with his laptop while Alex and Ryland play video games on the big TV.

"Fuck you," Victoria spits. She stands over Gabe and points at him. "Don't you fucking dare martyr yourself over this. I'm not some good girl you made go bad, and you're not going to sell that narrative." She's so mad she's shaking. "I was there too, and even if I was drunk off my ass, I knew about Bianca. If you want this to be a real goddamned marriage, it's going to be a fucking partnership."

Gabe looks confused, and then angry. "Fuck you," he snaps back at her, "if you think I'm just going to sit back and let the world talk shit about my wife."

"It didn't bother you when I was just a girl in your band." Victoria glares at him. "No way in hell you're going to do this fucking macho bullshit."

"Guys," Alex says, "why don't we all take a chill pill."

"Stay out of it," Victoria snaps at the same time Gabe says, "Back off, Suarez."

"Being your wife doesn't make me your property." Victoria's lowered the volume of her voice if not the anger behind it. "And it doesn't make you responsible for me."

"You want to be called a homewrecking slut, be my guest." Gabe folds his arms over his chest. "But don't come crying to me about it."

"You're just as much of a homewrecking slut," Victoria says through gritted teeth. "And you were the one with more to lose."

Nate's standing in the doorway between the lounge and the bunks. Victoria pushes past him and yanks the curtain on her bunk shut with a harsh rattle of the rings against the curtain rod.

*

Victoria does an interview alone.

"I noticed," the woman says, "that you didn't promise to obey in your marriage vows."

Victoria laughs. "Yeah, even drunk I knew better than to promise that."

"So you were drunk."

"Yes." Victoria smiles a little ruefully. She knows how to do an interview by now, and this is what she needs to do to sell this story. "I thought everyone already knew that. We're this week's drunken celebrities doing crazy things story."

"I also noticed no one's said the d-word."

Victoria laughs nervously and hopes it comes off as easy. "No. We might have been drunk, but we made a choice, and we're sticking with it."

"Really?" the woman prompts.

"Really," Victoria confirms. If Gabe can make pronouncements about their marriage, so can she. "Gabe's parents had a messy divorce, and mine have been married for thirty years. Neither one of us wants a divorce."

"So you come from a happy home. Does that mean you're one of the good girls that Gabe makes go bad?"

"Oh no." Victoria smirks at the camera. "I was bad long before I ever met Gabe."

*

Victoria doesn't think anything of it when Pete's backstage after soundcheck two days later. Pete likes to go visiting. He comes back to the bus with them, and Bob's waiting for them in the lounge. That's when Victoria figures out he might be there for a reason. They usually don't get the big boss when Crush sends someone out to talk to them.

Their greetings are a little subdued, and then Pete and Bob "invite" Gabe and Victoria to sit down with them in the back lounge. Gabe actually sits; Victoria leans on the wall next to the door.

"I don't know what you were thinking," Bob says. He holds up a hand. "I don't want to know. I do want to know what the hell you think you're doing now."

"You've always let us do press our own way." Gabe sounds defiant, but he's folding in on himself.

"Based on an agreed-upon strategy," Bob says.

"You just going to let the boss yell at me?" Gabe asks Pete. He hunches over, elbows on the insides of his knees, hands clasped together.

Pete holds his hands up, palms out. "Hey, he yells at me when I fuck up. Now it's your turn."

"Getting married and letting it get leaked to the internet was bad enough." Bob's glaring mostly at Gabe. "But now you're just making it worse." He rubs his hand over his bald head. "I don't know why you couldn't just make it a joke like everything else you do."

Victoria pushes off of the wall and goes to sit next to Gabe. She pries Gabe's hands apart with a touch and takes one of them. For all the flirting they've done on stage and in photo shoots, this is the first time they've ever really held hands. Gabe's large fingers between hers brings her a flash of sense memory of those same fingers sliding between her thighs and up into her.

"Is this like an early midlife crisis?" Pete asks. "Leaving the blonde girlfriend for the brunette wife isn't the way you usually do that. Dude, I would have gone sports car shopping with you."

"I think," Victoria says, and she looks directly at Pete, "that you shouldn't talk to my husband like that." Fuck them if they think they're going to walk all over him and leave her out of it. She switches her gaze to Bob. "We're married. We're not hiding it. We'll discuss a different approach to publicity, but we'll do it as a band. Right now, though, we have a show in a couple of hours, and we both need naps."

Bob shakes his head, his lips pressed tightly together. "I'll talk with the rest of your band."

Pete doesn't leave with him. "Speaking as your friend, not your boss," he says to Gabe, "you could have told me you were sleeping together so I'd be a little less surprised."

Gabe stands up, letting go of Victoria's hand in the process. "We've only slept together once." He goes through the door, leaving Victoria to be the only witness to the surprise on Pete's face when he figures out what that means.

*

Pete and Bob stick around for the show, which is not as much of a mess as it could be, and barely let them all get showered before they sit the whole band down in the dressing room. They've apparently told security they're not to be disturbed, because there are a couple of beefy guys outside the door and no one interrupts them.

When Gabe takes one of the armchairs instead of the couch, Victoria perches on the arm of it because there isn't quite enough room for both of them in the chair. Alex, Ryland, and Pete take the couch, Nate gets the other armchair, and Bob ends up in a folding chair.

"Since you're all being stubborn," Bob says, and he doesn't look any happier than he did earlier, "we're going to talk about this as a group." He looks at each of them in turn. "What you're doing now isn't working. You're only making things worse for yourselves."

"There's no such thing as bad publicity," Gabe says, and he sounds like such an asshole that he has to be trying for it.

"You want to talk about agreed-upon strategies?" Bob glares at Gabe. "We had an agreed-upon strategy for making this band appeal to the mainstream. Middle America, remember?" He shakes his head. "This is not the way to do it."

Gabe looks tired again. "What's done is done."

"Fine," Bob snaps. "But let's not make it worse." He looks at the other boys. "Any ideas about what our strategy should be now?"

Alex, Ryland, and Nate exchange looks, and it's Ryland who says, "We're on board with whatever Gabe and Victoria decide."

Pete snorts and shakes his head.

"Right now," Bob says, "they're not making very good decisions. It would help a lot if you three could have some input here."

"You need a strategy," Pete puts in. "A good one. Looking like stupid douchebags really isn't doing you any good."

"We're motherfucking Cobra Starship," Nate says with more vehemence than Victoria's ever heard him say anything. "We're built on a base of bad decisions. Fuck them if they're not in on the joke."

He's shocked everyone into a silence that seems to take up the whole room.

"Here's what we do," Gabe says into it, and Victoria wonders how long he's had it figured out. "Everyone knows we got drunk and got married. We just present that as fact, and if people want to ask us about the wedding, fine. Personal questions about Bianca or anyone Victoria might have been seeing are off limits, period." He says Bianca's name without flinching, but it still sounds raw to Victoria's ears. "We won't bring it up either. We stick to cheerful answers about getting married and focus on how it doesn't change that we're a band, and we're on tour. We also update the bio on the website to say that Gabe and Victoria got married in Vegas because Cobra didn't embody enough movie cliches, or something like that." He looks up at Victoria. "Okay?"

She nods and rests her hand on his shoulder. It's in line with their branding as a band, and she can live with it. "You can talk about becoming Gizmo's daddy too. That should be good for middle America."

He nods a little grimly. "Good thinking."

They both turn to look at the rest of the band.

"Good by me," Ryland says, and Alex follows it up with, "Me too."

"Nasty Nate?" Gabe asks.

Nate makes a face at him. "I hate that nickname. Your plan's good, though."

"Acceptable?" Gabe asks Bob and Pete.

"You should talk about the dog a lot," Pete says, which is probably his way of being helpful.

Bob's mouth is still set in a hard, unsmiling line, but he nods. "Fine. We'll see what we can do about the website, and we'll back you up with an official party line that this doesn't change the band. Unofficially," he adds, "don't fuck this up."

*

There's an email from Crush with an updated press schedule waiting for Victoria when she gets to her email the next afternoon. Every interview for the next week has either been canceled or assigned or reassigned to Ryland, Alex, and Nate.

One of the few things that stays on the schedule untouched is a shoot for promo photos. It's been a while, and Victoria always likes it when she gets to dress up and someone else does her makeup.

Thankfully, the only change the photographer makes to the original concept is to take a few pictures of just Gabe and Victoria.

Crush emails a link to watermarked proofs two days later. There's one that the photographer must have snapped between posed shots. It catches Gabe and Victoria in profile, turned toward each other. Gabe's leaning in and she's looking up and they're both laughing. They look happy.

Victoria emails the photographer directly and asks for a print of that one.

*

"So, hey," Ryland says, "this might be a sensitive subject, but are you and Gabe going to share a hotel room now?"

Victoria hasn't even thought about that. She's barely thinking beyond the next show or the next interview.

"If you are," he continues, "I know the rest of us would be happy to switch things around and take turns getting our own room."

"I don't know. I'll talk to Gabe," she promises.

People have started giving them a little space whenever she and Gabe are together, so there's no one in earshot when she says, "Hey, Ryland asked if we're going to share a hotel room."

Gabe looks taken aback, like the thought hadn't even occurred to him either. "Oh. Do you want to?"

"If we're actually going to make this work," Victoria says, "I think we should."

"Yeah, okay." There's something off about the way Gabe says it, but Victoria takes him at his word and they get two keycards to the same room at the next hotel.

Victoria's always glad to see a hotel. Real beds get to be a luxury on tour. She's always thought Gabe would really like them given that he can't sleep when they're moving, but he doesn't look very happy about it.

"I don't sleep well alone," he says with noticeable pauses between words. "It's been worse now that I'm not eventually going home to Bianca." By the time he finishes talking, the corners of his mouth are turned all the way down into the deepest frown Victoria has ever seen on his face. "I don't want to keep you up."

It hits Victoria that this is her husband, and that they were already friends, and he's someone she cares about. "You're not sleeping alone," she says. There are two beds, but they don't have to use both of them. "I'm your wife, and I'll sleep with you."

She's pretty sure Gabe doesn't believe her, but he takes his toothbrush into the bathroom. She takes a turn after him, and comes back out to find that he's under the covers, back to the center of the room.

Victoria pushes her clothes into her bag and turns out the overhead light. Gabe's shoulders are bare where they peek over the edge of the blankets, so Victoria doesn't feel like she needs to put on anything other than her usual overly large t-shirt and panties. She gets in on the other side of the bed and turns out the lamp on the nightstand. She figures if Gabe doesn't sleep well alone, it has to at least partially be about human contact, so she scoots up against his back. Her arms brush against his skin, and her knees rest against the back of his thighs. She thinks he relaxes a little, and it's not long before she can hear his breath relax into sleep and she stops worrying.

*

Gabe's being extra obnoxious. He and Victoria both stopped drinking quite so much after they got married, but he's been ramping it up again recently, and he's hungover and possibly on his way to drunk again. And judging by the way Nate looks sad and Alex reproachful, he apparently said something that was actually hurtful before she came into the lounge.

"Hey," she says. She goes to Gabe and cups her hand around his elbow. "Come on. We're going to take a nap."

"What? No." Gabe jerks away from her. "I'm not tired." The dark circles under his eyes say otherwise.

Victoria takes his elbow again. "You can keep it down for a couple of hours." It's not quite a question, and it's directed at everyone else.

"Yeah," Ryland says. "We'll keep it down."

Victoria walks to the bunks, and Gabe follows along. He kicks off his shoes and climbs into his bunk.

"I'm not going to sleep."

"Yes, you are." Victoria toes off her shoes and climbs in with him.

Gabe huffs. "This isn't going to work. You're too big for this."

Victoria pauses in the act of trying to fit herself into the spaces he's left. "I think not calling your wife fat is one of the basic rules of marriage."

"I'm not calling you fat. I'm just saying you're too big to fit into a bunk with me."

"Mmhmm." Victoria pushes him into the bunk another couple of inches to make room for her too. "I've seen some of the women you've brought back here." She pulls the curtain shut, and the near-darkness envelops them. Her phone's screen is too bright when she pulls it out to set an alarm, even when she cups her hand around it to contain its bluish glow. By the time she sets her phone on the shelf and turns over to get more comfortable, Gabe's already asleep.

*

Gabe is one of those people who gives definition to the phrase "flirts like breathing." Victoria's seen him do it for years. This is the first time since they've been married that she's seen him doing it with anyone as persistent as the woman he's flirting with now.

Victoria slams the end of her drink and pushes her way through the crowd to Gabe.

She gets there just in time to hear the woman say, "Let's get out of here."

Gabe's glance flickers over the woman's shoulder to Victoria. "I'm married." He holds up his left hand to show her.

The woman lets out a throaty chuckle. "Your wife never has to know."

Gabe's grinning a little as he says, "She does. She's right behind you."

The woman turns around and rakes Victoria with a look. Then she snorts and turns back to Gabe. "Yeah, right."

"No, really," Victoria says. She steps around the woman to get right to Gabe. He comes willingly into a kiss. Victoria has one hand on the back of his neck to pull him down, and she slides the other between them to cup his cock. He puts his hands on her ass and tugs her up so she's even more on her toes. He could probably pick her up if he wanted to. The thought sends a shiver through her whole body.

*

It happens because they're drunk, or they've been drinking anyway.

The whole band is clubbing it after a show, and they're all spending time on the dance floor. Victoria catches flashes of Gabe - he tends to stand out in a crowd - grinding against a series of women.

Victoria finds herself a spot on the floor and switches partners whenever someone comes up behind or beside her. Once, when she turns around, it's Gabe behind her. She smiles up at him because she doesn't have to let go of him. She can dance with him as long as she wants.

They move closer over the course of two, three, five songs, until their bodies are pressed together. Victoria puts her arms around Gabe's neck in an attempt to get even closer, and Gabe's hands at the small of her back pull her in.

He's hard between them, and she's wet, and when he leans down she tips her head up and kisses back. They're not even moving with the music anymore, just holding onto each other and kissing. It's amazing, being two alone in the middle of the crowd, and the fact that they're married, that they belong to each other in the eyes of God, the law, and everyone, gives it an extra thrill.

Gabe's lips move across her cheek, and then he whispers in her ear, "Wanna get out of here?"

Oh, she thinks. They're married and this doesn't have to end here. Victoria says, "Yes," out loud, and Gabe takes her hand to lead her off the dance floor. They hold hands in the cab and make out in the elevator.

Victoria pulls her key out of her purse as they walk down the hall to their room, but Gabe crowds up against her when they get to the door and she can't focus enough to swipe it. Gabe puts his hand over hers and guides the cardkey through the slot. He's warm against her back and his breath puffs across her neck.

She lets go of the key when they get inside, stumbling together. She lets her purse slide off her shoulder to join it on the floor, and then turns, her body rubbing against Gabe's the whole way, until she can kiss him again. They left only one of the lights on low earlier, and didn't turn on any when they came in, so everything has this half-shadowed glow to it.

Gabe steps forward, walking her backwards until her back hits the wall. His hands slide up her thighs to push her skirt up over her hips. Victoria unzips his jeans, and reaches into his boxers for his cock. She spreads her legs a little to give him space to touch her.

"I want to fuck you," he murmurs right up against the shell of her ear.

Victoria moans. She wants that so much right now. She has condoms, but they're in her purse, which is on the floor somewhere. It doesn't matter, though, because Gabe pulls one out of his pocket.

He doesn't bother trying to get her panties off, just pulls them to one side as he bends his knees so he can push up into her.

Victoria clutches at Gabe's shoulders and presses her face into his neck. He smells like sweat and heat and sex.

His hands grip her ass, and it turns out he really can pick her up. It's unbelievably hot, and she wonders why she never fucked anyone who would do that before. Her back's still against the wall, and every one of Gabe's thrusts move her against it. She keeps her face pressed against his neck so her head doesn't bang against the wall, so she can keep breathing in his scent, so he can't see the look on her face.

They're both breathing in harsh gasps that echo off of each other's skin and the hotel room entryway.

Gabe groans and thrusts in hard when he comes. He slumps against Victoria, pushing her harder into the wall.

"Gabe." Her voice comes out as a strangled whine. "Gabe, come on, I didn't come."

He lowers her down to the ground, pulls out, and replaces cock with fingers all at once. Another finger presses against her clit, and she reaches down to show him how she likes to be touched.

Their fingers move against her, Gabe's fingers move in her, and she presses her face into Gabe's shoulder. When she comes, it's almost too intense. She shudders between Gabe and the wall, and trusts him to hold her up. He strokes her hair while she comes down, and then slides his hand around under her chin and tips her face up for a kiss.

He kisses her like it means something, like he's drinking her in, like he's reaching for her soul, and she puts her arms around the back of his neck and kisses back the same way.

Gabe walks them to the bed, and they only stop kissing long enough to pull off their clothes. In bed, Gabe stays over her, pressing her into the bed, kissing her until she falls asleep.

In the morning, she wakes up still under Gabe. She was drunk this time too, but she remembers everything about last night. She remembers it felt like something more than just the result of a stupid, drunken night. The thought makes her throat ache.

She manages to get out of bed without disturbing Gabe. He's still asleep when she gets out of the shower. She packs up her stuff, checks Gabe's phone to make sure he has an alarm set, and then takes her bag and goes downstairs for breakfast.

*

Gabe crowds up against her back. "Hey, Victoria." He drops his head down to murmur into her ear. "You've been avoiding me."

She suppresses the shudder having him and his voice so close sends through her. "No I haven't." It's a lie.

"Yes, you have." Gabe puts his hands around her wrists, still plastered to her, and starts walking them out of the dressing room.

Victoria tugs at his grip, but not very hard, and she doesn't go anywhere. "Where are we going?"

It's not far, and it's tiny, like someone emptied out a closet and threw a couple of chairs into it to pretend it could be a dressing room or half-assed office or something.

Victoria steps as far away as the room will let her and turns around to face Gabe. "What are we doing in here?"

"Communication," Gabe says gravely, "is very important for a healthy marriage."

Victoria can feel her face twisting into a grimace. It's not like their marriage is all that healthy, and he sounds like he's reading lines. "Give me a break."

Gabe drops the ridiculous tone. "No, hey, I'm serious. We had a good time the other night, and you haven't talked to me since."

Victoria crosses her arms over her chest. "I have so."

"'Pass the salt' doesn't count." Gabe's loose and relaxed, which just makes her tense in a little more.

Victoria does not want to have this discussion. He's only her husband because they made a drunken mistake. She doesn't want to have any discussion with him. She wants out, but Gabe's between her and the door.

"Is this because we had sex? Because it's totally okay. We're married now."

"But it's not real," Victoria bursts out. It's all she's been able to think about since she woke up under him. "It's just this mistake we made. You're supposed to be with Bianca. You're in love with Bianca. And I'm supposed to be-" She unfolds enough to flap one hand around because there isn't really an end to that sentence. "Whatever I'm supposed to be doing."

Gabe isn't relaxed anymore, and his face has totally closed down. "Bianca's never taking me back. I know when she's mad in a way she'll forgive and when she's not, and she's not. She had my stuff put in storage."

Victoria flinches from the hard edge to Gabe's voice.

"This is it, Victoria. You and me."

"I'm not in love with you." This isn't some movie where she's been in love with him all along and just waiting for her chance. She wants to be married to Gabe, more than she ever thought she would - except, perhaps, under the influence of too much tequila, or whatever it was they were drinking that night - but that doesn't mean this is a fairy tale.

"I'm not in love with you either." Gabe's lips quirk up into a parody of a smile. "Love as a prerequisite for marriage is a relatively recent invention anyway." He steps toward her. "The other night was good. It was really good. We can be like that." That part is completely sincere.

It was really good. The dancing and the sex and the way they kept kissing. If it had been a one-night stand, she'd have been sorry to leave him in the morning.

Gabe cups her face in his hands. "Come on, Victoria. Real marriage, good sex and all."

Victoria sighs, and when he kisses her, she kisses back.

*

"Hey." Victoria brushes Gabe's hair away from his temple. "I'm going to bed. Come lie down with me?"

He frowns up at her. "I can't sleep on a moving bus."

"I know that," Victoria says patiently. "You don't have to sleep. Just lie down with me until I fall asleep."

She can't remember, now, if Gabe and Bianca ever tried sleeping at night when she visited, or if they just knew that Gabe couldn't sleep on a moving bus. Maybe Gabe won't sleep even with someone else there, but maybe he will. And if she's going to be married, Victoria at least wants some cuddling out of the deal.

"You're not going to have sex, are you?" Ryland asks. "Because I don't think any of us want to hear that."

"You wish you could hear it," Gabe shoots back. He raises his eyebrows at Victoria. "Are we going to have sex?"

She rolls her eyes. "Not where they can hear us. Are you coming or not?"

"Apparently not," he grumbles, but he stands up and goes back to the bunks with her. "You're on the inside."

"Yeah, yeah." Victoria climbs into her bunk and scoots in toward the wall. There really is enough room for both of them once Gabe spoons up behind her, and she relaxes back against him.

"Good?" he asks.

"Yeah." Victoria turns her head. "Goodnight kiss?"

Gabe leans in and covers her mouth with his. It's soft and off-center, and she's smiling when she turns back and puts her head down on her pillow.

She wakes up in the morning with Gabe sleeping deep and heavy against her back, one arm over her waist. She grins in triumph before worming her way out without waking him up.

It doesn't matter because he comes out to the lounge ten minutes later looking bewildered and better rested than she's ever seen him on tour. He sits down next to her and leans his head on her shoulder.

"Did you know that would work?"

Victoria brings her hand up and rests it against the curve of his skull. "Not for sure." She kisses the top of his head.

Gabe turns in so his face is pressed against her neck. "Being married to you has all kinds of extra advantages."

*

They do a video interview for some website, and halfway through, the interviewer asks, "For the rest of you, what's it like living on a bus with a married couple?"

"Terrible," Alex says straight-faced. "The loud sex keeps us all up at night."

Victoria flushes while Nate starts laughing and Ryland smirks.

"He's lying," Gabe confides to the interviewer and the camera. "Victoria won't sleep with me where they can hear."

That does nothing to make Victoria's blush fade. She elbows Gabe in the side. "I wouldn't have married you if I knew you were going to tell the whole world about our sex life."

"You wouldn't have married me if you weren't drunk," he shoots back.

"That's also true," Victoria says calmly, back on familiar footing.

The interviewer watches their back and forth with the absolute delight of someone who knows her interview is going to get more views than anything else she's ever done.

"Actually," Ryland says, "the best thing is that Gabe sleeps now."

The interviewer raises her perfectly sculpted eyebrows. "You didn't before?"

"So, no, it's totally crazy." Gabe shifts forward to the edge of the couch. "I can't sleep on a moving bus, right? And I don't sleep very well alone. So Victoria makes me come cuddle with her one night, and, boom!" He cuts his hands through the air. "Next thing I know it's morning and I'm waking up because she got up and left me in her bunk alone." He sits back again and puts his arm around Victoria's shoulders. "I'm getting a lot more sleep now."

Victoria pats his thigh and then leaves her hand there. "It makes you much more pleasant to be around."

Later, when they're headed out to the car to take them back to the venue, Alex asks, "How much do you want to bet every interviewer is going to ask us about what it's like to have a married couple on the bus with us now?"

Victoria laughs, and says, "Now you know how I feel every time someone asks what it's like being the only girl."

Gabe slips his hand into hers. She looks up at him in surprise, but he's talking to Ryland and just keeps their hands loosely clasped.

*

The five of them have brunch together on a day off when they actually get to stay two nights in the hotel. When they start talking plans for the day, Victoria says, "I think I'm just going to hang out at the hotel."

Gabe looks sideways at her and asks, "Would you mind if I hung out with you?"

She didn't even think he would want to do something so uninteresting. "No, I guess not."

So when the other boys, alternately calling them a bored old married couple and speculating on what they want to be alone in a hotel room to do, take off, Gabe and Victoria walk back to the hotel.

Victoria doesn't really have a plan for the day, she's just tired of always going and ready for some downtime. She answers her email for a while, and checks her Twitter replies. Somewhere in the middle of that, a post from Gabe pops up. While she wasn't paying attention to him, he took a picture of her, cross-legged on the bed with her laptop open in front of her, and tweeted it with the caption, Quiet day off with the missus.

She waits until he's absorbed in whatever he's doing with his own laptop, and then she takes a picture with her phone and tweets it with, Quiet day off with the mister.

She knows when Gabe sees it because he laughs, and he's smiling at her when she looks up.

Victoria gets through her email, pokes around at the internet for a while, and then she gets up and retrieves one of the makeup bags from her suitcase and a towel from the bathroom so she won't get nail polish all over the bed. She takes off the old nail polish, and goes back into the bathroom to rinse and dry her fingers and toes.

She's rolling the bottle between her hands to mix it when Gabe closes his laptop.

"Can I do it?"

Victoria blinks at him. "Do what?"

"Paint your nails." Gabe comes over to the bed and sits at her feet. "I do know how, but I'll take it off again if I fuck it up."

Victoria considers him for a moment. He seems sincere, and he probably has lived the kind of life where he knows how to paint nails. She hands him the bottle of polish.

Gabe cups her ankle in his left hand while he paints with his right. His touch is too firm to tickle, but it sends a shiver through her anyway. She's careful not to move and disturb him. He is good at it, careful and focused, and she looks at his bent head and thinks that this is one of the good moments.

He looks up after he does the last nail. "This looks pretty thick. Do you usually do a second coat?"

"No, one's good." Victoria wiggles her toes a little and looks down at them. They're as smooth and even as if she'd done them herself, maybe even more so.

"Did I do a good job?" Gabe's smiling when she looks up at him.

"Yeah." Victoria smiles back. "They look good."

Gabe holds up the bottle. "Good enough that I can do your hands too?"

Victoria shrugs. Why not? "Yeah." She holds out her hands.

Gabe looks at them, and then says, "Can I?" He gets up and comes around to the head of the bed. "Scoot forward." She does, and he sits down behind her, his legs stretched out on either side of hers and his chest pressed to her back. He flattens her left hand out on top of his own left hand so he can hold it steady while he paints with smooth strokes of the brush. His chin digs into her shoulder, and his cheek is right next to hers.

Victoria tries to control her breathing, and then remembers she doesn't have to. "This is making me totally hot."

"Yeah?" Gabe brushes his lips over her neck in a light kiss. "Do you have some kind of a nail polish fetish I don't know about?"

She shakes her head.

"Or is it just the attention?"

"That, I think." Victoria tips her head back onto Gabe's shoulder.

He keeps painting, focused on it even as he talks to her. "When they dry, we can do something about that."

Victoria closes her eyes so she can just feel Gabe surrounding her. "Okay."

Their breathing is the only sound. Gabe's warm against her, and even without looking she can tell he's being so careful with her nails.

"There," he says when he finishes the last one.

Victoria opens her eyes to check, and they're just as perfect as her toes. Gabe screws the cap back onto the bottle and then leans away from her to put it on the nightstand. He comes back, close again, and puts his arms around her. He slips one hand under the hem of her shirt to rest against her stomach. She's never thought of her stomach as an erogenous zone before, but Gabe's touch makes her squirm. His other hand slides up her leg until his fingers are curving in to her inner thigh. She makes a noise she didn't consciously decide to make when he stops.

"I don't have to touch anything for you to get me off."

She can feel Gabe's smile against her neck. He keeps pressing kisses against it, not so light that they tickle, but light enough that they just make her want more.

"No," he says, "but I want to fuck you." He kisses the soft skin just under her ear. "Actually what I want is to lie down and have you to ride me so I can watch you." His thumb strokes her stomach. "Maybe next time I'll watch you just get yourself off."

Victoria shudders. "God, Gabe." She brings her hands up and carefully touches her nails. They're not even tacky anymore, and she turns gracelessly, Gabe's hands sliding along her body, and takes his mouth in a devouring kiss.

She grinds against him, and finally getting some friction is such a relief that she breaks the kiss and groans.

"You're totally hot." Gabe tugs her close again. "My sexy wife," he murmurs before he kisses her. He pushes her shirt up while they kiss, and she pulls back and lifts her arms so he can pull it all the way off. He runs his fingers, and then his lips along the line of her bra where it lays against her breasts. Like the kisses to her neck, it's not quite enough, and she arches up toward the touch.

Gabe unhooks her bra and slides the straps down her arms, and then he just stares at her for a moment that goes on almost too long.

"Gabe," Victoria says, trying to get him back in the moment.

He pulls his gaze up to her face and says, "You have amazing breasts." He presses a kiss to one of them. "There's a reason they're the real star of CobraCam."

Victoria laughs, which turns into a moan when Gabe flicks his tongue over one of her nipples.

He glances up at her through his eyelashes. "Yeah?"

She nods. "Yeah."

He does it again, then sucks lightly, and she grabs at him, kneading his shoulders to keep her grounded even as his touch threatens to send her spiraling out into nothing but sensation.

"I thought," she finally gasps, cutting it off when he nips at the soft skin of her breast. "I thought," she tries again, "we were going to fuck."

Gabe pulls his mouth away from her slowly, his lips and tongue dragging across her skin. "We can do that." He slides one hand up her leg. "Condom?"

Victoria climbs off of him and off the bed. She pushes her skirt and panties down over her hips and steps out of them as she walks across the room to her suitcase. She doesn't even need to look back to know Gabe's watching her; she can feel it as surely as a touch.

He pulls off his shirt when she turns back, and then squirms out of his jeans and boxers while she walks toward him. She crawls up the bed to him, and hovers over him while they kiss. Gabe pulls the clip out of her hair, and it falls in a curtain around them.

"Condom," she says, voice unsteady. She tears it open and unrolls it down onto Gabe's cock. She takes him in her hand and strokes him a couple of times, and she finally sees him lose his composure. He bucks up into her hand like he can't control himself.

"Don't tease, Victoria," he grinds out.

"I'm not teasing." She slides slowly down onto him. "See?" She leans down and kisses him. "No teasing."

He touches her again, one hand on the outside of her thigh, the other resting on her stomach. "Everything about you is a tease."

She rolls her hips. "I follow through."

"For me." Gabe brushes his hand over her stomach. "Tell me what you like."

Victoria rocks against him a little. "This is good."

Gabe shakes his head. "That shit might work with the guys you used to date, but not with me." He slides the hand on her stomach down and the one on her thigh in. His voice drops low when he says, "Tell me what you like," again.

Victoria bites her lip, and puts her hand over Gabe's on her stomach. "I like this." She pushes his hand down, until his thumb is just pressing against her clit, and then she hisses at how good it is.

"There?" He rubs his thumb against her, and yes, there.

Victoria keeps her hand over Gabe's, pressing in so she can feel his whole hand against her, and moves, little not quite thrusts that hit her just right.

"You're so sexy," Gabe murmurs. His gaze is hot against her skin. "When we get home I want to take you clubbing so everyone can see how hot you are." He keeps stroking over her thigh. "So they can see that they don't get to have you." He rubs harder against her clit. "I could fuck you there. In a dark corner. They would know we were doing something but they couldn't be sure." His words are starting to fall apart as he jerks his hips up against her.

She's starting to fall apart too, picturing it, her between Gabe and the wall in a club with music pounding around them and people everywhere around.

"Showing them all that you're hot but only for me."

Victoria does fall apart, shuddering into an orgasm that almost shakes her to pieces. She trusts Gabe to catch her as she collapses onto him, and he presses his lips to her temple and thrusts up into her a few more times.

Gabe moves her just enough to get the condom off and drop it onto the floor, and then he wraps his arms around her and holds her close, like he knows she's feeling raw and exposed and needs to be warm and safe.

"What was it," he asks a while later, "that did it for you? Was it the dirty talking or the fantasy?"

Victoria shrugs. "Both." She presses her face against Gabe's shoulder. "You looking at me."

"My little exhibitionist," he says fondly. Then, after another few moments of silence, "Would you really let me fuck you in a club?"

"Probably not." Victoria sweeps her hand over Gabe's side in long strokes of skin against skin. "You wouldn't like it anyway. You usually keep your personal life private."

Gabe laughs without humor. "I think we've fucked that one up already."

Victoria presses her lips to his shoulder. "Shh. Stop ruining my afterglow."

They lie there for a while. Victoria drifts a little, never quite falling asleep, but content to just be. Her stomach growls some immeasurable time later.

"Dinner?" Gabe murmurs.

Victoria nods against his chest.

"Order pizza or go out?"

Victoria wanted a quiet day off, but now she's ready to leave the room for a while. "Go out." She pushes herself up. Gabe looks just as hazy and content as she feels.

"Okay." He stretches, and Victoria can't help admiring the play of muscle in the movement. "Wanna catch a movie too?"

It's been a couple of days off since she last saw a movie. "Yeah, sure." Victoria gathers up her clothes from where they've been scattered. "I'm going to take a shower. You figure out where we're going."

When Victoria thinks about fine Italian dining, Kansas City isn't what comes to mind, but that's what Gabe manages to find them. He pays for dinner, and the movie, and he holds her hand all the way through an otherwise forgettable comedy.

When they get back to the room, he uses their still joined hands to keep her from going deeper into the room and kisses her. It's the classic goodnight kiss, and she draws away from it slowly.

"Was this a date?"

Gabe brushes his thumb over her lip. "It's important in a marriage to have one-on-one time together."

Victoria can feel her lips quirking up into a smile. "So communication, sex, and date nights? That's your plan for a strong marriage?"

Gabe shrugs. "Pretty much."

Victoria thinks that maybe they won't fail at this. "Next week, I'll take you out."

Gabe smiles, pleased and a little shy. Victoria presses up on her toes and kisses him. He kisses back, and they make out for a while.

"About that sex thing," he murmurs.

Victoria laughs into his mouth. "We can try that again."

*

In the dressing room before their hometown show, Alex and Ryland keep rhapsodizing about sleeping in their own beds and Gabe draws in on himself.

"Hey." Victoria cups his face in her hands and kisses him. "You're coming home with me."

He closes his eyes for a moment, and the tension drains out of him. He pulls her into a tight hug that lasts until someone comes to tell them it's time to go on.

Gabe put "New Edition" on the set list, and she didn't understand why at the time. On stage, singing it, she gets it. They're singing to each other, and as much of a cliche as it is, she feels like every fiber of her being is reaching toward him. By the end of the song, her heart's beating so hard it feels like it might burst right out of her chest.

When she holds the note in the middle of "Good Girls Go Bad" a few songs later, Gabe yells into the mic, "Give it up for my wife Victoria," and the crowd screams for them.

The song feels like "New Edition" did: the two of them performing together effortlessly. Victoria thinks that if they can hold onto this in their marriage, they'll be okay.