Fic: A Woman Scorned (Claire/Devon, The Gates)

[fembuck]

Title: A Woman Scorned
Author: Janine
Fandom:  The Gates
Pairing:  Claire/Devon
Rating: R
Disclaimer:  I don’t own them.
Summary: A look into the relationship between Devon and Claire and why was so fraught with intimacy and tension. 
Note:  The story takes place during the last scene between Claire and Devon in episode 1x02 “What Lies Beneath”.

Devon’s life used to be simple. Many of the residents of The Gates wouldn’t believe it, but there had been a time when she was a simple girl with a simple view of the world. Marriage and life in The Gates had changed that however, and though Devon knew that she was now far more capable of taking care of herself than she ever had been in the past, she sometimes missed the simplicity of youth.

Standing across from Claire, watching candlelight dance over the vampire’s bronzed skin, was one of those times Devon found herself longing for simplicity. A lazy smile touched Devon’s lips as Claire locked the backdoor of the spa, but inside Devon was not nearly as calm as she looked. Inside of her love and hate, fear and excitement, desire, distaste and a plethora of other powerful and contradictory emotions warred for dominance.

Gazing at Claire, Devon couldn’t stop her mind from drifting back to a time before, to a time when Claire walking in her back door in the dead of night was a common sight. Once the key that Claire presently clutched awkwardly in her hand had been at home in her palm and had gotten plenty of use. Once Claire would have smiled at Devon before locking the door and when they were alone and secure together, Claire’s eyes would have turned dark as midnight and she would have stalked towards Devon with sinful purpose.

They had been friends once, more than friends, much more.

With sweat slicking their skin and the scent of blood in the air, they had pressed against each other, mouths hot and anxious on each other’s skin as fingers scraped and dug and pressed in, just there, just right.

Panting, ragged breaths used to fill the scented air of the workroom, benches and chairs and doors squeaking from the force with which Claire took Devon.

On those dark and lovely nights gone by, the feel of Claire’s tongue on Devon’s neck, lapping up her blood, as post-orgasmic tremors wracked Devon’s body had been as familiar to Devon as preparing her teas.

Lying together on the couch in the workroom, Claire used to nip at Devon’s skin and whisper things like, “I don’t know how I would survive this place without you,” or “I would lose my mind without this, without you.”

And like a fool, Devon had believed her.

Claire’s daylight hours had been spent baking and smiling and gardening, hanging posters up, sewing missing buttons back on and discussing Oprah’s latest book pick. During the day she was a perfect housewife, a perfect mother, a perfect neighbor and a perfectly helpful member of any number of committees. But in the night, with Devon, she was a vampire. She was wild and passionate, domineering, predatory, sensual and all of the other things daylight forced her to suppress.

For months they came gloriously together, but then Claire had come home smelling of fresh blood one too many times and Dylan got wise. He put the fear of Buckley in Claire, reminding her of what would happen to them, of what would happen to Emily if Frank learned that Claire had been feeding within The Gates – and on his ex-wife no less. Dylan reminded her that she was a mother now and that Emily’s needs had to come before her own. He stressed that they could no longer allow themselves to be controlled by their fangs, that if they wanted the protection of civilization they needed to be civilized, that what she was doing was selfish and put them all at risk and it had to stop.

Devon had no knowledge of this conversation however, and when their usual meeting times came and went without a word or an appearance from Claire, Devon worried. She was weak and foolish and she missed Claire, so one afternoon when she knew the coast was clear, she wrapped up a box of her ‘blood tea’, went to the Radcliff’s and rang the bell.

A bright smile stretched across Devon’s lips when she saw Claire, but Claire had no smiles for her that afternoon. She had no gentle touches or sweet words for the blonde. Her eyes darkened and her fangs dropped as she gazed at Devon, but she did not lazily saunter towards Devon or beckon the blonde to her.

Claire stood with her back straight and her arms crossed protectively over her chest and refused to look directly at Devon, even as she told her that ‘what they had been doing’ was over. Devon tried to appeal to her but Claire remained firm and remote, and when begging and groveling were the only options left to Devon, she stopped speaking.

Years before, she had fallen to her knees and begged Frank to stay with her only to have him walk away and she had later sworn that she would never debase herself that way again and she meant to keep her promise.

Her eyes burned as she turned away from Claire, but she kept her tears at bay, and without saying another word to the brunette, she placed the package she had brought with her down, walked out the door and didn’t look back.

And now, all this time later, Claire was at her door in the middle of the night again, radiant and brooding, and Devon wasn’t sure whether she wanted to kiss her or stab her through the heart.

In the past Claire had always walked through that door with the intention of taking – her blood, her body, and though Devon was loathed to admit it, a part of her heart – but this time would be different. This time Devon would be doing the taking.

She had been vulnerable and desperate for affection when things started with Claire and Claire had been more than willing to take advantage of that to satiate her bloodlust. But Claire was the one who was desperate now, she was the one who was vulnerable, and Devon would repay the kindness that Claire had shown her in full.

“I’m sure you remember the way,” Devon said, smirk firmly in place as Claire watched her, her expression as stony and remote as it had been that afternoon in her foyer so long ago.

When Frank left her, Devon had lost her husband, her home, her purpose and, due to the public nature of Frank’s affair, her dignity. Working with Peg, learning the craft had given her purpose again. It had given her something to focus on, something to do with her days, but inside of her something had remained asleep until Claire and her fathomlessly dark eyes had pinned her against a work bench one night and brought passion back into her life.

When her life had first started to fall apart Devon thought that she wouldn’t be able to live without Frank, but she’d survived the loss of him. And later, when Claire had brought warmth and laughter and passion back into her life, she’d thought that she couldn’t live without Claire, but she had survived the loss of her too.

Painful as it was, Devon learned a valuable lesson from their betrayals; she learned that the only thing she needed to survive was herself.

“Take a seat,” Devon said gesturing lazily to the stool beside her before she turned her attention to the needle in her hand and moved to uncap it.

Murderers, molesters, killers, and an assortment of other strange and deprived individuals called The Gates their home, but even among such a ‘diverse’ crowd Devon was always on the outside, somehow not good enough to be included in their ‘distinguished’ company. They had laughed at her and whispered about her, they had averted their eyes when she walked by and turned their backs on her. She was the victim but they had ostracized her and embraced the vampire whore who had stolen her husband.

Only Peg had proven herself to be a true friend, but Peg was enough. Peg had taught her the craft, the craft had enabled her to open her shop, and that changed everything.

Her new skill-set brought back her old confidence and the shop made her someone to be reckoned with. It made her someone with things people needed, it made her someone impossible to ignore, and she’d learned how to use it to her advantage. Through her special brews, manicures and pedicures, and chit-chat with customers over tea, Devon had become a warder of secrets, and those secrets would soon provide her with power.

She only needed herself to survive, but power would help her thrive.

“Devon,” Claire began, speaking for the first time since entering the spa. “I need to know that if I do this, it stops. Mrs. Cooper, the threats …everything,” she continued, watching Devon furtively but keenly, studying Devon’s reactions without trying to look like that’s what she was doing.

Devon was always relentlessly pleasant with her, but Claire knew that it was an act. She’d seen Devon’s real smile in the past enough to know when she was smiling for real and when it was subterfuge and for quite some time she’d seen nothing but subterfuge from the blonde.

Claire didn’t blame her for that, though. She knew that she deserved it. Though it had been necessary, she had been cruel to Devon. They had meant something to each other. The smiles that had touched her lips when her eyes landed upon Devon had not been lies. Years of living in The Gates had started to suffocate her. It was stifling and soul-crushing, and some days she had been so restless that she had literally torn at her own skin. Being with Devon had made her feel sane again, had helped free her. Once they started seeing each other it was like she could breathe again.

She could growl and stalk and feed and take when she was with Devon, and when they were done and lying together, a peace that Claire hadn’t felt since before The Gates would come over her. She had stretched and purred, luxuriating in being allowed to be what she was, if only for a while.

In a way Devon had saved her, and in return Claire had tossed her away like blood that had been left out on the counter overnight.

Cutting Devon off so abruptly, so completely had been heartless, Claire knew that, but she’d had to be heartless. She’d had to choose between Devon and her family, and as much as she enjoyed her time with Devon and had come to care about the blonde, she couldn’t risk losing her daughter.

In the days after her confrontation with Dylan, Claire had given a lot of thought to what she was going to do. She hadn’t been able to fathom actually cutting Devon completely out of her life, and had pinned her hopes on them being able to remain friends. She’d actually convinced herself that it was possible before she opened the door to Devon that fateful afternoon and the blonde’s scent hit her, making hunger and desire flare to life inside of her.

The moment she smelt Devon, the moment she saw her, Claire eyes blackened and her fangs dropped, and with a terrible clarity she realized that it was hopeless, that it would never be possible for her to simply be friends with Devon.

She wanted Devon too much. She didn’t have Dylan’s control, his restraint. She was no good at resisting temptation. If she and Devon spent time together, Claire knew she would try to bite her and that Devon would let her, and that if anyone found out she would lose everything.

She had needed a clean break and Devon had deserved a clean break. Ending things like she did had been harsh, but it was for the best.

Still, Claire knew that enough time had not passed for Devon to be able to see that.

“That’s the arrangement,” Devon husked, looking up from the needle for a moment to meet Claire’s eyes.

“If you’re lying, I’ll kill you,” Claire told her.

Devon had cared about her once, and at times when Devon looked at her Claire suspected that some part of her still did, but those formerly warm feelings were now so mixed with anger, resentment and hurt that Claire knew Devon was more of an enemy than a friend.

Trusting Devon was a risky proposition, one she wouldn’t have accepted if she’d had a choice, but she didn’t have a choice. If she didn’t trust Devon to help her, Mrs. Cooper would remember having seen her move the missing contractor’s truck into her garage, the police would become involved and the other vampires in The Gates would come after her and her family. Of course, trusting Devon to help her was problematic as well because even if Devon kept her word about helping her with the Mrs. Cooper situation there was no telling what else someone with Devon’s skills might be able to do with what was left of her blood.

Claire was damned if she did and she was damned if she didn’t. Doing nothing could end her and doing something could end her, but Claire wasn’t built for doing nothing ... so she acted.

“Yes,” Devon drawled. “I’m well aware.”

After all, purposefully breaking a person’s heart and taking a person’s life both required a cold-heartedness that Claire had already proven herself quite capable of.

“This might hurt a little,” Devon continued a moment later as she swabbed Claire’s arm with an alcoholic wipe before pressing the tip of the needle lightly against the skin covering Claire’s vein. “You do feel pain, don’t you?” she went on, looking over at Claire curiously.

The question was pointed, loaded with the history between them, and when Claire guiltily looked down into her lap, Devon knew the question had hit its mark and abruptly jabbed the needle into Claire’s arm.

“There,” Devon said a few seconds later, pulling the needle out and then pressing a cotton ball against Claire’s arm where it had been extracted.

She was silent for a moment as she capped the needle, and when she placed it down on the tabletop there was a strange poignancy to the moment.

“You can go to sleep tonight knowing this problem is solved,” Devon continued a few seconds later, turning so that she was looking directly into Claire’s eyes.

Claire’s jaw clenched and she was barely able to swallow the growl that built up in her throat. Devon was smiling and cordial as usual, but there was a cold glint in her eyes that conveyed to Claire that while the Mrs. Cooper problem might have been solved, there would be no détente between the two of them.

Claire moved to rise from her chair. The motion drew her momentarily closer to Devon and she paused, just for a moment, as the blonde’s scent washed over her.

Despite herself, she remembered a time when she would not have hesitated to close the distance between them and press her mouth to Devon’s. For a moment, for just a moment, she remembered the way Devon’s eyes used to sparkle with happiness and contentment when they were together. She remembered how radiant Devon’s smile was when it reached her eyes, and how peaceful she had felt lying naked with Devon in her arms as incense blanketed the air around them.

But those times were past.

Devon’s eyes did not dance for her anymore. Her smile chilled Claire’s blood instead of warming it. Things would never be peaceful between them again. Claire had seen to that.

“Oh, and Claire,” Devon started, her smile turning cold as she stared at the vampire’s back, “Do try to stay out of trouble.”

Claire’s eyes closed briefly, but she resisted the urge to turn around. She would have very much liked to stay out of trouble, but with every step she took towards the exit she became more convinced that Devon wasn’t going to let her.

Hell had no fury like a woman scorned, and Claire knew that Devon was going to try to make her burn.

 

The End