Should have left town before I started sinking

For a moment, the whole world froze.

Nick had only glanced at Cinder for a second. Just for a second, because he thought he had caught something out of the corner of his eye. The scene playing out in front of him between Dani and Dawn had been hot, sure, but he could spare a single second to glance away and confirm his suspicions, couldn’t he?

It was probably nothing, anyway. At least, that’s what he told himself. But then, he saw Cinder staring right at him.

And he just knew.

He knew that he had made a severe mistake. That, right now, he was looking into the eyes of a woman whose feelings for him were complicated, and just calling them that was already a massive understatement.

Even though Cinder’s eyes were wide enough to write on, he couldn’t make out all the emotions etched into them at once. They were a churning sea of amber-colored yearning and desire and confusion and fear and anger and embarrassment and… and… and…

He was lost in them. Everything else fell away for a single heartbeat, and it no longer mattered how hot it was, seeing Dawn squirming in Dani’s grasp like that, or how much her moans and squeaks aroused him, because he couldn’t hear them.

In front of him was Cinder, and everything else just didn’t seem real.

The only other thing that Nick could perceive was the pounding of his own heart. He stared at the woman in front of him as she stared back at him, eyes wide with distress. Neither of them said a word, or acknowledged what they were doing in any meaningful sense. What would even be the point? They both knew, just by looking at each other, that the current situation was not something that either of them had anticipated.

Cinder gulped.

Nick twitched.

Neither of them knew what to do.

“Oooaahhhnnnn!”

Then, a loud, throaty moan from Dawn brought the two of them crashing back down to earth. (Or wherever it was that Harem Hotel was located, anyway.)

Cinder flinched immediately and Nick started to breathe again. Neither of them completely understood what had just happened, what had passed between them in that moment, but they both knew that dwelling on it further wouldn’t be the right thing.

For Cinder, that was because she didn’t want to acknowledge the strange, twisted feelings churning around in her heart.

For Nick, it was because he wanted to focus on Dawn and Dani, like he knew he was supposed to be doing right now.

So, with a look of silent agreement passed between them, they turned their heads at the same time, and their attention returned to the show in front of them.

They’d missed quite a bit in that brief interlude.

Dawn was panting, shaking in Dani’s arms like she had come apart at the seams. Her body was slowly returning to normal as she struggled to focus on what was right in front of her, coming down the high of the orgasm Dani had inflicted on her. And Dani was dealing with some strange feelings of her own. It had felt strange, to touch Dawn like that, to make her cum. After all, Dawn had never really demonstrated those sorts of feelings towards women before. And while a person didn’t need to be attracted to women to cum at the hands of one, the way she’d responded to Dani’s touch hadn’t been the sort of behavior Dani would have expected.

Whenever a man touched her, Dani’s first instinct was to shy away. Not out of fear, or even disgust, just… it wasn’t what she wanted. Even when it came to Nick, one of her closest friends, her tolerance for contact with him was mostly a result of her Just One of the Guys upgrade, and she generally didn’t feel anything from it.

She would have assumed that it would be the same thing with Dawn, if the other girl wasn’t attracted to women. But what Dawn had just experienced…

…

Was Dani getting ahead of herself, thinking that maybe a small part of Dawn might actually be bisexual? Was that bigoted of her? Or was it something about Dawn that maybe not even the cat girl fully understood about herself?

Regardless, there wasn’t much Dani could do beyond this point. She’d brought Dawn to orgasm in spite of the girl’s proclaimed heterosexuality. How much further should she go? Would Dawn be willing to do more with her? And did Dani even want that?

These were the kinds of conversations that, in hindsight, they really should have been having on the nature walk. Or, at least, before Dawn got so high on Dani’s pheromones that any consent she gave was irrevocably tainted.

“I…” Dani’s mouth was surprisingly dry. She looked over Dawn’s head, and made eye contact with Nick. “I think that’s… enough for now,” she rasped out, loosening her grip on the cat girl in her arms.

Dawn turned back to her, her tail flicking behind her curiously. “Are you sure…?” She asked with somewhat of a breezy tiredness in her voice. “I was just having fun…”

“I had fun, too,” Dani said, helping the other girl off of her lap. “But I don’t want to, um…” her voice trailed off as she realized the difficulty of her position. She didn’t want to just tell the other girl “I don’t want to keep going” because Dawn might take that as a blow to her ego. But if she explained her apprehensions, it might force a conversation that Dawn wasn’t ready to have yet.

But… maybe that was better.

“…I don’t want to do anything that you’re not comfortable with,” Dani said, looking into the other girl’s bleary eyes. “Right now, you’re pretty high on pheromones, so I don’t consider that to be enthusiastic consent.”

Dawn blinked.

“Are you kidding me!?” Cinder erupted from her spot on the bed. Dani jerked her head around to look at the other girl, and saw the frustrated expression Cinder was wearing. Her face was hot and her mouth was hanging open.

“I’ve been sitting here watching this the whole time! You’ve been… you’ve been touching her all over!” She snapped. “How is THAT okay, but the rest of this situation isn’t?! Huh? Explain that to me right now, damn it!”

From where Cinder was sitting, this seemed like a really arbitrary line for Dani to be drawing. It was okay to fondle Dawn like a stress ball and make her cum all over the bed, but the second she tried to go beyond that, suddenly it wasn’t okay!?

Absolutely insane! That would be like if Nick was fine with Cinder consenting to being raunchily kissed, but wanted to be a stickler about touching her through her clothes or something!

…Well, wait, no, when thinking about it that way, maybe it wasn’t so cut and dry…

As that thought passed through Cinder’s brain and lingered there like a specter, the latina’s face began to burn even hotter.

“…Just forget about it!” She exclaimed, shaking her head. “I just… I…”

She felt like such a fucking fool for even getting involved. Like she cared about Dawn or her consent! She couldn’t think of anything that she cared about less! Cinder just wanted to fucking get out of here and not have to worry about any of this crap!

“…Well, uh… this… is certainly a revelation,” Dawn said, clearing her throat. The fumes from the sex had cleared enough that she was able to think again, even if there was still a thin layer of fog hovering in her brain.

She turned to look at Dani. “I wouldn’t worry,” she assured the other girl. “I mean… if I felt put off, I would say something.”

Dani bit her lip. She trusted that Dawn meant what she was saying, but given how Harem Hotel worked and the extensive suite of transformations that the other girl had been afflicted with, it was hard for her to be 100% confident that she wasn’t violating Dawn’s consent in some way.

Seeing the hesitation scrawled all over Dani’s face, Dawn pouted and reached out to grab her on the boob.

“Ah! H-hey!” Dani’s face turned crimson and she flinched when she felt the other girl squeeze down hard on her breast. It sent a jolt of pleasure through her body. “Th-that’s-!”

“You made me feel pretty good,” Dawn said cheekily, slinking over to Dani like a cat. “Is it so wrong for me to return the favor?”

Her eyes lowered from Dani’s face down to her curvy body. She didn’t get anything out of looking the tomboy in the eye, but that body…

Dawn had always envied women with figures like this. She tried not to- she knew that her value as a person had nothing to do with her appearance, but her brain. (Oh, and who she was as a person, that was probably pretty important, too.)

But, well…

She still showered regularly, brushed her hair, did her makeup, and wore nice clothes whenever she went out. Because she knew that, in spite of what her brain was telling her, appearances did matter. Even if she would never be beautiful in the same way a woman with Dani’s body was, that didn’t excuse her from taking care of her appearance.

Maybe she was being irrational. Maybe that didn’t matter.

But Dawn still put in effort every day to like the look of the person she saw staring back at her in the mirror. And if caring about her appearance made her a hypocrite, well, that was just something she would have to live with.

Even if, at times, she would rather look like Dani.

Cinder started grinding her teeth. Her heart pounded as she watched the shorter woman fondle the tomboy without hesitation. What is she doing!? Does she… does she really want to do things like that? Why? It’s just… flesh! That’s all it is! Just fat, and nothing more! What is the appeal of large breasts, anyway!? What is it with people caring this much about sex!?

It made her feel sick to her stomach. And not because her own chest was only a little bit plumper than Dawn’s! That had nothing to do with it! And anyone who insinuated otherwise was going to get hacked to pieces!

…Or, well, she’d yell at them. That was the best she could do right now.

The longer Cinder stared, the more uncomfortable she felt. Not because there was something intrinsically wrong with the sight of a cat girl groping another woman, but because, well, with each passing second that Dawn fondled her companion, Cinder felt a stronger and stronger urge to turn her head again.

This whole thing was for Nick’s sake, anyway, right? He was the one who was benefitting from this, no doubt enjoying the sight of two of “his” women touching each other.

Cinder just knew he was watching the two of them with a sleazy look on his face and lust in his eyes. She knew it! He was simply that type of man! (The fact that he never looked at HER with the lust she imagined in him didn’t help, either.)

She really, really wanted to see that look on his face. …Just to prove that she was right, of course, and that he was as big a sleaze as any other man. But after he noticed her looking the last time, Cinder couldn’t stand the idea of being caught again.

It was agony! All she could do was keep staring at the two of them, when she KNEW that Nick was watching as well and lusting over it! She knew it! Of course he was! And the fact that she couldn’t prove it without coming across as all doting and doe-eyed just drove her frustration even more!

No…

No, Cinder had to do something. She couldn’t let this stand! She had to find a way to prove that she was right, to prove that Nick was being a creep and watching Dani (forget that Dani was totally fine with it, that didn’t matter) while she was being intimate!

And, just as important, she had to do it while not looking like she was looking at him. That part was very, very important.

Using that as her motivating force, Cinder seized the initiative and pressed forward.

“Alright, that’s enough!” She snapped, making Dawn jump. The cat girl stopped fondling Dani and whirled around, surprised, only to see that Cinder wasn’t even paying attention to her.

Dani cracked her eye open, surprised and a little disappointed that the pleasurable caress of Dawn’s hand on her breast had come to an end. But when she saw what was going on, those thoughts suddenly became the last things on her mind.

With a light whistle on her lips, she stared at Cinder in amazement. The girl was standing on the bed, struggling a little due to the softness of the mattress, and glaring down scornfully at a very confused Nick.

“I know what you’re doing!” Cinder snapped, putting her hands on her hips. She narrowed her eyes. “I can see it all over your face! Lusting after the two of them, you… you pervert, you!”

Nick’s eyes flickered over to Dani for a moment. He looked just as confused as she felt. Then he returned his gaze to Cinder, and gave her a look of confusion.

“Cinder, I-”

“I don’t want to hear it!” Cinder snapped, stomping her foot and nearly falling over as a result. Her face was burning. “You… you’re just lusting over l-lesbians! …Well, DAWN isn’t a… …One of those, but Dani is! And that’s wrong, and-and gross, and-”

“Are you saying I’m gross?” Dani shifted Dawn away from her and sat up, alert.

Cinder recoiled. Her amber eyes were wide. “That’s not what I meant!” She exclaimed, shaking her head fervently. “I-I meant that NICK is gross, for-for lusting after you like that!”

“…Oh.” Dani thought that was pretty stupid, honestly, given how part of the reason she was here was to turn him on. But she wasn’t upset.

Cinder was getting mad for her sake, after all. Even if she was completely off the mark.

“You shouldn’t be directing your lust at… at a lesbian,” Cinder said, narrowing her eyes. She lowered them down into a gaze at Nick’s crotch, certain that he must have a throbbing erection right now.

If only she could do something to punish him for it!

“…This stupid thing,” she muttered, tugging on her collar furiously. “If not for this, I’d-! I’d give you such a beating!” She spat. “You pervert!”

Nick honestly didn’t know what to say in his defense. He was getting a strange vibe from Cinder’s words, as if she was just spouting out whatever came to mind. But he couldn’t feel a trace of sincerity from any of her claims.

…Well, the part about her being upset, that rang true.

Dani opened her mouth to tell Cinder to lay off, but Dawn quickly clasped her hand over it.

“Shh,” she quickly shushed the other girl. She lowered her voice into a whisper. “I think… I think this is what we want, actually.”

Dani looked at Dawn like she was crazy.

“You shouldn’t be… using a lesbian to get off, you creep!” Cinder repeated herself. She could hardly make out her own words over the sound of her pounding heart. “So I’ll… I’ll put a stop to that!”

Before Nick could say anything, Cinder was on top of him. Using her height advantage and her momentum, she was able to pin him down to the bed, and mounted him quickly before he could utter a single word of protest.

And just like that, Cinder had him trapped.

…Well, on the surface, anyway. He could have easily pushed her off, but if that thought had occurred to the other woman, she wasn’t showing it.

No, Cinder looked quite proud of herself right now, sitting atop him like this. Like she’d finally found the solution to her problem.

Or, like she was embracing the concept of righteous indignation.

“You’re dangerous, Nick,” Cinder purred, licking her lips and basking in the triumph of finally having the upper hand. “I knew I was here for a reason, and that was to keep you in check! So you won’t put your hands on poor, innocent Dani!”

Mary raised her eyebrow from the table. “Poor?”

Holly suppressed a snorting laugh with her hand. “Innocent?!”

Dani stared incredulously at the back of Cinder’s head. From the far mirror she could kind of make out the expression on the latina’s face, and what she could see was… bizarre.

“Uh…”

Dawn pinched her thigh. “Look,” she whispered to Dani, “I don’t like this any better than you do, but… I think Cinder’s working through something right now. I think… she’s using you as an excuse.”

To Dawn’s eyes, it looked like Cinder was transferring the protective instincts that she usually directed towards Ella onto Dani now. Because she couldn’t “protect” Ella from Nick while also getting her rocks off (not that she would use that terminology) she had to find some other justification.

Pleasuring Nick to keep him from “laying his hands” on Dani was the strategy she had chosen to compartmentalize wanting sexual contact with him while giving her an out afterwards.

Dawn didn’t think this was the best idea. But right now, she wasn’t sure if there was any other way to get Cinder to take the initiative.

All she could do was hope that Nick didn’t blow it-

“Cinder, I’m not going to do this.”

…Yup, she shoulda figured.

“What!?” Cinder exclaimed, glaring down at him. “And who says you get a choice, huh!?”

“Wha, are you going to assault me, then?” Nick asked.

Cinder’s face reddened even more. “No! I’m just-! Stopping YOU, you’re the… the assault… assaulter, um… I mean…”

She’d been trying to avoid it going that far, because she knew it wasn’t fair to call him that. And being called out on it just made her feel miserable.

Nick was removing her excuse, the bastard!

“You don’t have to worry, I’m not going to do anything to Dani,” Nick assured her. He doubted that she really felt that way. “So, you can get off. There’s nothing to worry about.”

The last thing Nick wanted to do was to put Cinder in a position where she felt like she was being forced to have sex or do something against her will. That couldn’t be good for her mental health, either.

…Wait, so then why was she giving him such a dissatisfied look?

Cinder stared down at Nick, radiating obvious disappointment. The frustration was pouring off of her in waves, like Dawn’s pheromones.

Her scowl deepened.

Wait, it couldn’t be that she wants to…?

No, that was insane.

Cinder may have been making a sour, silent expression, but in her head, she was screaming. Agh, you stupid jerk! Would it kill you, for ONCE, to just… not do this? I’m trying here, damn it!

She was doing her best, and Nick had to go and ruin everything.

Nick bit his lip. He was trapped between a rock and a hard place. Cinder’s true motive was starting to bleed out, and he was wondering if he should indulge her.

Then he felt a light kick on his foot from Dawn, almost like she was telling him off.

That was enough for him.

“…Okay, fine, you’re right, I-I was… looking lustfully at Dani,” Nick conceded. “Because, um, I’m just… so fulfilled with sexual desire, I can’t help myself! Yeah, th-that’s it.”

Dani almost burst out laughing. As if Nick had any problems with getting women to sleep with him!

As absurd as his statement sounded, it was satisfying enough for Cinder. Her disappointed expression gave way to a triumphant smirk, and she held her head up high. “There, you see?” She crowed. “I simply have no other choice!”

Dawn rolled her eyes. Why did her friend have to make this so complicated?