This installment of the "Facing The Music" timeline involves characters owned by Marvel. I'm not making any money but the story is copyright of me as are Celeste and Tony. Freeze is owned by the joint Leary/Keppel writing team.

This story was inspired by recent discussion on the Outside The Lines mailing list and I thank each person who nudged me into writing this. I'll gladly give you a link to the statistics that are mentioned in the story, if you ask.

Words, when they came, consisted of simple, heartfelt expressions of love and whispered encouragement as Sam and Rahne made out. But, most of the time, they simply allowed themselves to enjoy the wordless pleasure of holding each other and kissing each other. It was fun and a little giddy.

Pressing her knees against either side of Sam's waist, Rahne started an exploration of his neck, his forehead, his lips and the insides of his mouth. Detached, she noticed that there was a growing pressure between her legs, where she was pressing herself against him. But it wasn't uncomfortable, not at all. In fact, she kind of enjoyed it.

Sam's arms were still holding her tightly, but now they seemed to drop a little and be more centered around the small of her back. It only pushed her to kiss him deeper and made her move her arms along his back faster. She was operating more on instinct than anything else, her sensitive nose beginning to place the odor that they were generating. And she didn't really care that they were getting more and more aroused.

Finally, Sam's hands left her back and moved up her sides, making slow circles up and down. Rahne was quickly discovering that her ability to think rationally about the situation was disappearing. She felt his hand as it tentatively approached her chest and then circled around her breast and then lingered there.

Suddenly, the two of them realized what had happened and pulled away. Sam quickly removed his hand and stared, wide-eyed in shock at her. "Rahney?" he whispered as he started to kick himself. Rahne looked back at him for a moment and then got up and left the room.

***

One of the biggest parts of being an actress was dressing the part and Celeste looked every inch the part of the lover of a major underworld figure. From the back, her flame-red dress dipped down to a tormentingly low "come and get me, big boy" bow. In the front, her dress had been cut down to sin, as her grandmother would have aptly called it. A dangerously high split up the front would occasionally reveal the small caliber pistol strapped to her leg. Long, blonde hair dramatically upswept in an elaborate bun, matching diamond necklace and earrings, and a seemingly empty-eyed expression completed the look.

Tony Longhair, dressed in a designer tuxedo, her "escort" for the evening, had done a great job playing the jealous lover. He had been spotted glancing jealously at her every time she danced with another person, a display that was only planned half the time. But, given the fact she was also under the watchful eye of his right-hand man, Freeze, she was in no danger of getting the wrong kind ofattention. Still, she could get the right kind of information from the men she danced with and flirted with. "So Sledgehammer will get the next shipment of pash in next weekend?" he asked as he slipped off his jacket and laid it over the back of the couch.

"Saturday," Celeste said as she sat down on an ottoman in their hotel suite. "And it's going to be stored overnight in his warehouse." Pash was the latest date-rape drug, one that would leave its victim with some memories of the attack. She knew first hand the dangers of the drugs, and the two of them were dedicated to making sure that no one would ever have to experience it again.

And, by tampering with the shipment and the warehouse, Tony could do three things at once. It would effectively cripple needed resources for the double agent who had been bucking for Tony's job by courting the Kingpin's endorsement, hurt the Kingpin, and sign Sledgehammer's death warrant, with the Kingpin as his executor. Tony grinned as he loosened his bow tie and unbuttoned his cuff links. He had an old, old feud with the Kingpin and would never miss a chance to hurt the man.

Kicking off the stilettos, Celeste sighed. "I do love the Russian Tea Room. Thanks for taking me there tonight." The restaurant, the clothing, and the presidential suite at the Hilton had been designed to make her look like an expensive and demanding courtesan, a luxury well above the average man's price range, but well within the expected look for Tony Coyote Longhair, the second highest man in the Network.

"Thank Emma for picking it all up-- again." Emma had long ago worked out an arrangement between Tony and the Mutant Underground where Tony would personally protect Celeste in exchange for Celeste's help on occasions where a pretty face and kind word could get information out far quicker than force. It was more than a fair trade, especially given the fact that Celeste was the only woman Tony could ever imagine trusting.

"I wasn't kidding when I told Ed that you were going to have to get me out of this dress tonight." Celeste stood up and turned her back to Tony. "It seems most male designers are majorly into bondage." Pointing to the location of the secret zipper, she waited for the chance to breathe normally. He quickly unzipped, unsnapped, and untied her, trying not to linger too long on what could become a very enjoyable task if he allowed himself to realize what he was doing.

A knock on the door made them jump. Celeste, expecting one or another member of the Network to be waiting to talk to Tony, just stepped out of the dress and waited for him to open the door. Tonight, neither of them wanted to have company and having to cover herself would quickly make that point. He walked over and opened the door, only to find Rahne standing there.

Celeste promptly picked up her dress and tried to cover herself with it. Rahne was one of three people who had a good guess as to where she was at all times, but her best friend was also the last one to take advantage of the situation. "What's the matter?"

Rahne looked at the two and started to back away. "It's nothin', nothin' at all. A can come back when ye aren't busy...." Then after taking a small, almost hopeful sniff, she paused, disappointed. "You weren't. . . um. . . busy?" Part of her had hoped that Celeste and Tony were involved romantically, if for no other reason than her friend needed someone who loved her as she was in her life.

Tony quickly ushered Rahne into the suite so he could close the door. "It's a long story." Celeste could pick and choose what she wanted to tell the young mutant. "Were you followed?" Then, as a secondary thought, "It is nice to see you again. We should have lunch sometime."

"A donnea think A was followed. Someone helped me tae sneak up." A man who looked like he could be Emma's brother had met her downstairs and given directions how to sneak up to the suite. "Can A ask what's goin' on?"

"Tony and I were trying to squash a pash smuggler," Celeste informed Rahne as she walked into a bedroom. Donning a terry cloth robe, she came out and continued, "So I was flirting some information out of somebody." Turning to Tony, "Thank Freeze for remembering who my friends are, will you?"

Watching as Celeste hung up the dress on a hanger, Rahne had to feel slightly sorry for the man that Celeste had pumped for information. "A can go," she offered, realizing that this wasn't a normal business trip that Celeste was on.

Instead, Celeste pulled Rahne into the bedroom with an explanation, "This is girl talk." With a resigned sigh, Tony nodded and sat down in a comfortable chair with a book he had bought earlier that day. "So what got you so upset?" Celeste asked as she closed the door.

Friendship didn't require any more invitation than that. "Sam and A were makin' out and things got heavier than they ever had before and we got a wee bit carried away. A'm a guid girl but A liked it. And then, we got carried away..."

Celeste sat down on the silk bedspread and dragged her friend down next to her. "How carried away?"

"He touched me...." Rahne blushed and held her bent hand six inches in front of her right breast.

After waiting a moment for her to continue, she prompted, "How did you feel?"

His hand had been so warm it didn't seem like she had had two layers of clothing separating it from her skin. And it felt so right that she couldn't tell him to move it. And she was so embarrassed that he would have noticed that her nipple was firm. "Confused," Rahne admitted. "And ye were the only person A could talk tae. A wouldn't have dared tell Mummy and Kitty wouldn't have seen muh problem, A donnea think."

Celeste understood why Rahne had turned to her. As a fellow Christian, she was expected to tell Rahne that she was totally wrong for allowing the situation to get out of control, which was what Rahne wanted to hear. Rahne had been raised to feel that such sexual feelings outside of marriage were totally wrong, and the prevalent Christian culture didn't make the situation easier. "What did you do?"

"A enjoyed it and A was ashamed of enjoyin' it," Rahne admitted. "A had tempted Sam and he had fallen intae lust and A hadn't stopped it beforehand--" As soon as she said it, she heard the pun in the sentence and giggled.

"And good Christian boys and girls don't do that stuff?" Celeste asked, thinking of the "True Love Waits" campaign her church had been conducting. Maybe because of her jadedness, she didn't really think that signing a piece of paper was a good way to make a commitment to virginity until marriage. A commitment like that had to be made on a date-to-date basis, with set mental standards that would not be crossed.

"Exactly!" Rahne paused, "Do they?"

Celeste had been quite the tease as a teenager, taking pleasure in turning on her date and then walking away. It was the best way she could find to be both wild, as her parents expected, and a virgin, as her grandparents expected. "It does happen."

"Sure, look at me," Rahne muttered. "With the 'guid Reverend' as a father I should have known."

"And God can take what some people would call mistakes and turn them into miracles," Celeste whispered as she hugged Rahne. From the tone of her voice, it was clear that she was talking about both her best friend and her own daughter.

"Ye think?" Rahne had a hard time reconciling the fact that her own father, who had warned her endlessly about the sins of premarital sex, had in fact indulged in the very same sin.

"I know." The firmness in Celeste's voice left no room for debate. Rahne hugged her friend back.

"Then how am A supposed tae think about what happened?" Rahne laid down on her stomach across the bed. After taking the small gun out of her garter belt and slipping off her hose, Celeste did the same.

"What do you think?"

Rahne sighed and tried to straighten the conflicted emotions in her mind. "All the books say what Sam did was wrong and A shouldn't have let him get that far." Her favorite writer and speaker wrote proudly of the fact that she didn't even kiss her husband until they were married. Another writer felt that couples should actually spend less than twenty hours a month together and work up to eighty hours a month when they could be 'responsible'. But, lately, Rahne didn't feel that sexual attraction was something to be avoided or ignored or diminished. Instead, it needed to be handled. "A donnea think A agree with them."

That was a major confession from Rahne, and Celeste rewarded it with a smile. "Rahne, if you choose not to do something, then you'll always choose not to do it. If you choose to do something, than you will choose something." If Rahne saw virginity as giving up something then the next time she was in the same situation, she might be tempted to give in. If she saw it as saving something, then she would wait.

That was confusing. "What do ye mean?"

"If you choose not to have sex because the Bible says no, then that's all you'll choose and that's okay. But if you choose to be chaste because virgins who get married think that their sex lives are better than non-virgins who get married, and are happier in married life than others, then that's a better decision." Remembering all the stuff she had to go though after her rape, Celeste said in a bitter tone of voice, "And trust me, deciding to forgo an AIDS test or the discovery that you can't have children because of a sexually transmitted disease is the best choice in the world."

"A never thought of it like that before..." Rahne trailed off.

"That's not to say that I won't sleep with someone until I'm married, but I'm waiting until the right time with someone I love and am sure that I'll spend the rest of my life with." Celeste didn't want to make Rahne feel that if she didn't wait she would have done something totally wrong. "That's a decision that's up to you. And only to you."

"Aye, that's true." Rahne admitted as she thought out loud. "Kurt's a believer but he and Amanda are expecting a child." Personally, Rahne was interested in seeing how that child would be raised, if he or she would be raised in church or out of it. There was no real room for compromise between what Kurt believed and what Amanda practiced. "And Kitty and Pete really love each other."

"There's that angle," Celeste admitted. "Part of my reason for waiting for the right time is that I just don't want to risk that if by some miracle, I got pregnant, I would be stuck trying to raise that child alone." A child needed two loving parents who would make them the center of their lives. "The last thing I would like to think I would do is rush into anything with just anybody."

"Or be like Kurt and Amanda, where they got pregnant and it wasn't planned. Now, Amanda doesn't want to get married." Rahne thought for a long moment about everything she had ever been taught about sex before saying honestly, "A donnea think A could do it before A got married. It's okay for Kitty and Pete but nae for me. A was sae uncomfortable-- ye phone is ringing." A faint ring came out of Celeste's suitcase.

With a sigh, Celeste opened the case and pulled out her phone. "I'll take it in the bathroom but it won't be a minute." Caller ID let her know that it was Sam on the other end.

"Is Rahne there?" Sam asked, very concerned. Rahne had run off without telling him where she was going. That wasn't a good sign.

"She's better, Sam." Celeste wanted to end this conversation as soon as possible.

"Ah feel like crud." That was the understatement of the year. He had spent an hour on the roof, staring at the moon and praying. The only reason he hadn't called earlier was he had wanted to give Rahne some time to calm down. Tomorrow, he planed to seriously talk with her about what happened and reassure her that she could talk to him about anything.

Truth be told, in the circles Celeste had started to move in, this was nothing. Emma was taking her and Tony to the Hellfire Club for special occasions and, in the back of her mind, sex was getting more and more commonplace. Even her own wild period had made her think that what had happened between the two was nothing. But that was why the friendship between her and Rahne worked so well, they were nearly polar opposites. "Rahne does too."

"It shouldn't have happened," Sam stated. "Lila and Ah went farther a couple of times, but Rahne's different and Ah should have stopped muhself." Even when he thought that he had lost Rahne, he hadn't gone that far when they made up. It was hard to explain what had changed between then and now, except that the day after Thanksgiving was exactly three months away. That was the day he was going to surprise Rahne by asking her to marry him.

Rahne was innocent in ways that Celeste would never be. She never objected when it happened to her. "Sam, I never dated a guy more than three times as a teenager."

"That's interesting," Sam said, trying to figure out where this was coming from.

"I went too far by the third date to see them again without delivering." Celeste changed into the nightgown she had brought with her while waiting for Sam to understand what she was saying.

"If we go there again, then Rahne might really get uncomfortable." Sam nodded. "I'll keep my head about me."

"The big head has to keep control of the little head," Celeste pointedly reminded him. Then she shook her head. How did she become so much like Emma that she could take what would have been an half hour conversation and condense it into three minutes?

"Just tell her Ah'm sorry and that Ah was worried about where she had gotten to. The rest Ah'll tell her later." Sam decided to hang up the phone and let Celeste go back to Rahne.

"Okay." Celeste agreed. "And Sam, let's go out sometime. It's been a long time since the three of us have had fun together."

"Sure will," Sam promised as they said their good-byes. Celeste smiled as she walked out of the bathroom and slipped her phone back where it belonged.

"Sam okay?" Rahne asked. She had overheard them.

"Worried about you and sorry that he did what he did." Celeste sat back on the bed and sighed. "Tony might be having a visitor tonight. If he does, just play along." It wasn't the best place for Rahne to have a personal crisis, but when was life convenient? As long as the woman played things by ear nothing bad would happen.

Rahne frowned and carefully asked, "What are ye intae these days?" She and Sam had both noticed the gradual changes in Celeste. Lately, she had become colder inside and noticeably secretive. And what was worse, Celeste wasn't happy with her life anymore.

Celeste smiled as she sat on her leg. "I'm still on the side of the angels." Her methods weren't the normal ones but they worked. The strains of faking a relationship with Matt so that somebody could control Ariel had been exhausting her, and coupled with her involvement with Emma's Mutant Underground refused to let her operate in normal terms.

Rahne took a deep breath and decided to be blunt. Celeste was the mistress of lying to herself. "Why are ye makin' everybody think ye and Tony are sleepin' together?" That was the polite way of saying what she wanted to say.

Celeste blinked, shocked her friend would ask her about that. "Umm..." She shouldn't have surprised, but she was. "I told you, to get a pash dealer."

That was an explanation for tonight, but Celeste went out of her way to make people who didn't know her think that. "And the note from Dani just happened to appear in muh purse after meetin' ye for lunch in New York? And ye just happened tae be in life-threatenin' danger for knowing about a business transaction? What are ye really intae these days?" The only reason for cultivating the image of the two being lovers was if Celeste was truly in danger. And if she was, Rahne would do anything to help her friend.

Truth be told, Celeste had fought for Rahne's knowledge of Emma's mutant underground, but Emma had vetoed it. If Rahne knew about it, then Sam would have known, and then the rest of the X-Men. Too much was at stake to be honest with Rahne, so Celeste creatively misdirected her with "It's part of a complicated game. Emma's trying to get me in the Hellfire Club and I need to have the illusion of power."

"And Tony's playing along?"

"Every kiss is part of the script. It's the only thing I'm acting at anymore." That was a lie, her whole life was a script written by the demands of the mutant underground. The real Celeste had become a faint echo in the back of her head.

"Why did ye leave yuir church?" Rahne had been shocked when Paige told her that and the reason behind it. She just desperately wanted Celeste not to lie to her again. Rahne couldn't be friends with a habitual liar.

"A teenage girl and boy got pregnant and only the girl was told to ask the church for forgiveness." Celeste had been outraged and let the church know that she was leaving regardless of whether or not they went through with the planned action. They didn't but she hadn't been in a church for weeks. It was actually easier for her conscience when she didn't think about all the lies she was telling.

"But it takes two!" Rahne protested. And suddenly she realized something about the incident between her and Sam, that it had taken two to lose control of the making out. "And one should have kept a level head."

Biting back the remark that a level head added to the problem, Celeste nodded. "Now what are you going to do about it?"

"Work on keepin' things under control, tell Sam A'm not ready for that and A donnea think that A would feel comfortable with it, not until we are engaged. But that's the only new thing A want tae do when we get engaged." Rahne smiled as she came to her conclusion. "The rest are things that A want tae be married tae find out. Tonight was way too sudden."

Curiosity and will power fought a mental eight-round match in her mind before curiosity won by a knock-out. "What kind of things?" Celeste had her doubts that Rahne would ever feel that comfortable with sex-- doubts that Rahne's next few sentences quickly erased. Celeste's jaw dropped down and she had to physically place her thumbs under her chin to close her mouth. She had learned a lot about Emma's sex life over the time they had to work together, and Rahne truly seemed to have the same sort of interest. No wonder Emma had once said that she had a flame that burned much like hers.

Making a mental note to buy Rahne's bridal gift from a sex store, Celeste tried to come back with something semi-intelligent to say to her friend. "Um. . . does Sam know you have that kind of... interests?"

Rahne shook her head. While she could talk about this stuff with her friend/sister, she hadn't got comfortable enough talking about sexual things to him yet. "Think A should tell him?"

The next words just spilled out of her mouth. "Rahne, your honeymoon night might tax his healing factor. And before you try-- well, let's just say a few of those things could just test his immortality." Shaking her head, "But it would take Guido an hour to get that grin off of his dead body!"

Rahne laughed and quickly changed the subject. "How did you do your eyes so they sparkle like that?" Celeste had a natural talent for applying makeup, even if she looked too vampish for Rahne's taste.

"Sit down..." Celeste, grateful for the break, quickly motioned for Rahne to get in front of the mirror while she pulled out her make-up. It never failed, no matter what they talked about, no matter how serious the topic was, they could never be serious for too long. Life was too short and far too dangerous for that.

"And Rahne..." Celeste started with a grin, getting what she hoped was the last word in, "If Sam does complain, remind him that you could wolf out the next time he goes where you don't want him to and really tear up his back."

"A donnea know," Rahne shot back. "Some men like that kind of thing!" That started Celeste to laughing so hard that she fell off the bed. Pushing her luck, Rahne joked, "Might just give a whole new meaning to the term bestiality!"

The resulting pillow fight got so rambunctious that Tony had to come in and try to break it up. Understanding the fact that Rahne needed to be teased and helped to feel normal, he gamely surrendered by pointing out, "It's not every day I get to wrestle with two beautiful women in bed." It took housekeeping three days to locate all the feathers from that fight.