Thread: The indecent Challenge. {Skittish Butterfly, n' ForeverMischievous}

As he started answering Genny's cheeks flushed red as a slight panic started to rise in her for the first time, thankful the crowd's eyes were all on the big guy talking down to her from the stage. First it was when he told her he wouldn't be molesting her or laying a hand on her without her agreement. In theory that should have made her happy, and sounded almost civilized, but it just felt to her like he'd pulled another plank out of her safety raft of objections. What was she going to do if he somehow made it seem reasonable for her to go along with this challenge she'd started herself? And then the worst. The cameras had turned on him, filming his words as they sensed a budding story, so close to what she'd dreamed but for a minor detail he was promising explicitly, on-camera to quit the dirty business, all because of her -- so long as she showed he was wrong about his training. Of course he was wrong! Of course she could prove it to him. It was just stupid that she should have to put herself into such a situation though. It was a bad idea and she stepped forward, ready to tell him so, but the crowd had started chanting her name, this time like a victory chant. They were all surging toward her again, patting her back, some of them yelling excitedly You did it, Genny! You got the Bastard! and Way to go Genny! There was nothing she could do about it, no amount of carefully reasoned denial and rejection to him would be heard over the crowd. Genny felt the butterflies battering her stomach as she came to grips with the thought she was going to have to do this, trying hard to focus on the positive even as Erick's cold stare still held her eyes, finally forcing her to look away. She raised her arms in reluctant defeated victory, accepting the wishes of her admiring public and the lights of the fawning media cameras. Some sense inside her told her he must still be looking at her with some look she would find too disgusting to bear if she actually returned his glance and she couldn't bring her eyes back to his even as the crowd slowly nudged her toward the floor at the foot of the stage, the cameras waiting, as if everyone knew such an important even required a closing sound bite to seal the deal. 30 seconds later and she was at the foot of the riser, Erick standing directly over her up on the stage and Genny did not like the arrangement at all. As the flash bulbs popped, all she could think of was the papers accompanying headlines of the Governor to be's daughter's victory with pictures of her face at his feet. She quickly turned and hopped upward, struggling to pull herself up on the stage with him, not waiting for a path to the backstage stairs to clear lest even more pictures of her be taken. More flashbulbs went off behind her as she worked to get herself up on the stage, but her mind was on how she could handle this. He was so tall, so big. Had he seemed this giant in the elevator? Were his eyes that full of steel? She remembered it slightly, now as she stood next to him, facing the crowd and cameras from the stage, but he seemed so much more intimidating as she stood next to him. She raised her hands as the crowd cheered her. Thank you, thank you. This is a great day. I'm sure we all look forward to the next press conference when Mr. Larsen when its proven to his face how wrong he has been about women, and I might add about himself, and goes back to what I hope will be a more productive career in industry. She tried to smile, a small part of her wishing stupidly inside that this whole thing would just go away, that she was just a regular girl and not a Governor's daughter, or nearly so, and didn't carry these difficult responsibilities. Genny turned as the cameramen waved directions to them, offering her small hand to Erick to seal the deal on camera, suddenly aware how big his own hands were. Was he really going to do this? His eyes seemed to say he would. But he wouldn't touch her, he said. Not unless she asked him to. She didn't like that part, and found herself fidgeting as she waited to see if he would shake her hand or back down. She hoped he would back down. If he didn't, what would Daddy say? She prayed he would be proud of the part about getting a bad man to stop doing bad things, that no one would care or ever find out how she had to do it.