The Art of Seduction

Title: The Art of Seduction
Author: Mandy
E-mail: kitty_amazon@yahoo.com
Rating: NC-17
Category: S
Spoilers: fourth season-ish.
Key words: JMPR, smut
Author's Notes: at the end.
Summary: Jarod devises a new way to escape Miss Parker, but how far will he go?
Written for the Pretender Story Auction.
Disclaimer: Not mine blah blah blah no infringement intended, no profit gained.

The Art of Seduction

The ability to delay satisfaction is the ultimate art of seduction.
- Robert Greene

"The Seductive Character
The Ideal Lover"

"Most people have dreams in their youth that get shattered or worn down
with age. They find themselves disappointed by people, event, reality, which
cannot match their youthful ideals. Ideal Lovers thrive on people's broken
dreams, which become lifelong fantasies. You long for romance? Adventure?
Lofty spiritual communion? The Ideal Love reflects your fantasy. He or she is
an artist in creating the illusion you require. In a world of disenchantment
and baseness, there is limitless seductive power in following the path of the
Ideal Lover."

Jarod didn't mean to do it. In fact, it was only through a silly
miscalculation that they had ended up in the same place at the same time, he
reflected. He had just wanted to keep her on her toes. Make her realise that,
even when she thought she was getting away from it all, she wasn't getting away
from *him*. But he hadn't counted on the storm coming in so fast, and he hadn't
counted on the car refusing to start, on not being able to get away before she
came. And by the time their altercation was over, after they'd been fighting
and battling and grappling for her gun, and by the time she had won and was
standing over him with a triumphant smile on her face, and they were both wet
and cold, by the time all that had happened, the storm had gotten very bad, and
they were snowed in anyway.

So they had to spend the night in a tiny little rustic cabin together,
high on the side of a mountain and miles away from anywhere. And it might not
have turned out the way it had, if he hadn't remembered that stupid book he had
read while pretending to be a sex therapist. Might not have turned out the way
it had, if he hadn't come with a plan to worm his way out of situation; not with
anger, or violence or even guilt, but with the oldest form of art on the planet.
The art of seduction.


"Choose The Right Victim"


They stood shivering inside the little cabin, both soaked to the bone
after their tussle in the snowdrifts outside. Miss Parker held her gun, fixed
pointedly on Jarod, although it shook a little as she shivered. Hnee,nee, in
his groin, had insured she had possession of it. He hadn't been expecting that,
but he should have. Of course Miss Parker would fight dirty to win.

"You know, I knew I packed the handcuffs for a reason," she said. Not taking
her eyes off Jarod, she crouched down beside her slightly damp duffel bag,
digging around until she found what she was looking for. With a metallic clank,
a pair of cuffs slid across the hardwood floor towards him.

"No, really, I'm not much into jewellery. You can have them," Jarod said dryly.
Miss Parker narrowed her eyes at him.

"Put them on. Attach yourself to..." her gaze roamed around the room, at the
sparse furniture - one rickety table and chairs, a wooden bench and sink, a
small gas stove, a refrigerator that had to be older than their ages combined, a
door that led into a miniscule bathroom, a fireplace with a rug in front of it,
an old wooden dresser with a dusty mirror, a bedside table and a rather large
and comfortable looking brass bed, conveniently fitted with brass spokes on the
bed head.

"Oh, let me guess..." Jarod muttered.

"Attach yourself to the bed - both hands over your head, loop the chain around
one of the bars," Parker ordered sharply.

Jarod looked at the bed, shivered, looked at his damp clothing and then
looked at Miss Parker appealingly. She rolled her eyes, sidling across the room
and, without looking away from him, jerked open a few of the drawers on the
dressers until she found what she was looking for; a big fuzzy blanket. She
tossed it to Jarod, who caught it with a smile.

"Better get out of these wet clothes," he said, and tried not to smile.

He supposed it wasn't entirely necessary to strip off as much as he did.
For while all of his outer layers were wet from rolling around in the snow, the
long john he was wearing underneath was only a *little* damp, but that didn't
stop him. Jarod stripped right down to his cotton Calvin Klein boxer shorts,
rolling his shoulders to ease the tension in them. And it was while he was
flexing his muscles and wriggling out of his boots, jeans, sweater and long
johns that he happened to notice the particularly *blank* expression on Miss
Parker's face.

In Jarod's experience, an expression like that meant one of two things.
Either she was trying very hard not to laugh, or she was being very careful not
to expose her true reaction to the sight of his near-naked body. Jarod knew
which one made the most sense to him.

Jarod wasn't conceited, or even vain, but after four years on the outside,
he had come to understand that, to most women (and even some men), he was very
attractive. Out of necessity he kept his body very fit, and had developed a
short but useful series of exercises he could perform every day in any location,
which meant his body was sleek and toned. He spent a lot of time running,
whether for pleasure or because he was being chased, and loved to swim when he
could, and it was because of this that he was in remarkably good shape for a man
of his age - a fact which apparently hadn't gone unnoticed by Miss Parker.

And noting the carefully neutral expression on her face, the slight
loosening of her grip on her gun, Jarod had an idea.

It was suicidal, he thought. It was dangerous, and he could be completely
off the mark, and Miss Parker could be thinking about something else entirely
whilst staring blatantly at his naked chest, and damn, it just might work. He
could turn the tables on her, getaway before she had a chance to take him in,
and maybe humiliate her a little in the process.

Seduction. Seducing someone, Jarod knew, was a fine and careful process
that had to be drawn out as long as possible. It was the act of surrounding
someone, whose defences were already weakened, with illusion and misdirection,
carefully drawing them out of reality, away from their normal responses and
reactions and placing them alone and isolated in a new situation, with only the
seducer to turn to. Jarod considered the act of seduction deceitful, and never
would have considered the process for a woman he had met during one of his every
day travels. Miss Parker, however, was a different matter.

She was, he decided, gathering his blanket and handcuffs and sitting on
the bed, the perfect example for seduction. Disillusioned, unhappy and lonely,
she was far more likely to respond than if she had of been happy and contented,
as she had been a little over a year ago with Tommy.

Jarod draped the blanket over himself artlessly, craning his head around
to see as he handcuffed himself to the bed. He wouldn't take it all the way, he
decided. Just enough to weaken her defences, to make her let down her guard so
she was in a vulnerable position he could take advantage of. Then he would make
her the captive, and wait it out til morning - fix the car, or walk down the
side of the damn mountain, and leave her to fume. It might even teach her a
lesson, and he would enjoy taunting her about it in the months to come.

Just make her want what she couldn't have, Jarod thought, reclining on the
bed and smiling sardonically at the still-silent Miss Parker. Tease her,
torment her, drive her slowly crazy with confusion and need, and then strike -
easy. He'd be free and laughing by the morning.


"Create A False Sense Of Security"


"All done?" Miss Parker asked sharply, and Jarod rattled his handcuffs against
the bed head.

"Want to check?" he asked serenely. He figured he'd have to get out of the
cuffs fairly soon - they were going to make his shoulders ache after a little
while. But if she let him out of the cuffs, there was no way Miss Parker was
going to put down the gun long enough for him to get close in any way. He'd
just have to lull her into complacency.

Miss Parker eased closer to him, her gun still trained squarely on his
chest. With one hand she attempted to reach the cuffs to check them, but seems
as Jarod had cuffed himself right in the middle of the bed, she couldn't reach.
She let out a soft huff of impatience, and Jarod tried not to smile.

Shuffling even closer, Parker raised one knee onto the bed, then the other
one, at which point she paused, as if waiting for him to make a sudden move.
When he didn't, she narrowed her eyes at him and shifted even closer. Her gun
arm was no longer held out straight or braced, but she placed the muzzle
squarely over his chest as she leaned forward and over him to examine the cuffs,
rattling the chain, her torso looming over Jarod's face.

"You should get out of those wet clothes," Jarod murmured slowly, huskily, and
Miss Parker jerked back to stare at him.

"What?" she said, and Jarod tried to look as innocent as possible.

"You might catch pneumonia," he said brightly. Miss Parker hopped off the bed,
the gun now dangling loosely from her hand. She rolled her eyes.

"Yeah, like I'm going to strip off and parade around in my underwear to give you
a free show," she said, and laughed.

"Actually, I was thinking more along the lines of changing into fresh, dry
clothes. It's kind of cold in here, anyway," he said, and shivered
dramatically.

Miss Parker seemed a little off balance, as if she had been expecting some
innuendo on his behalf... she even looked a little disappointed, he thought.
But dutifully she approached him again, tucking the blanket up around his
shoulders, before disappearing into the bathroom with her bag.

When she emerged again it was in jeans, a thick sweater and a heavy
overcoat, and she barely afforded him a glance as she tucked her gun into her
waistband and headed outside. A moment later he heard the sound of an axe
hitting wood.

She left him there for half an hour, and Jarod listened to the sounds of
her occasional cursing as she chopped wood, and was vaguely worried that she
shouldn't be out while the winds were so strong and the snow falling so heavily.
But he was more concerned about the ache that was gathering in his shoulders,
and attempted to shift around to ease the pain, which, of course, dislodged his
blanket.

By the time Miss Parker came back inside with an armful of wood, he was
twisted around and hunched over, straining against the bars to stretch his
muscles. The door slammed behind her, shutting out the wind and the snow, and
she dropped her load of wood, yanking out her gun and storming over to him
angrily.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" she barked angrily, showering specks
of snow over the floor. Jarod grunted, not looking at her as he twisted around.

"Trying to stretch my muscles. That wasn't the most comfortable position you
put me in," he said, and then let out a soft moan of relief as he felt his back
crack somewhere around his shoulder blades. Miss Parker stared at him
anxiously, obviously torn about what to do, so Jarod turned his head to look at
her, "We might as well face it, Miss Parker, we're stuck with each other for the
night, at least. Can we set aside hostility, and for god's sake, can you
handcuff me in a different position? This is killing my shoulders."

It took only a moment of consideration, and then Miss Parker pulled the
key to the handcuffs out of her pocket. Jarod stayed very still as she uncuffed
his left wrist, attaching the bracelet to the bar on the bed head itself, so
while Jarod was still handcuffed to the bed, his left arm was free and he had a
lot more range with his right. He pulled the blanket around his shoulders
quickly, feeling the cold, watching as she pushed the bedside table awayaway
from where he was sitting, so he couldn't reach it and anything it may contain.
He shivered.

"Are you going to light that fire?" he asked, and Parker shot him a look of
annoyance.

"When *I'm* ready, Jarod, I'm not your maid," she snapped, but Jarod noticed she
didn't waste any more time, stripping off her overcoat, going straight to the
fireplace and laying a fire.

He watched for twenty minutes as she attempted to create a little blaze,
but her kindling was stacked too close together, and the newspaper she had lit
underneath was smoking and smouldering away into nothing, with only a little of
the kindling lighting, before it would quickly go out again. He tried not to
smirk as she became more and more frustrated, stuffing more newspaper in and
piling more wood on top, which only made things worse.

Finally, when she was coughing from the smoke and her eyes were red-
rimmed, he cleared his throat, asking, "Would you like a hand?"

Parker looked over her shoulder to glare at him, but picked up her gun
anyway. She tossed him the handcuff key, and trained her gun on him as he
unlocked himself, and ambled over to the fire. He knelt in front of it, and
began picking away bits of kindling. "Your problem is that everything is piled
on top of each other, which means the flame has no room to breathe. Less is
more," he said, showing her the gaps he had created between the pieces of wood.
He picked up the box of matches, re-lit the newspaper and blew gently, coaxing a
small, crackling fire into life.

"Lucky I've got a fucking boy scout here, then, huh?" Miss Parker said dryly,
and Jarod chuckled.

He added more wood to the fire slowly, bigger bits that took a little
longer to catch, and then sat back, proud of his small accomplishment. He
flashed Miss Parker a wide smile, noting her surprise at his response, then
looked back at the fire.

"All right, back on the bed," she said gruffly, and he rose without protest,
settling back on the bed with his blanket and handcuffs. He even gave her the
key when she held out her hand.


"Send Mixed Signals"


Miss Parker had relaxed somewhat. She had turned her back on him, at
least, and was rifling through the cupboards under the bench in the kitchen,
apparently ignoring Jarod, who was snuggled in his blanket with the warmth of
the fire. He watched her go from cupboard to cupboard, growling under her
breath.

"Something wrong, Miss Parker?" he called, and she shot him a poisonous stare.

"The woman I rented the cabin from *assured* me there would be enough supplies
to last until I could drive to town in the morning. So far I've discovered two
tins of soup, a tin of hotdog sausages, a tiny carton of UHT milk and some very,
very lumpy sugar!" she said, obviously unimpressed.

"Try the fridge," Jarod supplied helpfully.

She opened the fridge door and was silent. Jarod waited patiently for the
reaction that was coming - he hadn't come up to the cabin without a reason,
after all. He saw her reach inside and pick something up, before straightening
up and half-turning to look at him. "'Enjoy your stay,'" she quoted from the
small note he had left, and then held up a bottle of champagne and a punt of
strawberries for him to see, "What the hell is this, Jarod?"

Jarod shrugged, kind of pleased with his gifts now that he had a grand
plan for escape - they would fit in well. "Just to remind you that I know what
you're doing before you do, to let you know that I'm around," he said, "But
seems as I *am* around, it's kind of a moot point."
"Can't you ever just leave me alone, Jarod?" Miss Parker sighed wearily, putting
the champagne and strawberries back in the fridge.

It was on the tip of Jarod's tongue to make some caustic remark about him
'leaving her alone when she left him alone', but he cut it off before it came to
bear. That wouldn't do, not at all. If the plan was to seduce her, he'd have
to keep things on the level, approach her with daisies rather than dead roses.
"Now what's the fun in that?" he asked playfully.

She jerked her head around in surprise, closing the fridge door and
staring at him, trying to gauge his expression. Jarod smiled sleepily at her,
tucking his blanket around him more tightly, only his right arm poking out.

"Fire needs more wood," he said.

He considered his next move carefully as she put wood on the fire. He had
her attention, certainly. Maybe she didn't recognise it consciously, but he
realised that she was put off balance by his behaviour, and it was enough to
subdue her automatic hostile reaction, enough to spike her curiosity. She
wanted to know what he would do next; he had her intrigued by the slight
difference in their interactions. There was no sexual undertone, not quite yet,
but he had a feeling that should be brought into play soon. But first, he
wanted to bring her attention to focus solely on him - not on capturing him, or
bringing him in, but on him and, more importantly, his responses to her.

"You should take holidays more often, Miss Parker," he said softly. She
stiffened, from where she was standing in front of the fire, and turned her head
slightly.

"Why? You want to stalk me in the Bahamas?" she asked.

Jarod chuckled slightly, propping himself up on his right elbow, making
the chain on the cuffs jangle as he rested the side of his face on his hand.
"No, although that might be nice. I was just thinking that you don't get away
from the - away from work nearly enough," he corrected, wanting to avoid
bringing the Centre into their conversation.

She was weakening, he decided, very slowly. Although she still held her
gun, she was edging slowly closer to him, seemingly without even realising it.
He gazed up at her, making sure his expression and body language portrayed the
image of someone who was relaxed and comfortable, perhaps even inviting her to
come closer.

"Yeah, well, leave is hard to come by..." Parker said, shrugging, nonchalantly.
She placed her gun on the dresser casually, too casually, and strolled over to
stand by the bed, looking down at Jarod.

"So why are you here Jarod? Why didn't you disappear before I arrived? If
you're not here for any devious purposes, why are you here?" she asked, and
perched on the side of the bed.

"How do you know I'm not?" he asked, with a small smile, "I could have put
arsenic in the food and stuck around to see the results..."

"I wouldn't eat or drink anything *you* left for me," she said, and Jarod
quirked a brow at her.

"Ah, but knowing that, wouldn't make more sense for me to put it in something I
hadn't left? Injected it into the soup, for example?" he said knowingly, and
Parker smiled with amusement.

"No, you wouldn't do something like that at all, Jarod. The worst I can expect
is that you shook up the champagne so it will go everywhere when I open it," she
jeered. Jarod grinned.

"So it's *when* you open it now, not *if*, is it?" he asked. Miss Parker
blinked.

She seemed on the verge of something, as if on the brink of moving closer
or moving away, the make or break of the moment - and Jarod didn't want her to
have control of that decision. So he took it out of her hands, laying back and
resting his head on his hands, closing his eyes. He knew this move would
confuse her; they'd almost been flirting, or at least having a friendly
conversation, and his sudden retreat was sure to make her wonder what she had
done, why he had backed away.

He wondered if she had ever been slowly, carefully seduced before, with
patience and intelligence. Her own methods of seduction were probably based on
sexual power and bold moves, he decided, and a lot of men would be in such
sexual awe of her, that they wouldn't consider a slow and steady assault on her
defences. He was carefully easing her out of her known perimeters and into his
- he would ultimately have complete control, as only he would know what was
coming next. It was a slow, deliberate dance, and she didn't even know the
tempo.

He felt her shifting restlessly beside him, as if wanting his attention
but not wanting to attract it, before her weight left the bed and he heard her
footsteps leading into the kitchenette. "Miss Parker?" he called, and heard her
pause, "When you do open that champagne, don't forget to share."