A/N: So I don't know why I'm so hung up on the concept of Cato as mentor, but I can't help it. If you've read some of my other stuff you'll know I also like the idea of tributes training with their mentors for a few months so the plot/relationships have plenty of time to develop, and I usually have the tributes live and train separately from their district partners (so no Peeta here. I'm sorry and I totally agree with the school of thought that Peeta should not just be dismissed in Catnoiss stories, but it just didn't work for this one).

Disclaimer: THG and its characters don't belong to me.

Warnings: violence, sexual content, lots of nasty language

Random FYI: Cato's style is classy AF. Think Idris Elba or Justin Timberlake. His cologne is basically YSL L'Homme, which I think smells divine.

Enough already, let's get to the story. Thanks for reading!

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Cato doesn't dream all that often. Mostly he either doesn't really sleep or he passes out after a night of heavy drinking.

But when he does dream, nothing's concrete. It's just colors and sounds and smells. Well, just one color really (crimson). And one sound (screaming). And one smell (iron).

There is one exception.

When he was four years old he had a terrible earache. His mother sat down in her rocking chair and coaxed him up onto her lap, and he pressed his cheek into her breastbone. She rocked lazily but steadily back and forth, back and forth, patting his back slowly, rhythmically, in time with the motion of the chair as she watched her after-dinner Capitol shows. It soothed him and he fell asleep, and when he woke a couple of hours later, his earache was gone.

Eighteen years later, he can still remember the exact rhythm of the rocking and the patting and how his mother smelled like gardenias, and sometimes he dreams of that evening.

On the nights he dreams of crimson and screaming and iron, he wakes so full of pressure he thinks he will burst. The last four years have taught him that he can relieve that pressure if he holds a lighter to his flesh until his skin bubbles up, and so he keeps one in his bedside drawer in all of his residences. His mansion in 2. His townhouse in the Capitol. His room in the District 2 male tribute's apartment at the Training Center.

When he wakes from the dream about his mother he does not reach for his lighter, but stares at the ceiling and wonders if she remembers that night so long ago. He has never asked her if she does and he never will. It's not the kind of thing that men from 2 talk about.

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If you ask Cato what he likes, he will give you a list of the finer things in life.

Actually, that's probably not true. Most likely, he'll shoot you one contemptuous glance before he turns on his heel and stalks off, unless you're rich, important, beautiful, or someone from the Academy.

But if he does deign to answer your question, here's what he'll say:

He likes well-tailored three piece suits (he especially loves a close-fitting waistcoat, that one) in shades of gray or navy.

He likes the dry whisper that the silk tie he has chosen for the day makes as he as he loops it over itself (full windsors only, of course, because big boys need big knots).

Naturally, then, he also likes the shush his silk pocket square makes when he stuffs it into the left side of his suit jacket.

He likes hand-crafted leather shoes that come from a place across the ocean called Italy.

He likes his collection of watches, some of which are gold and some of which are stainless steel and some of which have leather bands.

He likes his cologne, a special blend that the premier Capitol "nose" concocted just for him. It smells fresh and woody, with notes of bergamot and cedar and white pepper.

He likes his sheets, which are made from pure Egyptian cotton, and his gray cashmere blanket. He is told that they are made by a company called Frette, which is in Italy, the same place his shoes come from. (This Italy place, he has decided, must make even nicer things than District 1).

He likes filet mignon, medium-rare and served with asparagus and whipped garlic potatoes.

He likes a nice glass (or eight) of small batch rye whiskey. Neat, of course. Never on the rocks.

He likes cigars that come from a warm, tropical place they tell him is called Cuba. He keeps them in a glass-topped rosewood humidor, which he also likes.

He likes the black sedan with the leather interior that his driver uses to get him where he needs to go when he's in the Capitol.

He likes to go hunting for big game (they let him own and shoot firearms now that he is a Victor) in the mountains just outside of the Capitol and in the grassy plains in 2. He has killed elk and buffalo and a grizzly bear, and he has mounted all of their heads in his billiard room in 2.

He likes women who look elegant in public, but who spread their legs for him the second he gets them alone. It amuses him. They act so refined around everyone else, but he knows what they look like on their knees with his dick in their mouth and his cum on their face. He knows what they look like on all fours. He knows the sounds they make as he spreads their cheeks and pushes his cock into their well-oiled assholes.

He particularly likes the women who understand intuitively that there will be no cuddling and no conversation afterward. The ones who stand up as soon as he has finished, dress themselves quickly, and slip out without a word.

He sighs with exasperation when he brings home one who doesn't understand this, because then his lips and his teeth and his tongue are forced to waste time and energy on two one-syllable words: Get and out.

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Cato will be mentoring for the third year in a row for the 75th Annual Hunger Games. This year his tribute is Quintus, who is an in-fighter like him. A swarmer. He likes to crowd his opponent, he likes to get right in their face and unleash flurries of punches. He's good with weapons in general, but he's especially brilliant with a sword in his hand. He is a younger version of Cato, who is convinced that his tribute will win two years in a row.

And then he finds out that for the Third Quarter Quell the Victors will be forced to mentor tributes from districts other than their own. He is furious when he hears the announcement that 2 will be responsible for the tributes from 12. Of course they would pair the most prestigious district with the trashiest one. The citizens of 12...they're not even people, as he understands it, but filthy, subhuman rats.

Cato is the second youngest Victor from 2. The youngest is Alec, his tribute from last year. The rest of them-Brutus, Cassius, Enobaria, Lyme, Hetalia, Marcus, Tamora, Linus, Thea, Heath, Liam, Buffy and Ronin-all refuse to deal with this shit, and since seniority rules, Cato and Alec are forced to flip a coin to see which will mentor the boy (heads) and which will mentor the girl (tails).

Alec flips the coin and it comes up heads, so Cato gets the girl.

It doesn't really matter anyway. Neither of them intend to train their official tribute; they will be mentors in name only. Seneca immediately calls Lyme to let her know that, while the mentors from the outlying districts will not be allowed any contact with the kids from home, the gamemakers are willing to turn a blind eye to such behavior for 1 and 2, as a reward for their continued loyalty to the Capitol, and as long as they're discreet about the whole thing. So Cato will spend his time training Quintus and, since it's his first year, Alec will assist Enobaria as she trains Clove. They'll run off Seeder and Chaff, the District 11 Victors who were assigned to 2 for the quell. It won't be hard to do. They're both old and half-senile anyway.

Cato and Alec watch 12's reaping, because they should probably at least know what they're dealing with.

Effie Trinket draws the name Primrose Everdeen and a little 12-year-old girl with golden braids and sky-blue eyes and rosy lips and cheeks steps forward in shock. Cato sighs and drops his head into his hands. Bloodbath. Casualty. There go his mentoring stats. He'll probably come in dead last...at least in the bottom four.

And then he hears the frantic yell. "No! No! Prim! I volunteer!" He lifts his head just as the girl from the eighteen-year-old-section pushes Primrose Everdeen behind her. She's small, not really much taller than the little girl she has replaced, and lean, like everyone in 12. Her skin is olive and her hair is so dark he thinks it might be black and he doesn't understand at first why she's volunteered to sacrifice herself for this little girl, until the camera closes in and shows that, though their coloring is completely different, their features are similar. Cousins, then, or possibly sisters.

Her name is Katniss Everdeen, and she is, in fact, the older sister of Primrose. She seems to have some spine to her. Maybe she'll make it past the bloodbath.

It still sucks a bag of dicks.

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He meets her for the first time when she arrives at the apartment he will be forced to share with her. He can see that even though she has tried to clean herself up, there's still dirt beneath her fingernails. He can see how worn the fabric of her faded blue dress is. He rolls his eyes with disgust and glares at her, expecting her to flinch.

But she doesn't. She just scowls back at him, her gray eyes cold and surprisingly hard. He's actually taken aback, although he maintains his icy mask.

"Look, I'll get right to the point," he says. "This is a waste of my time. There's no way in hell you're gonna win, and even if you had a chance, I don't want you to anyway. I'll be spending most of my time down on the second floor with the guy I was supposed to mentor this year. But I can't have you completely embarrassing me. So I'll come up with a training schedule for you and I'll see how you're doing every once in awhile. Can you do anything?"

She doesn't answer. She just stands there, continuing to scowl at him.

"Can you do anything?" he repeats impatiently.

"Do anything?"

"Yeah. You know. Are you fast, can you climb, do you have any experience with weapons or fighting or...anything?"

"No."

He snorts. "Of course not. I'll give you a schedule tomorrow."

He turns to Cinna. "I'm going to the second floor. Make sure she at least looks respectable at the parade. None of those stupid coal miner helmets." And then he leaves.

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Cinna makes her look respectable all right. He does his job a little too well, in fact, because she's literally on fire and the crowds roar and she and her fifteen-year-old district partner, some scrawny kid whose name he doesn't even bother to learn, steal all of the attention away from Quintus and Clove.

When he berates Cinna for it, the stylist just rolls his eyes. "It's your own fault. I wanted to ask your opinion, but you were with Quintus the entire afternoon." Cinna isn't afraid of Cato. He's styled the male tribute from 2 for the last seven years. He styled Cato himself. Still dresses him regularly, in fact. He's one of the only people whose lip Cato puts up with, because if he popped him in the face like he does everyone else who gets smart with him he'd have to find another stylist, which would be more trouble than it's worth, and no one is as good as Cinna anyway, so he just sighs and glares at the man.

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He hands her the schedule for the week the next morning just before breakfast and shows her as quickly as possible how to use her personal training facility, which is across the hall from the apartment. There's a track so she can run long-distance and sprints. There's a climbing wall and a net that spans the entire ceiling. There's a raised platform covered with a thick mat for hand-to-hand sparring, which she'll never use because he'll never bother to train her. There's a survival lab of sorts, with a database chock-full of information on finding water and building shelter and foraging in just about any environment imaginable. There's a section dedicated to weapons. There are swords and spears and machetes and throwing knives and bows and arrows. There's a computer program with detailed tutorials and when you're ready to practice it spits out human-shaped holographs for her to practice on. If she ends up being halfway decent with any of the weapons (which he seriously doubts will happen), she can increase the difficulty. She can adjust the settings so that the holographs move and charge her. She can make two or three or four of them come at her at once. But he doesn't bother to go into that much detail, because it's a moot point in her case.

He glares at her the whole time.

She scowls back.

When he asks her if she has any questions, she just shakes her head.

They go to breakfast. Effie Trinket comments that she's pleasantly surprised to find that the girl uses the silverware and chews with her mouth closed.

"They usually eat like barbarians," the escort says as an aside to Cato. "They stuff in as much and as quickly as they can. Except for the boy from four years ago. Now he had manners."

The girl from 12 glares openly at Effie, her teeth clenched, her nostrils flared. Cato laughs.

"What was his name?" Effie murmurs to herself. "It's on the tip of my tongue..started with a P. I wanna say Peter, but that's not right. Do you remember?" she asks Cato.

Cato shrugs and shakes his head as though he doesn't remember. But he does. Peeta Francis Mellark. Fourteen years old. Youngest of three boys. Blond hair. Blue eyes. Broad shoulders. Strong for his age. Died by my hand, my sword. From a stab wound to his thigh. Bled out.

"Peeta," the girl bites out. "Peeta Mellark. And you should know. You killed him."

"Did I?" Cato asks nonchalantly, and bites down on his english muffin with a crunch. "I killed a lot of kids in that arena. Eight, to be exact. That's the record you know. For most kills."

"Can't keep 'em all straight?" she asks, sarcasm in her voice.

"No point. None of them really mattered anyway." He takes a sip of coffee.

"Or maybe you're just too stupid to retain that much information."

"Young lady!" Effie scolds.

Cato doesn't say anything. At least not right away. There are some things Cato likes. And there are a lot of things he doesn't like, and even more things he doesn't give a shit about. But there are very few things that he hates. Katniss Everdeen, however, has managed to stumble upon one of them. Cato Hadley hates being called stupid. They found that out the hard way at the Academy when he was twelve years old. They found out that even though it took him five minutes to read one paragraph, it took him less than a second to break someone's leg. They found out that it didn't matter if he couldn't connect that since six times seven equals forty-two, forty-two divided by six equals seven, because if his fist connected with your face, you'd never even be able to count to forty-two again anyway.

But Cato doesn't break Katniss Everdeen's leg. He doesn't punch her in the face. He takes another bite of his english muffin and he chews it slowly as he studies her. After he's swallowed, he wipes the butter from his lips with his napkin. "You know what you need to learn?" he asks evenly.

"Manners?" she taunts. "Respect?"

He shakes his head. "No." He picks up a knife. The serrated one they use to slice the bagels in half. "How to stitch yourself up if you get a nasty cut in the arena."

Before her confusion can even register on her face, he's on his feet and at her side and his fingers are wrapped around her bicep and he's sliced the flesh just beneath her shoulder.

"Jesus Cato!" Cinna yells, and Effie gasps.

But he just shrugs. "I'm just trying to help her. It could happen you know. Easily."

He turns back to her. The pain doesn't seem to have registered with her yet. She's just staring at him in shock as her blood flows red down her lean olive arm.

"There's a tutorial on how to stitch up wounds in the database," he tells her with a smirk. "And I'll have someone bring you up the needle and thread and all that shit." He crosses back over to his side of the table and downs the rest of his coffee. "I'm out," he says to Cinna. "I'll be on the second floor. If she needs anything, find someone else to help her."

She's still staring at him in shock as he stalks over to the door. When he reaches it, he turns around and raises an eyebrow at her. "You'll uh, want to put some pressure on that. To stop the bleeding."

He's still laughing about it when he reaches Quintus's training room.

"How's your tribute?" Brutus asks him.

"She's a fucking cunt," he says, and then he turns to Quintus. "If you get your hands on her, kill her slowly."

Quintus grins. "Yes sir."

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When he returns that evening to get ready to go out, she's sitting on the couch watching footage of the Second Quarter Quell.

He expects her to turn her head and glare or to cower in fear. But she doesn't acknowledge his presence. It irks him.

He goes to take a shower and get dressed and when he comes back out, she's still sitting there in front of the tv, notebook and pencil in hand.

He goes over to the bar and pours himself a pre-game whiskey. His back is to her, and he glances up into the mirror, his eyes flitting briefly to her face. She seems calm as can be. He wonders if she somehow found some painkillers. He'd purposely neglected to have them send up any numbing cream so she'd get to experience each and every prick of the needle, so she'd know what thread sliding through her flesh felt like.

He goes into the dining room. Cinna looks up from his sketches.

"She stitch up her arm?" Cato asks him.

"Like a boss," Cinna says.

"She took something for it though. Ibuprofen at least." He says it as a statement, but it's really a question.

Cinna shakes his head. "Nope. She didn't."

He's annoyed.

He goes back out to the living room and plops down in the easy chair across from the sofa. "How's that arm?" he smirks.

She looks over at him and raises her eyebrows. She pauses the tv and stands, and then she puts up a finger. Just a second. She leaves the room and returns with a knife. The one he cut her with that morning. She approaches him and he eyes her warily. Is she going to try to attack him? Because that would be incredibly stupid of her. But she doesn't attack him. Instead, she holds the knife out to him, handle first.

He's confused. He doesn't know what else to do but take it from her.

She shimmies out of her hoodie and he sees the cut. The stitches are small and neat and even. She holds out her other arm and pushes the sleeve of her t shirt up onto her shoulder.

"I think I need more practice."

He tries to maintain his composure, but his eyes widen ever so slightly, and he can tell by the way the corner of her mouth turns up and her steely irises gleam that she's noticed his reaction.

"Well?" she asks, her voice low and velvety, almost a purr.

It's enough to snap him back to his usual self. He grins sadistically and takes hold of her elbow. He meets her eyes and he draws the blade slowly across her skin, digging in just a little, wiggling the blade just a little.

She doesn't blink. She doesn't flinch. She just stares right back at him with those gray eyes.

When he's done he lets go and he knows his disappointment at her lack of reaction is evident on his face.

"Thank you," she says. "I'll take that back now." She holds out her hand and he places the knife in her palm. She hands it to the waiting Avox and she sits down on the couch and starts the footage back up as she applies pressure to the wound.

He sips his whiskey and stares at the tv. He pretends to be engrossed in it but his brain has no idea what his eyes are looking at.

When the bleeding slows to a crawl, she cleans her hands and her cut with the antiseptic wipe and he can't help himself. He watches in fascination as she sews herself up. He thinks maybe his phone is vibrating in his pocket, but he can't take his eyes off of her arm long enough to check it. This time she's using her non-dominant hand and the stitches are messy and uneven. His eyes dart to her face as she laughs softly at herself. "It looks like a first-grader did it," she mutters. "Or a drunk."

There's a knock on the apartment door, and Brutus pokes his head in. "Cato what the fuck? I texted you like three times. We're waiting for you."

He downs the rest of his whiskey and leaves without a word.

That night he dreams of crimson and screaming and iron. When he wakes in a cold sweat, he knows that it was Peeta Mellark's blood he saw and smelled. Peeta Mellark's screams he heard. He rolls over and opens the drawer of the nightstand. But this is not the District 2 male tribute's apartment. This is the Disttrict 12 female tribute's apartment. There is no lighter in the drawer, and the pressure is building inside of him. He doesn't know how to release it.

None of this would have happened if he wasn't stuck mentoring this ratty little bitch. He would have been in his usual room with his trusty lighter in the drawer. This is her fault. Ratty little bitch. With her ratty gray eyes.

And all of a sudden his dick is rock hard and he's wrapped his fist around it and he's coming in less than a minute.

The pressure has been released.

He falls back asleep.

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The next night he's at a quiet, smoky bar with Alec and Linus and Ronin when he locks eyes with a beautiful girl. She's tall and willowy and elegant. She's wearing a short (but not too short) and fitted (but not too fitted) sheath dress and expensive stilettos that show just the right amount of toe cleavage. She has rich brown skin and milk-chocolate eyes and an afro (he's a sucker for a girl with an afro). She's sipping a glass of chardonnay with a bunch of her girlfriends.

He makes his way over to her. He takes the glass from her hand and sets it on the high top.

"It's chilly outside," he says. "Do you have a coat? I'll get it for you."

"Why?" she asks coyly. "Where am I going?"

"To the Training Center," he says. "With me."

She narrows her eyes and runs her tongue over her teeth and pretends to consider him. But only for a few seconds, and then she nods her head toward the coat rack. "It's the olive green trench coat."

He goes to retrieve it. He can hear her girlfriends whispering and suppressing their giggles. Lucky bitch, they hiss.

He can't help but agree with them. She is one lucky bitch. In fifteen minutes he'll be tearing her ass in two.

When he returns, they've all regained their composure and they're playing it cool. He slips the olive green trench coat over her shoulders and takes her hand and they walk the three blocks back to the Training Center.

By the time they make it into the apartment, he's pushed her skirt up to her hips and discovered that she's gone commando this evening. He bends her over the couch, wondering why she's suddenly become so giggly, and he pulls his half-hard cock out of his fly and rubs it on her ass cheek.

She giggles again. It's high-pitched and annoying and conspicuously loud in the dark, silent living room. "Shut the fuck up!" he hisses. The last thing he needs is a midnight lecture from Effie Trinket.

He strokes himself a few times, but he can't seem to stiffen up past half-mast. She's looking over her shoulder at him and giggling again, and she's wiggling her hips and grinding her rear against his thighs.

But it's not working. What the fuck is wrong with him? This has never happened before. He starts to panic. What if she tells all of her friends? What if they tell people? What if a rumor starts to spread? What if they whisper that he's impotent?

He slaps his dick on her ass a few times. Come on you little fucker he says to it. Get it together. Stiffen up.

She giggles yet again. God she's so fucking loud.

"Shut up!" he grinds out through clenched teeth and shoves her face into the couch cushion, which only makes her moan. Keen, really.

Holy shit. If everyone in that apartment isn't awake by now it'll be a goddamned miracle.

And then she vomits all over the couch. He tucks himself back in his pants in disgust (he's gone all soft now) and turns her over. Jesus, she hadn't seemed anything other than tipsy at the bar. The alcohol must have just now hit her. He yanks the woman's skirt down and grabs her by the arm and he tosses her and her olive green trench coat into the hallway outside of the apartment.

"Get her out of here," he barks to the nearest Peacekeeper.

When he turns around he sees his tribute tiptoeing toward the hallway where the bedrooms are.

He should just let her keep going and pretend he never saw her, but the words are out of his mouth before he can stop himself. "What the fuck are you doing?" he asks.

She winces and stops in her tracks.

"I said what the fuck are you doing?" he asks again.

She turns to face him. She's in a dark-colored silk chemise and her feet are bare and her hair is down and spilling softly over her shoulders, the tendrils brushing against the dark wounds on her arms. Even in the shadows, he can see that she's horrified, and he realizes she's an innocent. "I couldn't sleep. I was in that chair." She points to the corner of the room.

"Doing what?"

She shrugs nervously and her voice shakes. "Just looking at the city at night. Getting some water." He looks down to see a glass in her hand. "And then you walked in with that girl and I didn't know what to do."

He smirks at her. This'll be fun. He wants to see just how uncomfortable he can make her. "Did you like what you saw? Gonna go back to your room and touch your little pussy now while you think about me?"

Her innocent discomfort evaporates and her features harden. "Not much to see," she retorts. "Other than a flaccid penis. I didn't realize guys could go impotent so young."

His blood starts to boil but he keeps his composure. "You know what you need to learn?" he asks her.

"How to stitch myself up if I get a nasty cut in the arena?" She's mocking him. Her voice is low and dumb-sounding. Her "dumb guy" voice. Why do girls always have a "dumb guy" voice?

He laughs softly though there's no mirth in it. "No. How to deal with the elements."

Her eyes widen just a fraction. Aaaaah. He's hit a nerve.

But she recovers herself immediately and narrows her eyes down to slits. A challenge then. That's what she wants. Oh, he's more than happy to oblige.

He stalks over to her and grasps her roughly by the arm, enjoying her involuntary wince as he digs his fingers into her still-fresh cut. He sees her momentarily consider digging her heels in and resisting him, but then a mixture of pride and acceptance forms on her face. She's clearly not one to back down from a challenge, and she knows how fruitless it would be to fight him anyway. He could overpower her with one hand. She struggles to keep up with his resolute pace, but she doesn't try to pull out of his grasp as he ushers her out into the hallway and up onto the roof. He swings her around hard and her shoulder blades and the back of her skull thud against the rough brick wall. It's early June and it's been fairly pleasant during the daytime-in the low 70s. But the nights have been clear and cloudless, and it's consistently gotten down to about 50 for the past few nights. And the wind is cruel this high up. It whips her hair into her face and raises goosebumps along her arms.

"Night night," he says, patting her head as though she's a dog, because, after all, he's putting her out like she's one. "I'll come get you in the morning."

He returns to the stairwell and closes and locks the door to the roof. "Don't let her back in unless it looks like she's gonna freeze to death," he says to the bewildered Peacekeeper, who has now watched him toss two different women around like rag dolls in the space of three minutes.

He strips down when he reaches his room and goes to take a piss. It's then, when he flips on the light, that he sees the blood on his fingers-he must have accidentally reopened one of her cuts when he grabbed her arm . He rubs his fingers together and thinks of her in that chemise (fuck you Cinna he says to himself, because surely the stylist picked that out for her). He thinks of her hair tumbling all around her face.

Aaaaaand now he's hard as a rock. So he sticks the tips of his fingers in his mouth and tastes her blood as he jerks himself off into the toilet.

He sleeps like a baby.

He wakes around 7:30am. She's been up there for about seven hours. It's pouring. Everything is gray and he can't even make out the building across the street, that's how hard it's coming down.

He's not that stupid. He doesn't want to risk her getting hypothermia, because if he pushes it too far he really may have to answer to the gamemakers. She doesn't have to be in great shape when she enters the arena, but she needs to actually be alive to enter the arena.

He leaves the apartment and he climbs the stairs and he unlocks the door and he pushes it open.

She's huddled in a wet little ball against the side of the bricks, and she's shivering. She looks up at the sound of the door.

He raises his eyebrows at her from inside, where it's nice and dry and warm. Well?

She pushes herself up off the ground and makes her way over to him. Her hair is plastered to her head. Her skin is covered in goosebumps. Her teeth are chattering. Her clothes are soaked through. He can see the outline of her ribs and her hip bones and her breasts. He can see just how skinny she is.

She looks up at him with venom in her eyes and he can tell that she hates to be cold. It makes him smug. He's gotten to her. He's regained the upper hand. He will win this thing (whatever the hell it is).

He holds the door open for her and follows her back down the stairs, trying not to slip and fall in the trail of water dripping off of her. It's no easy feat, because now it's her shoulder blades and her bottom that catch his attention, and he has to consciously force himself to pry his eyes off of her shivering form and down to the floor.

When they reach the apartment she immediately heads for her room and he hears the sound of her shower starting up.

She doesn't come out for breakfast.

He's rather pleased with himself.

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The next morning, he emerges from her room and finds her standing at the buffet. She pours herself a mug of hot cocoa and she adds a dollop of whipped cream and then a smattering of chocolate sprinkles.

"Still cold?" he asks smugly.

She whips around, mug in hand.

"Still impotent?" she shoots back.

His blood boils but he keeps his composure. "You know wh-"

"What do I need to learn?" she cuts him off.

He lifts his chin and looks down his nose at her. He's ready to lock her in her room for three whole days. "Howto function without eating."

She throws her head back and laughs. "Oh no problem. I know hunger. I know all about it. We're old friends, me and hunger."

He scoffs. "I doubt that."

She raises her eyebrows. "I almost starved to death when I was eleven. After my dad died in the mines and my mom went crazy and I had to figure out how to feed the three of us. I know what it feels like when you haven't eaten anything for a week except a third of a rotten squash and a handful of dried mint leaves. I know how your stomach turns on you. Like it's trying to eat itself to feed you. I know about the headaches and the dizziness. I know how even lifting your arm feels like you're trying to lift a hundred pound weight. So go ahead. Be my guest. 'Starve' me for a few days. In fact, I'll do it voluntarily. You won't even have to make me. And I dare you to do it with me. I bet you don't make it twenty-four hours. I bet you've never truly been hungry in your life."

He stares at her, trying to come up with a retort, but all he can think of is a third of a rotten squash and a handful of dried mint leaves.

"Come on," she challenges again, breaking into his thoughts. "Do it with me. You've packed on a few pounds since your victory. You look like you could stand to go a few days without eating."

He has gained a little weight over the last four years actually. He's still built and muscular, but he's gotten...not flabbier exactly, but...puffier. Not quite as cut. He's a little upset about it, but he likes his whiskey too much. He'd thought no one noticed. He'd thought his t shirts and his button-downs and his waistcoats covered it up. But he's obviously wrong.

She's wounded his vanity, but he'll be damned if he'll let her know that. So he grins lazily at her. "The ladies don't seem to mind," he says. "They love me."

She snorts. "No they don't. They love your money. They love your status. They love that you're a Victor. They don't give a shit about you. No one does. And no one ever will. You'll die all alone."

If he thought he hated being called stupid more than anything…

"Mmm, let's forget about the hunger thing. I think you should learn how to put your shoulder back in place if you dislocate it."

She blinks and opens her mouth, but before she can say anything he has closed the distance between them and he braces her waist with one hand while with the other he wrenches her arm towards him and out of its socket.

There's a sickening pop and she drops the mug she'd been holding in the opposite hand. It shatters and hot cocoa goes everywhere. He swears she sucks half of the oxygen out of the room as she gasps.

He lets go of her and steps back to admire his handiwork. She's looking down in horror at her arm, which is limps and dangling awkwardly.

"You're in the arena and you just fell out of a tree. And that-" he says, pointing at her arm, "just happened. What're you gonna do about it?"

She's just standing there, her shock starting to give way to the pain. Her face is turning a sickly green color.

"What are you gonna do?" he asks again.

She still doesn't answer because she's struggling to keep her breakfast down and her breathing even. "Well," he says after a few seconds, "I guess you'd better figure it out."

And then he leaves.

The next time he encounters her, her arm is in a sling and she scurries from the room when she sees him.

And after that, she continues to steer clear of him.

He has officially won this thing (whatever the hell it is).

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Again, thanks for taking the time to read this. And please, please, please review! It motivates me to keep going.