Disclaimer: I own nothing related to the Tangled universe including, but not limited to, characters, names of places, lyrics, dialogue, or any other piece of product. Disney retains all the rights to this universe. I am making no money or receiving any kind of compensation, material or non-material, for this fiction. It's all for fun. Please don't sue me. I do claim the writing, the idea behind this particular narrative, and any peripheral characters or locations created to augment Disney's work.

A/N: Less about true love, and more about the means to an end. Saucy!Flynn and Innocent!Rapunzel . Non-cannon. So if that is a turn off – you have been warned. I promise deliciousness to those who stick around. Enjoy!

Smolder

Flynn Rider liked a challenge.

He liked drinking the Stabbington brothers under the table with Attila laughing behind the bar. He liked stealing things that were unstealable like tiaras belonging to long lost princesses. He liked making experienced women scream and cry and forget any other lover ever touched them. Yeah. He really liked that. And not because it was easy, but because he could.

Flynn Rider didn't like work.

He didn't like spinning his wheels for days on end for another man's gain with little profit for himself. He didn't like things that have set rules and regulations. He didn't like things like not on his time or at his discretion.

On that same token – Flynn Rider didn't like virgins.

Virgins were too needy, too timid, and had way too many expectations. It was exhausting to break them in and Flynn had better options. Normally a girl of less experience would get nothing more than a cunning grin from him or maybe an ass squeeze if she was presumptuous. Normally a girl who wasn't confirmed deflowered by one of his compatriots or by her profession didn't get much further than a scintillating brush of his fingers – no matter how comely.

The vestal virgin village girl profile was what he avoided when he looked for a good romp. There was no thrill. Some brainless flirting, one smolder, and corset strings were loose and her skirt was up around her waist. Often they'd cry, more often they'd confess love, every time they made it so Flynn could only go back to that village under the cover of darkness and always on watch for an angry father. It was easy game, but the price was too high for the low payout.

No. He didn't have time for that.

Give him a girl who knew her moves any day. Give him a girl who knew the cat and mouse routine but who also knew she would collapse on top of him sweating at the end of the evening. Give him a girl who wanted just sex, no stings, no attachment, nothing that chafed or clung tight to him like commitment or affection. That was what he liked. That was what he wanted.

But this girl, this Rapunzel, was different.

She was a virgin, no doubt. She was so untouched by anyone he could smell it on her when she got close, her frying pan a menace in his face. And she was young. In that cotton candy colored confection of a dress, with green eyes that would drown a lesser man, she was ripe for the picking by someone more attune to the needs of a dainty damsel. This was a girl that he would pass by on any street on a normal day without so much as a smolder, but this wasn't a normal day and she wasn't a normal girl.

Rapunzel was the girl who broke his smolder.

The notorious Flynn Rider had given her the smolder and nothing happened. No flushed cheeks, no fluttering eyelashes, and no giggling. All he got was a puckered brow and a threat from a frog. That didn't happen to him. Maybe it did to other guys, but not to Flynn Rider.

She broke his smolder and what once was was work was now a challenge.

Flynn Rider liked a challenge.

He agreed to take her on a fool's errand to see the lanterns, but he has no intention with actually going through with it. He just needed to gain her trust so he can get out of this mess of hair. He flexed his hands and clenched them back into fists, trying to loosen the bonds, but failed. Who knew human hair would be more difficult to slip out of than rope?

Meanwhile she ran around the tower in frantic gaiety, and her creepy frog stared at him from the floor by his hair-bound feet. She murmured and exclaimed unintelligible phrases, grabbing things she thought she might need and then slamming them back down in frustration. He caught snatches of her dialogue. There were affirmations that she just knew that the lanterns weren't stars and worried whispers about her mother. He listened for a crack in her armor, a way to prove she wasn't immune to his charms, but heard nothing. She was more worried about whether she should or should not bring a muffin than with how devastatingly handsome her captive was.

It was offensive.

He'd just have to show her what she was missing. That was exceedingly difficult to do when tied to a chair with a watch frog at his feet, but Flynn Rider liked a challenge.

He made pretty good work of his right hand, knowing that if he could just slip one hand free the other binds would go slack and freedom would be easy. He just had to go slow, keep eye contact with her bug-eyed counterpart so he didn't notice the minute fidgeting of his wrist, his fingers, and he'd be free in just a few… then she whirled. Their eyes locked as she strode to him. He froze, watching that frying pan with wide eyes, sure she had caught him.

"Look, Blondie, it's not what you think." He already had a splitting headache and the last thing he wanted was that frog's tongue in his ear again.

She looked at him like he was crazy, which was ironic.

"What's not what I think?"

"Nothing. Never mind."

She raised a suspicious eyebrow, and her grip tightened on her weapon. His teeth gritted in anticipation, but she didn't move to strike. Instead she asked a question.

"Is grass sharp?"

The question made him wonder if she had hit him with the frying pan and now he was dreaming. The question was beyond bizarre.

"Excuse me?"

"My mother says grass is sharp like knives, which is why people wear shoes, but I see lots of animals outside without anything at all on their feet. So, I was wondering, is the grass sharp or not?"

He looked at her bare feet and then back at her face, so delicate but trying to be so brave. Had she never been outside this tower before? Surely she had. His mind wouldn't accept the possibility that she hadn't, but if she had, wouldn't she know that grass was soft? The whole thing is more than he wanted to consider, so he answered before he can confuse himself with more questions.

"It isn't sharp."

"Is it rough?"

"No. It's soft."

"I knew it!" She clutched her frying pan to her chest in revelation.

The frog caught his eye and gave him a knowing shrug.

That made Flynn even more uncomfortable.

"Why don't you just wear shoes?" He asked before he had the chance to consider regretting it.

"I don't have any."

"You – don't." Disbelief. Who didn't have shoes?

"I never have."

The crazy thickened and he needed to stop asking questions. He needed to stop asking or else this challenge was going to turn into way more of a freak-show than he wanted.

"Right. No shoes. Okay. That's fine." He heard himself and was embarrassed at his rambling. They need a new topic before his brain exploded. "So, not to rush you, but are you going to be ready to go soon? It's kind of a hike and daylight's a-burning."

And the sooner he was out of this pseudo-bondage situation the better. He was losing circulation.

"Yeah. Okay. Am I ready? I think I am. Do I need anything? Maybe a book or – or a handkerchief? Maybe an apple. Or a blanket…? Oh! This candle!"

He would have answered her, but she wasn't talking to him. She was talking to herself. A habit, apparently, that she didn't know she had. How could she know? There didn't seem to be a lot of other people around to let her know that she sounded a little crazy.

"You won't need a candle." He was frustrated, but tried not to show it. He never realized how much he talked with his hands until they were tied to this chair. "Look, Blondie –"

"Rapunzel."

"Right. We won't need much of anything. The kingdom isn't that far and we can get any supplies we need along the way. The important thing is that we get moving."

He didn't want to seem too anxious, but he had a long list of people who wanted him dead and the sooner he could get that crown and get away from them the better. There was an island somewhere just calling his name. There was no way he was going to let this five foot tall freak show ruin it for him.

"Right, right, right…" She scooped up her frog at his feet and walked away from him to have, what he could only assume was, another private conference.

The only thing more disturbing than that idea was the thought that he was starting to get used to it.

While she conferred with her reptilian companion, he worked his right hand with intention. They weren't watching him, so he didn't have to be subtle, he just had to be quiet. A twist here, a bend there, then one quick tug and his hand popped out of the improvised rope. As he predicted the remaining binds caught the slack from his freed appendage and he glided his left hand to freedom. He rocketed up and out of the mess around his feet before she could realize his escape.

With two swift steps he was behind her. He grabbed edge of the frying pan tucked beneath her arm and pulled it out of her grasp before she knew what was happening. She whirled around on a surprised heel, the frog still in hand, and took in the scene. It didn't take her long to figure out what happened.

A small hand darted out to grab back her weapon, but he held it up out of her reach with a smooth step backwards. She was fast, but he was faster.

"We won't be needing this." He twirled the pan and tossed it out the window from whence he came.

Rapunzel and her frog both gasped at the gesture. A beat pulsed in the air. Both parties wondered what the other would do next. Then Rapunzel, as if she realized the fullness of the situation, looked at him with wide eyed terror. She stumbled backwards in attempts to distance herself from him.

"Look. I think we got off to a bad start." He sauntered towards her retreating form. "Let's try this again. The name's Flynn Rider. How you doing?"

She scurried her way back against the wall, beneath the painting of the lanterns. When she hit the wall, she squeaked and froze. She eyed the stairs to her side, the rafters above her, the window behind them, and seemed to evaluate her options. Flynn kept a careful distance. He didn't want her to run, he didn't want her to hide, he wanted her right where she was. Nothing was less sexy than full on chase. He'd get all sweaty for the wrong reasons and his hair would get messed up. That wasn't what he wanted. Plus she had that feral look and he wasn't interested in claws. So he stopped where he was and kept talking instead.

"Sorry if I startled you by climbing into your tower. I just needed a place to hide for a minute."

She didn't seem to believe him. Instead she began rapidly reeling her extensive hair towards herself, clutching it to her chest like a lifeline.

"Who sent you here?" Her voice was tight, trying to be hard, but failing.

"No one sent me. Like I said, I just needed a place to hide."

He looked down at the river of hair slithering by and he held back a grimace. That was a lot of hair. It was hair he couldn't imagine, hair he didn't want to understand, and the way it moved on the floor reminded him of snakes. He hated snakes. So he pushed those thoughts aside. If he thought about it, it freaked him out, and he did not want to freak out right now.

Instead he looked at her face at the same time as he planted one boot on top of her hair. She jerked against the unexpected halt, and then froze. The last several feet of her locks were trapped under his foot. The rest was latched to her chest in her tiny arms. The expression her face took looked like she was trying to change colors and blend into the wall the way her frog did. It also looked like she believed it could actually happen.

This girl gave him headaches.

"What do you want from me?" She asked.

"All I wanted was a place to hide before I went on my way, and I got that." He said. "Imagine my surprise to find the prettiest girl in Corona all the way out here."

Her face was a blank mask of confusion at his compliment. Those wide green eyes stayed unblinking under a furrowed brow like her brain rejected the possibility that what he said could be true, but she wasn't moving. She wasn't inching towards the stairs or looking around for something, anything that she could wield with the efficiency of her frying pan. It may have had something to do with fact that he stood on her hair and it made movement difficult, but he got the feeling it is something more than that.

"You – you think I'm pretty?" Her voice is a squeak and he nodded.

"I've never seen anyone like you before."

That much was true.

He had never seen anyone with seventy feet of hair. Frankly he never wanted to see anyone with this much hair ever again, but despite her oddity, she was pretty. It wasn't an obvious, cheap pretty that he tended to seek, but he wouldn't kick her out of bed. Was she the prettiest he'd ever seen? No. Far from it. That is where he stretched the truth, but she was cute, she had the crown, and she'd broken his smolder. That was enough to keep his attention.

"Mother says I'm plain, but that is okay because the world needs plain people to make the beautiful people look more beautiful." She fidgeted with the giant load of hair in her arms.

Flynn had seen a lot of plain girls. The world was full of plain girls. He knew plain girls. He'd slept with a couple when the need arose. This girl was anything but plain. You don't have enough hair to make a mile long rope and get to be called plain, but he was not here to address her deep body image distortions. He was here to avoid certain death. He was here for the crown, not counseling. He was here to get his smolder back.

Flynn crouched to pick up the hair under his boot. She stiffened, but didn't bolt, so he kept on with his plan. He scooped up her infinite locks in both hands and stood. He tried his best to focus on how soft and silky it was instead of its freakish length.

"Sounds to me like your mother is wrong about a lot of things. I've been with a lot of women, seen even more, and you – you are breathtaking."

He stepped towards her, small but purposeful, and winds her hair around his fist to gather any slack. When she didn't make any immediate evasive action, he took another step.

"And that's a good thing? Being breathtaking?" She watched him with rapt attention. Each move he made caught by her eagle eyes, but she stayed put.

"Very good." He said. "It doesn't get much better."

He is close now. The small tower didn't offer much room to run. He slowed, inching forward the way a great cat closed in on its prey. He saw just how small she was. Her tiny frame dwarfed under the shadow of his broad shoulders and thick arms. She looked fragile, but he knew she wasn't. There was strength in her that he didn't understand.

His hand, wrapped thick in gold, reached the place where her arms clutched her hair to her chest like a shield. The contact made her jump and she let out a noise that sounded something like meep. He projected ease and confidence in hopes it would transcend to her. While she wasn't melting into this first touch, she wasn't hitting him over the head with blunt objects. He counted it as progress.

Her little frog peaked out from his nest on her shoulder with distrust. He was unimpressed, and Flynn wished he could tell him to calm down. He would be impressed in just a few minutes. But then he would be talking to a frog, and that made him no less crazy than this wide eyed innocent standing in front of him.

"Why don't you let your hair down?"

He prompted as he nudged one of her delicate wrists.

She shook her head. "No. No it is fine right here."

Any spell he had on her obviously didn't extend to where her hair was concerned. It was a key point with her. Even a village idiot would have picked up on that by now, so he didn't push the issue. Instead boot clad toes brushed her bare ones, and she gasped at the proximity. He loosed one of his hands and ran his fingers up from her wrist to her elbow, her shoulder, her neck, and cupped her cheek. She watched him without blinking. Her body strung tight from her head to her toes. She didn't run. She didn't struggle. She just watched. Her expression was a war of fear and curiosity .

"Don't be afraid." He spoke not louder than a breath.

"I'm not." She said in her own quiet voice even as she pulled herself up as tall as she could and squared her shoulders.

She was not sure why she whispered, but felt it was somehow appropriate. He smirked at her bravery. No. She wasn't afraid, and he planned to take full advantage of her lack of discretion.

"There's a good girl." He leaned in closer so his forehead rested on hers, holding her gaze the whole time. She stopped breathing. "Now just relax. This is going to be fun."

Her eyes narrowed in speculation. What was going to be fun? He didn't give her much time to wonder.

He closed the final distance to her lips and pressed his mouth against hers. He kept his eyes open, focused on hers, trying to convince her that this was okay. She let out a surprised squeak. Her body jerked back, but there was nowhere to go, nowhere to run. What was he doing? Was he trying to eat her mouth?

Then his eyes slid shut and his head tilted a bit more to the side. The sweep of his hair brushed against her forehead. There was a deliberate move of his jaw, his lips shifted against hers and – oh. It felt nice. It felt warm and wet and welcoming. He tasted like a secret and she never had a secret before today. She liked the way it felt, dark and coiled deep in her stomach.

His other hand, large and rough, dropped her hair and came up to join his other to cup her face. He tilted her chin up towards him, opening her up to his touch. She allowed it. Her eyes slid shut just as his tongue pressed against her lips. It was a strange feeling, but she wanted it. Nothing in her life was ever strange. It was all the same all of the time. This was new. This was fun. She liked this game. She wanted to keep playing.

The fingers of one hand skated down the column of her throat, grazing the skin of her collar bone, before slipping down around her back and pulling her off the wall. The strength of the motion caught her by surprise and she stumbled up against him, gasping into his mouth in the most unintentionally sensual way. As she stumbled, her grip on her hair faltered and fell. Her hands came up in front of her body and crashed into his chest. Her hair made a whispering thud on their feet as he gathered her body up against his.

Flynn was not an easily impressed man. He was not a man who was caught off guard by women or by their bodies. He knew his way around a woman's curves and caresses, but this girl was surprising. Though this girl was every bit a virgin, the way she kissed him was filled with such unaltered enthusiasm it gave him pause. There was a lack of expectation in her touch that made him wonder just what he'd gotten himself into. She bowed into his every move, every suggestion, with such whole hearted, eager need, he wondered how he would ever settled for less. The way she kissed him made him want to be better, made him want to make her moan and squirm and beg him for more. That realization was like a cold stone in his stomach. He wasn't someone who cared. He wasn't someone who bent to the needs or wants of others, especially weird girls in the middle of the woods. He wasn't someone who tried to be better. He was awesome just the way he was.

That train of thought made him pull back just enough to look down at the girl in his arms. Her tiny hands clung to his vest like she would crumble without his support. Her pink lips were swollen, bitten, and so kissable he almost fell back against her just for the hell of it. He'd stolen The Lost Princess' crown that morning. He deserved a good lay. A really good lay, but he would get it elsewhere. Somewhere away from this strange, complicated, googly-eyed girl with more emotional baggage than she had hair, which was saying something.

But that wasn't to say there wasn't an opportunity here, with her looking up at him with unabashed wonder. He recognized his chance for redemption and didn't hesitate to take full advantage.

It was time to try again.

He lowered his head in preparation, pulling his gaze from hers for a moment to heighten the affect. Then, with the practiced flair of a paid performer, he lifted his chin just enough to look at her. His full lips pursed into a smirking pout. His smooth brow knitted into concerned canvas of optimally planned angles. The lids of his eyes squinted to his most intimate bedroom gaze and – boom. The Smolder.

Maybe it was Rapunzel's lack of context of the earlier smolder that led to its backfire. Maybe it was her preoccupation with finding out about the lanterns. Maybe his game was thrown off by the fact that he was tied up in massive amounts of human hair. Whatever the reason for the previous failure, it was a mistake he wasn't intent on repeating.

He didn't.

Her green eyes widened. Pretty pink lips parted in a gasp. He felt a shudder run down her back. Now that was what he was looking for. That was what was supposed to happen when he smoldered. His confidence restored to its rightful place, tightened his grip around her waist and enjoyed the blush that spread under the freckles on her cheeks. He had her just where he wanted her.

"Now," He said, his face so close to hers she practically saw double. "Where is my satchel?" He asked and her eyes flickered to the stairs beside them.

Bingo.

Maybe his smolder wasn't so broken after all.

A/N: I am leaving the resolution up to the reader. I know how I think it should end (Flynn staying v. Flynn leaving), but you all can fill in your own blank. Like I said, this piece is way less about being soul mates and way more about being an excuse for a hot kiss while Flynn is still all Flynn.

I'm working the details of a full length Tangled fic, but have to tie up a few loose ends first.

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