A/N: I wrote this for softywolf on tumblr because she said she was having a bad day. Uh, so this is a bit AU because Erica and Cora know each other under normal circumstances and everyone's friendly, but I just love the idea of the whole family-pack dynamic thing, so I had to include it. Cheers!

This is all Isaac's fault, Stiles thinks as he dodges yet another glare from Cora. They're shopping for — of all things — a lamp for Derek because Isaac broke it playing an unauthorized game of football. Which led to Derek angrily demanding a replacement and Stiles having to organize a group trip to Ikea to satisfy the raging werewolf. (Stiles doesn't know what it is with these Hales and their odd attachments to inanimate objects, but he'd learned not to ask questions after the Red Pillow Incident with Cora a few weeks back.)

Cora and Stiles were the only ones taking the mission seriously though. Stiles because, well, it was a mission and Cora because — why was Cora still helping him? They'd lost Scott and Allison in the curtains section an hour ago (gee, I wonder what they're up to there, Stiles rolls his eyes), Boyd and Erica had wandered off to try out couches after losing interest in the sixth aisle of lamps, and Isaac and Derek had headed straight to 'researching' in the cafeteria when they'd walked in. Stiles isn't exactly sure why Cora had decided to stick with him of all people, but then again, he isn't complaining.

He'd begun noticing Cora as, well, a woman about four months ago when she was still in her warming-up-to-everyone phase (which, now that he thinks about it, he isn't sure she's out of that). He'd walked into Derek's flat unannounced — and that was the last time he ever did that. Cora had swung down from the rafters — what the hell she was doing up there Stiles didn't know — and tackled him to the ground, scattering the papers he'd been holding in his hand everywhere. Except, it didn't really result in Stiles all sprawled out on the ground so much as it did in Cora straddling him. He didn't exactly have any complaints about that, but that was more due to the wind-being-knocked-out-of-him and some oh-she's-hot-wow-nice-job-figuring-that-out and a lot of shit-she's-on-top-of-you-Stiles. Turns out, it didn't take much for Stiles to develop a gigantic crush on a girl he wasn't sure still wanted to kill him or not. So that sucked.

And of course there was the whole 'Derek's little sister' thing that he couldn't exactly get around. Even if he wanted to just grab her and kiss her and maybe do more than kiss (and he did, a lot), he couldn't for the life of him ignore the image of Derek as a fucking werewolf training all his werewolfitudely anger at him. So, Stiles wasn't about to risk his manhood for a girl whose big brother could literally rip his throat out with his razor sharp wolf teeth.

Stiles sighs. Life, he thinks, is a bitch. And there's nothing more to it than th-

Whoa! That's a great shade of orange, I wonder if Derek'll like this one... Stiles pulls out his phone, takes a picture, and sends it to Derek for his approval. He glances at Cora (sneakily, he likes to think) before slapping himself internally.

*Ding!* goes his phone. Derek doesn't like the lamp — too swirly, he says (whatever the fuck that means). Stiles sighs again and resumes his Quest for a Replacement Lamp Because Isaac (Stupid Fucking Adorable Okay Yes He Does Like and is Friends with Isaac He Shouldn't Be Blaming Him For This After All it Was His Idea) Broke Derek's Other Lamp Which Was Hideous By the Way and Shouldn't Derek Have More Than One Bedside Lamp If He Babysits Kids All Day?

Stiles goes back to looking at lamps and sneaking glimpses of Cora over the shades. Did she have to wear that low-cut shirt today? Doesn't she know every guy is going to be —

Maybe he'll like this blue one!

Cora Hale did not like guys.

It's not that she wasn't into guys — she just was more of an appreciater than a liker. She handled herself pretty well for the first nineteen years of her life, but then she just had to wander back home again to Beacon Hills and of course her brother's pack consisted of all teenage werewolves — and a human. A human who, Cora had noticed, was extremely attractive. Like, wild-bedhead, somehow-golden-brown-eyed, lanky-skinny-sexy attractive.

So it was only natural that this kid (Stiles, was his name) was already in love or lust or whatever with a completely gorgeous knockout genius of a girl named Lydia. Cora hated Lydia (more on principle than any other reason because Lydia was only mildly annoying and most people were mildly annoying to Cora so she'd learned to soldier on) because she was the only one Stiles had eyes for and she kinda wanted him to look at her. Also Lydia's voice kinda got on her nerves.

"How about this one?" Stiles startles Cora's thoughts as he shoves a navy blue square-ish lamp into her face.

The scowl comes naturally. "No."

"Come on, we've been looking for hours and I'm bored."

"Well, it isn't my fault the rest of Derek's 'pack' wandered off." (She isn't really annoyed, this is just how she works.)

"So it's my fault?" (Stiles loves getting her riled up because it's so easy and because her hair gets all wispy and wild and he likes to imagine she looks really similar to this in bed, all flushed and husky-voiced and sexy.)

"I didn't say it was your fault, I just said it wasn't my fault!" (Cora can't help but notice the way Stiles' hair seems to stand up a little more when he's angry like it's alive and begging for someone to feel it and fuck there he goes, running his hands through it while he argues and she can't hear him anymore and — )

"Are you even listening to me? God, what is it with you Hales and your weird zoning out thing, I swear it's even more annoying than Peter's made-up stories." (Stiles isn't even aware of what's coming out of his mouth now, he's just watching Cora and the way she wets her lips right before she insults somebody and the way her eyes just flashed gold for a second there and how she's about seven inches shorter than him but she just seems taller because she's so close to him and wait a second when did she get so close and how and why and what and and and

Stiles's thoughts become a tangled ball as he trips and bumps into them and he doesn't exactly know how he got so close to her and she doesn't exactly care when he got so close to her and she wishes he would kiss her and that in itself is weird because Cora Hale does not wait for a stupid guy to do anything when she can get it done herself, and better. She's just about to act on that and her fingers are actually uncurling themselves and reaching closer to Stiles's jacket (why does he wear so many layers all the time it's the middle of September it isn't that cold —

And because she's just about to grab him and kiss him, now is the perfect time for the universe to punish her.

"And now I need to know is this real love/Or is it just madness keeping us afloat?" goes Stiles's phone. "Oh, oh, um, I'm just gonna..." Stiles motions to his phone and since Cora nods her okay, he awkwardly backs up from the was-it-an-almost-kiss-or-was-she-going-to-rip-my-t hroat-out? thing and answers the call without checking the ID. "What?" he bites out because he just fast-forwarded through the whole little scene in his head and he's decided it was an almost-kiss and he just wants to murder whoever it is that called him.

"Stiles, what year did George Harrison die in because Derek say 1999 but I'm pretty sure it was like 200-" and yeah, sure, Stiles loves Isaac like a little brother and all, only now he's seeing the downside of having a little brother, like how he could call you when you're just about to maybe-kiss the girl you've been dying to kiss-and-maybe-more-with for months, so thanks for that, Isaac.

"Itwas2001hediedoflungcancerandhe'scrematedinIndia byeIsaacsavemesomecurlyfriesIgottagonow," Stiles spits out in one breath because damned if he's going to let Cora get away so quickly and he can see her trying to slink off to the linen section. He ends the call, but not before he hears Isaac's triumphant cries of "hah, I wiiiiiiiiin!" and he smiles because, yeah, he kinda does have a soft spot for 6'1" werewolves who are really 12-year-olds on the inside.

Of course, this is Ikea where you can get lost if you turn around too quickly and lose somebody if you fucking blink, so Cora's escaped by the time he walks past the display of — get this! 750-count Egyptian cotton palm-tree print! — sheets. She thinks, for a minute, that she just might have actually gotten away when she hears that voice behind her. "Penguin pillowcases, huh? I never took you for a cuddly-animals kinda gal," Stiles smirks at her as she turns and seriously, she has a crush on someone who uses the word gal unironically? But she's reminded of why, exactly she does like him when his attempt to be cool and suave ends up knocking over the very stack of penguin-ed pillowcases he just mocked her for.

"Smooth, Stilinski," she grins at him from above and god he likes the view because those legs look like they're longer than the Great Wall of China from the floor and damn it keep it steady, lil guy he warns his dick as it reacts (completely inappropriately) to the view. Cora doesn't offer a hand up and Stiles is grateful because he's embarassed enough as it is and he's pretty sure she noticed how, ahem, excited he got and he's glad she didn't say anything.

"Cora," Stiles starts nervously. He's decided, what the hell, go for it, except he's too much of a gentlemen to kiss a girl he isn't even entirely sure likes him and so he'd like to secure explicit permission beforehand; also he just wouldn't want his ass kicked by a Hale and if he outright kisses her, he's pretty sure he'll have three Hale werewolves hunting him before he can so much as stammer an apology.

"Stiles," she deadpans although her heart starts beating a little faster than normal and she can hear his pump-pump, pump-pumping quicker, too.

"So, there's this girl I like, and I want to know bad of an idea it would be to just kiss her because I've kind of been dying to for a really long time now —" Stiles keeps going but Cora can't hear because of course this is about Lydia he's been in love with her since third grade why are you such an idiot falling for the first wild-haired brown-eyed stupid stupid boy you see, "so, is that okay?" he finishes looking at her expectantly but also nervously.

"Yeah, whatever," she rolls her eyes and walks away from That Stupid Boy as he will now be referred to because really, Stiles, way to get a girl's hopes up. She's almost made it past the silks when she feels a (strong, gentle, dammitstopnoticingthat) hand on her arm. She turns around and crosses her arms, blinking at the unexpected closesness of Stiles but then glaring at the most-definitely unwelcome invasion.

"Why are you walking away?" He looks confused and fuck she loves it when he pulls that face because he looks like a puppy and her mama werewolf instinct kicks in for a second and she wants to hug him until she remembers that Cora Hale does not do hugs. She huffs angrily and a bit annoyed because isn't it obvious but then "You said yes, so that's good," comes out of his mouth.

"Yeah, well, sorry if I fail to see how you kissing Lydia is so great for me."

Stiles laughs, somehow in a low tone, and the sound sends actual shivers up her spine and she thought that only happened in cheesy romance novels, which is so uncool right now. "You weren't listening to me, were you?"

"I heard enough." She's annoyed and, he can see, a bit upset. It doesn't even matter that she wasn't listening (in fact, it's probably for the best — his speech was pretty embarassing) because she kinda just gave him his explicit permission.

"Whatever," he rolls his eyes and grins, hugely, like a jack-o'-lantern and her heart cracks a little because she loves that smile.

She recovers just enough to spit out a "What?" but doesn't get further than that because Stiles is using those rough hands to cup her face gently and pull her the six inches or so to him and then suddenly — wonderfully, finally — he's kissing her and for exactly one second she's too shocked to do anything but then it's like she comes alive because she threads her hands into his soft soft hair and is kissing him back so passionately and a little bit desperately that he's sorta really mad for not doing this earlier. And then she moves both hands to his chest and pushes him back against the wall and wow this is actually happening is running through both their minds and the kiss takes on a whole new level as Cora probes against Stiles' lips with her tongue and he opens his mouth eagerly to the invasion.

He can't keep his hands in one place, he's running them up her sides, across her back, now one's in her hair and the other is slowly but surely inching its way to her boob and, well, that's a little too slow for her so Cora steps away and grabs his right hand and puts it right where she wants it. She smirks at the adorable surprised look on his face but then she's the surprised one when he starts pulling her top off and whispers or moans or somethings to her in that deliciously low voice "This was getting in the way," and since she can't let him win she yanks that ridiculous jacket off, then makes quick work of his button-down but needs his help removing the t-shirt and hot damn because when he does she wonders when exactly she decided she liked pale-ish boys who had surprisingly defined-but-not-bulging muscles except then he puts his mouth on her neck and she forgets her train of thought. He trails down her exposed neck, his lips leaving tiny flaming patches on her sweet skin and she smells like men's body wash because Derek is the one who shops and he always forgets about Cora's soap but Stiles loves that because he doesn't know a single other girl who just doesn't care about that. She's rubbing his back now and her hands are getting lower and lower and closer to the front so he pulls back for just a moment a mumbles "Car?" She nods, so he helps her put his slightly-too-big jacket on and he pulls on his t-shirt and they stumble out to Stiles' Jeep.

They're in the back seat now and they're moving too fast but going any slower would be a sin so he forgets that her big brother could kill him blindfolded and she forgets that she could accidentally kill him and what they're doing right here right now is reason enough to forget the world so he keeps sucking on her breasts as she keeps rubbing him and twisting and flicking and god he's gonna come unless — unless

"Do you want to...?" Cora whispers.

"Fuck — keep doing that, just that — yes," he whisper-shouts back as she uses one of her unusually sharp nails to lightly scrape circles and squares and all sorts of shapes on his dick and he grabs a condom out of the pocket in his side door and she puts it on for him. And then he's inside, inside her and it's amazing, so much better than he thought it would be and it's because it's with her and she's gorgeous right now as sh rocks her hips and Stiles can't quite remember what town he's from or what color his Jeep is, because his whole mind is filled with the picture of her on top of him as she goes faster and faster and he reaches up and massages both of her perfectly-sized boobs and she rolls her eyes a bit back in her head when he lets go of one only to start brushing against her clit instead.

Cora can only think one thing and it's Stiles Stiles Stiles Stiles Stiles and it's the way his fingers are circling but never actually touching her aching, swollen center and she needs his touch more than anything except she also is thinking about how fantastic he feels inside her and how he fills her up so much she feels like she might burst and oh yes okay now he's flicking her and it's pleasure-pain and it's the best she's felt yet and it just might — it just might push her over the edge — if he keeps that up any longer —

And Stiles can sense how close she is and he's relieved because he's been holding his off for a bit now and so when she rides him faster and faster he starts meeting her movements, matching her thrusts and also rubbing her absolutely dripping clit. He switches his attentions to the other neglected breast and latches on with his mouth and it's partly the feel of the wet hot kiss he bestows on it with not a bit of tongue but mostly the sound of his rough sex-pleasured voice whispering "Cora, Cora, Cora, Cora," that really sends her tumbling, careening, spinning wildly out of control and her cries and spasms of pleasure pull him over too. And it's earth-shattering and Stiles can't see for the stars clouding his vision and Cora can't feel anything but absolute contentment and it's such a strange feeling she can't help but laugh.

Stiles raises his head from where it's buried between her boobs and asks with a lazy smile, "What?" and dammit he just looks so happy there and she just feels so happy right now she thinks she could die and be happy.

Cora just shakes her head and pushes him down on the seat where she joins him. "Nothing. That was fun." He snorts with laughter and rolls his eyes because, yeah that was fun. Stiles can't quite believe what just happened, only that he thinks he might be half in love with this girl but now Derek doesn't scare him as much because he's seen Cora in action and he's pretty sure not even Derek would want to tangle with her.

Back at Derek's flat (what Isaac likes to refer to as 'the pack HQ'), Cora and Stiles announce their couplehood by telling (the PG parts of) the story. After an uncomfortably long awkward silence where Scott shoots Stiles a proud look, Boyd nods his congratulations, Erica looks giddy over the gossip, and Derek seems too stunned to move, Isaac breaks the quiet.

"So, you guys didn't get the lamp then?"