Lily dabbed at her forehead with a mauve handkerchief, silently cursing LoveGun for sending her down to Louisiana in this heat. The mugginess of late summer was taking its toll on her, even as she loitered in the shade of a tall, spreading oak tree. Her contact was supposed to meet her here--a member of the organized crime families of New Orleans who went by the most silly codename she had ever heard. Bubble Beard. She chuckled slightly under her breath as she began to set out across the sweltering field. She adjusted her hat to shield her eyes from the sun, squinting until she saw the rotting remains of an old plantation house in the distance. The once grand columns had crumbled from lack of repair, and the roof had caved in in some places. She drew a grim face and continued on towards the building. So this was the top-secret storage facility he had mentioned in a raspy whisper on the phone. Lily rolled her eyes and hitched up her skirt a little in an attempt to keep burrs from catching in it as she continued wading through the overgrown grass.

BubbleBeard flicked his cigarette out of the window and stepped out of his vehicle, the heat waves pouring off of everything. Grumbling to himself for choosing such a remote, muggy location, he checks to make sure his gun is loaded and started the long walk towards the dilapidated plantation house. Seeing a figure move in the distance, he freezes, not knowing whether it was the heat playing tricks on him, an enemy, or the lovely Lily Evans. Deciding to proceed forward with caution, BubbleBeard takes a winding path towards the building, getting close enough to see the back of a person entering the storage facility.

Hearing movement, Lily clutched the gun hidden beneath her skirt. Although this was meant to be an amiable mission--strictly business--she wouldn't put it past anyone to kill her and have both the money and the drugs. It had happened to only too many good mobsters. She turned around quickly, sliding her gun out of its thigh holster as she called out.

"Bubble Beard? That had better be you, and you'd better put down your gun."

BubbleBeard raises an eyebrow and chuckles, keeping his gun held aloft. A pirate never relinquishes their weapon. Stepping forward he calls,

"Yarrr, I can't be complyin' with yer request, lass! Now quit with this banter, it be far too hot fer this arguing!"

Stepping into the broken down house, he steps into a shadowy corner and awaits Lily's response. He knew this was a legitimate business opportunity, and he'd dealt with Lily before and would've liked to have thought she'd never do anything to cross him, but alas, you just never knew in the life of crime.

Lily grudgingly nodded, still keeping her grip tight on her gun. "Well, I would at least appreciate you not pointing that thing at me. Wouldn't want any accidents." She glanced around the ruined building, noticing blotches of rotten wallpaper that had once been very expensive. "Where's the coke, anyway? I've got your money in a knot under that big oak tree out there." She pointed out a broken window to the oak tree she had been enjoying the shade of earlier.

BubbleBeard stepped out from the shadows, his gun aimed at the ground, but still loaded. Walking to the back of the room he taps around on the wall until he hears the hollow spot. Taking the butt of his gun, he smashes it into the wall and grins as the wall crumbles, revealing a descending stone staircase. Pausing for a moment, he pulls his flask out and takes a gulp, offering some to his partner in this crime.

"Ladies first there lass, and be warned, the third ter last step is almost completely nonexistant, if yee miss it, yee might twist one of yer pretty little ankles there."

Lily smiles and wipes the flask briefly with her handkerchief before taking a sip. She draws her face into a tight knot before smacking her lips and shaking her head. "Well, thank you very much, Captain. I'm not much of one for whiskey, though." She handed it back to him before carefully starting down the steps, feeling each step before her carefully, testing her weight on it before continuing down. She managed to skip over the tricky step before alighting quickly on the floor of an ancient cellar. She held her handkerchief delicately to her nose at the stench of what must be half a century's worth of dead rats. "D-do you have a flashlight by any chance?"

BubbleBeard chuckles and steps in front of Lily, lighting up a cigar and puffing the smoke, watching it swirl above their heads. Reaching above and to his right, he fiddles for a moment before yanking down an ancient torch, a lengthy thick stick wrapped at the top with a cloth soaked in some sort of liquid. Pulling out his lighter, he holds it to the tip and waits a moment before a bright light lit up the room, causing them to both momentarily cover their eyes.

"Will this do?" The Captain grumbled, not understanding why people hadn't learned to see better in the dark as he had... Then again, he thinks, not everyone can be a pirate.

Lily tried not to cough as BubbleBeard's pungent cigar smoke mixed with the stench of the cellar. She turned around slowly, squinting at the dark--and there it was. A small mountain of unassuming burlap sacks, stamped SUGAR, that were (she hoped) filled with finely pulverized Columbian cocaine. She smiled and approached the goods, fishing a swiss blade knife out of her bra. She turned to the Captain and nodded toward the bags, flipping out the knife. "I hope you don't mind, Captain, if I take a quick peek? Just to make sure that neither of us has altered the deal." He nodded with a flourish of the hand, and she sliced a tiny hole into one of the sacks toward the bottom. Dipping her fingertip into the coke, she brought it to her nose and snorted it with as polite a sound as she could muster. An excited grin spread over her face, and she nodded happily.

"Yes, this is just the stuff, my Captain. I'm glad to see you've held up your end of the deal." She straightened and began to make her way toward the stairs. "I'll bring my car up to load it in. Oh, and I lied to you a little--the money's not under the tree. It's buried about ten yards away from there. I'd be happy to show you where it is if you won't mind helping me load the product."

Laughing while watching Lily try a line of his product, BubbleBeard grabs four of the five sacks and leaves the already open one for her to carry. Hell, the lass has to pull some of her own weight after all he thinks. Stepping up the stone steps, he turns his head to make sure Lily wasn't struggling at all. Seeing that she was doing just fine, BubbleBeard pauses and blinks the sweat out of his eyes.

Continuing forward he makes his way across the building, peering through the broken windows and walls to see that there was some movement down by the road. Calling over his shoulder, he barks,

"Oi lass! We might be havin' some company on this here adventure"

"What?" Lily almost missed a step, causing her to quickly catch her balance while trying not to spill any cocaine. As she hurried up the last few steps, she squinted into the slowly dusking horizon--sure enough, there was a squat cop car parked on the distant highway. Two blue uniforms were making their slow way through the field. "Fuck. I should've known that I'd get a close encounter with the blues once I got to New Orleans. We've got to hurry. Just put this stuff somewhere--I'll get my car and the money." Lily quickly stashed her bag in a dark corner of the house, praying that the groaning floorboards wouldn't give way. She almost flew out of the door and into the field, careful to keep low. Her petite frame helped her elude the policemen's notice as she trotted through the tall grasses. Finally approaching her car, she drove it rapidly to the hiding spot, loaded the briefcase of money into it, and trundled on a carefully concealed backroad to the plantation house. As she got out of the car, she noticed that the police had picked up their pace. They must have seen or heard the car. Fuck. She grabbed the briefcase, still covered in a fine layer of dirt, and made her way into the house, sliding it across the floor to CaptainBubbleBeard. "Count it, quick."

BubbleBeard nodded and followed suit, deciding to stash the cocaine instead of risking bringing it into the open. Tossing his cigar out of the front door, he runs over to a corner of the room and slides back a picture, exposing a safe in the wall. Quickly dialing in the combination, he stashes his load inside and shuts it securely, replacing the picture hastily over it. Looking down at the briefcase, BubbleBeard grunts,

"Yoho lass, I'll take yer word for it this time, we have ter make our getaway! It be best if we ditched me car, it's too easily followed back ter me. And if it makes no difference ter yee, I'd like ter do the drivin' as I no doubt know these roads better than yee!"

Lily smirked and nodded. "Sounds like a plan, Captain." She grabbed the opened bag of coke and carefully loaded it into the backseat of her coupe. As BubbleBeard loaded in the last of them, she slipped into the passenger's seat and buckled quickly. As CaptainBubbleBeard slid into the driver's seat, she handed over her keys.

"Now, don't be afraid to rev this baby up. I've had some modifications put in it." She adjusted the side mirror to look behind the car. The policemen were fast approaching the house, and yelling something that sounded like "Stop!" Lily pulled a grimace and nodded to BubbleBeard. "Let's go."

Nodding quickly, BubbleBeard floors it and weaves in and out of the thickets, the car rattling along the dirt road. Taking a sharp right in between two trees, BubbleBeard glanced over at Lily who was keeping an eye in the rear-view mirror. Noticing the phenomenal beauty in her face, BubbleBeard was distracted for a moment too long and almost swerves into a fence running along the side of the dirt road. Jerking back onto the road, he steps on the gas pedal even more and veers off to the left, parking the car in an abandoned barn, smiling as he watched the cops zoom past them.

"Well then... That certainly be a getaway for the books!"

Lily was breathing heavily as Bubblebeard pulled into the barn. Her jolted nerves still refused to calm down for several moments after the sirens had faded away. In her bloodstream, the effects of her cocaine sample were amplified by her fear of being caught by the police, and then exacerbated by the close shave with the fence. She looked over to BubbleBeard, wide-eyed, and stared at him for a moment. Maybe it was the relief that began flooding through her system. Maybe it was a sudden realization of how intimate their location was. Maybe it was still the adrenaline overdose coursing through her veins, but Lily suddenly pulled the pirate next to her into an impassioned kiss, not minding the vague taste of soap on her lips. She released him quickly, her face blushing as she realized what she had just done.

"Oh, God! I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry." She looked pointedly away, out of the window to stare at an old butter churn. "That--that was very unprofessional of me. I just...get affectionate sometimes when I'm excited." It was a lie. She had never been compelled to kiss someone before. She quickly opened the door and slipped out, leaning against the side of the car.

BubbleBeard was shocked as Lily leaned in to kiss him, but he certainly did not mind. Far too quickly it seemed she pulled away and got out of the car. Frowning, he adjusts the bubbles in his beard and steps out of the car, walking around slowly to her.

"Ahoy... Well that right there be one of the best lip embraces this Captain has ever partaken in... I... Yes, it was unprofession..."

BubbleBeard choked on his words, something that hadn't happened since first grade when he'd accidentally called his teacher Mom. Shaking his head he realized there was only one thing to do. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his flask, taking a sip and offering it once again to Lily. As she went to take it, he pulls it back and grabs her arms, pulling her in close to him.

Her body fit so snugly into his. She looked up into his face, her hand still wrapped loosely around the flask of rum. She thought about kissing him again. It really hadn't been too bad. But she was also only too aware of the fact that she was alone in an empty barn with a man that she had been willing to shoot dead forty five minutes ago. This wasn't any kind of logic or compatibilty talking. More of animal instinct than emotion. She started to pull away from Bubblebeard, but she suddenly remembered something. Hushed whispers in the dorm rooms at boarding school, her best friend telling her how she had just let some great sweeping feeling take over, and that was all she needed and she didn't regret a thing. They hadn't even known each other that well, there was just some...mutual desire. Lily didn't kiss him. She leaned her head, almost in a defeated way, against his chest.