Hey all! Before you send a request my way, I’d appreciate it if you took a moment to read through this.
Characters I will write for include :
Bucky Barnes (the most popular character I write for)
Benjamin Poindexter
John Walker
Bob Reynolds
Yelena Belova
Sam Wilson
Carol Danvers
Agatha Harkness
Natasha Romanoff
Joaquin Torres
If the Marvel character you’re thinking about isn’t on this list, shoot me a message, and I’ll let you know if I’m open to it!
Pairings :
I write in x reader stories in 2nd person POV.
I do not write for ships unless the reader is part of the dynamic.
I will write throuple/poly relationships if the reader is involved (Sambucky x Reader, WinterAgent x Reader, SentryAgents x Reader, GhostWidow x Reader, etc. If you're unsure, just ask.)
All my readers are fem!readers, just because that’s what I know best. There are plenty of other very talented writers who write for male!reader or gn!reader, so show them some love!
I do not write parent!character x child!reader dynamic as the main plot. I write romantic or platonic dynamics.
NSFW content :
I love writing intimacy, but I do not do graphic smut.
I’m very comfortable writing sensual, emotional, and R-rated or suggestive stories. I like focusing on tension, steamy scenes and emotional connection rather than graphic details. (references for these type of stories: Siren and Unholy Trinity)
I won't write :
Incest
Anything that romanticises substance abuse (that’s a very personal boundary for me as someone who struggles with that myself).
Non-con (but I’ll write power dynamics and dub-con to a limited extent)
How to Request :
You’re more than welcome to send in requests through my Tumblr asks. Just know that while I read every message, I can't guarantee that every request will be written. I get a lot of asks, and I choose what to write based on what clicks with me creatively.
If you’d like a guarantee of having your request written...
I’m starting to be active on Ko-fi again, so any requests made through my Ko-fi will be prioritised and written within a month as long as they follow these guidelines as my way of saying thank you for the support and helping me keep this hobby sustainable.
buy me a ko-fi here!
At the end of the day, this is something I do for love, not profit. It’s free labour, and I’m writing because it brings me joy, and this community keeps that joy alive.
I may not always be able to respond to every comment or ask, but I love y'all, and I’m grateful for this fandom ❤️
Summary : Emperor James rewards his new favourite gladiator, Dex, with the one prize he loves most: his empress.
Pairing : Gladiator! Benjamin Poindexter x Empress consort! reader x Emperor! Bucky Barnes (she/her) | Roman Empire AU
Warnings/tags : Bucky is referred to as Caesar as a title, reader is referred to as Domina as a title, probably not historically accurate, gladiator!Dex, established marriage, poly relationship dynamics, open marriage, threesome (MMF), bisexual Bucky Barnes, bisexual Dex, voyeurism, exhibitionism, jealous Bucky, sub! Dex, praise kink, power dynamics, blood kink, violence, explicit sexual content though not anatomically descriptive, everyone is kinda insane about each other, but when in Ancient Rome, right? (let me know if I missed anything!)
Word Count : 11.3k
Notes : I’m still working on the ex!Bucky / reader x dex, but this is what I came up with while I was distracted. I’m going to be working on ko-fi requests next week, and I promise my next fic will be fluffy! enjoy!
James first saw you at the theatre.
He was obliged to attend a play beneath painted columns, where actors wore masks and lied with their whole bodies while senators pretended to understand art. A young James in his twenties had only been emperor for two years then, still young enough that the gold on his head looked almost too heavy, still watched by Rome like the city was waiting to see what kind of god he would become.
And then he looked across the theatre and saw you in your father’s box.
He had seen women like you before, a senator’s daughter draped in white, gold pinned in your hair. You were out of your beautiful mind, mostly because you’d rather be studying war routes than be stuck in a family affair.
James forgot the play entirely. He forgot the whispering advisors behind him. He forgot the ambassador leaning in to discuss grain routes. He even forgot that half of Rome had eyes on him and the other half had spies doing the same. He stared at you like a man struck by cupid himself, absolutely certain, in that sacred, devastating way only young men and emperors could be, that you were the most beautiful woman alive.
By the next morning, he had asked for your hand.
Your father nearly wept from joy. His daughter was to be the Caesar’s wife! His bloodline would forever be tied to the imperial house. His name was secured in marble, law, prayer now! He agreed so quickly the ink had hardly dried before the whole city knew.
James, meanwhile, didn’t care about your father’s joy, or his bloodline, or the Senate’s approval. James cared that you looked at him with heart eyes during the betrothal feast, smiled behind the rim of your cup, and made the emperor of Rome feel like a trembling boy offering flowers at a goddess’ altar.
Years passed after James took you as his empress consort, and impossibly, over the years, James loved you more.
It should have gentled with time, but it did not. If anything, it grew worse. James loved you like conquest, like you were the only law Rome had ever written that he cared to obey. He would have waged war for you without blinking. He would have emptied the treasury if you asked nicely enough. He, in fact, fed every senator who insulted you to the lions and slept peacefully afterward with his face pressed to your stomach.
And gods, you loved him, too. Not because he was Caesar. Not because the city screamed his name or because provinces bent beneath his standards. You loved James when the laurel came off. You loved the man who crawled into your bed exhausted and kissed your hand like victory in the political chambers of Rome meant nothing until you touched him. You loved the man who could command armies and still looked at you before making any choice that mattered, as if your nod was worth more than every omen in Rome.
When he came home from war missing an arm, Rome held its breath.
James raged through fever and pain, half-mad with humiliation while physicians whispered of new medicine generals paced outside his chamber like war dogs without a master. The bronze-and-gold miracle that would become his new arm had not yet been forged. Rome only knew that its emperor had returned from campaign broken, and that was enough to make the Senate bare its teeth.
You had no heir yet. For whatever reason the gods had chosen to keep your womb empty, and every ambitious old man in the capital looked at your husband’s missing limb and your untouched nursery, and mistook them for weakness.
You thought it was laughable, really.
So you stepped into court in his place.
You wore imperial purple for three years. You sat beneath his eagle. You lifted your chin and reminded them, with a smile cynical enough to pass for mercy, that James was still Caesar, still beloved by the legions, still chosen by Rome, and still very much alive. How dare they look upon his suffering and see an opportunity to seize the throne? How dare they mistake recovery for surrender? How dare they question your husband’s rule?
After that, the Senate learned to approach you with caution.
You listened to senators and praetors attempt to test you. You answered them so coldly, that their little traps died in their mouths. By the time James could stand again, Rome had already learned to bow twice: once for Caesar, and once for the woman who guarded his throne.
Some whispered you must have been Minerva's daughter. There was no other explanation to how you won the war your husband started.
Others were wise enough to whisper nothing at all, because they feared you almost as much as they adored James.
Even the consuls, Sam and Steve, your husband’s oldest friends, who had seen James bloody, foolish, young, and half-starved in campaign tents, bowed their heads to you with the same loyalty they gave him. Not because James demanded it, but rather because you had earned it. Because while your husband learned to live with the automaton arm his engineers built for him, you kept Rome from eating itself alive.
James never forgot that.
The arm made him look more divine to the people. It was a beautiful bronze and gold fitted over what war had taken from him, plates shaped so elegantly to his shoulder and muscle that poets started calling it proof the gods still favoured Caesar. To Rome, it was a miracle of empire and invention. A gleaming symbol that James could not be diminished, not by blade, not by blood loss, not by any foreign king foolish enough to think removing one limb could make him less of an emperor.
But you knew the truth that the inner workings were vibranium.
It was gift from the Wakandan royal family, though gift was too simple a word for it. You had built that alliance during James’s absence from the throne. You saw the ink on treaties and felt the weight of foreign jewels in your palm. The Wakandans gave you the brilliance hidden beneath Roman gold because you had loved him so much, entire nations had to answer.
But you also knew where the straps bit into his skin. You knew the phantom pain. You knew the days he hated the weight of the arm, hated the shine, hated the way people looked at him like he had become myth when all he felt was wounded and less himself. You knew the nights he woke shaking, bronze fingers clenched hard enough to dent the bedframe, and you climbed into his lap, took his face between your hands, and held him there until Caesar disappeared and he was only James again.
The worst of it was that he could no longer train with his men.
Not because he was too weak, but rather because he was too strong.
The first time he returned to the camp, everyone cheered until he picked up a practice sword and nearly shattered the post clean through. The second time, Sam laughed at him, lifted his shield, and was promptly driven backward so hard the rim split beneath James’ bronze hand. Steve didn’t fare much better. His shield lasted longer, which only made James more annoyed when it finally cracked straight down the centre.
You had to write to Wakanda again for stronger shields, because the emperor’s consuls could no longer survive sparring with him, and your husband was becoming insufferable about it.
James had sulked for three days, though denied it, of course. He sat in your chambers with his jaw set and his arm gleaming in the lamplight, pretending to read reports while glaring at nothing. You had climbed into his lap without asking, plucked the scroll from his hand, and kissed him until his bad mood gave way under your mouth.
“You broke two shields, my love,” you murmured against his lips.
“They were poorly made.”
“You hit them like you were trying to punish the gods.”
James’ mouth twitched into half a smile, but he tried very hard to hide it, so you kissed him again, sweeter this time. His human hand settled at your waist first, then tightened as if he could not help himself.
“I miss it,” he admitted eventually, so quietly you almost did not hear him.
You smoothed your thumb over his cheek. “I know.”
He missed the clash of bodies and the bite of exertion. James had always loved bloodsport, but now that he could no longer trust himself in the training yard, watching the gladiators in the arena became much more than just a pastime.
It was to scratch an itch he could not reach.
At first, he made appearances for occasional big matches. Then, he did so more often. He would eventually watch with a focus you recognised too well, the same hunger he brought to battlefields.
So he started choosing champions, but they never seemed to last very long.
He once chose a man who had power, but no discipline. Another had beauty, but no instinct. A third had the crowd eating from his palm until he started believing applause mattered more than survival. James favoured them briefly, dressed them well, sent royal physicians to make sure they survived longer, placed bets through Sam just to annoy the Senate.
And every single one disappointed him in the end.
“They never last,” James said one afternoon, grim and irritated, as he came to you smelling faintly of sun-warmed marble and arena dust. “My champion is dead. Again.”
You looked up from where you were reading scrolls by the window.
He was trying to sound merely inconvenienced, but you knew him better than that. He wanted someone worthy to look at. He wanted a gladiator to hold his attention. brutal enough to make him forget, for a little while, that his own hands had become too dangerous for friendly combat.
The fallen champion had been strong, James told you. He was strong enough to please the crowd for a season, strong enough to make the bookmakers nervous, strong enough that his death in the arena that morning had earned a proper roar.
But he clearly wasn’t strong enough to be remembered.
He looked less like a grieving patron and more like a man offended by mediocrity.
“I need a new one,” he said. “Someone worthy. Someone the people can love too.”
You glanced up from your scroll and smiled. “May I come with you and choose?”
James turned to you, and for one brief second, he looked every inch the emperor: A man who commanded legions and broke kings. Then you tilted your head and blinked up at him through your lashes.
His whole face softened into hopeless defeat. The same sweet love that had ruined him in a theatre years ago, with the absolute stupidity of a young emperor in love, that Rome could burn as long as he had you.
So he walked across the room, took your hand from the scroll, and pressed his mouth to your knuckles.
“Of course, darling,” he said, because he would have rearranged the empire just to see you smile.
—
The training grounds were less like a spectacle and more like an animal pit. From the upper gallery, the yard looked almost elegant: warriors moving through dust as trainers calling instructions like generals shifting pieces on a map. Up here, with James’ hand resting at the small of your back, it smelled of sweat, leather, old blood baked into sand, and ambition so desperate you could almost taste it. Every man in that yard knew the emperor was watching. Every man wanted the patronage.
You adored it, which meant James noticed immediately.
He stood beside you in purple, watching the men below with the stern dissatisfaction of a man who had been disappointed too many times. But even as he observed the fighters, you knew part of his attention remained on you. James liked to pretend he was above jealousy when he indulged you. He was not. He simply loved you more than he hated wanting to keep you all to himself.
One of the trainers hurried to meet you, bowing deeply to James and then to you. He began explaining the men on the field, naming strengths, records, bloodlines, schools, failures, promising bodies and disappointing minds. James listened, but you drifted past the words.
And to be fair, you didn’t even know what you were looking for until you saw him.
He was not the largest man on the grounds, though he was broad enough through the shoulders to make the others look unpolished. He didn’t posture for the trainers or laugh with the other fighters or glance up at the imperial gallery in desperate hope of being noticed. He stood still while his opponent circled him, a delicate knife in one hand, head slightly tilted.
“That one,” you said, tilting your chin, “What’s his name?”
The trainer followed your gaze. “Dex, domina.”
Dex. Short, almost abrupt. You liked the sound of it at once, liked the way it sat in the mouth.
“He has not bloodied the Colosseum yet,” the trainer continued, careful not to overpromise in front of Caesar. “But he is promising.”
Promising was a dull little word for what happened next.
The man opposite Dex rushed him with too much confidence and not enough patience, and Dex simply let him come. He didn’t meet force with force. He waited, watched, measured the distance with a lovely accuracy your James had once loved. When the man came too close, Dex moved aside and threw his knife without flourish. The blade struck his wrist and the sword dropped. A second knife from his belt hit the sand beside his throat as he fell, close enough to make every man in the yard freeze. Dex stood over him, breathing steady, blood on his face, one last blade still waiting in his hand.
Gods.
James glanced at you.
You were smiling.
Not the smile you gave senators when you wanted them afraid but unsure why. This was private, because you were delighted. James knew this expression too well, because it was the same one you had worn the first time you saw him return from battle with dried blood at his cheek and fury still in his eyes.
He exhaled through his nose. “I’m not blind.”
You looked up at him, innocent as a temple offering. “I did not say anything.”
“You did not need to.”
The trainer suddenly became extremely interested in adjusting the leather strap on his wrist. Wise man.
James’ mouth twitched, but there was recognition under the amusement. He knew you had a type, and unfortunately for his dignity, your type flattered him enormously. You liked men with soldier’s bodies and haunted eyes. Men who could kill without hesitation, but would go still beneath the right touch. Men who seemed dangerous to everyone else and obedient only when they decided you had earned it. Men who looked like they slept badly, loved violently, and needed a hand at the back of their neck more than they needed mercy.
James, tragically, fit the description perfectly.
And now this gladiator in the yard did, too.
Dex was called into another match. He wiped blood from his eye with the heel of his hand and left a red smear across his temple, making himself look worse and better at once. The second fighter was quicker than the first, cleverer too, and now even James gave him his full attention then. You felt it in the way his hand shifted against your back, fingers pressing more firmly through the fabric of your gown. Dex moved like he was learning the man in front of him piece by piece. Not just fighting. He was studying, letting his opponent reveal himself, then punishing every mistake with precision.
By the time Dex put the second man down, James was no longer merely indulging you.
He was watching.
Dex straightened in the sand, chest rising and falling, blood bright against the pale angles of his face. Someone spoke to him, but he didn’t answer immediately. His eyes lifted instead, drawn up to the imperial pair standing at the upper gallery. For one breath, he looked at you, and there was enough heat in it to amuse you, enough interest in your beauty to make your smile widen.
Then his eyes moved to James.
And stayed there.
Oh.
It was not a simple admiration. It was not the clumsy hunger of a man looking at power and wanting proximity to it. Dex looked at James like a starving man looking at a fixed point in the sky. Like the emperor was not simply a patron or ruler, but a direction he needed to survive.
The trainer cleared his throat delicately. “He needs refinement, domina. But the instinct is there.
James turned his head slightly, finally looking down at you.
He was already yielding. He had been yielding from the second your attention caught and held.
“You think he is the one?” James asked.
“I know he is.”
“You like him because he is covered in blood.”
“I like him because he looks good covered in blood.” James gave you a flat look, but the corner of his mouth betrayed him.
“And,” you added sweetly, he does not seem to care whether the other men like him. He wants to be useful more than admired.”
James’ gaze slid back to Dex, who was now standing alone while the trainers spoke around him. His shoulders were squared, not arrogant and simply waiting.
“Useful,” James repeated.
You touched James’ wrist, thumb sliding over the seam where living flesh met metal miracle. “Can we please have that one, my love?”
James closed his eyes for half a second, as if asking every god in Rome to grant him patience. After all, James would have choked on his own laurel before denying his empress anything.
“As you wish,” he said.
You beamed up at him.
The trainer bowed quickly, already prepared to run off and make the necessary arrangements, but you lifted one hand to stop him.
“And have him washed properly,” you said, watching Dex stand bloodied in the sand. “Then send him to dinner.”
James froze.
You kept your face serene, as though you had suggested nothing unusual at all, as though inviting an untested gladiator to dine with the emperor and empress was merely a practical extension of patronage and not an indulgence you had already begun to enjoy.
James turned his head slowly.
“He should meet his patrons properly,” you nodded.
“His patrons,” James repeated. He stared at you for a moment longer, then sighed as he lifted your knuckles to his mouth and kissed them with all the resignation of a man who had already lost.
—
Dex arrived washed clean and dressed in a fresh tunic.
The blood was gone from his face, which you thought was a shame, but the bath had left him flushed in a different way. His hair was damp at the ends. His skin still held the warmth of steam. The clean linen made him look too soft. He stood at the entrance of your private dining chamber with his hands at his sides and his eyes moving over everything: servants, exits, lamps, table, knives, James, you.
He was careful about it, which only made it more obvious. Dex did not stare like the bored nobles at public feasts. He looked, stopped himself, then looked again when he thought no one noticed. His attention caught on the gold at your throat, the bare line of your shoulder, the way James’ gold hand rested against your waist with shameless familiarity, as if even the emperor’s miracle of an arm had been made to hold you.
James had been touching you since Dex entered the room. Nothing scandalous by your standards, even when his hand dropped to circle the inside of your thigh over the imperial robes. You and James had done far worse in rooms full of senators, so half the Senate probably thought the two of you were indecent. The clever half knew better than to say so.
So this, really, was nothing.
It was just marriage, by your measure.
Dex looked as if he didn’t know what to do with it.
That pleased you.
“Sit,” James said.
Dex obeyed at once.
Not meekly, but as if command gave him relief. He sat with his spine straight, eyes lowered just enough to be respectful, hands still and visible beside his plate. The servants brought wine, figs, roasted game, olives, and honeyed cheese. Dex didn’t touch his cup until James lifted his first, and when he did drink, it was careful, almost ceremonial, like he was learning the rules of the room by copying one gesture at a time.
You smiled.
James sighed, and his hand settled over yours between you, bracketing your fingers. He could pretend to scold you all he liked, but he loved this too. The imperial couple on one side, the chosen champion on the other. It was a hierarchy so clear it didn’t need to be spoken aloud.
Dex loved it even more. You could see it in the way his shoulders eased when James asked him about his weapons, in the way his eyes relaxed when the conversation turned to balance, weight, and accuracy. The way he seemed to settle into himself once he understood what was being asked of him. Dex didn’t want flattery. He didn’t want aimless attention. He wanted direction. He wanted to know where to stand, when to speak, what pleased the people holding his future in their hands.
James was good at that.
For all the war stories, your husband had always been a diplomat when he wanted to be, even if nowadays it was harder to come by. He listened, and yet he could turn a question into a leash even the other man thanked him for it.
“So,” James said, watching Dex over the rim of his cup. “The throwing knives.”
Dex’s expression steadied at once. “Yes, Caesar.”
“Why do you prefer them?”
Dex glanced at the dinner knives on the table, decorative and useless, then back to James. “A blade is only honest if the hand is honest first.”
James chuckled and nodded.
There he was. Your James. The soldier under the emperor. He understood Dex before, and that was precisely what made him curious.
You leaned into your husband’s side. “Like you, my love.”
James didn’t look at you, because he knew he’d fold if he did. “Don’t start.”
Dex looked between you both, but his attention was fixed on the ease, the teasing, the way you could prod at Caesar without fear, and the way James allowed it, even craved it. The way his hand tightened around yours when you called him my love, as if the title mattered more than emperor ever could.
Dex understood hierarchy.
And this hierarchy was intoxicating.
James belonged above the world. You belonged beside James. And somehow, you had both looked down into the sand and chosen him.
“My wife has a good eye,” James said.
Dex turned to you with restrained attraction, made more tempting by the effort he put into controlling it. He thought you were pretty. Obviously he did. Most men did, and far less gracefully. But Dex looked at you like it was only part of the problem. You were not merely aesthetically pleasing to him, but you were the hand that had pointed. The reason he was sitting at an imperial table instead of sleeping in a barracks with blood under his nails.
It was almost too easy to see the obsession beginning.
“Did you know I chose you?” you asked.
Dex swallowed. “No, domina.”
His eyes dropped to your mouth for half a breath, then to where your hand rested inside James’. He corrected himself quickly, eyes returning to the table, but James saw it and smiled, though not kindly.
“My wife is beautiful, don’t you think so, Dex?”
You tilted your head toward your husband, amused. “James.”
“What?” he asked, almost scowling. “It’s a simple question.”
It was not simple at all, and Dex knew it. There was no safe answer, only a correct one. Too eager, and he disrespected the emperor. Too restrained, and he insulted the empress who had chosen him. Silence, and he failed the test entirely.
Dex took one careful breath. “Yes, Caesar.”
James hummed. “Only yes?”
You bit back a smile.
“She is…” Dex stopped, and for the first time all evening, his composure faltered. Pretty was insulting. Even divine felt dangerous to say in front of the emperor, though looking at you made him understand why men built temples, why they dragged marble from mountains, why they carved women into goddesses and still failed to make stone look alive. His eyes dropped, as if staring too long might be its own kind of offence. “She is the most beautiful woman I have ever seen.”
You arched a brow, amused by how hard he was trying not to make it sound like confession.
“But,” Dex looked down for half a second, then forced his face back up. “She is difficult to look at properly.”
James frowned. “Difficult?”
“Yes, Caesar.”
“Why?”
Dex swallowed once. His hands remained perfectly still beside his plate. “Because looking too long feels disrespectful. Looking away feels impossible.”
Huh.
James stared at him, jealousy and pleasure moving behind his face in such quick succession that anyone else might have missed it. James liked the answer. Hated that he liked it.
“Good,” he said.
Dex’s attention snapped to him.
James leaned back, one arm draped behind you, bronze fingers resting near your shoulder like a visible claim. “Would you fight for her?”
Dex didn’t hesitate. “Yes, Caesar.”
James’ smile deepened. “Of course?”
Dex lowered his head in certainty, and echoed him. “Of course.”
You felt James’ hand tighten gently against you. “And if she asked you to bleed?”
Dex looked at you then. There was no performance, no arena bravado. There was no desperate attempt to charm you.
“If she asked,” Dex said quietly, “I would try to make it worth her attention.”
Oh. Oh.
You leaned in and kissed your husband’s cheek before his pleasure could sour into jealousy. His hand rose automatically to your face, thumb brushing beneath your chin, touch possessive and tender all at once. Dex watched that too, like he was studying not only you, but the sacred rules by which you and James existed together.
James gave him structure.
You gave him purpose.
Together, you gave him a north star to follow.
And from that night onward, Dex didn’t merely want to win.
He wanted to be chosen again.
—
Dex’s first fight in the Colosseum was meant to be a test. A public measure of whether your chosen gladiator could survive when the sand was real, the blades were real, and the crowd was real.
Dex did more than survive.
He made the Colosseum go quiet.
There was a stunned pause after the first knife left Dex’s hand and struck true, after his opponent lost the use of his sword arm before he even got close enough to swing. The crowd had expected a strong man with a shield or a loud man with charm.
Instead, they got Dex.
Cold, bloodied, silent Dex, moving across the sand like he already knew how the fight would end. He didn’t roar or preen. He didn’t waste himself trying to be loved. His knives flashed in the sun, and men twice his size fell around him.
By the time the last opponent hit the sand, the silence shattered and the Colosseum erupted.
Dex stood at the centre of it, blood streaking down one side of his face, one blade still loose between his fingers. The people screamed his name like they had known it for years.
Dex. Dex. Dex.
It rolled upward, shaking the imperial box beneath your feet.
You looked at James.
James was already looking at you.
His face was composed for Rome, of course. The emperor didn’t gape at his own gladiator. The emperor didn’t look openly pleased. The emperors certainly didn’t look at his wife with irritation, awe, and reluctant arousal all tangled together, as if he hated how right you had been and loved you far too much to resent it properly.
You laughed beside James, delighted, your hand tightening around his bronze fingers as Dex lifted his eyes to the box. Not to the roar of Rome offering him its first taste of worship, but to James first. Then to you.
The people screamed his name, but Dex looked only at the two of you, blood on his face and chest rising beneath battered leather, waiting for command more than praise.
“He is good,” he said simply.
You turned your head toward him.
“He was wonderful.”
James didn’t answer.
Gods, he knew that tone. You had used it for jewels you didn’t need, silks you wanted, and treaties you had already decided he would sign because your mind had reached the end of the game before his advisors knew they were playing.
You wanted Dex.
And of course because James could not please you, and definitely not because anything was missing in your marriage. James knew exactly how to make you fall apart. He knew the sounds you made when no one else was permitted to hear them, knew the vicious sweetness of your mouth when you wanted to ruin his dignity.
You did not need Dex.
You wanted him.
And James, jealous as he was, could deny you nothing.
“What prize could possibly match that?” you asked innocently.
James’ bronze fingers flexed. The plates clicked once, quiet beneath the thunder of the crowd.
“Coins,” he said.
You hummed, unimpressed.
“Better quarters.”
Another hum, but sweeter this time.
“New knives,” James added, already hating himself for negotiating with a woman who had conquered him years ago.
“All lovely,” you murmured, leaning closer until your lips nearly brushed his ear. “But not enough.”
James closed his eyes for half a second.
He didn’t need you to spell it out for him. He knew when you desired. He could feel it in the way you held his hand, in the pleased little smile you wore while Dex stood bloodied below.
“You want him,” James said.
You didn’t pretend otherwise, but you did dress up nicer. “No,” you shook your head, “after that showing, he deserves me.”
The honesty was worse than coyness would have.
James looked at you then: his wife, empress. His impossible problem.
You were not a coin purse. Not a trinket. Not a feast favour to be tossed to a victor.
To James, you were the prize above all prizes.
That was what made this make sense.
If Dex had fought like that, then no gold in the treasury was enough. No better room was enough. No blade, no title, no public honour could match what James valued most in the world.
Only you.
Only a night in your presence.
Only the empress he adored so completely that even his jealousy was no match for her wants.
James’ jaw tightened. “He is my champion.”
You smiled, slow and devastating. “Yes, my love.”
His eyes darkened at the patience of it. You lifted his bronze hand and kissed the cold knuckles, gentle as worship, cruel as victory.
“You do not have to,” you said, and you meant it.
James almost laughed.
Because of course he had to. Not because you commanded him. Not because Rome expected it. Because you had asked, and you were looking at him like that, and James had never survived your requests with his pride intact.
Below, Dex bowed his head toward the imperial box.
James stared at him for a long moment, jealousy and interest twisting together until he could no longer tell which one was which. Dex wanted structure. You wanted Dex. And James, doomed with how much he loved you, found the decision already made inside him.
James signalled one of his soldiers closer.
The man approached at once, bowing low beside the imperial seats. “Take him from the arena,” James said.
The soldier waited.
James’ bronze hand tightened around yours once.
Then, with the grim authority of an emperor giving away the only prize worthy of such a victory, he said, “Feed him and have him sent to the empress’ private baths.”
—
Dex entered your private baths like he expected to be punished.
It was the first thing you noticed. Not the blood drying along his temple, though your eyes caught there immediately. Not the sand still on the edges of his hair, or the bruises beginning to bloom beneath the torn straps of his armour. Not even the way he looked, battered and too beautiful for a man who had just made the Colosseum forget how to breathe.
It was the careful way he crossed the threshold. It was the way his gaze found you as he stood at the edge of the baths with victory still hot in his blood and confusion written plainly beneath all that discipline.
You were waiting for him in silk that the steam had made damp against your skin, standing barefoot by the water like you belonged to the marble and the gold and the heat rising between you. Dex looked at you as if he had been handed a god’s favour and didn’t know what to do.
“Domina,” he said, bowing a little.
You smiled. “Come here.”
He obeyed.
That was already becoming your favourite thing about him, how command settled him, how it gave his hunger something to latch on to. He moved closer until he was standing in front of you, close enough that you could smell blood beneath the clean mineral steam. Close enough that you could see how hard he was trying not to stare at you.
You reached up and touched the cut at his brow.
Dex’s breath caught.
“You’re still bleeding,” you murmured.
“It’s nothing.”
“I didn’t ask if it hurt.”
His eyes lifted to yours, confused for one bare second before you leaned in and licked the blood from the sharp line of his cheekbone.
Oh, that ruined him.
His whole body locked, because the arena had never prepared him for this kind of your tongue over blood, your lips at his skin, your fingers curled at the torn leather near his shoulder, holding him in place while you cleaned the red from him like you had every right to taste what his opponents had put on him.
When you pulled back, his pupils were blown wide. Lust moved through him like a blade drawn from its sheath.
“Domina,” he said again, but this time it sounded less like respect and more like a warning to himself, a reminder of your rank within the imperial roman household.
You smiled against his jawline. “You did such a good job.”
His hands twitched at his sides.
The praise struck deeper than your mouth at his skin. You watched him absorb it, watched the arena drain from him in pieces.
“You were beautiful out there,” you continued, fingers moving to the fastenings of his armour. “You let them think they had a chance.”
Dex swallowed.
“You liked that?” He asked.
“I loved it.”
His gaze dropped to your hands as you began to strip him of the leathers, buckles, and strap. The armour that had made him look brutal became clumsy beneath your fingers. Piece by piece, you took the Colosseum off him.
Dex let you.
He endured it like reward and torture were becoming the same thing. His breathing changed when your fingers brushed bare skin. His jaw tightened when you kissed the blood at his throat. He looked almost offended by how carefully you touched him, as if no one had ever taught him bedroom manners.
“You don’t know why I’m doing this,” you realised.
His eyes flicked to yours. “N-no.”
So honest.
You laughed.
“You won,” you said. “You pleased the crowd. You pleased the emperor.”
Dex’s whole focus sharpened at James’ title.
“And me,” you added.
That was worse.
His eyes dropped again, not submissive in the way men faked for favour, but overcome by the structure of it. His emperor had sent him here. His blood had bought him not just survival, not just applause, but your attention.
You slid your hand to the back of his neck and drew him down.
“You understand now?” you whispered against his mouth. “This is your prize.”
Dex’s breath broke.
For a heartbeat, he looked genuinely lost.
Then you kissed him.
He didn’t move at first, and not because he didn’t want to. Want was written all over him now, in the tension of his shoulders, the heat of his skin beneath your hands, the painful restraint.
So you gave it what he understood best: an order.
“Touch me, Dex.”
His hands found your waist with startling care, large and callused and still faintly dirtied from the fight. He kissed like he fought, concentration and instinct, learning you with frightening attention. He didn’t rush until you told him he could. He didn’t take until you made it clear you wanted to be taken. Every sigh you gave him became instruction. Every pull of your fingers in his hair became permission. His hands tightened at your waist when your robe slipped loose in the steam, the silk drifting from your shoulders like it had never belonged there at all.
You, now bare before him, made him hungry.
You made him good.
You backed him toward the edge of the bath, kissing him down each marble step until the warm water closed around both of you and the last of his uncertainty burned away beneath your mouth. His breath hitched when you praised him again, cruel against his lips. “You’re so good for me.”
That was when you knew you had him.
That was when he accepted his reward because he realised he had earned you.
Because he had fought well enough for James to send him here.
Because Rome could scream his name until the stone cracked, and still nothing would matter as much as your hands on him, your mouth on his, your voice telling him he had done well.
“Again,” he said before he could stop himself.
Your brows lifted, finding his courage of demanding anything from his empress endearing. “Again?”
His eyes dropped. “Say it again.”
Oh.
You touched his face, thumb dragging gently over the place your mouth had cleaned. “You did so good, Dex.”
He kissed you harder then, like gratitude had finally turned into need.
The bathwater stirred behind him as steam curled around both of you. The marble pressed cool beneath your bare feet while Dex held you as if he had been given a prize too precious and too dangerous to survive mishandling. He was careful until you made him bolder. He was quiet until you pulled sound from him.
And when you let him have you, when you rewarded him with your body, Dex learned that he would burn the whole Colosseum down just to earn you again.
—
Nothing changed after Dex.
James had expected a crack in the holy marble that is your marriage. Maybe an ugly distance when you returned from the baths smelling of steam, oil, and another man’s hands. Maybe a punishment from the gods for giving his champion the one prize in Rome James valued above gold, glory, and his own pride.
Instead, you came back to him.
The first night, he was waiting in your chambers with a scroll open in his hand and not a single word of it read. He looked composed because the emperor had to look composed, even when jealousy had been chewing through him for hours. But the moment you stepped inside, damp-haired from the baths, that composure went thin.
You smiled at him.
James put the scroll down.
You climbed into his lap, and tucked yourself beneath his chin like you had only gone away to return sweeter. His bronze arm locked around your waist first, then his living one followed, holding you so tightly you laughed against his throat.
“There you are,” you whispered.
His mouth pressed to your temple. “Was he obedient?”
You smiled and nodded.
That was how it started, with James holding you in the dark, jealous beneath you, asking in that dangerous voice whether his champion had listened. Whether Dex had touched you only when told. Whether he had waited. Whether he had been good.
So you told him.
You told him how Dex looked at you when you praised him. How he held you with those careful hands, so precise it almost made you sigh. How he kissed like he was learning a battlefield. How he never rushed until you gave him permission. How every sound you made changed him and taught him exactly where to aim next.
James listened like it hurt.
And then his hands would move, and that became the ritual.
Dex fought. Dex survived. Dex won. Rome screamed his name louder each time because, unlike James’ other favourites, he didn’t die quickly or disappoint. He lasted. He learned. He bled and endured and kept earning the reward James had been furious enough, insane enough to give.
By the third time, telling James of your affair felt like foreplay.
By the fifth, neither of you bothered pretending otherwise.
You would enter his chambers with your robe loose and your mouth still swollen from kisses James had not given you, and he would already be waiting. Sometimes he dragged you to him before you spoke. Sometimes he made himself sit still just to torment himself
Then he would ask.
“Tell me.”
So you did.
You told him where Dex had touched you. How his hands had searched, learned, and course corrected. Dex was the picture of pinpoint accuracy, touching you like every reaction was a target he intended to strike cleaner the next time. He was careful until you made him desperate, until your praise pulled noise out of him, obedient in a way that made James’ heart beat quicker every single time you described it.
James was different.
James was brute force.
He was never careless with you, but he was hungrier. After the arm, he was a war machine trying to imitate a knife throw. He could pin you with effortless strength and still kiss you like he was asking forgiveness for wanting so badly. He had years of knowing you, years of loving you, years of learning exactly how to make your voice break.
Sometimes James copied what you told him Dex had done and did it better.
He would place his hand exactly where you said Dex had held you, lower his mouth to the same place, and ask against your skin, “Here?”
You would try to answer. He would make that difficult.
Other times, he would try to copy him and be worse because jealousy made him clumsy, and you loved that too.
You’d whine and pout and say, “He was gentle there,” and James would go still for one terrible second before pulling you under him with a sound that was almost a growl.
“With my wife?”
“Mmhmm,” you would whisper, because you were cruel.
Then he would lose the thread completely.
There were nights when the jealousy became filthier, though James never would have admitted in daylight. The palace physicians tracked your cycles with incredible precision, and on your request they would tell you exactly when an heir would be impossible to produce.
On the days the physicians had marked safe, you let Dex finish inside you, feeling him convulse in your walls as you moaned loud enough for the guards to be suspicious of your… activities.
Then, you would step through the threshold of your chambers in a loose robe, with warm, sticky, white liquid running down your thighs.
For one breath, James would only look.
Then he’d catch you by the waist and drag you against him with a ruined noise.
His bronze hand would close at your hip, heavy and cold through silk, while his living hand pulled the robe open like he had run out of patience for knots, fabric, distance, all of it.
“You let him,” he would say, voice rough against your mouth.
“Would you rather I not?”
His jaw would tighten, because no.
He wanted you like this. He wanted Dex to leave something for him.
So James would drop to his knees because he had decided that no trace of another man’s victory would remain on you unless he had tasted it too. He grip your thighs, and press his mouth to your core with a hunger that made your hands fly into his hair, and made sure Dex’s seed ran down his throat, too.
He would never admit how much he loved it. But there, in the dark, James loved the filthy proof that you had wanted, taken, returned. He loved the salt-sweet ruin of you, the heat of your body, the intimate evidence of Dex’s reward folded into your own pleasure. He loved turning jealousy into devotion.
Afterward, he would hold you like he had won a war.
You would lie against his chest, satisfied and adored, while his metal fingers traced idle circles over your hip.
“You enjoy this too much,” you murmured once.
James’ mouth brushed your hair. “I hate it.”
“No, you don’t.”
You would earn a small pause before he sighed. “No. I don’t.”
Because James would be lying if he said it was only jealousy.
Yes, Dex had touched what James loved most in the world. But he also loved the filthy thrill of hearing your pleasure described in your own voice. It was the unbearable sweetness of you coming back to him every time. It was the way Dex’s hands gave James something to compete with, something to imitate, something to conquer and fold back into your marriage.
And you loved both.
Dex’s focus. James’ strength. Dex’s careful hands. James’ golden grip. Dex asking to be worthy. James proving he already was.
And James, jealous as he was, kept sending Dex back to you.
—
One day, after a particularly brutal bout, Dex left the arena bloody enough to make even James’ head tilt..
That was how you knew his performance had been exceptional.
Three men had fallen in the sand. One had crawled, one had begged, and the last had gone limp with Dex’s knife buried so close to his throat that the whole Colosseum gasped before it screamed. By the end, Dex stood alone in the middle of all that golden victory, hair slick with sweat, blood at his mouth, chest rising beneath battered leather while Rome howled his name like it had always belonged to them.
But Dex did not look at Rome.
He looked to James as if telling him, I will have my reward now, Caesar.
Your husband’s bronze fingers tightened around the railing.
“He’s going to the baths,” James said, like routine.
You should have been satisfied with that. Usually, you were. Usually, you let James pretend he was merely rewarding his champion, and you let Dex pretend he was only accepting what his emperor gave him, and afterward you returned to your husband flushed, and smiling, ready to tell him every detail until jealousy turned him needy.
But this time, you didn’t move toward the corridor to change into your robes.
This time, you moved closer to your husband.
Your hand slid over the cool gold of his arm, then up to his shoulder, your body pressing into his side in a way that was far too intimate for the public eye,
James didn’t stop you. He only looked down at you with those ocean-blue eyes, already bracing himself against whatever impossible task you were about to ask of him.
“My love,” you murmured.
His eyes narrowed, because he knew you too well, because he knew that tone too well. “No.”
You smiled. “I haven’t said anything.”
“You have.”
You bit your lip and giggled, and his teeth clenched because he loved that sound and hated what it did to him. Below, the crowd still screamed for Dex. Above, you tilted your face toward your husband and let your lips graze the edge of his chin, light enough to be deniable, warm enough to ruin him.
James’ hand caught your waist.
You looked down toward the arena again, at Dex being led out beneath the arches, bloodied and unaware that his fate was being changed in real time.
“You’ve seen what he can do alone,” you said, low and sultry. “You’ve watched him throw knives. Watched him bleed. You have witnessed him win.”
James said nothing.
You turned back to him, your fingers curling into the fabric at his chest. “Don’t you want to witness what he does when the prize is in front of him?”
His breath changed.
Even a small break in the emperor’s composure was a little victory, proof that he was imagining it despite himself. He was imagining Dex and you at the baths, the champion he had chosen try to be worthy of the empress James adored.
“You are asking for trouble,” he said through gritted teeth.
“I’m asking for you.”
James looked at you then, and for a moment he was not Caesar at all. He was only your husband, furious with himself for wanting what you wanted, already bending his limitations because he had been bending for you since the day he ever laid eyes on you.
You cradled his cheek.
“If I want you there,” you whispered, “will you deny me?”
His eyes closed for half a second.
And you could see his beautiful, familiar, inevitable defeat.
James could deny senators and kings and entire armies and sleep well afterward. But not you, especially when you asked like that. Not when your mouth was so close to his and your hand was on his face and your eyes the exact sort of desire he had spent your marriage failing to resist.
“If you want me there,” he said, voice rough, “then I’ll be there.”
—
Dex stopped dead at the threshold when he found not only you, but James, at the baths.
The emperor sat in the corner on a low chaise lounge, half-shadowed by steam, dressed in nothing but a loose dark robe belted carelessly at his waist. For the first time since Dex met him, he had no laurel on. It was just James, bare throat lit gold by the lamps, arm resting along his thigh, his eyes fixed on Dex with a calm so heavy it felt like a hand around his neck.
Dex went still in the doorway.
Was this a trap? He thought.
What were the other options?Of course the gods would let him believe he had been chosen, rewarded, wanted, only to place Caesar in the room and watch him hang himself on desire. He straightened his scarred spine, hands open at his sides as if surrendering weapons he did not even carry.
“Caesar,” he said, carefully.
You chuckled from the edge of the bath.
You were standing in loose silk robes, as usual, hair pinned badly enough that a few strands had slipped against your throat. Beautiful, and smiling like you knew exactly what his mind had done to itself the second he saw your husband in the corner.
“Come here, Dex.”
He obeyed, because he didn’t know what else to do. Because despite everything, he still believed he deserved you.
You reached for him the moment he was close enough, fingers curling into the front of his tunic, pulling him down. His eyes flicked once to James, instinctive and panicked, but you only smiled against his mouth before kissing him.
“Don’t worry,” you murmured. “I invited him to watch.”
Dex didn’t believe you at first.
How could he? The emperor sat ten paces away, watching his champion stand half-ruined in the empress’ hands. Dex could feel James’ stare on him like a blade.
Then James shifted.
Dex looked before he could stop himself.
The emperor’s face had not changed much. His posture was still almost lazy against the chaise. But his bronze hand had disappeared beneath the loose fall of his robe.
He was stroking slowly, Dex realised.
Dex’s thoughts stopped.
Oh.
James was not there to punish him.
James was watching.
More than that, James, who had scowled all the way here, saw him and instantly realised that he actually wanted to watch.
You smiled and kissed the corner of Dex’s mouth. “There you are.”
Dex swallowed, eyes still fixed on James for one helpless second before he forced them back to you.“He’s—”
“Yes,” you said, sweet and cruel. “He is.”
From the chaise, James’ voice came low through the steam. “Please her.”
Dex’s whole body went rigid, but not with fear this time.
With purpose.
You laughed as his grip tightened on you, as the command settled into him like a blade finding its sheath. Poor thing. He had walked in expecting a trap, and instead found his emperor watching, touching himself, giving him the only order that mattered.
So Dex, who loved structure, who loved command, who loved being chosen by the two of you more than he loved the roar of Rome, bent his head and obeyed.
At first, he was careful. His hands stayed at your waist, gripping silk instead of skin, as if the emperor’s order had given him purpose but not quite absolution. He kissed your mouth, then the corner of it, then your nose, learning each sound you made with the same terrible focus he brought to knives and open throats.
“Dex,” you breathed, tugging at the front of his tunic.
At this point, that whine was familiar to him: it meant you were impatient. It meant you were needy.
Just like that, his mouth turned hungrier. His hands rose, rough and reverent, sliding over your ribs until his thumbs brushed beneath the loosened silk at your chest. You arched into him, and Dex made a groan so deep it was almost wounded. Behind him, James’ breath changed.
You smiled against Dex’s mouth.
“Did you hear that?” you whispered. “The emperor likes watching you touch me.”
Dex froze for half a second, eyes flicking over his shoulder.
James’ robe wasn't fully open, but it was opem enough to ruin any pretence of dignity. His human hand moved lazily beneath the fabric, but there was nothing lazy about his face. He looked furious. He looked starving. He looked like he wanted to drag Dex away from you and crown him for the privilege.
“Don’t stop,” James said, though, voice rough.
That was all Dex needed to push you back against the marble wall.
It didn’t hurt, but it was firm enough that your breath left you, firm enough that the cool stone kissed your bare shoulders as Dex followed you in, his mouth finding yours again while your hands worked at his clothes. Buckles came loose and damp linen slipped. His tunic fell somewhere forgotten near the bath steps, and yours followed after it, silk pooling at your feet.
Dex looked at you then, and even now, he still nearly forgot how to breathe.
“Touch her,” James ordered from the chaise.
Dex obeyed beautifully.
His mouth dropped to your throat first, then lower, kissing over warm skin while his hands explored places that made your fingers tighten in his hair. He touched your breast, careful until you mewled, until you dragged him closer and made it clear you wanted less worship and more ruin.
“Good,” James murmured.
Dex shuddered at the praise like it had landed under his skin.
You caught his face and made him look at you. “You like when he tells you that?”
Dex swallowed. “Yes, domina.”
Oh, James liked that.
Dex’s head turned just as James’ bronze hand punched into the wall beside him, splintering a white fracture through the marble.
For one suspended second, no one moved.
James stared at the damage, teeth clenched, breathing hard, hand still half-buried in the broken stone.
Then you laughed delightedly.
“My love,” you said, voice sweet as poison, “jealous?”
James dragged his bronze hand free with a painful scrape. “Continue.”
Dex looked between you both as if he had walked into a temple and found the gods wanting him bloody on the altar.
You reached for him again. “You heard your emperor.”
Dex lifted you before you could take another breath, hands firm beneath your thighs, carrying you to the nearest marble table like your body weighed nothing. He set you down on the edge with shocking care, then stepped between your legs and kissed you until the room narrowed to your lover and your husband’s command still ringing in the room.
His fingers slid between your thighs.
You gasped, head tipping back, and Dex followed the sound like instinct. He watched your face as he touched you, learning where your breath caught, where your thighs trembled, where your body tried to close around his hand.
His grip tightened at your knee.
“Mmm,” Dex hummed, voice ruined with obedience borrowed from another man’s authority. “Keep your legs open for the emperor.”
James made a sound from the chaise that almost sounded like a curse.
Your eyes fluttered toward him.
He was watching everything now. His human hand was moving harder now, rougher, while his bronze fingers flexed against his thigh as if he was seconds from breaking something else just to keep from joining in.
Dex saw it too, and gods, the sight changed him.
He touched you with more confidence after that. He had been ordered to please you, and James was watching him succeed. Every sound you made became proof of it. Every desperate little movement of your hips made Dex’s mouth part like he could taste triumph in the kisses you gave him.
“There,” you breathed.
Dex’s eyes snapped to yours.
“Here?” he repeated, curling his digits in you.
You nodded, lips parted, fingers digging into his shoulder. “There, Dex.”
He did it again.
James’ bronze hand closed around the arm of the chaise. The wood cracked beneath his grip.
Dex smiled for the first time in a flicker of understanding, because he finally knew that this must be his greatest prize: You trembling open beneath his hand. James watching with jealous, hungry eyes.
“G-good boy,” you managed, the praise breaking on a gasp as the pleasure finally snapped through you, your thighs tightening around his wrist while you came undone around his fingers.
Dex nearly dropped to his knees.
He would have, if not for your hand catching beneath his chin.
It was just enough to guide him back up, thumb pressed lightly under, making him look at you while his breath came uneven and his hand still trembled between your thighs.
“Oh, sweet thing,” you murmured, smiling as his eyes searched yours. “You please my husband, you know.”
Dex went very still. “W-what?”
You hummed, standing up though your legs still felt flimsy from the orgasm, dragging your thumb along the line of his jaw. “You pleased my husband in the arena. Didn’t he, my love?”
You looked past Dex.
James had gone silent.
That was how you knew the question had struck home.
He sat half-undone like he was holding himself back by the strength of his own pride. His face was unreadable to anyone else, but not to you. You could see the heat there, the terrible fascination he had no hope of hiding now that Dex stood before you, so desperate to be told what to do.
“James,” you said sweetly. “Join us?”
For one second, he didn't move.
Then the emperor stood.
The steam curled around him as he walked by the baths, bare beneath the slightly loosened robe. Dex watched him approach as if watching the sun descend from the sky. His breath caught when James stopped behind you, close enough that the heat of him at your back.
You leaned into your husband with a pleased little sigh.
“Tell him,” you whispered. “Tell him how he pleases you.”
James’ shoulder muscles worked once.
“You’re… precise,” James said at last, voice low. “You don’t waste movement. You don’t beg for the crowd, and that makes them beg for you.” His blue dragged over Dex’s pretty face, possessive now, and not for you. “You obey well.”
Dex shuddered.
You smiled. “There,” you murmured. “See?”
James’ hand settled at your waist. You reached back, caught his wrist, and lifted his bronze knuckles to your mouth. “Now kiss him for me.”
Dex’s eyes widened.
James’ didn’t. He only looked at you, long enough to pretend there was still a decision to make.
You pouted up at him. “Please?”
That was the end of that discussion, of course.
James caught Dex by the back of the neck and kissed him.
It was not gentle. It was not sweet in the way James was sweet with you. It was command first, hunger second, jealousy beneath both, and Dex didn’t push him away. He kissed his emperor like he had been waiting for the order his entire life. His hands hovered uselessly for one breath, then clenched at his sides. You laughed softly. “Poor thing. He doesn’t know where to put his hands.”
James broke the kiss slowly, breathing rougher than before.
You looked at Dex. “Take his robe off.”
Dex obeyed.
His hands were careful as they found the dark fabric at James’ shoulders. Your husband hated how much he liked being handled with such frightened precision. The robe slid down one shoulder, then the other, falling open beneath Dex’s touch until your husband stood bared in the golden steam, all scarred muscle, living flesh, and divine metal.
Dex forgot how to breathe again.
You stepped closer behind him and took his wrist.
“Here,” you whispered against the gladiator’s ear, guiding his hand forward. “Not so nervous. He won’t break.”
James gave you a look.
You smiled sweetly. “Well. Not from that.”
Dex’s fingers touched James with almost unbearable hesitation.
James inhaled.
Oh.
There it was.
You felt the shock of recognition move through all three of you at once. Dex liked this. James liked this. And you, standing between them with your hand wrapped around Dex’s wrist, liked it so much you nearly laughed.
“You pleased my husband in the arena,” you whispered to Dex, your mouth brushing the shell of his ear. “Now let me show you how to please my husband in bed.”
You guided Dex slowly, teaching him the shape of your husband’s pleasure, the pressure, the rhythm, the little changes that made James’ breath catch despite himself. Dex learned with terrifying focus. Dex did everything like survival depended on getting it right, and now he had James in front of him, breathing harder each time Dex followed your murmured instruction.
“Like that,” you praised. “Good boy. Watch his face.”
Dex did.
James hated that. James loved that.
And he did not stop it.
He did not even want to.
Dex looked wrecked by the privilege of it, eyes flicking between James’ face and your hand over his. You could feel his pulse jumping beneath your fingers. You could feel the moment obedience became hunger, the moment he understood this was not punishment, not indulgence, not a trap.
It was an invitation. Especially when you gently pushed him on his knees for his next lesson.
James reached out and caught Dex’s chin, forcing his gaze back up.
“Well?” James said, voice rough enough to scrape. “If you’re going to please me, you should learn from the best.”
—
Well.
After that, it became less about teaching Dex and more about watching both of them realise they liked the lesson.
At some point, your hands fell away from Dex’s wrist because he no longer needed the guidance. James had kissed him harder, meaner, with the kind of lust that should have made the room hostile, except Dex only leaned into it, too. They moved together badly at first, James trying to keep his pride intact while Dex tried to obey and compete at the same time. It was almost funny, really, how quickly your careful little plan had turned into your husband and his champion touching each other with the same hunger they usually reserved for pleasing you.
So you took your rightful place on the chaise.
You sat back in, watching them fuck each other like wild lions in captivity, both in heat. James with his bronze hand braced against the marble, body tense and beautiful, mouth parted around Dex’s name like it annoyed him to say it. Dex on his knees, then standing, then dragged close again, learning your husband the way he learned you, chasing every moan as if he was addicted. They forgot, for a while, that you were anything but witness and goddess and judge.
And gods, you enjoyed watching.
You touched yourself lazily, smiling when Dex looked over and nearly lost himself at the sight of you. James noticed, and grabbed Dex by the cheeks and turned his face back with a possessive warning, and you laughed because neither of them understood yet that this was exactly what you wanted all along. By the end, the baths looked half-destroyed.
There were cracks in the marble where James had gripped too hard. The lamps had burned low. The steam had thinned. Dex was on the chaise now, with his face resting in your lap, loose-limbed and wrecked, his cheek pressed to your thigh while your fingers combed gently through his damp hair. James sat on the floor beside you, back against the chaise, one arm draped heavily over your legs as if he intended to keep both of you there by imperial decree.
Both men looked ruined in the prettiest way.
Your husband’s mouth was still wet from having Dex come undone in his mouth, his breathing still uneven, and when he finally managed to lift his eyes to you, there was accusation there beneath all that dazed satisfaction.
“You planned this,” he said.
You paused with your fingers in his hair. Then you shrugged.
“I don’t see either of you complaining.”
James huffed a laugh against your knee.
Dex shut his eyes, mortified and pleased all the same.
Of course not.
Dex was still in your lap when James moved closer, bronze fingers brushing damp hair away from his temple before he leaned down and kissed him there.
It was almost nothing, barely a claim.
Dex still froze, though.
James lingered there, mouth close to his skin, voice low enough that it felt meant for the three of you and no one else in Rome.
“Next time,” he said, “I want him with us in our bedchamber.”
Dex’s breath caught.
He looked up too quickly, hopeful before he could hide it. “Next time?”
You tilted your head, almost amused.
Of course there would be a next time.
As if James could look at him now and decide he had no further use for him outside of the colosseum. As if you could watch your husband kiss his champion and not already be thinking about how pretty they would look together again.
James’ eyes narrowed. Dex realised the mistake at once.
His lashes lowered, voice softened into obedience.
Summary : You joined Dex’s stream as a guest and left with a problem.
Pairing : Camboy! Benjamin Poindexter x Pornstar! reader (she/her)
Warnings/tags : porn industry au, pornstar!reader, camboy!Dex, virgin!Dex, switch! Dex, livestream sex, masturbation, exhibitionism/voyeurism, praise kink, mentioned bi!reader, jealousy!Dex, unprotected sex (they are mentioned to be tested and reader is on the pill, but wrap it up guys), filthy but still more focused on reactions/chemistry than explicit anatomical detail??? Dex being embarrassingly obsessed. (let me know if I missed anything!
Word Count : 12.8k
Requested by : anons X X
Notes : I see all your freaky asks :) I will be responding when I can, but in the meantime… enjoy!
You were a pornstar.
You didn’t call yourself an “adult entertainer” in the PR-friendly way. You weren’t an influencer who liked to sell a little fantasy on the side. A pornstar. A well-known one, actually. At least, you were famous enough that husbands and boyfriends recognized you in grocery stores, in hotel lobbies, in nice restaurants, on the street, their eyes going wide and staring at you for one beat too long while their girlfriends and wives stood beside them with absolutely no idea why their man had suddenly forgotten how to act normal.
You were used to it by now.
You always noticed the double takes, to the swallowed panic of oh shit I watched you get fucked by two guys on my screen last night. You were used to awkward little flashes of recognition from men who had absolutely seen you naked and were now trying to pretend they hadn’t watched you moan your co-star’s name into a pillow at two in the morning. Some of them got brave and asked for pictures. Some of them went pale when you smiled back, hand tightening on their girlfriend’s hand, hoping she didn’t recognise you. Most of them just looked away too quickly, as if you were guilty, like their search history had somehow climbed out of their phones and started walking around in chunky mary janes
It didn’t flatter you the way it used to.
Nothing really did, not anymore. You had been in the industry long enough for sex to become work in the most practical, unromantic sense.
You rarely, if ever, had sex without lighting, angles, and contracts. You had to think about testing windows, release schedules, which performer looks good with you on camera. Which one was all hype and no chemistry. Which one looked expensive but moved like they were waiting for applause. You still liked your job. You liked the control, the money, the fact that you had built a name out of everyone else’s desire. But desire itself was harder to come by.
These days, when you scrolled through adult sites, it was mostly scouting.
That was what you told yourself, anyway, curled up in bed in your hoodie with your laptop open, boredly clicking through streamer trending pages like you were reviewing résumés. Pretty girl. Pretty boy. Nice body. Bad camera presence. Too fake. Too loud. Trying too hard. You had seen every version of beautiful by then, and most of it did nothing for you.
Three hours of scouting had done absolutely nothing for you.
Nothing. Not a flutter. It was as dry as the Sahara down there. You had clicked through girl after girl with perfect asses, perfect lighting, perfect lip gloss, all thighs and breathy little smiles, and your only thought had been, great angles, weak branding. You watched a brunette arch her back so prettily it probably made half the site black out, and you just blinked at the screen like you were reviewing tax documents.
Then the men.
A blond with abs so defined he looked carved out of a protein advert. Nothing. A tattooed guy with a nice mouth and no camera presence. Nothing. Some cocky pretty boy calling everyone baby like he had learned seduction from a bad podcast. Absolutely fucking nothing. You had seen bodies. You had touched bodies. You had been paid very, very well to make bodies look better than they were. Sexy alone didn’t do anything for you anymore.
You were about to close the tab when you saw him.
Dex.
Just Dex.
No fancy stage name, no stupid pun, no little devil emoji. He didn’t use an overproduced thumbnail of him biting his lip like he was trying to seduce a ring light. He crossed your screen in a small live window with a ridiculously high viewer count for his production level, and him sitting there in a plain, dim room like he had accidentally wandered into every guy and gal’s dirtiest fantasy.
You hovered over the stream.
He had a big body, broad shoulders, thick arms. He had the kind of build that made your brain go. Ugh. Hot.
Annoyingly hot.
But that didn’t mean anything. Three-quarters of the industry was hot until they opened their mouth or moved like they were waiting for a round of applause.
So, fine.
He was pretty.
Was he good?
You clicked on him.
And then Dex looked up at the camera.
He wasn’t smirking or posing. He wasn’t selling you that lazy, hollow confidence men loved to mistake for sex appeal. Dex looked almost offended by his own arousal, tense and tightly wound, one hand wrapped low around himself… and, Christ, he was blessed enough there to make even you pause.
His jaw worked. His shoulders were rigid. His eyes were so dark and focused they made the heat between your legs finally, finally wake up after hours of nothing.
Oh.
You sat up a little straighter.
Well, that was new.
You had fucked beautiful men professionally. You had kissed women so pretty they made entire comment sections lose their minds. You had been under, over, between, worshipped, handled, filmed, edited, marketed, sold. Looking perfect was boring. Experience was overrated. Confidence was usually just choreography.
But Dex looked untouched in a way that did not feel innocent.
The worst part was that Dex was not even doing anything particularly new.
You had seen men touch themselves on camera before. You had seen it polished, staged, rehearsed, marketed within an inch of its life. Men who knew exactly when to bite their lip, when to groan, when to lean back and show off for the lens. Men who had perfected the fantasy so thoroughly there was nothing human left in it.
Dex wasn’t like that.
Dex looked like he hated that he wanted to be watched.
He sat too stiffly, one hand braced on the arm of his chair, the other stroking himself, his jaw clenched so hard you could see the muscle jump. His room was dim except for the glow of his screen, obsessively neat lines and no personality, like he had tried to make the space as controlled as possible because nothing about him was.
He kept glancing at the chat, reading whatever filth people were throwing at him, and every time his eyes flicked over something that got to him, his mouth parted just slightly before he forced it shut again.
God.
You leaned closer to the laptop.
He was trying to be quiet, that much was obvious. He was trying to keep his breathing even, trying to make it look like this was routine, like he was just another camboy doing what people paid him to do. But his body kept betraying him. His throat moved when he swallowed. His thighs shifted open another inch. His hand tightened around himself, careful at first, almost punishingly restrained, like he was afraid of giving too much away.
And you realized, with a curl of heat low in your stomach, that he was still holding back.
Even alone, even with thousands of people watching, Dex was holding something back.
You should’ve been bored. You should’ve clicked away, made a note of his follower count, and sent his profile to your manager like any other piece of potential talent. Instead, you sat there in bed with your pulse picking up, watching the way his hips gave one helpless little twitch into his fist when someone in the chat must have praised him.
Oh.
Your lips parted.
Dex’s eyes went unfocused for half a second, his grip faltering before tightening again, and the sound he made was rough and clearly not meant to slip out. The chat exploded. You could see it reflected in the faint flicker of his eyes, hundreds of people losing their minds because the untouchable pretty camboy had made a noise.
Dex went red.
And then, instead of playing into it, instead of giving the camera some smug little smile, he looked angry. Embarrassed, even. He was turned on enough that he couldn’t hide it and furious that everyone had noticed.
Your stomach dropped in the best way.
“Oh, you poor thing,” you murmured to no one, smiling at the screen.
Dex’s hand moved faster, but not like he was trying to put on a show. It was simultaneously worse and more honest than that. His rhythm stuttered, then steadied, his shoulders tense, his free hand gripping the chair like he needed something to anchor himself to. He kept looking away from the camera and then back again, like he couldn’t decide whether being watched made it better or made him want to crawl out of his own skin.
You had been desired by millions. You had built a career out of being watched. You knew the difference between arousal that was performed and arousal that escaped.
This was escaping him.
And maybe that was why you gave yourself permission to let it happen to yourself, too. Dex was losing control in inches, and you were doing the same in secret, thighs tightening, hips rolling once over nothing, twice, slow enough that you could still pretend it was nothing. You could still pretend you were just watching. You could still pretend you hadn’t started chasing pressure because some camboy with a furious blush had made you feel wanted through a screen.
You could not look away.
Dex was hot, yes, but hot was cheap in your world. His body was good, his face was better, his mouth was pretty in a way that made your imagination wander. But it was the restraint that ruined you.
You shifted again, slower this time, not even thinking about it. The pillow beside you had slipped between your knees at some point, warm from your body, and you tugged it closer with the same absentminded irritation you used to adjust a blanket. Except then Dex’s hand tightened on the screen, his mouth parted like he hated himself for needing it, and your thighs pressed together around the pillow before you could stop them.
You were not scouting anymore.
Scouting didn’t end up like this. Scouts did not sit in bed with their laptop glowing blue over their bare legs, breathing a little too shallow, hips moving in these tiny, thoughtless drags against a pillow. You only noticed when the friction pulled a soft moan out of you, embarrassing in how surprised it made you.
On screen, Dex lowered his head, breath coming harsher now. His hand was moving with less control, his hips following in small, involuntary jerks. He was close. Anyone could see it. He looked almost pained, brows drawn together, mouth open, every bit of him wound tight and shaking with the effort not to be too loud.
Then he looked at the chat again.
Whatever he read there made him freeze.
For a second, he just stared.
Then his eyes lifted to the camera, dark and wrecked, and he said, voice rough, “Don’t call me that.”
You stopped breathing.
The chat must have done exactly what he told them not to, because his teeth clenched, his hand tightened, and the next sound out of him was so fucking pretty it made you desperately hump a pillow.
Oh, he was a problem.
He was a massive fucking problem.
You watched him finish with his head tipped back, trying and failing to keep quiet, one hand still white-knuckled on the chair, his face flushed with embarrassment and pleasure. It was not polished or professional. It was so much better than that. It was messy and furious and needy, and when he finally slumped back, breathing hard, he looked almost offended by his own body.
Like he had lost a fight.
For a long moment, you didn’t move.
Dex slumped back on screen, breathing hard, looking offended by his own pleasure, and you stared at him with your thighs still locked around the pillow. Only then did you realize what you had been doing. Only then did you look down at yourself, at the twist of sheets, at the pillow dragged shamelessly between your legs, and laugh under your breath because, Jesus Christ, three hours of professional scouting had left you dry as dust, and Dex had made your pillow slick and sticky without even knowing your name.
You stared at the screen long after he ended the stream.
Then you picked up your phone and called your manager, Joanna.
She answered half-asleep and annoyed. “This better be an emergency.”
“I found someone.”
“For a video?”
You looked at Dex’s frozen profile photo, his serious mouth, his too-intense eyes, the ridiculous viewer count sitting under his name like proof that you weren’t the only one who had noticed.
But you were going to be the first one who mattered.
“For me,” you agreed, voice still a little too warm. “Camboy. Goes by Dex. Pretty big numbers, no studio work, and only solo stuff as far as I can see. Find him and work it out.”
Joanna went quiet, then, suspiciously she said, “Are you scouting, or are you horny?”
You smiled. “Both.”
Honestly, Joanna was shocked it wasn’t just the former.
He must be special.
—
Joanna managed to get you coffee with him three days later.
Which started very normal.
There was no immediate sexual tension so thick it made the barista uncomfortable. Not even dramatic eye contact over steaming mugs. No gag-worthy you’re even prettier in person that made you roll your eyes and secretly preen. It was just Dex sitting across from you in a corner table, shoulders too broad for the little café table, hands wrapped around a black coffee he barely touched, talking to you about the weather like he had not been the reason you dry-humped a pillow two nights ago.
It had rained that morning. You said you liked the smell of wet pavement when you didn’t have anywhere to be. He said he hated rain because it made people careless on the road. You laughed and told him that was such a depressing answer. His mouth twitched into an almost-smile, like he was embarrassed he had been funny by accident.
Then you told him you used to be a barista.
That surprised him.
“Really?” he asked, and it was the first time his voice lifted with something other than polite caution.
“Yeah,” you shrugged, “I can still steam milk better than half the people in here.”
His eyes flicked toward the counter, assessing the machine like he was genuinely considering whether that was true.
“What about you?” you asked, saving him from the heavy load of the conversation. “Before the camboy thing.”
His thumb moved once against the cup.
“Military.”
Ah.
That made the posture, the exit-scanning make sense. The calm that didn’t feel relaxed so much as trained into him.
“Fair,” you said, letting your eyes drag over him just enough to be obvious.
His ears went pink.
Fuck. Hot.
What you didn’t know was that Dex had almost not shown up.
And because he did not want to. Because he wanted too badly. Because your manager’s email had sat in his inbox like a live grenade, your name in the subject line, your actual name, your professional name, the name he had typed into search bars more times than he would ever admit out loud.
He loved your solo work most, which wasn’t surprising, considering his preferences for doing things alone.
You had no idea how many times you had been on his screen while he was live, in a second tab, your voice low in his tiny earphone while his chat thought they were the ones getting him worked up. And sometimes, sure, they helped.
But mostly, it was you.
Your solo clips were safer. He loved seeing your pretty face going soft with pleasure, with no one else in frame, no one else touching you, no one else making him feel that ugly twist in his stomach. It was stupid. Irrational. Embarrassing. You were not his. You didn’t know his name until two days ago. You had no idea he existed beyond maybe a faceless number in your views, but Dex still liked those clips best because, for a few pathetic minutes, he could pretend you were only being watched by him.
The scenes with other performers were harder.
He watched those too, but it made him mean, jealous in a way he had no right to be, staring at strangers with his jaw tight and his hand wrapped around himself like he could punish the feeling out of his body. He hated them for touching you. Hated himself for watching. Hated most that he still finished.
He knew he was not special for wanting you. Half the internet wanted you. He could see two joggers in the background, whispering in your direction. They’ve probably seen your videos, too.
Dex was no different from them, having spent months as one anonymous viewer in an ocean of them, wanting too much from too far away.
And now you were sitting across from him in sunglasses and a soft sweater, smiling like this was normal.
He asked about your job without being weird about it. Not the gross questions people thought they were allowed to ask because you were famous for sex. He asked what made a good scene, how you knew when someone had camera presence, whether the industry was as overproduced as it looked from the outside. Dex was proud of getting the questions out, considering he had spent an hour that morning practicing in the mirror in the effort to make himself feel like a normal human being.
You told him the truth. Sometimes yes. Sometimes no. Sometimes the best thing on camera was a move nobody planned, and sometimes the hottest person in the room became boring the second they started acting like they knew they were hot.
Eventually, though, you had to talk business.
“So,” you said, stirring your drink with your straw. “Usually, before a full collab, I’d do a test screening.”
“I…” Dex’s eyes came back to yours. “I can’t do that.”
You blinked, leaned back. “That’s pretty standard, Dex.”
“I know.”
“You know?” You raised your eyebrows.
“I read the packet your manager sent.”
“Mm,” you hummed, sipping your coffee.
His ears went pink again, but he didn’t look away this time. “I’m not saying no to you. I’m saying no to doing it like that first.”
Oh?
“Okay,” you said, leaning forward a bit. “Then how would you do it?”
He took a second. You watched his thumb move once along the seam of his coffee cup, the only nervous tell he had really given you. He was shy, you realized. Not helpless or naive, but shy in a controlled, locked-door kind of way.
“Let’s do a “test screening” on my stream,” he said, and he looked like he was gonna wince with how needy he sounded.
You stared at him for a beat, then laughed softly. “You want your first collab with me to be on a streaming site?”
“Yes.”
“You know my team is going to call that risky.”
Dex nodded. “Yes.”
“And you still want that?”
His gaze held yours, steady now despite the blush still sitting high on his cheekbones. “If I’m going to collab with someone like you, I want you on my screen first. Not the other way around.”
Oh.
You smiled into your coffee. So there was a marketing bone in his body. Smart.
You understood it instantly, because it was a good branding move.
His whole appeal was the intimacy of his setup, the feeling that viewers were seeing something private slip out of him in real time. A studio debut would make him look like everyone else. But you appearing on his stream? You, the famous pornstar, stepping into his room, like the fantasy had chosen him personally?
That would go insane online.
“Ah,” You nodded slowly. “You want it less produced.”
“Yes.”
“Your audience gets to feel like they saw it happen before the industry got its hands on you.”
His mouth twitched up. “You’re good at this.”
“I’m known for a reason.”
“I know,” he said, a little too quickly. You smiled at that, and he looked down into his coffee like it had the answers to the universe.
Fuck, he was cute.
There was something sweet about how badly he was trying to be professional while clearly not believing you were actually sitting across from him. It made you want to tease him just to see what would happen.
“You watched my work?” you asked lightly.
His fingers tightened around the cup. “Yes.”
“Research?”
“No.”
Your eyebrows lifted. Dex’s face went red.
Oh, that was fun.
You didn’t push him too hard, at least not yet. You just smiled into your drink and let him sit with it. Let him know you had noticed. Let him know you were kind enough not to eat him alive in public, even though you could.
“Okay,” you said eventually. “If I were to say yes, my rules still apply. I need boundaries and a safe word, of course. My manager sees the platform terms and the moderation plan. If I say stop, we stop. If I say cut, you cut. If your chat gets ugly, they’re gone.”
Dex nodded immediately. “I want you comfortable.”
It was so direct that it knocked some of the teasing right out of you.
You studied him for a second. “You’re very serious.”
“I’m trying to be.” His throat moved.
You smiled, smaller this time. “Relax, Dex. I’m not going to bite you here.”
His eyes dropped to your mouth, then back up.
“Okay,” he said, not sounding relaxed at all.
You laughed, warm and genuine. The rest of the meeting went like that. Business, then teasing. Testing requirements, then him asking if you still knew how to make latte art. Revenue split, then you asked if all ex-military boys read contracts like they were defusing bombs. He was shy, yes, but he kept up with you. He got drier as he got more comfortable, answering your little jabs with quiet, deadpan comments that made you laugh harder than you meant to.
By the time you stood to leave, you had already decided that whatever his final offer was, you were going to accept it. Dex rose when you did, because of course he did, and you watched him catch himself almost reaching for your chair.
“Send the room specs to my manager,” you said. “Camera setup, schedule, moderation. All of it.”
He nodded.
“And Dex?”
He looked at you.
You smiled. “Don’t overthink it.”
By the time you got into the car, your manager had texted.
How did it go?
You looked back through the café window.
Dex was still sitting there, coffee untouched, staring down at the table like he was trying to process the fact that you had been real.
You typed back: Good chemistry :)
Which translated to: get the contract through at all costs.
—
The contract came through a week later.
Joanna read it first, then legal, then you, curled up on your sofa with a glass of iced coffee.
It was careful and specific. From platform split, moderation rules, content usage, safeword protocol, post-stream review period. Dex had done his homework like he was preparing for a military operation instead of a livestream.
Joanna called you after. “He’s weird.”
You smiled at the PDF on your screen. “I know.”
The schedule was locked in for Friday night, two months from the initial meeting.
It was prime livestream time, where most people were off work for the week and needed to blow some steam off.
The announcement that he was going to have a special guest went up at noon and started trending by dinner. By the next morning, the comments were already feral, speculating on who the guest could be. The other half were calling the guest “lucky,” like luck had anything to do with it.
By Friday afternoon, your bag was packed like any other shoot: robe, makeup, a backup outfit, your own wipes, your own water bottle, your own little collection of professional comforts that made unfamiliar rooms feel less unfamiliar. You had done this hundreds of times before, with different sets and different performers.
But this time, your stomach kept doing this stupid little flip every time you looked at the address.
—
Dex’s apartment was exactly as clean as you expected.
The first thing you saw was shoes lined neatly by the door, counters wiped down, unopened waters on the coffee table, folded towels stacked beside them, a bowl of mints like he had prepared for a business meeting and a sleepover at the same time. The contract sat printed beside a pen, already signed on his end, with little tabs marking the important sections.
Dex stood in the doorway in a black shirt and dark jeans, barefoot, hair still a little damp from a recent shower. His eyes flicked over you once before he looked away, polite enough to be cute and interested enough to fail at hiding it.
“Hi,” you said.
“Hi.”
You stepped inside, smiling as you looked around.
“You cleaned like my manager was coming to inspect the place.”
Dex shrugged. “Would she?”
“She usually does,” you chuckled, “but you negotiated me coming here alone, so…”
“Then I cleaned the right amount.”
That made you laugh, and he relaxed by about half an inch. He offered you water, pointed out where the bathroom was, showed you the towels and extra robe, and then handed you the final printed contract like this was all very normal.
When he led you to his livestream room, you felt a bit parasocial, which was weird, because you rarely felt that anymore. There’s the table you saw on stream! There's the bed in the background! There’s the chair he jerked—
“The water is in the corner,” Dex said, pointing yet again to another oasis of neatly arranged water bottles.
You nodded and smiled, looking at the countdown stream on his computer. You read the comments, feeling pleased with yourself.
devilcam199999: WHO IS IT?
6polly16: dex with a guest is crazy
starknaked3000: is it a model???
the.raft.wifi: hes probably already nervous lmao
You leaned closer to the screen, amused. “They’re going to be unbearable.”
“They usually are.”
You smiled and he pretended not to notice.
The setup was good. While his room didn't have studio gloss, he had flattering lighting, clean frame, camera angled to catch the bed if he widened the shot, desk close enough that he could cut the stream instantly. He walked you through the kill switch, delay, blocked terms, moderator list, and what to do if either of you wanted to stop.
“You really did your homework,” you said.
His eyes flicked to you, and that tiny almost-smile came back. “You sound surprised.”
“I’m not surprised. I’m impressed.”
It was enough to make his face warm while he turned back to the monitor like the settings suddenly needed his full attention.
You liked him. That was becoming inconvenient.
He had a first-timer’s shyness and a professional’s discipline, and the combination was doing stupid chemicals to react like fireworks in your brain.
Before he clicked anything live, he paused.
“Can I ask something?”
You leaned against the desk. “Yeah.”
Dex looked almost embarrassed, but not scared. Just very aware of himself. “Can I kiss you first?”
Your eyebrows lifted.
“To get it out of the way,” he added quickly, then immediately looked like he regretted phrasing it like that.
You laughed. “That is possibly the least professional way anyone has ever asked to kiss me.”
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
“I know.”
“I just don’t want the first one to be for them.”
Oh.
How sweet, asking for one small thing to belong to the two of you before the camera got any of it.
You stepped closer. “Okay.”
He looked pleasantly surprised.
Dex kissed you carefully, almost chastely, one hand hovering near your waist but not touching until you gave him the smallest nod. His mouth was warm and far more polite than anything about the night ahead of you had any right to be. It lasted maybe three seconds. Four, at most. A sweet little closed-mouth kiss that shouldn't have made your stomach dip the way it did.
When he pulled back, you smiled. “That was very respectable.”
His ears went pink. “Was that bad?”
“No,” you said, still smiling. “That was adorable.”
Dex looked like he would rather walk into traffic be called adorable by you, which only made it worse.
You reached up, fixed the collar of his shirt even though you were going to take it off him anyway, and stepped back before you could get too fond of him too quickly.
“Okay,” you said. “Now we work.”
That helped him, and you could see almost instantly, how it whipped the room back into shape.
He nodded and turned to the monitor while you stepped into the bathroom and stripped to change to your skimpy two piece-piece, grabbing your robe from your bag and slipped it over your shoulders. When you got back out, he was checking the countdown settings. The chat was moving so fast now it looked like static. Dex had not even gone live yet, and they were already losing their minds over the idea of a guest.
You stepped into the preview beside him.
There you were, on his camera.
You missed this. The amateur stuff. It's been like, three years since you’ve done it like this.
“Oh,” you said, watching the monitor. “This is going to be good.”
Dex looked at your reflection instead of the chat. “Yeah.”
You smiled. “Ready?”
He took one breath. Then he clicked the stream into place.
“Ready enough,” he said.
The five-minute countdown began.
—
Three…
Dex sat in his usual chair, fully clothed, hands folded loosely in his lap like this was a normal stream and not the first time his chat had ever been promised a guest.
Two…
The chat was already moving too fast.
One…
The waiting screen vanished.
For half a second, it was just Dex. Same room, same camera, same controlled lighting. Same pretty, unreadable face that made people tip just to see if they could crack it. He looked at the chat, then at something off-screen, then back at the camera with his jaw a little tighter than usual.
“Hi,” he said.
The chat exploded just from that.
fluid69: HIIIIII DEX
blipped_and_bricked: he looks nervous oh my god
0nlyCams0fKamarTaj: WHERE IS THE GUEST
mod_mara: Be respectful. Rules are pinned.
Dex read none of it out loud. He never really did when it moved like this. He only glanced at it, then back off-screen, where you were standing in your robe, smiling with your arms folded like this was the funniest thing you had done all year.
They had known about a mystery guest for two days. They had theorized, spiraled, argued, made tier lists, accused him of secretly having a girlfriend, accused him of hiring another camboy, accused him of doing a faceless collab, accused him of lying for engagement. No one had guessed you, because why would they? You had not cammed in three years. You didn’t just wander into camboy streams like a surprise prize.
Dex swallowed.
“I have…” He stopped, jaw flexing like the word was harder than it needed to be. “I have a friend here.”
You almost laughed.
A friend.
You, pornstar-men-recognized, standing barefoot in his bedroom in a silk robe, and Dex had introduced you like you were coming over to borrow sugar.
The chat went rabid.
redline.616: A FRIEND????
hellskitchen_: DEX HAS FRIENDS???
6courtroom9: no because why was that hot
_afterdark: show friend show friend show friend
TIPBOT: @/redline.616 tipped 25 tokens — “for the friend fund”
Dex’s ears went pink.
You decided to save him and ruin him at the same time by moving, showing one bare leg sliding into frame from the side, like you had wandered in by accident. Your robe skimmed high on your thigh. You heard the chat hitch, the delay catching up in a sudden, violent flood of messages.
Dex turned his head toward you.
You gave him your hand. He took it immediately.
That, for some reason, was what made the room feel intimate. Even on camera, even with thousands of people watching, he was going to do this properly.
He pulled you closer, not rough or showy, just a steady tug until you stepped between his knees, face still off-camera. Then he looked up at you, waiting.
You smiled down at him, let the pause stretch just long enough for the chat to collectively lose its mind, then lowered yourself into his lap.
Oh, boy.
pretty-prince: WAIT
pretty-prince: WAIT WAIT WAIT
skull.hour: IS THAT—
starknaked.3000: NO FUCKING WAY
27watch: I KNEW I RECOGNISED THAT LEG
mistermidnight: DEX WHAT DID YOU DO
TIPBOT: @/mistermidnight tipped 100 tokens — “IS THAT WHO I THINK IT IS?????”
TIPBOT: @/skull.hour tipped 250 tokens — “DEX YOU ABSOLUTE MADMAN”
You settled sideways across his thighs, one arm sliding around his shoulders as if you had sat there a hundred times. Dex went very still under you, almost stunned like his body had accepted you before his brain could process the fact that you were real, warm, and in his lap on his own stream.
“Hi,” you said to the camera.
That was all it took.
616.redline: I KNOW THAT VOICE I KNOW THAT VOICE
kamar-taj404: SHE HASN’T CAMMED IN YEARS?????
catholicguilt: DEX BAGGED A LEGEND???
the.raft.wifi: I WATCHED HER LAST NIGHT
velvet_77jaw: everybody shut up she’s real
blip.checked69: DEX BLINK TWICE IF YOU SOLD YOUR SOUL
TIPBOT: @/catholicguilt tipped 69 tokens — “I am deceased”
TIPBOT: @/goodboycommittee tipped 300 tokens — “I literally had her video open yesterday. Dex you lucky bastard.”
Dex read that one.
You felt it in the way his fingers flexed once at your waist in a tiny possessive twitch. That little reminder that yes, half the internet had seen you, wanted you, touched themselves to you, said filthy things about you. But now you were in his lap, on his screen, while they all watched him realize exactly how many people had wanted what he had his hands on.
You turned your head slightly, lips close to his ear.
“Breathe,” you murmured, sweet enough that the mic barely caught it.
Dex breathed.
The chat saw that too.
slowburnsir: he is NOT surviving this
camdad_404: his hands his HANDS
mod_mara: Do not spam. Tips are not requests unless accepted.
The second his eyes met yours, the room changed. The chat was still screaming. The tips were still chiming. The screen was still bright with names and numbers and disbelief. But Dex stopped looking like a camboy hosting a special stream and started looking like a man with you in his lap, trying very hard to remember that everyone else existed.
You smiled at him like you knew exactly what you were doing.
“Your chat is excited,” you said.
Dex’s gaze flicked to the screen, then back to you. His hands tightened again, just slightly.
You raised an eyebrow.
He looked flatly at the camera for half a second, then down at where you were settled across him.
“I noticed.”
The chat caught the tone even if they did not catch the whole meaning.
rorschach69: OH HE’S JEALOUS JEALOUS
confessional_3am: that was possessive as hell
guilttrip04: “i noticed” SIR????
billyphobia.16: wait this chemistry is insane
TIPBOT: @/lonelyplanet69 tipped 400 tokens — “for whatever that was”
You should have kept it professional, and to be fair, you mostly did.
You faced the camera again, one hand resting lightly against Dex’s chest, feeling his heartbeat under your palm. It was very fast. Sweet, actually, if you ignored the fact that the man beneath you looked one good compliment away from blacking out.
“Hi, chat,” you said, bright and calm, like you had not just detonated his entire platform. “I hear Dex promised you a guest.”
The chat screamed.
Dex, poor thing, looked at you like calling him by name in that voice had been an attack.
You smiled wider.
“So,” you continued, letting your fingers tap once against his shirt, “be nice to him tonight.”
You leaned a little closer to the camera, lowering your voice.
“He’s new at sharing you guys.”
After that, you stayed in his lap for a while, letting the audience settle as word spread that you were her. You saw the chat screaming itself into static while Dex tried very hard not to look like he was losing his mind on camera. He was touching you through the robe already, one palm over your hip, the other over the swell of your clothed breast, fingers pressing in like he could feel the heat through the fabric, like he was trying to be respectful and failing in the most beautiful way.
Dex’s ears went pink, but he kept his eyes on you.
You stepped in close, hands finding the hem of his shirt. He lifted his arms before you even had to ask. Disciplined Dex standing there half-submissive in front of his own camera while you dragged his shirt up over his stomach, over his chest, over those ridiculous shoulders, and tossed it off-frame like it didn’t matter.
The chat went wild at the sight of him.
You barely looked at them. You were too busy looking at him.
His chest rose and fell too quickly. His stomach tightened when your fingertips skimmed down the center. His teeth clenched when your nails grazed the waistband of his jeans. He was so still it almost looked controlled, except nothing about the front of his jeans was controlled at all.
Dex was already hard, and not even half-hard from nerves and anticipation. Rock fucking hard, straining behind denim like his body had given up pretending. Like sitting with you in his lap, smelling your perfume, seeing the chat call you a legend had ruined every professional thought in his head.
“Dex,” you said sweetly.
His eyes shut for half a second.
You laughed under your breath and popped the button of his jeans.
27noirsignal_: OH MY GOD
ricochet.004: He’s so embarrassing
redacted-h3ll : everybody act normal.
TIPBOT: @/anonymous tipped 500 tokens — “for that reaction”
The zipper came down slowly.
Dex’s hands twitched at his sides.
“Don’t help,” you murmured under your breath, not loud enough for the mic to catch it.
He froze.
You pushed his jeans down just enough, then his briefs, watching his face while he was exposed to you and the camera all at once. He sprang free, heavy and so obviously neglected that you made a pleased sound before you could stop yourself.
The chat exploded.
You reached for him, but not properly. You gave him the lightest touch, fingertips fluttering over him, barely there, soft little strokes that were more a tease than relief. Dex’s breath hitched. His stomach jumped. His hands curled into fists like he was physically stopping himself from grabbing you.
You touched him again, featherlight.
His hips gave one tiny, helpless twitch into your hand.
“Oh,” you whispered, smiling. “You’re sensitive.”
glasshog_77: DID HE JUST
midnightorbit : she barely touched him I’m crying
goodboycommittee: this is not a stream this is an execution
You wrapped your fingers around him for one second, just enough to feel him pulse in your hand, just enough to make his mouth part.
Then you let go.
Dex let out a broken little breath, like he hated how much he wanted to chase your touch.
You smiled like a terrible person. “Your turn.”
For a second, he just stared at you. Then his eyes dropped to the tie of your robe.
Dex reached for it carefully, like the silk was a trap. His fingers brushed your stomach through the fabric before he pulled the knot loose. The robe opened in a slip of blue shadow and skin, but you didn’t make him peel it off you. You just let it fall.
The silk slid down your shoulders, down your arms, and pooled at your feet, showing blue lingerie.
It was pretty, almost innocent, if anyone watching was stupid enough to believe that.
Dex stopped breathing.
The chat did too, for about half a second. Then it lost its collective mind.
27watch: she knew exactly what she was doing
devilcam199999: DEX BLINK IF YOU’RE ALIVE
TIPBOT: @/anonymous tipped 1000 tokens — “WELCOME BACK TO STREAMING”
Dex’s eyes dragged over you with a focus so intense it made your skin heat. It wasn’t polished or performative. Dex looked like he was trying to survive you.
You stepped closer, turned back so your ass was facing him, and took his wrist, guiding his hand to your waist.
“Touch me.”
His palm settled against your skin with reverence first, then hunger second. His fingers spread over your ribs, thumbs brushing the edge of the lace. He traced the strap of your bra with one finger, then bent his head and caught it gently between his teeth.
Your breath hitched.
His teeth tugged the blue strap down your shoulder inch by inch, his mouth hot against your skin, careful until your breath shook. Then less careful when he heard it. His lips followed the strap, kissing the place it had marked, and when his eyes flicked up to yours, there was something darker in them now.
“Turn around,” he said quietly, almost embarrassed by his own command.
You did, because fair was fair.
Dex’s hands went to your hips as you faced him again, your chest to his, your ass framed perfectly by the lens in that tiny blue scrap of lace. The chat started moving too fast to read. Tips chimed over each other, bright and frantic, while Dex stood in front you, naked and hard, one hand sliding to your back to steady you, the other moving down over your hip.
Then his hands cupped you, thumbs pressing into the soft flesh of your ass, spreading you slightly through the lingerie so the camera got the kind of view that made the chat forget how to spell.
catholicguilt: DEX???
soft_dom_accountant: HIS HANDS
the.raft.wifi: THE VIEW THE VIEW THE VIEW
goodboycommittee: chat shut up I’m dying
TIPBOT: @/mistermidnight tipped 500 tokens — “that angle is insane
And that was when Dex realized that the camera had the better view.
His hands paused. His fingers flexed once against your skin. His jaw tightened near your temple, and you watched his eyes flicker from you to the feed, from the feed back to what little of you he could see over your shoulder.
Oh.
Oh, he didn’t like that.
Chat clocked it before you did.
exitwound-17: HE’S JEALOUS OF US
badangle_300: DEX MAD WE CAN SEE HER ASS BETTER THAN HIM
holyshitcam.24: possessive king has logged on
user-51down: he set up the angle lol
TIPBOT: @/anonymous tipped 400 tokens — “for the angle”
Dex’s mouth flattened.
You arched your back just enough to make the view even worse for him and even better for them.
His hand shot to your back, pulling you back against him.
There he was.
Not the shy camboy or the careful professional. Just Dex, tense, jealous, turned on so badly he looked almost angry about it, his arousal hard against you from behind while thousands of people watched him lose the battle in real time.
You looked back at the camera and smiled.
“Aw,” you said, voice soft and sweet. “I think he forgot sharing means sharing.”
Dex’s grip tightened.
The chat screamed.
He bent close, lips brushing your ear.
“They get to watch,” he muttered.
His hands slid lower, possessive and warm, holding you open for one more second before he turned your face away from him.
“But I get to touch.”
Your back hit Dex’s chest, and you could feel the hard planes of his body behind you, the heat of his skin, the shaky rise and fall of his chest, the twitch against your lower back every time the chat said something particularly filthy. He was trying not to react, you could tell, wrapping an arm locked around your waist like he was keeping you in place for the camera and himself at the same time.
He was still jealous.
You could feel that too.
The chat had the front view now. You parted your thighs, your flushed chest, Dex’s big hand splayed possessively over your stomach. They could see the curve of your body better than he could, and it was clearly ruining him in several directions at once.
blindspot-13: this angle is criminal
sector_42seven: she’s so lucky smh
castle50files: DEX YOU GOOD???
TIPBOT: @/badangle_300 tipped 500 tokens — “I could never have his self-control”
Dex’s cheek brushed your temple when he leaned down.
“Tell me what to do,” he said.
It came out rough and almost too quiet. It wasn’t a performance. It wasn’t even a line. It was just a simple request.
Your stomach pulled tight.
Because Dex had his hands on you in front of thousands of people, but he still asked. He still waited. He still needed the words. Even with your hips held under his hands and your breath already starting to shake, he wanted instruction.
You turned your face slightly toward him. “You want me to teach you?”
You felt him twitch again against your back.
confessional.09: yikes
audiofile_6b: oh he LIKES being told
lessonpla.n: teacher voice unlocked
TIPBOT: @/anonymous tipped 300 tokens — “give him step by step instruction”
Dex’s hand tightened over your waist.
“Yes,” he said.
Fuck.
You smiled at the camera, sweet as sugar, and reached back to touch his thigh, just enough to make him feel your fingers and suffer.
“Okay,” you said. “First, put your hand here.”
You guided his hand up your stomach to your chest. Dex followed instantly, palm large and warm as it slid over your ribs. His fingers hesitated at the edge of your bra, then cupped one breast through the blue lace, careful at first, too careful, like he was scared of making you feel like a prop even though the entire point of the stream was showing you off.
You covered his hand with yours and squeezed.
His breath caught.
“Like that,” you murmured. “Don’t be scared.”
Dex swallowed, then did it again, firmer this time. His thumb dragged through the sheer fabric, and circled once. Your hips shifted back against him before you could stop yourself.
His mouth brushed your ear. “There?”
“Mm. There.”
The chat went white-hot.
echo.17room: SHE SAID THERE
9lives_witness: he’s learning in real time
paperclip-666: I’m going to be sick they’re so hot
bigwindow.34: DEX’S HANDS ARE HUGE?????
TIPBOT: @/bad.r0m4nce tipped 600 tokens — “student of the year”
Dex’s other hand moved lower, slower, down your stomach, over the rise and fall of your breathing. You felt the moment his fingers reached the waistband of your lingerie because he stopped again, waiting.
You were going to lose your mind.
“Under,” you told him.
His fingers slipped beneath the thin blue strap at your hip, and your thighs parted by instinct.
Dex went still behind you, his breathing now unsteady. You could feel him trying to stay controlled, trying not to rut helplessly against your back while he touched you, trying not to make this about how badly he wanted to lose his mind just from being told what to do.
“Lower,” you whispered.
He obeyed.
His fingers slid down, cautious, feeling the pool already gathered there, and the sound he made was almost inaudible. The mic caught just enough that the chat turned feral.
static.8pm: DID HE JUST MAKE A SOUND
mercykill_27: HE’S GONE
witnessbox.6: she’s literally teaching him and he’s dying
Dex’s forehead dipped against the side of your head. “Show me.”
You slid your hand over his, guiding two of his fingers higher, positioning them exactly where you wanted him. “Here. Not too hard. Keep your fingers flat.”
He rubbed once.
Your knees nearly buckled..
Dex felt that too. His arm around your waist tightened immediately, catching you, holding you up before the audience could even see you falter. Miss international pornstar, can’t be embarrassed like that in front of an audience, right?
“Like that?” he asked, voice wrecked.
You nodded, then remembered he needed more than that. “Yes. Small circles, Dex.”
He did exactly what you said.
Small, slow circles over your sensitive bundle of nerves, fingers slick beneath the lace, his other hand still cupping your breast for the camera like he couldn’t decide if he wanted them to watch or wanted to cover you from everyone. His thumb moved again, firmer now, and the combination made your head fall back against his shoulder.
Dex stopped for half a second.
“No,” you breathed, grabbing his wrist. “Don’t stop.”
He started again instantly.
The chat screamed.
panicbutton.23: DON’T STOPPPPP
sweetspot_808: he immediately listened lolol
kneesweak.4am: he is so obedient I’m unwell
goodboycommittee: Dex looks like he’s going to pass out
Dex’s fingers kept moving, slow and slick, learning the rhythm by how your body answered. When he pressed too hard, your hand tightened around his wrist and he eased off. When he drifted too low, you corrected him with a gentle, “Up, baby,” and his whole body shuddered behind you.
Baby ruined him.
You felt it in the hard twitch of him against your back.
“Oh,” you laughed, but it came out broken. “You liked being called that?”
Dex’s mouth pressed to your shoulder.
His silence was answer enough.
The chat caught the shape of it even if they missed the words.
catholicguilt: SHE CLOCKED HIM
velvet-raw: he is not beating the needy allegations
goodboycommittee: DEX BABY FOCUS
TIPBOT: @/soft_dom_accountant tipped 250 tokens — “focus and concentration, babe”
You rolled your hips into his hand, showing him the pace you wanted. “A little faster now. Don’t chase it. Let me grind against your fingers.”
Dex made another sound then, rough against your skin, and did exactly that. He held his hand firmer, letting you move on him, letting you use his fingers while his palm pressed you open under the thin lace. His other hand squeezed again in time with the movement of your hips.
It was filthy.
Worse, it was intimate.
There were thousands of people watching. The chat was flashing too quickly to read. Tips were chiming. The room was bright with the glow of the screen and the sound of strangers losing their minds. But all you could feel was Dex behind you, his breath hot at your neck, his fingers doing exactly what you told him because he wanted to be good for you more than he wanted to look in control.
“Good,” you whispered.
Dex’s hips jerked once against your back, and you made a lewd sigh you haven’t made in a long time.
His fingers faltered for one second, not stopping completely but losing the rhythm, and you knew exactly why.
You smiled, cruel and warm at once.
“Don’t look at them,” you murmured. “Look at me.”
His eyes dragged away from the chat to the monitor, to the reflection of your face tipped back against his shoulder, your mouth open, your body moving against his hand. He looked wrecked. Blushing, jealous, and so focused on your pleasure that the whole audience might as well have vanished.
“That’s it,” you said. “Right there.”
Dex’s fingers moved faster.
Your hand flew up to his wrist, not to stop him, just to hold on. His mouth found the side of your throat, and you felt him twitch again, harder this time. “Dex,” you gasped.
His voice was hoarse. “Tell me.”
You clenched around nothing.
“Keep going. Don’t change anything. Don’t you dare change anything.”
He didn’t.
For all his jealousy, all his almost-frantic arousal, Dex could follow an order beautifully. He kept the pressure perfect, the circles tight, his hand steady while you rocked into him, your breath breaking into little sounds you couldn’t dress up for the camera even if you wanted to.
And then you realized distantly, that you weren’t performing.
You were just naturally losing it while Dex was touching you exactly the way you told him to.
His arm locked tighter around your middle, holding you upright against him, his fingers never stopping. “Like this?”
“Exactly like that.”
“You’re close.”
It wasn’t a question.
You laughed, but it cracked into a moan. “Don’t sound so proud.”
“I am.”
Oh, fuck.
That should do it.
Heat snapped low in your stomach, pleasure cresting hard and fast because he sounded proud, because his hand was perfect. Your head tipped back against his shoulder, your hand clamped over his wrist, and you came on his fingers.
Dex held you through it.
He didn’t stop too soon and didn’t get greedy. He didn’t panic when your hips jerked or when your thighs shook. He slowed only when you told him to, easing you down until you were gasping against his chest, body loose and hot and humiliatingly satisfied.
For a moment, the chat was just chaos.
27noirsignal_: HOLY SHIT
lonelyplanet69: Men take notes.
catholicguilt : the praise kink economy is thriving
TIPBOT: @/anonymous tipped 2000 tokens — “WELCOME BACK INDEED”
Dex pulled his hand out from under your thong slowly.
You felt his fingers leave you and shivered.
Then you looked at the monitor, at his face, at the furious blush on his cheekbones. At his dark eyes locked on your reflection. At the way he held his wet fingers slightly away from your body like he didn’t know what to do with the evidence of what he had just done to you.
You smiled, and licked his finger to clean him up, making a show of it for his already feral audience.
Dex’s eyes went black, because you teased him too much.
You should have known better, honestly. Dex had already been wound tight before you ever sat in his lap. So maybe it was your fault when he finally broke.
You were still catching your breath, knees unsteady, your blue thong damp and shifted crookedly beneath his hand. The chat was still feral.
redacted-h3ll : SHE CAME FIRST
glassjaw_838: I’M NEVER RECOVERING
midnightorbit: he looks like he’s about to snap
lonelyplanet69: someone check on him
TIPBOT: @/anonymous tipped 2000 tokens — “GOOD BOY DEX”
Dex read that last one, and felt him freeze.
Then you laughed, and made it worse by looking back over your shoulder. “See that? They think you’re a good boy.”
His hand closed around your hip, and it wasn’t gentle this time.
“Oh,” you whispered.
Dex bent you over before you could finish the thought.
One second your back was against his chest, his arm around your waist. The next, your cheek was pressed on the desk, your eyes turned toward the monitor, your hips angled up, Dex behind you with both hands on your ass like he had finally stopped caring about looking composed.
The little blue thong was in his way.
Dex stared at it for half a second like he wanted to kill it.
Then he hooked his fingers under the thin strap and pulled it aside.
The stupid thing stayed stretched over one hip, pretty and useless, leaving you exposed for him and the screaming, frothing chat that had no idea they were watching the exact moment Dex stopped being manageable.
It was supposed to go on for much longer than this before this happened. The contract had been very clear about the intended sequence: strip each other, handwork, oral, teasing, breast play, then penetration if both performers confirmed continued consent. But it had also been clear that the sequence was not a binding script so much as a guideline, and that both performers could improvise as long as the safeword system remained active, respected, and immediate.
Your safeword was milkshake.
You hadn’t said milkshake.
You had not even come close.
What you said instead, when Dex pressed himself against you from behind, was, “Oh, fuck.”
Dex froze just long enough for one last thread of professionalism to drag itself through him. His hand slid up your spine, grounding. “This okay?”
Your fingers curled against the desk.
“Mmhmm,” you hummed l immediately. Then, because he was Dex and needed the final bullet point checked off before he lost his mind completely, you added, “Keep going.”
The sound he made was almost a laugh in relief.
You pushed your hips back a fraction, and that was when Dex lost it.
His hand locked around your hip, the other braced beside yours on the desk, his body folding over you just enough that his mouth brushed your ear. You could feel him shaking, not exactly with nerves, but with the force of wanting you so badly that restraint had become physically painful.
His voice came out wrecked, and much too honest for a man with thousands of people watching.
“Ready to watch your favourite pornstar take my virginity?”
For half a second, your brain went completely blank.
Wait.
What?
Then Dex pushed into you all at once.
Not elegantly with practiced timing, and not like a performer hitting a mark or giving the camera the perfect angle. He shoved into you like his body had been waiting so long it refused to negotiate anymore, and the shock of him punched the air straight out of your lungs.
Oh, Dex was big.
You knew that. You had touched him. You had wrapped your fingers around him and thought, somewhat smugly, that you understood exactly what you were dealing with.
You did not.
Because seeing was one thing. Feeling him split you open from behind, hard and curved just right, was another thing entirely. He hit somewhere deep and bright, the kind of spot that made your knees buckle even with the desk under your hands. Your mouth fell open. No sound came out at first. Just a broken little inhale while your body tried to process his size, the stretch, and the fact that Dex had just announced to a live audience that you were taking his virginity.
The chat went nuclear.
exitwound-17: VIRGIN?
holyshitcam.24: Dex is a virgin?!
the.raft.wifi: EXCUSE ME
catholicguilt: THIS IS HIS FIRST TIME?????
audiofile_6b: OMG SHE JUST TOOK DEX’S VIRGINITY LIVE
Except Dex moved. And every clever thought in your head went straight out the window.
His first thrust was clumsy. Too deep, too eager, too much. His rhythm stuttered because he clearly didn’t know whether to chase his own pleasure or watch yours, and somehow that made it hotter than anything scripted could have been. You had been fucked by men who knew exactly how to look good on camera. Men who knew their angles, their timing, their marketable groans. Men who could make sex look expensive and still make it feel like absolutely nothing.
Dex did not know how to make it look good.
Dex only cared about what made it feel good.
And fuck, did it.
He found that spot again by accident, then gripped harder when your whole body jolted under him. His hand tightened on your hip. “There?”
You were too fucked out to be dignified. “Yes. There. Again.”
He did it again, harder, and your arms nearly gave out.
For the first time in a long time, you weren’t performing in front of a camera. You weren’t making sure your face looked pretty when you moaned. You weren’t arching for the best light or thinking about whether the angle sold the chemistry. You weren’t managing another performer’s ego, not timing your reactions, not pretending someone was better than they were because the scene needed it.
You were bent over a camboy’s desk while he fucked you raw and messy and half out of his mind, and the only thing your body cared about was the way he kept hitting that spot, the way he learned from every sound you made, the way he adjusted not for the camera but for you.
His inexperience made him greedy. His obsession made him attentive. His jealousy made him filthy.
Every time the chat screamed about your body, Dex pulled you back harder onto him. Every time someone tipped for the view, his hand slid possessively over your ass like he was reminding them they could watch all they wanted, but they could not feel how tight you were around him. Every time you moaned his name, his rhythm broke.
“Dex,” you gasped.
His hips stuttered.
He folded over you, chest against your back, one arm wrapping around your waist to hold you up while he kept fucking into you in rough, uneven strokes. His mouth found your shoulder, teeth grazing skin, not quite biting, just desperate enough to make you clench around him.
He swore into your neck.
Dex, who had been so careful. Dex, who had asked to kiss you before the stream because he wanted one thing to belong to the two of you. Dex, who had printed contracts and arranged water bottles and checked the kill switch twice. That Dex was gone now, this Dex had no idea how to want halfway.
bad.r0m4nce: this man is having a religious epiphany
static.8pm: she broke him
mercykill_27: no he broke HER
TIPBOT: @/anonymous tipped 5000 tokens — “BEST STREAM ON THIS SITE”
You saw the messages blur across the monitor.
You didn’t care.
You could barely keep your eyes open.
Dex’s hand slid under you, fingers finding your sensitive spot between your legs again with frantic focus. He remembered what you had taught him, remembered the pressure, the small circles, except now he was fucking you while doing it and his hand was not nearly as steady as before.
You laughed, or tried to, but it came out as a moan. “Yes. Fuck, yes, just—don’t stop.”
He was determined while his hips kept snapping into you, making your body go loose and frantic at the same time. His breathing got harsher against your neck. His thrusts lost what little rhythm they had and became closer to instinct.
He was close.
His whole body changed, going tight behind you, arm locking around your waist, forehead pressed to your shoulder like he was trying to hold him back. It was an embarrassingly short time, and he knew it. He made one ruined moan into your skin and you clenched around him helplessly.
“Fuck,” Dex choked. “I’m—”
You should have said something professional. Something about pacing, control, stamina, the stream, the plan.
Instead, knowing you were religiously on the pill, you pushed back into him and whined, “Inside, please.”
Dex’s hips snapped forward once, deep and helpless.
You felt him empty himself in you.
His whole body shuddered, pulsing deep, his grip bruising-tight for one second before he caught himself and loosened like even mid-orgasm he was terrified of holding you too hard. He buried his face against your shoulder, shaking through it, breathing your name like he had no idea the mic could probably hear every broken piece of it.
And that should have been the end of it.
Except the feeling of him filling you, the heat of it, the broken little sound he made, the fact that Dex had lost his virginity inside you live on stream and was still rubbing your clit like the only thing he knew how to do was follow your last instruction….
It sent you over too.
Your orgasm tore through you so hard you actually cursed, hips jerking back against him, thighs shaking, hands slipping on the desk. Dex held you up through the whole thing, still making those ruined little sounds every time you clenched around him.
You were feral.
For a long time, there was no acting at all.
Chat was losing its mind.
kamar-taj404: THIS WAS HIS FIRST TIME. HIS FIRST TIME.
blip.checked69: she is NOT performing anymore
TIPBOT: @/anonymous tipped 10000 tokens — “HISTORY WAS MADE”
Dex stayed inside you for a moment, breathing hard against your shoulder, his arms around you like he had forgotten the stream existed too.
Then, very quietly, he asked, “Good?”
Your laugh came out wrecked.
“Good,” you echoed, voice hoarse. “Very fucking good.”
Dex smiled into your shoulder and stayed folded over you. One of his hands was braced on the desk beside yours, the other wrapped around your waist like he had forgotten he was allowed to let go.
You blinked at the monitor, still dazed, because the thing that kept replaying in your head was not the stream count, or the tips, or the fact that Dex had just fucked you live so messily that you had forgotten to perform.
It was the virgin thing.
It was genius, not telling beforehand to get a real reaction out of you.
Technically, he hadn’t done anything wrong. There was no contract clause that said a performer had to disclose previous sexual experience. You were tested, asked for consent, boundaries, yes. Experience level? No. Virginity was a construct anyway.
You knew all that.
You believed all that.
And still…
He had given you something he had never given anyone else, and even if that should not have mattered, even if you were too professional and too sex-industry literate to get sentimental about the concept of virginity—
Fuck.
It mattered.
It mattered enough that you should have known from the way he strictly did solo stuff. The way he had asked to kiss you before the stream because he didn’t want the first one to belong to the audience. The way you had to talk him through touching you.
Your fingers flexed against the desk.
“Dex,” you said finally, voice wrecked.
He hummed against your skin, barely enough to be a real answer.
You smiled, mean even like this. Especially like this. “Do you want to show chat?”
He went very still.
He understood what you meant: wanna zoom the camera on proof that you just made a mess in me?
It was standard, really, at this point. Shots like that were in high demand.
The chat saw your smile and started moving so fast the text blurred into light.
slowburnsir: SHOW CHAT WHAT
camdad_404: pleasepleaseplease
pretty-prince: DEX YOU OWE US
TIPBOT: @/skull.hour tipped 3000 tokens — “for the reveal”
Dex lifted his head.
His face was beside yours in the monitor, flushed and wrecked, hair mussed, eyes dark. He looked at the chat, at all the names begging, all the tips chiming, all the strangers who had watched you take him and still wanted more.
Then his mouth flattened. “No.”
Before the chat could even properly react, Dex reached past you and cut the stream.
The screen went black, and the sudden silence was so sharp it made you giggle.
Dex turned you around immediately, hands careful now despite everything, flipping you to face him and lifting your ass up to sit you on the desk against him. You were still laughing when he kissed you, almost desperate, then gentler when you kissed him back. His mouth was clumsy, like he had just realized the entire internet had seen him lose his mind over you, and now all he wanted was a part of you that belonged to neither camera nor contract nor chat.
You gave it to him.
Several, actually.
You kissed him until his shoulders dropped, until his hands stopped gripping like he was afraid you would vanish, until the frantic edge of him became almost shy again.
Then you blindly reached for one of the towels he had stacked nearby and tugged it underneath you, muscle memory.
You kissed the corner of his mouth. “You didn’t tell me you were a virgin.”
Dex looked at you for a second, still breathing hard.
Then, with the driest, most infuriating little tone, he said, “Well, I’m not anymore.”
You laughed so hard you had to hide your face against his chest.
Dex’s arms came around you properly, one hand smoothing over your back, the other resting low at your hip like he was still half-convinced touching you was a privilege he had to earn. He kissed your temple. Then your cheek. Then your mouth again, slower, like now that nobody was watching, he could finally stop performing control and simply be greedy.
Eventually, you pulled back just enough to smile.
“Okay,” you said, still close enough that your lips brushed his when you spoke. “Now did that convince you to make a video with me?”
Dex’s eyes changed.
It was subtle, returning to himself with a terrifying piece of certainty.
“I want an exclusivity contract.”
You blinked at him.
For a second, you genuinely thought you had misheard him, because there was possessive and then there was whatever the fuck that was.
He had just lost his virginity on livestream. He should have been dazed, maybe overwhelmed. Maybe asking whether the stream had gone well, whether the numbers were good, whether Joanna would be happy, whether the audience liked you with him.
Instead, Dex looked at you like he had found the one clause in the entire industry he cared about.
“Exclusivity contract,” he repeated.
Your mouth opened, then closed. “Dex.”
His hands tightened. “You never fuck another performer but me again,” he said, quiet and absolute. “Got it?”
Oh.
You had negotiated worse things than this with men who thought violent jealousy was part of the brand. You knew the difference between a possessive bit for the camera and a man who meant it so deeply it was probably a walking red flag.
See, a performer should not feel this possessive after one stream. A new collaborator shouldn’t look at you like every booked performer on your calendar was an affair.
You had been in this industry long enough to know when desire became entitlement, when chemistry became control, when a man started mistaking access for ownership.
Except Dex had not acted entitled to you.
Dex had wanted you so fucking badly, and still,he had still waited for every yes.
And, more than anything, he had made you love the job again.
Not in theory, not in the marketable, “I’m so lucky to do what I love” way you said in interviews when people wanted you to be grateful and sexy and easy to digest.
Dex had made you love it again.
He had made the camera feel electric again. He had made being watched feel intimate instead of routine. He had made you forget your angles. He had made you forget the chat. He had pleased you to the point that you stopped performing in front of an audience that had paid to see exactly that.
You should have been more alarmed by him.
Instead, you kissed him, and he made a low sound into your mouth when you bit gently at his bottom lip.
His hands slid around your waist, pulling you closer like he had been waiting for you to argue so he could convince you with his mouth. You let him. You let him kiss you like the contract was already signed, like he could sear your loyalty into his skin if he touched you carefully enough, desperately enough, possessively enough.
“Not even women?” You asked, almost innocently. “Guys usually like it when I—”
“No.”
Your thighs pressed together before you could stop them.
“If I’m gonna fuck you for a living,” he continued, “I’m not sharing.”
Oh.
Well.
That was inconveniently hot.
You should have told him that was impossible.
You should have told him exclusivity cost money, career-shaping money. That your name was a brand, your schedule was booked months in advance, your team would have questions, your existing scenes had deposits, clauses, penalties, timelines. That adult performers did not simply get claimed by the first beautiful, obsessive camboy who managed to make them orgasm on camera for the first time in a very long time.
Instead, you pouted.
“But I have a threesome schedule with Frank Castle and Matt Murdock next month.”
You watched every part of him shut down with jealousy. His mouth flattened. His eyes sharpened. His hands flexed on your waist like he could feel Frank’s name on one side of you and Matt’s on the other and wanted to drag you physically out of the hypothetical.
“Cancel it.”
You bit your lip, delighted. “Dex.”
“Cancel it,” he repeated.
“It’s already booked.”
“I don’t care.”
“There are contracts.”
“I’ll pay the fee.”
You blinked.
He did not say it like a joke. Like if there was a cancellation penalty, fine. If there was a buyout, fine. If Joanna wanted numbers, fine. Dex would find the number, calculate the cost, send the wire, and erase the booking from existence.
And God help you, you were into it.
“You can’t just buy me out of my own schedule,” you said, but you were smiling.
Dex’s eyes dropped to your mouth.
“I can try.”
You laughed, and he kissed the sound right out of you.
It was less shy now. Still controlled, but there was confidence in it that had not been there an hour ago.
His fingers slid up your back, into your hair, holding you where he wanted you while he kissed you harder. You let him for a second, then two, then long enough that the towel under you shifted and you had to laugh into his mouth again.
“You’re so cute.”
Dex frowned. “I’m serious.”
“I know.” You kissed him, smiling into it when he tried not to respond and failed. “That’s why it’s cute.”
His mouth chased yours when you pulled back.
You let him have another kiss. Then another. Then you cupped his face between both hands, still laughing softly, still stupidly charmed by the fact that Dex’s first post-virginity business decision was apparently to remove the entire rest of the industry from your schedule.
“Send the exclusivity contract to Joanna,” you murmured against his mouth.
Dex kissed you again.
You kissed him back, biting gently at his bottom lip just to feel the way he shuddered.
“And we’ll talk.”
His hands slid around your waist.
“Talk,” he repeated, like he didn’t believe either of you would be doing much talking.
You smiled.
“Mm-hmm. Professionally.”
Dex looked at you. Then at the black screen where his chat had been cut off mid-hysteria because he had decided the aftermath of your pleasure belonged to him and him alone.
I’m pretty certain I’ve devoured all your dex fics. You are just incredible, you write for him in every scenario and I’m transcended into heaven. Thank you thank you thank you!!
I’d be so curious to know your thoughts on a pornstar/camboy!dex. It’s a rogue one so please feel free to ignore this if the inspiration is lacking. But with the way you’ve written dad!Dex in a way I never thought could be possible, I’m sure that you could write anything.
Have the most wonderful day ❤️
you are so kind anon! I love the idea of camboy!Dex, and this will be up soon, paired with another request!
this is kind of out of the blue but i've been debating getting my first tattoo and you mentioned you're tatted up so... would you say it's worth it? everyone around me only tells me not to do it but likeeeee it'd be super pretty and cool and meaningful to me. I'm a little scared it'll hurt though
Omg hi nightlight! I love my tattoos, but I understand the experience is different for everybody.
I took so long to curate my first couple of tattoos. There's always that pressure of "having something meaningful," but I personally find that the more tattoos I get, the less that pressure matters. I have both sentimental tattoos and stupid tattoos (a carton of oat milk for no reason other than it's cute lol). I even have knife tattoos for no other reason other than they were pretty. I don't regret them, mostly because I believe in art of art's sake!
As for pain, it depends where you get it. What's funny is my right shin hurts like hell but when I got my left shin done, it didn't feel like anything bad. One on my arm hurts but one on my ear doesn't. The human body is such a fascinating thing, and pain charts might help, but I found that whatever you think it is, it's probably not as bad.
all in all, do whatever! It's your body, and if you do get it, I'm sure whatever you choose to get will look sick as hell.
may I pretty please request virgin!dex who doesn't want reader who takes his virginity away to have sex with anyone else? lowkey I think that's what he'd do lmao
I will combine this with another request, I hope you don't mind!!!!
Summary : Dex gets embarrassingly turned on watching you interrogate people.
Pairing : DDBA! Benjamin Poindexter x reader (she/her)
Warnings/tags : FREAK4FREAK, implied switch!Dex, foreplay, very suggestive sexual content, public-ish arousal, masturbation/palming through pants (no super anatomical detail as per usual), voyeurism, torture/interrogation, poisoning, implied death, blood/injury, guns, captivity/restraints, waterboarding a source mentioned, psychological torment, dark romantic comedy, food, Dex and reader are not a healthy-model couple, they are both murder gremlins, but hey, a least they love each other! Reader is very violent in this so please keep that in mind!!! (Lmk if I missed anything!) (Set after DDBA S2)
Word Count : 4.7k
Requested by : anon
Notes : I am in such a freaky!Dex mood and my requests didn’t disappoint! If that’s not your thing, don’t worry, I have a fluffy dad!Dex on the way and a Bucky blurb in the works. Enjoy!
Dex was palming himself through his trousers.
You knew.
He thought the dark hid it. He thought standing in the corner of the warehouse, just outside the bad flicker of the overhead light, made him invisible. He had that silent, tactical, killer-boyfriend posture down perfectly too: shoulders squared, chin slightly lowered, eyes fixed on you and only you.
But he was also obviously hard.
You knew because you had watched him get hard when you waterboarded a source two months ago. You knew because you had watched his mouth water with lust when you shot a man in the foot for saying “I don’t know” with what you felt was a disrespectful attitude. You knew because he had almost moaned, while you tied a guy to a swivel chair and spun him in circles until he was nauseous enough to start confessing government passwords between dry heaves.
There had been the Lego incident too, where you made a man kneel on the bricks and recite his own lies back to you while you and Dex ate lo mein out of the box and booed his performance.
There had been the karaoke machine incident, where you chained a broker to a folding chair and informed him that every wrong answer added another song to his mandatory performance list at gunpoint. By the time he was wheezing through a tearful rendition of “In The Navy” by the Village People while you scored him with a clipboard and shouted critiques, he was volunteering information you hadn’t even asked for yet.
There had been the game-show phase, where you dragged in a spinning prize wheel covered in handwritten categories like FINANCIAL CRIMES, CHILDHOOD TRAUMA, and INAPPROPRIATE AFFAIRS WITH SUBORDINATES. Every spin determined the next topic. You kept applauding after each answer and saying, “Fantastic energy from our contestant tonight,” while Dex stood in the corner looking like he was proud of you.
Dex had really just Pavlov-ed himself into thinking this was foreplay, so could you really blame him for getting bricked up, now?
To be fair, it was slightly embarrassing for him, because Dex used to do the interrogations.
He had been good at them too. Dex could make silence feel like a hand around their throat. He could stand too close, say almost nothing, and watch men realise their lives had become very small, very quickly. He had that unsettling calm, because your sources all knew he had the ability to make a paperclip feel like a loaded gun.
And then you got jealous.
Not jealous like possessive. Jealous like, “Baby, how come you always get to do the fun part?”
Dex had looked at you for a long moment, genuinely concerned, because you were sitting on the counter swinging your legs, eating fries out of the bag, asking to torture a man like you were asking to pick the movie.
“No,” he’d said.
You gasped like he’d betrayed you personally. “Baby.”
“No,” he shook his head because he loved you so much, he would never ever ever put you in harm’s way.
“Dex, please,” you pouted.
“No.”
“Please, please, please.”
He rubbed a hand over his face. “Sweetheart....”
“Pretty please.”
“No,” he tried to calm you down by wrapping his arm around you and pressing a firm kiss to your temple.
“With a cherry on top,” you looked up at him, all doe-eyed and adorable.
He stared at you.
You stared back, looking like an angel if angels had ever said, “I wanna do the torture,” in the same tone as, “I wanna go to the zoo.”
Dex lasted maybe twelve seconds, because he could not say no to his girl.
And that had been the beginning of the end, really, because it was humiliating how much better you were at it.
He was good.
You were theatre. You were yappy.
Dex was quiet and terrifying. You were loud and terrifying. You filled the room with so much insane commentary that the victim never got a moment to psychologically adjust. You were the human equivalent of sadistic Skeletor with a gun. Currently, you were walking around in tattered clothes, one sleeve hanging off your shoulder, blood drying under your chin, hair wild, acting like the man tied to the chair had inconvenienced your afternoon plans (he did).
A few hours earlier, the source had woken up strapped to a chair with a puncture mark crooking the inside of his arm and a piece of medical tape still stuck to his skin.
He had spent the first ten minutes screaming. Then the next ten demanding answers. Then the ten after that begging.
Then, while scrolling through your phone, you had informed him that while he was asleep, you had administered poison directly into his veins. You had even shown him the empty syringe.
The look on his face had been priceless.
Ever since then, he had been watching every movement you made like it might determine whether he lived or died. Which, to be fair, it probably would.
In one hand, you had a small glass vial. In the other, you had a takeaway milkshake cup.
“Okay,” you said, pacing in front of him. “Let’s start over, because apparently every question I ask has to go on a scenic little road trip before it reaches your brain.”
The source sobbed.
You stopped walking and stared. “Oh my god.”
Dex chuckled from the dark, a breath of sound from the shadows.
You pointed the vial toward him without looking. “Don’t encourage me, baby,” you cooed.
Dex hummed.
That was all he gave you now: a hum, a chuckle. Sometimes, if he was feeling brave, a small laugh.
The last time he had said anything more, you had whipped around mid-interrogation, pouted at him with blood on your cheek, and said, “Baby, you’re interrupting my one-woman show.”
Even though you were the one who asked him the question. “Dex, what do you think?”
And, tragically, Dex had answered.
The source had been halfway through a panic spiral, and Dex had calmly pointed out a contradiction in the man's story before you could get there yourself.
The source immediately latched onto it and started talking to Dex, as if Bullseye could be reasoned with better than you.
You had gone completely silent. Which, for you, was alarming.
Dex noticed, even if the source definitely hadn't.
You had just stared at both of them for a long moment before setting your drink down very carefully and announcing, in a voice so wounded it bordered on theatrical tragedy, “Wow.”
The source had looked confused. Dex had looked concerned.
“Wow,” you repeated.
“Baby—”
“No, it's fine.” Which meant it absolutely was not fine. “You can have it.”
“Have what?” Dex tilted his head.
“The interrogation.” You had thrown both hands up. “Clearly it's yours now, honey. Why don't I just go sit in the fucking audience?”
The source had looked between the two of you like he was witnessing a divorce. Dex, unfortunately, had made the mistake of looking amused, because even when you were murderous, Dex still thought you were adorable.
“Oh, that's cute,” you had snapped, bratty all of a sudden. “Laugh at your ditzy little girlfriend. That's fine.”
“I'm not laughing at you,” Dex frowned, finally realising his mistake. “I’d never.”
“You ruined the pacing,” you sighed, disappointed.
“Baby.”
“You stepped on my reveal.”
“There wasn't a reveal yet,” he furrowed his eyebrows.
“There was going to be.”
Dex had pinched the bridge of his nose. The source had quietly started crying again because mommy and daddy were fighting.
You pointed at him immediately. “See? He gets it.”
The interrogation had technically continued after that, but your feelings had been hurt enough that the performance suffered. You got the information eventually, but you spent the entire drive home dramatically staring out the window and refusing to acknowledge Dex's existence, which obviously broke your psychopath boyfriend’s heart.
By the time you got back to the apartment, you were still offended.
Dex had followed you inside. You had ignored him. He had followed you into the bedroom.You had ignored him harder.
Eventually he'd caught your wrist gently and pulled you into his lap before you could escape again. “Baby,” he whined, only to be met with silence. “Come on.”
There was only more silence.
“You know I didn't mean to ruin your bit.” He nuzzled into your neck. He was so pretty, dammit, was it hard to be properly mad.
You gave a little sniff and accused him, “But you did.”
Dex had buried his face against your shoulder with the exhausted patience of a man negotiating with a tiny yet violent warlord. “I'm sorry.”
“You made him think you were cooler than me.”
That had actually made Dex laugh, which was a mistake, because you had immediately tried to get up.
He'd wrapped both arms around your waist and held you there, kissing your neck, your nose, your cheek, apologizing between each one.
“Sorry.”
He kissed the end of your jawline.
“Sorry.”
He kissed the edge of your mouth.
“I'm very sorry.”
“You should be,” you huffed, “You ruined my one-woman show.”
“I know, baby.”
By the end of the night, Dex had been reduced to kissing every inch of you he could reach and murmuring apologies against your skin, fucking you from behind just the way you liked it, while you very generously considered forgiving him.
Which, eventually, you did. Mostly because he asked so nicely.
Since then, Dex had learned an important lesson: When you were in the middle of your show, he kept his commentary to a minimum.
So now he mostly stays quiet. Mostly.
“Right,” you continued, turning back to the source. “You sold information to The Hand’s little errand boys, which is already tacky. You lied to my boyfriend, which is stupid. You lied to me, which is worse. And then… and this is where I start taking things personally — you made me chase you through a warehouse in these boots.”
You lifted one leg slightly. The source stared at the boot with primal fear.
“These are cute,” you snapped. “These are not pursuit boots. These are ‘stand there and look hot boots! You clearly have no respect for fashion.”
Dex made another huff, and this time, it was dangerously close to a laugh.
You glanced toward the corner.
You could barely see his face, just the line of his face, the whites of his eyes, his shoulders too tight. His hand was low and lazy in the way men only got when they were trying very hard to look casual about touching themselves through tactical trousers.
You smiled.
He was caught.
Cute.
But you had a source to terrorise, so you let him suffer privately for another minute.
You held up the vial. “Do you want the antidote?”
The source nodded frantically.
“This?” you asked, shaking it lightly.
“Yes,” he choked. “Please.”
“Oh, now we’re polite,” you rolled your eyes.
“Please—”
“Wah, wah, wah,” you said, pulling a face. “Cry harder. Maybe if you make enough tears, we can recreate the Titanic and float the antidote over on a piece of driftwood.”
“I don’t know what you want!” He jerked against the chair.
You gasped so loudly Dex actually shifted. “Don’t know what I want?” You said, breathy, “Men. Always saying that.”
Dex hummed again from the dark, amused and doomed.
You looked at him like not you, of course, baby, and crouched in front of the source, vial between two fingers, milkshake balanced neatly in your other hand like this was a very normal hostage brunch.
You wiggled the vial, and the source's eyes locked onto it immediately like it was salvation.
Pathetic.
“Look at you,” you said. “You weren't this attentive when we asked you the first time.”
The source swallowed hard. “Please.”
“Awww please,” you said, mimicking his voice so badly it barely sounded human. “Please. Please. Save me. Help me. I lied to dangerous people and now there are consequences.”
Dex's chuckle.
“You know what really irritates me?” You asked. “The poison isn't even what's killing my mood right now.”
The source blinked.
“You are.”
His face fell.
“You had one job,” you continued. “One. Singular. Tiny. Little. Job. Tell the truth. That's it. That's the whole assignment. Kindergarteners handle more complicated instructions every day.”
He started to hurt push against the restraints. “I'll tell you—”
“You should've done that before the toxins started doing cartwheels through your circulatory system,” you said in between sips of your milkshake.
“I'll tell you anything!”
“Now?” You scoffed. “Now we're cooperative? Interesting timing.”
The source started shaking harder.
Dex bit back a moan so hard his muscles ticked.
His hand flexed once against the front of zippers, fingers pressing down like he could punish the reaction out of himself, but it only made it worse. He was hard enough that the thick fabric did nothing to hide him; you could see the heavy outline of his arousal straining against the fabric, obscene and obvious.
He wasn’t even subtle anymore.
His palm dragged once, slow and rough. If the room had been any darker, if the source had cried any louder, if you had looked at him one second longer, Dex might have given up completely and shoved his hand down there and started stroking himself right there in the corner while you ruined a man’s life.
You saw. And honestly, that was a problem for later as you turned back to the source and pretended you weren’t even a little wet.
“You have maybe,” you glanced at your bare wrist, where there was no watch, “a couple of hours.”
The source made a desperately strangled noise.
“Don’t ask me how long exactly,” You rolled your eyes. “I don’t like being micromanaged.”
The source sobbed. “I’ll tell you,” he blurted. “I’ll tell you anything, just— just give me the antidote.”
You looked delighted. “Oh, see?” You beamed, “Growth.”
Dex murmured something that might have been approval, might have been a prayer, might have just been the sound of a man realising he was edging himself until you were done being insane.
You stood dramatically and circled the chair.
The source tried to follow you with his eyes, and you hated that. “Don’t look at me like that.”
He immediately looked away.
“No,” you poured, “Now that’s rude.”
He looked back.
“Too much,” you sighed.
He started crying again, tears falling from the loser’s stupidly red eyes.
You threw your head back. “OH MY GOD,” you groaned, “Again with the crying. Do you have a subscription? Is this a service? Are they sending you little weekly boxes of tears?”
Dex laughed before he could stop himself. It was small and quickly swallowed, but it was too late. You heard it.
Your head snapped toward him with predatory delight.
Shamelessly, even then, Dex didn’t slow down with his hands.
The interrogation was only half the problem. The real problem was that Dex already knew what came after. He knew you'd be riding the adrenaline for hours, still buzzing from the power of making a man break. He knew you'd get your hands on him the second you were alone.
After a good interrogation, you got possessive. Bossy. Greedy for attention, and Dex loved it. He loved it when you climbed into his lap still stained with someone else's blood, smelling like gunpowder and victory. He loved when you grabbed his chin, told him what to do, and looked at him like he was yours.
Maybe he was hard because you looked gorgeous like this, giving a man hope when you were the one who poisoned him. Maybe it was the blood drying on your skin. Maybe it was the torn clothes hanging off your body.
But mostly he was thinking about getting home. About you shoving him through the apartment door before it was even locked. About being dragged down onto the couch or the bed or the floor. Dex couldn’t stop thinking about getting you home, about yanking your clothes aside and feeling you sink down on him still slick, hot, and shaking.
He wanted your thighs tight around his hips, your fingers fisted in his hair, your mouth still running filthy in his ear while you took him. He wanted you squeezing around him so hard he forgot how to breathe, laughing when he moaned, telling him he looked so pretty trying to behave, telling him he’d been so good watching, telling him to keep his hands on you and take it.
And Dex would just sit there wrecked under you, hands locked on your waist, letting you use him until all that rage finally burned out.
Dex knew you always got worse after: Meaner, needier, hotter.
So there he was, standing in the dark trying to look intimidating and dangerous, while secretly imagining you pinning him flat on his back an hour from now, riding him through the last of that interrogation rush while telling him exactly how good he'd been. Poor guy never stood a chance.
You tilted your head. “Dex,” you said, conversationally, “are you hard right now?”
The source stopped crying so abruptly, you thought he might vomit.
Dex stared at you, almost lovingly. You stared back.
Then the source whispered, horrified, “W-what?”
You put down the milkshake and snapped a gun you had in your belt toward him without looking. “Not you,” you scowled. “Adults are talking.”
Dex inhaled through his nose, useless, like you couldn’t already see how badly his body had betrayed him. He was so turned on, leaking enough to stain,
Dex just shrugged.
Like yes. Obviously. What else was he supposed to do while you stood there torturing people?
You grinned.
“See?” you told the source. “You made it weird.”
Even though you were just as into it. Poor guy didn’t know this was foreplay.
“I didn’t—” he attempted to say, but you interrupted.
“You did,” you insisted, “If you had answered twenty minutes ago, my boyfriend wouldn’t be over there acting like the dirty slut he is, hm?”
Dex closed his eyes for half a second, having a tiny funeral for his dignity.
You turned back to the source and leaned close enough for him to see your smile properly.
“Now,” you said, throwing both arms into the air so dramatically your sleeves slipped down your wrists, looking every bit like a spouse at the end of a disastrous marriage counseling session, “tell me where the drive is before I start taking this personally.”
The source stared at you. His face was slick with sweat, blood crusted at the corner of his mouth. His chest rose and fell in quick, shallow bursts as he sat bound to the chair.
You stared right back. Then you pointed at yourself with exaggerated disbelief.
“Do you have any idea what tonight was supposed to be?”
The source blinked, confused and terrified all the same.
“No, seriously,” you continued, leaning forward. “Guess.”
“I—”
“Date night,” you said, and the words came out wounded and offended, “Date. Night.”
You pressed a hand dramatically against your chest and turned toward the dark corner of the warehouse where Dex stood.
You pointed at him. “Tell him.”
Dex, wisely, said nothing.
“Thank you,” you replied immediately, as if he'd just delivered a heartfelt speech supporting your argument.
Then you spun back toward the source.
“We had plans.”
The source looked seconds away from fainting.
“We were gonna leave early.”
You started counting on your fingers.
“Maybe get Thai.”
Another finger.
“Maybe my sweetheart was gonna watch me commit light arson.”
Another, skipping over the fact that you had called Benjamin Poindexter my sweetheart in front of an enemy.
“Maybe make out in a parking garage.” You shrugged. “You know. Romance.”
“Please—”
“No, because now I'm upset.” You crouched in front of him. The movement was sudden enough that he flinched. Even then, your smile widened. “You lied to us.”
“I'm telling you now!”
“After making us chase you.”
“I—”
“After making me climb stairs,” you huffed.
The source blinked. His expression changed into genuine confusion. You looked personally offended by his confusion.
“Do you know how many stairs?” You asked.
“...No?”
“Neither do I.” You stood abruptly. “Too many.”
Your boots scraped across the concrete as you began pacing. Back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth, like an agitated predator trying to decide where to bite.
“Dex,” you called over your shoulder, “tell him how many stairs.”
Dex bit his lip, slowing down his hand movements, because he was too fucking close to burst in his pants. Still, he said nothing.
You jabbed a finger toward the source. “See? Even Dex is upset.”
Slowly, cruelly, you lifted the vial. The tiny glass container caught the warehouse light as a clear liquid shifted inside.
Immediately, the source's eyes locked onto it.
Good.
You gave the vial a small shake as the liquid sloshed against the glass.The source visibly recoiled.
“Look at him,” you complained to Dex. You gestured toward the trembling man.
“He's only interested in the vial.”
You shook your head.
“Not our relationship.”
Another disappointed shake.
“Not our feelings.”
“Baby,” Dex said quietly from the corner. It sounded like a warning, but really, he was moaning.
“No,” you warned, pointing at the source again. “This is why communication matters.”
“P-please just give me the antidote,” the source begged, foam starting at the mouth. Not too long, now.
You whirled around dramatically. “See?” You pointed at him. “Me, me, me! Is everything about you?”
The source made a strangled noise.
You sighed, as if carrying the burden of emotional maturity was simply too much.
Then, without warning, you pinched the vial delicately between two fingers and held it out over the concrete floor.
The source froze, every muscle in his body violently locking. His eyes widened so far they looked painful.
“Tell me where the drive is,” you said sweetly, “or I drop it.”
The color drained from his face. “Wait—”
You loosened your grip, just slightly.
A panicked noise ripped straight from his throat. “WAIT.”
“Then talk,” you sneered.
“PLEASE.”
“Talk,” you said, now sing-songy.
“PLEASE DON'T DROP IT.”
You tilted your head, pretending to look genuinely conflicted. “Dex, baby.”
From the darkness came Dex’s voice, “Hm?”
You turned your head just enough to find him in the shadows, then batted your lashes. “Should I drop it?”
“No.” His answer came too quickly to be anything but part of the bit, but his hand told a completely different story. It was still low, gripping himself through the denim, trying to make it look like nothing while you both knew exactly what it was.
You smiled wider. “Just a little?”
“No.” His voice stayed calm. His hand didn’t.
“Tiny bit?”
“No.”
You sighed dramatically and looked back at the source.
“See?” You gestured toward Dex with the vial. “He’s the reasonable one in this relationship.”
The source was openly crying now.
Not tearing up or sniffling. Actual fucking tears running down his face, shoulders shaking, breath hiccuping like his whole body had given up on dignity.
You stared at him.
“Oh my god.” You glanced back toward Dex, whose silence was getting less professional by the second. “Did I break him?”
Dex made a small sound in the dark. Almost a laugh, almost a groan.
That did it.
The source shattered.
Words exploded out of him: Names, drive locations, locker numbers, addresses, passwords, dead drops, contacts. Everything came spilling out so fast he nearly choked on it, each sentence tripping over the last in a desperate rush to answer before your pretty fingers slipped.
You listened with delighted attention, head tilted and smiling. “See?”
More information spilled out.
“That wasn’t so hard.”
The chair rattled beneath him from how violently he was shaking, sweat dripping from his forehead because he could feel the poisons grip on him now.
Tears streaked through the grime on his face. His voice cracked repeatedly as he emptied everything he knew else into the room.
You nodded approvingly.
His eyes were hollow. His face pale.His body sagged against the restraints.
“Please,” he whispered. “Please.”
“More,” you simply said, “I know you have more.”
Dex chuckled.
You pointed at him again. “Don’t interrupt, baby! It's rude.”
He hummed.
“Don’t hm me either.”
He went quiet.
Good boy.
The source kept babbling. You let him. You even encouraged him with little nods and fake sympathy noises until finally he was empty, sagging in the chair, sweaty and pale and stupid with relief.
That was adorable.
You walked back around to face him and held the vial up.
He stared at it.
“Please,” he whispered.
You smiled, faux-kind. Then, you placed the vial carefully in his lap.
“There,” you said. He cried harder, but this time in gratitude, which was somehow more annoying. You leaned in, voice bright and cruel. “Oh, and I left you a knife.”
His gaze dropped, and there it was, on the floor near his bound hands. Close enough to give him hope. Far enough to make it desperate.
Dex’s eyes flicked to it, then back to you.
“You can figure it out,” you told the source. “Cut yourself free. Drink your little miracle. Reflect on your choices. Maybe start a podcast or whatever you red-pilled boys do, huh?”
The source was shaking too hard to speak.
You patted his cheek once, lightly. “Don’t thank me. I’m shy.”
Dex was on you the second you turned and made your way to the warehouse exit.
His hand caught your waist, fingers biting into torn fabric, and his mouth crashed into yours like he had been starving in the corner all night. All that restraint, all that pretending he wasn’t hard and ruined while you stood there… gone the second he touched you.
You laughed into his mouth. “You liked my show, baby?”
Dex’s answer was a kiss so rough your back nearly hit the wall, desperate and needy and so fucking horny.
That was answer enough.
When you pulled away, it wasn’t far. It was just enough to look down between you.
Enough to see the hard, obvious strain of him through his trousers. Enough to see the damp patch darkening the fabric where he had leaked through, so worked up from watching you that he hadn’t even been able to hide it.
Your smile went sweet. You slid down just enough to press your mouth over it through the cloth.
Dex went still, as if you had put a knife to his throat.
Your tongue dragged once, lewd and slow, tasting the mess he’d made of himself, and the sound that came out of him was music to your eyes.
“Hmm,” you murmured, looking up at him through your lashes. “You always taste so sweet.”
Dex snapped; the final break of a man who had spent too long behaving.
His hand fisted in the back of your torn shirt, and then you were up, hauled over his shoulder in one brutal motion, your laugh breathless as the warehouse tilted beneath you. Dex’s arm locked over the backs of your thighs, possessive and firm, keeping you there like he was done asking his own body for permission.
Behind you, the source whimpered.
Behind you, metal scraped against concrete, rope strained, hope making its pathetic little noise in the dark. Then came the tiny pop of the vial opening, a desperate swallow, another, and then a silence you could only describe as a sinking realization that he’d been fooled.
You could picture his face changing without even looking: relief curdling into confusion, tongue working against the burn, waiting for medicine and tasting cheap airplane liquor instead.
“That’s…” His voice cracked, thin with horror. “That’s vodka.”
A broken wail ripped through the warehouse, and you only smiled against Dex’s shoulder, sweet and smug, because the poison was real, the antidote was not, and Modified Hemlock B had never had a cure in the first place.
Dummy.
Dex stopped in the doorway at the wail, chest rising hard, one hand still gripping your thigh like he was five seconds from losing patience with the entire concept of distance.
You lifted your head, blood on your cheek, smug as sin.
Dex looked back into the warehouse. Then at you.
Then he smiled, knowing how much you enjoyed that. And yet, Dex was still so fucking in love.
“You’re worse than me.”
You only laughed, dangling over his shoulder like a prize he’d stolen from a crime scene.
“Aw,” you sighed dreamily, “You always say such nice things.”
Dex carried you out into the night urgently. He knew that if he didn’t get you home soon, he was going to ruin you against the nearest wall instead.
Summary : Dex tries to leave you for your own good. You both know it won’t last.
Pairing : DDBA! Benjamin Poindexter x reader (she/her)
Warnings/tags : FREAK4FREAK, makeup sex, no anatomical detail but still explicit, angst-ish jealous!Dex, stalking-ish, kidnapping mentioned, injury, murder, blood, car sex, morally dark romance, not a healthy relationship but then again both Dex and Reader are batshit insane, food, brief mention of suicidal ideation. (let me know if I missed anything!)
Word Count : 7k
Notes : I think I’m currently on a jealous!Dex mindset. Enjoy!
Dex broke up with you like he was doing you a favor.
He stood in your kitchen with his hands folded in front of him, shoulders stiff, eyes fixed somewhere over your head because he knew if he actually looked at you, he wouldn’t be strong enough to do it.
So, even though it felt like putting a gun in his mouth and pulling the trigger, splattering brain matter all over the white wall, he said it anyway.
“I’m not good for you.”
It was shaky, but it was a good effort. He had been thinking about how he would say it all morning, the second it left his lips, it tasted like poison.
You blinked at him.
For a second, Dex thought you might cry.
Instead, you laughed.
It was jarring, too bright in your cute little apartment, with your pink mugs drying beside his perfectly arranged knives by the sink and one of his shirts hanging over the back of your chair because you had worn it to bed the night before. The whole place was full of him: his order tucked into your chaos. His clean routines stare against your glitter and mess. His life was already so carefully arranged around yours, it was funny to think he would ever walk away.
“Oh, baby,” you said, pressing a hand to your chest, fake-hurt and saccharine in nature. “Is that what we’re doing? You’re saving me?”
Dex flinched.
Because yes! Yes, he was. He was a good guy now, and as selfish he might be, he would rather have you alone without him then dead with him. He could stalk you, watch you, keep you safe from a distance, even if you broke up. He couldn’t do it if you were fucking deceased now, could he?
“They took you last night to get to me,” he said, fidgeting with nothing in his fingers. “You’re in danger because of me.”
He was right, of course. Some rogue task force agents had figured out Bullseye had a girlfriend and decided you would make good bait. They bound, gagged, bruised, shoved you into the back of a van and drove you to an empty warehouse.
They didn’t tell their superiors, of course. They said get Bullseye first, kill him, bring the dead body to Powell, and get a promotion. That way, nobody else got to take the credit for their work right?
Dex had gone supernova and found you an hour later.
And you had been so sweetly delighted to see him, even like that. He was your beautiful, blood-soaked rescue dog with murder in his eyes and hands that killed your captors.
He had held, cradled, and unbound you, asked you if you were okay, and all you did was smile at him with blood trailing down your mouth and asked “what do you want for dinner baby?”
Fuck.
He had carried you back and watched you sleep. He was awake all night with a pistol in his grip, watching the door, the windows, the hallway, the rise and fall of your chest. Every breath you took felt like a reprieve he hadn’t earned.
By morning, he had convinced himself that leaving you was the only good guy option he had left.
Your smile dropped.
Because that, unfortunately, was the thing about Dex. He could be cruel by accident. He could stand there with those sad eyes and talk like loving you was a crime, talking down on you as if any man could tell you what to do for your own good. Please.
You frowned, stepping closer. “You don’t get to decide that for me.”
“I already did,” he sighed.
There it was. He felt like he had slit himself in the wrist saying that.
For a second, you looked genuinely wounded.
Dex saw it, he wanted to move toward you. His hands wanted your face, your waist, your bruised wrists, wanted to hold every hurt place and swear he would drown every task force officer in the city before anyone touched you again.
But that was the problem, wasn’t it? Dex loved you like a weapon. He loved you so much it made enemies out of strangers. It turned you into a target.
The spiralling thought crawled through him, sick and relentless: if he stayed, they would come back. If he stayed, someone would use you to get to him again. If he stayed, one day he would be late and you would be dead and you death was the one thing he cannot be responsible for, he can’t, he can’t, he can’t, he fucking can’t!
But then your frown disappeared.
It turned… glossy. Your mouth was pressed into a right pretty line, and you tilted your head as if you had just remembered you were supposed to be the fun one in the relationship.
“Okay,” you said sweetly.
What?
Dex’s eyes narrowed. “Okay?”
“Yeah.” You patted his cheek once, almost condescending. “Go be noble, handsome.”
He looked confused then, even when he was heartbroken beneath it. He had expected some emotion. A fight maybe.
Your anger would have made sense. Your grief would have made sense. Some sick part of him had pictured you crying so hard you couldn’t breathe, hands fisted in his shirt, nails scraping his skin as you begged him not to leave you. He had imagined you shoving him, cursing him, maybe even dragging a chair across the kitchen and threatening to tie him to it just to keep him there.
But you only smiled.
And fuck, the rotten, possessive monster in him was insulted.
Like how dare you let him do exactly what he said he’d do? How dare you stand there calm and pretty while he was ripping himself out of your life with his bare hands? How dare you not make him bleed for it? Dex wanted punishment. He wanted proof. He wanted you to lose control so he could feel your undying love.
Instead, you gave him permission.
You even grabbed his wrist and walked him to the door.
Dex followed because he had started this and because stopping now would mean admitting the truth: that every step away from you felt wrong.
His eyes dragged on everything as he moved: The mug he always used. The little smear of red polish he hated on the counter from when you had painted your nails there. The chair where he had sat last night cleaning blood from under his fingernails while listening to you rant about your kidnapper’s bad manners.
He had spent so long trying to root himself in your life. Now you were opening the door like he was nothing but a guest.
“If you want to leave,” you said, still smiling, “then leave.”
Dex stopped in front of you.
He wanted you to make it impossible. He hated himself for that. He wanted the door slammed shut, he wanted any proof that this wasn’t as simple as walking out. But you only stood there, beautiful as ever in his shirt, looking at him like you had already decided what came next for the both of you.
His chest felt too tight, his throat felt raw. He told himself this was good. This was better. You were letting him go, so that should’ve been mercy.
So why did it feel like punishment?
He looked down at your mouth, at your split lip. He had kissed you so carefully there just hours before. And now, you caught the front of his shirt and pulled him down into a kiss soft enough to make him sigh.
It was a goodbye kiss, he realised. At least you wanted him to think that.
For one breath, Dex tried not to kiss you back. Then he failed, because he was Dex, and you were you, and there had never been anything normal about the way you loved each other. His hand came up to cup your face, careful around the bruise on your cheek, careful around the split in your lip, careful even now while he was leaving you.
When you pulled away, he followed for half an inch before catching himself.
You smiled against his mouth.
“There,” you whispered. “Now go be noble.”
Dex stepped into the hallway like every inch of distance cost him his sanity.
You didn’t stop him.
You only stood there in the doorway, bright-eyed and terrible, watching him leave like this was not killing you, too.
At the elevator, he looked back.
You smiled and waved at him.
The doors closed between you.
Dex stood there with empty hands and a heart that would not stop clawing at his ribs, telling himself this was right. This was love. This was what a good man would do.
At least you were making it easy… right?
—
Three days later, he found a package of all of his stuff on his doorstep, though he didn’t know how you found his new address so quickly.
He was sure he’d been subtle, and yet, you continued to surprise him.
It had been left exactly in the blind spot between the hallway camera and the stairwell mirror, where no one would have seen you drop it off. Smart girl, he thought, then immediately hated himself for thinking it.
He opened the box to see that you had wrapped his knives individually, blades oiled, handles cleaned, each one placed parallel to the next. His spare ammunition case was taped shut with some strawberry washi tape. His toothbrush was sealed in a little plastic bag. His socks were folded the way he folded them, which felt more intimate than if you had thrown them loose into the box.
Dex crouched in the doorway for a moment, staring down at the package like it might bite. Like you might be hiding inside it somehow, waiting to laugh at him for flinching.
There was no note, though you had never needed a note to make a point.
He carried the box inside and unpacked it thoroughly, every item coming out like evidence. These were all proof that he had lived in your apartment. Proof that you had let him. Proof that, for a while, he had been stupid enough to believe he could have nice things. A world's best boyfriend mug, a box of tea you bought him, a book he had read just because you had written little comments in the margins and he liked hearing your voice in his head.
Then he found the shirt. The one you had been wearing when he broke up with you.
It was his shirt, technically. It was grey and soft from too many washes, still creased in the shape of your body. You had folded it carefully and placed it there like a final insult.
Dex picked it up.
He should have put it away. He should have washed it. He should have thrown it out if he was really as noble as he had tried so hard to be.
Instead, he pressed it to his face before he could stop himself.
It still smelled like you.
Like cinnamon, sugar, the faint trace of your shampoo. He missed you so much and so stupidly that for a second he forgot he was standing alone in a studio apartment he hated, holding a box of proof that you had accepted his leaving better than he had.
At the bottom of the package, beneath his things, was a burner phone, fully charged, with one number saved.
Dex stared at it.
Fuck.
He should crush it and throw it away. Instead, he placed it on his bedside table.
—
That night, he tried to sleep with the lights off and failed. The apartment was too empty. There was no sound of you moving around in the kitchen, no music playing low from your phone, no drawer half-open because you had taken out a bread knife and forgotten to close it. You weren’t there to cuddle up to him. No evidence of anyone alive but him.
He told himself this was good. This was the whole point of leaving, right?
You were away from him, and therefore away from the target on his back. You were alive. You were safe. Maybe you were angry, maybe you were already plotting something awful, but at least you were breathing somewhere he couldn’t ruin you.
Still, Dex laid on his side with your unwashed shirt gathered in his hands. He hated himself for it. Hated the way he pressed his face into the fabric and inhaled desperate like an addict. Hated that his body relaxed when he did. Hated that even after walking away, some animal part of him still believed your scent meant home.
He must have slept eventually, because the burner phone lighting up felt like a gunshot in the dark.
Dex opened his eyes and reached for it before he could talk himself out of it.
The first thing you sent was a photo of yourself in that red dress.
Oh.
The dress was obscene. He had always loved it, but he pretended to disapprove of it. He said it was too tight. It showed too much of your cleavage, your shoulders. This time, your lips were painted to match.
He remembered standing behind you once, hands on your waist, looking at you in the mirror and saying, very calmly, that you were not wearing that outside.
You had laughed then and called him possessive.
He hadn’t denied it.
Now you were wearing it for someone else.
Underneath, your message read:
date night!!! don’t worry he’s probably only committed tax fraud and like, three white collar crimes. character growth for me xoxo
Dex stared at the photo until the edges of his vision sharpened.
The room seemed to narrow around the screen and your bare collarbone and the curve of your smile.
He fucking hated the the idea of some man sitting across from you, looking at you in that dress, thinking he had earned the right.
Then the phone buzzed again.
You had sent a location, followed by a screenshot of a Tinder profile.
Dex clicked it before he could stop himself.
The man was too old for you, and definitely too smug. He had an expensive suit in the first photo, dead eyes, a bio full of words like entrepreneur and traditional values and looking for someone feminine.
Dex could see exactly what you had picked him for. Obviously, this man was designed in a lab to make Dex want to put his fist through a wall.
Twenty years older than you, at least.
His thumb hovered over the screen when the message came through.
trying soooo hard to date normal men now that my scary ex boyfriend dumped me for my own good :(
Dex sat up, your shirt was still in his lap.
The stupid, rational, noble part of him tried to tell him not to answer. It told him this was bait. It told him you had always been clever enough to turn his own jealousy into a leash.
Then Dex stared at the phone until it buzzed one more time.
he keeps looking at my chest btw. very empowering for me as a single woman
Ugh.
Dex got out of bed.
—
He didn’t go to seek you out.
Pfft.
That was what Dex told himself.
He didn’t grab his coat because of you. He didn't take the burner phone with him because of you. He didn't go across the city with his teeth clenched so tight it hurt because you were sitting pretty, smiling at a man old enough to know better and stupid enough not to.
He was just passing by.
That was all.
He just happened to end up outside the restaurant while going on a walk. He just happened to cross the street with his hands in his pockets with head down.
He didn’t go inside.
That was progress.
That was him being so fucking noble it made his him wanna vomit.
Dex stopped by the window.
Inside, the restaurant was dim and expensive in that hollow, tasteless way. You sat near the back, of course you did, angled just enough that he could see you.
And there you were, beautiful as the day he left you, which was like, last Tuesday.
Your date leaned toward you, talking at your mouth instead of your face.
Dex’s hand twitched.
You looked bored, actually. You had your chin in your hand, eyes dull, smile fixed in that polite little shape Dex knew meant you had mentally killed someone six different ways and found all of them uninspiring.
Then your eyes flicked toward the window, and you saw him.
You smiled, knowing there was an audience now.
And suddenly, magically, you were interested in your date.
You sat up straighter and twirled a piece of hair around your finger. You tilted your head at the man like whatever he had just said was fascinating instead of probably criminally stupid. You even laughed the kind of laugh Dex had once heard against his own throat in bed.
The man smiled wider, encouraged. He leaned closer.
Too fucking close.
Dex’s hand furled into fists, nails digging into his palms. He didn’t even realise he had bled until he heard a little drip on the pavement.
He wanted to fucking put his head through a mirror, but he didn’t. Because killing him would give you exactly what you wanted.
And Dex might have been a psychopath, but he wasn’t stupid.
You wanted him to make a scene. You wanted him to walk in and ruin your date and prove, in front of everyone, that he had never really let you go. You wanted blood on the white tablecloth and his hand around your wrist and that furious voice telling you that you were done.
He knew you.
He knew the trap because he wanted to step into it so badly.
So before he did something stupid, he left.
He walked back down the street, breathing evenly.
Then he saw the man’s car. He recognised it from his dating profile.
Dex stopped.
It was parked near the curb, glossy and obnoxious, exactly the kind of car a man like that would own. He looked at it for one long second.
No.
He was not going to kill him.
That would be unreasonable.
Instead, Dex took out his knife and slashed his tyres.
There.
Now the man couldn’t take you home.
Dex wiped the blade, folded it away, and walked back to his car feeling almost sane.
—
Two days later, the burner phone lit up in the dark while he was sitting on the edge of his bed, still awake, still pretending he was not waiting for it.
He picked up the phone pathetically quickly, and a photo loaded.
Dex went very still.
It was a rooftop bar, with city lights behind you, gold light on your skin. You were perched beside a man in a suit too expensive to be tasteful, eyes glittering toward the camera like you knew exactly what you were doing to him.
Worse, you were kissing the man on the cheek.
You weren’t really kissing him. Dex could tell. Your mouth barely touched his skin. It was theatrical, a pose, a cute little murder weapon aimed straight at Dex’s ribs.
It worked.
The man was handsome in that dead-eyed finance way. He had an empty smile and too-perfect hair. He had an expensive Cartier watch on his wrist. He looked like the sort of man who too loudly at his own jokes and gave waiters weird nicknames even after reading their name tags.
Dex hated him immediately.
Then he read the message underneath.
this one said vigilantes are bad for the economy :( thought you’d hate him
For a moment, all Dex could hear was his own breathing. It was controlled, but not controlled enough.
He texted back before his pride could stop him.
Go home.
Your reply came almost instantly.
you don’t get to tell me what to do anymore, Dex. you broke up with me, remember?
Fuck, he remembered.
He remembered your kitchen. Your pretty face, the pretty smile you had when you had decided not to beg. He remembered your mouth on his. He remembered walking out while every devoted part of him screamed to turn back.
He remembered thinking you were making it easy. He had been an idiot.
Then another message came through.
unless you wanna come get me?
Dex turned the phone face down. He stared at the back for five seconds.
Then ten.
Then he picked it back up.
He wasn’t going to give you what you wanted, he thought as he pulled on his jacket, and checked the address you had very helpfully attached to the next message. He wasn’t going to storm in. He wasn’t going to put his hand around your waist and tell you the date was over. He wasn’t going to break the man’s nose against the bar just because his cheek had your lipstick on it.
He was better than that, even if he fantasised about it all the way there.
When he arrived, he didn’t go inside. He stayed near the service entrance, where the light was dimmer and the staff moved too quickly to look at him for long.
Through the glass, he saw you.
You were laughing, but not your real laugh. Dex knew the difference, and somehow that was worse. You were performing now, all sweet tilt of your head, slow fingers tracing the rim of your glass.
Your date said something, and you smiled like it amused you. Then your gaze slid past him, toward the service door, toward the shadow where Dex stood.
He knew you saw him when your smile changed.
Then, because you were evil, you turned back to your date and touched his arm.
Dex’s hand flexed once at his side.
Dex really didn’t want to give you the satisfaction of killing him, so Dex only looked harder.
The man had a badge clipped carelessly to his belt, half-visible beneath his jacket when he stood to order another drink. Corporate, he saw, at a finance firm. He was too proud of it and too stupid to hide it. His watch flashed under the bar lights every time he moved his hand, begging to be noticed.
Men like that always had something to ruin.
Dex only had to find it.
It didn’t take long for him to find his name on the reservation. The name on the reservation led to a company profile. The company profile led to a Facebook profile. The Facebook profile led to a wife not nearly half as beautiful as you, Dex thought, so that was understandable. Then came the corporate card attached to the table, and the Hinge profile that shouldn't have existed.
Dex stared at all of it, and sent the proof where it needed to go.
Less than a minute later, the man’s phone started buzzing.
Dex watched him check the screen. He smiled when the colour drained out of his face.
You leaned forward, all pretty concern, chin in your hand, lashes fluttering like you hadn’t built the entire night to end exactly here: proof that Dex cared.
The man stood too quickly. His chair scraped against the floor. His hand went to his hair, then his watch, then his phone again as if touching enough expensive things might keep his life from falling apart in public.
Dex watched you bite your lip before realising that you were trying not to laugh.
Then, because he was still Dex, because restraint had limits and his limit was apparently a smug man wearing a watch that ugly near you, he made one more small adjustment to the evening.
He took a cocktail stick from a service cart and aimed.
A second later, the clasp of the man’s watch snapped, slipped from his wrist and dropped neatly into his glass of red wine.
The splash was small, but the humiliation was not.
The man stared at it as if he was going to lose it.
You looked toward the service door again. Your smile widened because you knew Dex was proud of himself.
—
He finally snapped three days later, when you sent him a photo from a date with an anti-vigilante task force agent.
Not a finance guy. Not some smug older man with a LinkedIn bio full of lies. Not someone Dex could ruin with an email or a slashed tyre.
A task force agent.
Fuckin’ one of them.
One of the very same people who had taken you.
Dex stared at the photo for a long time, so still he barely looked alive. You were smiling at the camera from the passenger seat of a sleek black car, wearing a little black dress and vicious amusement. Beside you was a man Dex didn’t know by name yet, but he knew the type immediately. He had dark hair, a leather jacket, a thin mouth, the kind of face made for press conferences and bad decisions.
You had your cheek pressed near his shoulder, his task force badge clearly visible.
The agent had one hand on the wheel, looking proud of himself.
Dex’s stomach twisted, and not just from jealousy.
No, this was worse.
This was you going on a date with danger on purpose. This was you putting your pretty little hand back in a bear trap and smiling when it closed. This was you looking at the same tribe of man who had violently gagged you, bound you, bruised your wrists, and deciding, with horrifying cheer, that this time they would make excellent bait for a change.
Dex knew you were a freak before, obviously. He had known from the way you treated murder like flirting when it came from him. But this was insane, even for you.
And the worst part was that it worked.
It fucking got to him.
The burner phone buzzed again.
look baby!!!! i’m dating someone age appropriate and employed by the government. healthy choices :)
Dex bit the inside of his cheek until it bled but did not answer.
Then, you send another message.
he says vigilantes are unstable men with hero complexes. thoughts?
Dex’s teeth clenched.
The room around him seemed to tunnel until there was nothing but the phone in his hand and your stupid, delighted little face glowing up at him from the screen.
Then, he felt another buzz.
he keeps asking if i have any exes. should i tell him you’re shy?
Dex stood even before the next message came through.
he says he’s gonna take me home! do you think i should let him come inside me too?
Dex’s fist closed around the phone so hard the screen cracked. No. No no no no no! How dare you fucking say that? How fucking dare you even suggest such a vile thing?
The final message buzzed in.
i mean, you were the only one who ever got to. but you wanted to be noble, right? gotta learn to share if you wanna be a good guy.
And that was the moment the monster in him shifted from jealous to possessive. Not because he thought you were helpless. Not because he thought you were stupid. You were on the pill; he knew that, but that wasn’t the point. The point was that until now, he had been trying to tell himself he had no claim over you anymore. That leaving meant letting go completely. That loving you from a distance was still love.
Then he read those words, and every decent, self-sacrificing thought in him went out the window.
Because no.
He did not want to share.
He did not want to be good.
He wanted you to be his.
So he read it again.
Then again, until fire burned through him
By the third time, his hand was already around the keys.
He found you twenty-three minutes later in the parking garage beneath a hotel too expensive for an agent’s salary. It was the kind of place with cameras in all the wrong corners and concrete floors that reflected the fluorescent lights in pale, ugly strips.
He found the car on level four.
The engine was still running.
Music played low through the speakers, bass muffled under the soft mechanical hum of the car. The windows had fogged at the edges, turning the back seat into a blurred confession booth. Dex saw you through the glass first, perched over the agent’s lap, still fully clothed, thank fuck.
Still, your dress had ridden up just enough to be suggestive. His jacket was still on. Your hands were planted on the leather seat on either side of him instead of touching his chest, like you were holding yourself there because you didn’t want to touch him anymore than you had to.
The agent didn’t notice.
He had one hand at your waist, fingers too sure, too familiar, his face tilted up toward yours as he tried to kiss you, hungry in a way that made Dex’s jaw lock. The man kept chasing your mouth, and you kept giving him just enough to keep the act alive.
You looked bored, thank god.
Dex could see the little glaze behind your eyes, glossy and false. He knew you were uncomfortable by the stiffness in your shoulders and the way your knees pressed into the seat instead of settling against him. He knew from the way your fingers dug hard into the leather, not his hair, not his coat, not anything that would make this real.
The agent thought you were teasing him.
Dex knew you were enduring him.
Your body stayed half an inch away every time the man tried to pull you closer. Your mouth turned at the last second when he went for a real kiss. Your lashes fluttered like flirtation, but your eyes flicked once toward the window because you were waiting.
You were just trying to sell every ugly second because you knew Dex would come.
And because some terrible, freaky little part of you wanted him to see exactly what happened when he tried to leave you unclaimed.
And it worked, because now his blood was boiling like a volcano before an explosion.
Dex harshly pulled the car door open like he wanted to rip it off its hinges.
The agent turned, irritated first, then confused. “What the—”
Dex dragged him out by the collar and slammed him against the side of the car hard enough to make the frame jolt. The agent’s head snapped back. His mouth opened, ready with some badge-brave threat or official little command.
That was when he saw Dex properly. The colour drained from his face.
You watched it happen from the back seat, lips parted, eyes glittering.
Imagine his face, really. Imagine being this anti-vigilante task force golden boy, handsome and government-funded, thinking you were taking some gorgeous girl home for the night. Imagine realising, way too late, that her ex was none other than Bullseye.
“Fuck,” the agent breathed.
Dex smiled, but it was most definitely not a nice smile.
“You asked about me?”
The agent’s hand twitched toward his weapon, but Dex reacted first.
He slashed his throat as the agent made a choked sound, more shocked than loud, and then Dex let him drop beside the car, limp like he deserved to be.
For a second, there was only the engine humming.
Then you gasped. It sounded so fucking fake.
Dex looked at you.
You were still in the back seat, dress riding high, lipstick smudged, one hand pressed to your mouth like you were horrified. But your eyes betrayed you, because they were bright and thrilled.
“You killed him,” you whispered.
Dex stared at you, breathing hard through his nose.
Your mouth trembled, but not from fear. You were trying not to smile.
Dex stepped closer to the open door. The garage lights cut his face into harsh lines, made him look even more ruined than he already was. He looked furious, heartbroken, and possessive all the same.
“Why the fuck,” he barked, “did you go out with a task force agent?”
You blinked up at him, feigning innocence. “I’m broadening my horizons.”
“He was one of them.” And what he meant by that was that one of them hurt you, one of them kidnapped you, one of them had harmed you.
“You left me single,” you pouted. “What was I supposed to do?”
His eyes went dark, and that was when you knew he had snapped.
All that faux-noble restraint and self-punishing distance, All those nights alone with the shirt that still smelled like you, all of that pretending he could walk out of your life and call it love? Gone.
Dex leaned into the car, one hand gripping the doorframe, the other reaching for your chin. He held you still, firm enough to make your breath hitch.
“You could have gotten hurt.” This time, though, he sounded genuinely worried.
You only batted your pretty lashes, though. “I knew you’d come.”
That was almost worse than the date. Worse than the photo. Worse than the agent dead on the concrete, because you were right.
You had known.
You had known exactly how to pull him back. You had known jealousy would get him halfway there, but fear would finish the job. You had known Dex could barely survive seeing you with a bad man, but he could not survive seeing you in danger with one.
“You’re sick,” he said.
You smiled then, soft and awful at the same time. “Yeah.”
Dex’s thumb brushed your cheek, gentle and comforting. Because you should know better. In fact, you did, but chose not to care.
That scared you more than the rage. You knew he was genuinely upset with you. He was disappointed.
“We’re going home,” he said.
You gave him a little pout, your stomach flipping at the mention of your shared home. “Are we?”
“Yes.”
You didn’t move.
Dex sighed. “Get out of the car.”
“No.”
Oh?
Suddenly, this stopped being about the task force, the breakup, the game you had both been losing on purpose. It became much more honest.
Dex looked at you like he wanted to shake you. Kiss you. Lock you in a cabin forever to keep you safe.
“You don’t get to do this,” he said.
“You broke up with me.”
“You don’t get to make yourself bait.”
“But you left!” Your voice was softer now, the bratty edge thinning out. “According to you, I’m not bait anymore, am I?”
Dex went still, because fuck did you have a point. That was the whole reason he left you, right?
You looked up at him, still glittering, but there was a crack now, a wounded thing peeking through the performance.
Dex’s mouth tightened as your smile flickered.
His shoulders dropped, as he frowned, ruching his thumb over your cheek. “I don’t wanna see you get hurt, baby.”
Aw. How cute.
You stared back, mouth trembling, the whole act finally splitting open enough for him to see the hurt underneath.
Not fear or guilt. Hurt, that you had refused to show him at the door. Hurt, the whole reason you were acting out and apparently, borderline suicidal for.
Then, very softly, almost small, you said, “Then don’t leave me.” You shook your head. “Please.”
Dex closed his eyes for half a second. When he opened them, the noble man he tried to be was fucking gone, never to return again.
Then he climbed into the back seat with you and slammed the door shut.
He kissed you like he had finally stopped lying to himself.
Oh, how you’ve missed his lips.
The windows fogged quickly at the edges, blurring the parking garage into streaks of white light and concrete shadow. Outside, the agent’s body was still slumped against the side of the car, a problem for later. Every faint shift of the vehicle knocked the corpse, every soft rock making a dull little sound.
Dex felt it too. He had a sudden awareness of where you were, what he had done, what you had made romantic because neither of you had ever known how to love in a way that did not look a little like a crime scene.
For one second, you thought he might stop.
Then your fingers slid into his hair and you whispered his name.
Whatever. He’ll just kill anyone that walked in.
He kissed you again, gentler this time, like your mouth was the only place in the world that had ever known what to do with him.
“There you are,” he whispered against your lips. “There’s my girl.”
All the glittering cruelty drained out of you. All the bratty little texts, the bad dates, the cute dresses, the performance. It fell away under his hands until there was only the aching truth: you had missed him so much it had made you mean.
Of course Dex knew from the start. It didn’t mean he was unaffected.
His hand slid to your waist, the dress bunched high. Your leg was hooked to the side, your back pressed into the leather, your hands trailing against his shoulders. Dex shifted his weight so he wouldn’t crush you. He even tucked one hand beneath your head so you would not hit the door. He kissed the corner of your mouth, then your cheek, then the sensitive beneath your ear, lingering there like he had spent eight days starving and had finally been allowed to taste home again.
“Missed you,” he breathed.
You closed your eyes.
Dex’s mouth brushed your skin. “Missed you so much. Couldn’t sleep. Couldn’t breathe right without you.”
Your fingers tightened in his hair, and the sound you made was small, broken, and you would have been embarrassed if it had been anyone else. But it was Dex. Your Dex, who could kill a man for touching you and then sigh like he was the one being saved when you pulled him closer.
He had lasted almost a full eight days before he completely lost the plot, and in some ways, you were proud of him. That man missed you after two hours of you in the gym.
But this time, he had lasted a whole week and one day of him pretending he could be good without you. A week and one day of him sleeping badly, eating worse, telling himself you were safer while his body mourned you. A week and one day of you smiling at other men because if Dex was going to leave you, then you were going to make it hurt.
And now he was back, kissing you like an apology, holding you like a vow.
“Don’t leave me,” you whispered as you felt Dex hook your black lace panties aside and undo his own belt just enough to do the job.
His forehead rested against yours, all the anger stripped out of him until only the love was left. “I won’t.”
“You promise?”
His free hand came up to your face again. His thumb brushed your cheek so gently it made your heart ache.
“I promise,” he said. “Never again.”
You believed him.
Maybe that was stupid. Maybe you were both stupid. Maybe that was the whole point.
And then he pushed in and stretched you out, and suddenly you were too drunk on him to even think.
You kissed him, needy, and Dex made the most helpless little sigh, almost a whimper, into your mouth. His hand gripped your waist. Yours slid down his back to trace his scar over his shirt, pulling him closer until there was no space left for either of you to pretend you had survived time apart.
The car rocked faintly under you, the windows going completely white now.
“Mine,” he whispered, but it didn’t sound like ownership this time. It sounded like relief.
Dex kissed the words out of your mouth before you could say anything cruel. He kissed your little mewls quiet. He kissed your wrist, too, the place where the bruises had been days ago, when they took you.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered against your skin.
You shook your head.
He kissed the inside of your wrist again.
“I’m sorry,” he said anyway, more of an apology to himself than to you, “For making you feel like I wanted to leave.”
You hated being seen that clearly, so you just pulled him down and kissed him until his apology turned into another broken sigh.
Finally. Finally.
When Dex reached his high with you, he did it quietly, almost sweetly, his face hidden against your neck, arms locked around you like he was afraid the world might still try to take you if he loosened his grip. He breathed your name once, and then held you through the shivering aftermath like I got you, baby.
You stroked his hair as the car settled beneath you and your heartbeat calmed with his. Dex’s breath warmed your throat, his body still curled protectively over yours.
Then, very carefully, he lifted his head.
His hair was a mess, mouth swollen. His eyes were still dark and a little wild, as kissed your cheek once.
Then your nose.
Then your mouth, so tenderly it made a terrible night feel almost normal.
“Do you wanna get dinner?” You asked dreamily.
He blinked at you, then scowled when he realised. “The dickhead didn’t feed you, did he?”
You huffed, breathless and offended now that he just knew. “He took me to some stupid fancy small plates restaurant. I’m still hungry.”
Dex’s eyes gentled so much it made you want to cry.
There he was.
Your psychopath boyfriend. Your man, sitting with you in a fogged-up dead agent’s car, still bloodied, still ruined, and yet still thinking about whether you had eaten enough.
He brushed your hair back from your face.
“Anything for you, baby,” he said.
So he got you your favourite takeout, kissed the sauce from your lips with a fond laugh, and by morning, his toothbrush was back in your apartment as if he had never been stupid enough to leave at all.
i will be requesting after, but first: just know that i love your writing so much. from what i’ve seen, i’m not the first or will be the last to say it. your writing has gotten me back into writing after a really bad writers block. your characterization is something i strive for !! never stop writing and i would love to be added to your tag list for dex and his family series !! much love <33
this is so kind!! I’m glad I’ve managed to inspire and help you to create! I’ve added you to the taglist and tysm for reading my fics, mwah😘
Ok but im lowkey getting married at the end of next month so ill probably only write drabbles starting July 20-ish until late August bcs I’m having two weddings (our families are from different continents lol) and uhhh yeah. I’m trying to write full fics now while I have the time lol.
I think it’s really cute that Bucky and Dex have their respective little families in your fics. Bucky with Jamie and Dex with Leo. It’s really nice to read, especially with your writing.
Aaaa thank you! I haven’t set a timeline for Bucky and Jamie yet, so maybe I should make an Elevator, Baby Masterlist similar to my What Makes a Good Man? Masterlist? Thoughts?
(Also, send me more asks about Bucky and Jamie please!!! I love them and miss them so much but a bit stuck on Bucky atm)
